4.
The three Partners in the Venture.

The three partners in the venture to come to Walvis Bay from Cape Town with the idea to trade there as well as supply cattle and sheep to St. Helena, as they had a contract to supply meat to the British garrison still left on the island after Napoleon had died in 1821. They salted meat and traded with the very numerous vessels that were loading guano at Ichaboe.


Thomas Morris together with his wife and two young sons were in the party that treked by wagon from Cape Town in October 1843. On his various trips between Walvis Bay and St. Helena Morris stayed at Longwood Old House, the house Napoleon occupied during his sojourn on that island.

Thomas Lawton financed this adventure and was the owner of the vessel “Susan” which plied between Walvis Bay and St. Helena. The venture was most successful at first but things went wrong and they had to give up the contract in 1846.


Dixon, his wife and five children (all born in Dublin) were the rest of the party together with Morris who left Cape Town in October 1843. On arrival in Walvis Bay, eight months later, they built two houses for their families as well as a trade-goods storeroom at a place, later named by Dixon as Sandfontein – three miles from Walvis Bay. There was an ample spring with plenty of grazing for their sheep and cattle and it was sheltered by a huge dune, protecting it from the daily south-west wind. Evidently, this spring gave up so they moved to the Hottentot settlement of Scheppmansdorf, named after the Rhenish Missionary living there. This, later became known as Rooibank, which lies 20 miles east of Walvis Bay.

The partnership of the above three broke up, but Dixon and Morris continued to cure meat to sell to the guano ships as well as live animals and continued exporting cattle and sheep overland to Cape Town.
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