Miss Bruce was listed amongst the passengers travelling on the City of Adelaide's maiden voyage from London to Adelaide and we suspect that she was the captain's daughter, Janet.
She was at the bottom of the first-class list where the ship’s surgeon, the matron, and others who are not paying passengers are usually to be found. She did not sign either of the letters of thanks that appeared in the Register.
An unmarried 21 years old would be looking for something to do with herself, and acting as hostess in the saloon on her father’s brand new ship might have been more appealing than being idle or working. One of her roles may have been to look after the Letchford children. (See also the Hillier story.)
She does not appear on the return voyage, but given her father’s connections, she could easily have had a holiday in Adelaide with friends he had made during his years on the Irene, and returned home on any of the company’s ships. A reasonable theory, but we cannot presently prove it.
We cannot find Janet Bruce in either the Scotland or England census of 1861. She may have been married by 1864, but where? She has a name that is surprisingly common among the Scots. A Janet Bruce married in Adelaide in 1879, but she was 30 years old and her father was Donald Bruce.
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Miss Janet Bruce
1843 - 
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