Clement Horner Stott, architect and land surveyor, was the son of Simon Horner Stott, a missionary among the Indian population of Natal, and his wife Anne Emma Newey. He was educated in England at the Methodist Kingwood School near Bath and upon his return to Natal around 1890 was articled to an architect in Verulam. In 1894 he passed the examination for the Survey Certificate of the University of the Cape of Good Hope and that same year was licensed to practice as a surveyor in Natal. He subsequently practiced as an architect and surveyor with offices in Pietermaritzburg and Greytown, initially on his own, but from 1896 in partnership with W. Tomlinson. In 1897 he married Florence Eliza Harwin, with whom he had six children. During the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) he wrote The Boer invasion of Natal; being an account of Natal's share of the Boer War of 1899-1900, as viewed by a Natal colonist (London, 1900). By 1903 he was a member of the (British) Society of Architects (MSA) and a Fellow of the (British) Surveyors' Institute (FSI). From about 1902 he practiced in the partnership Stott & Kirkby, which had by 1906 designed the YMCA buildings and many commercial buildings in Pietermaritzburg, Hilton College near the city, the Government School of Agriculture at Cedara, and the telephone exchange and other buildings in Durban. The firm had also surveyed a block of 70 farms in Zululand in 1905. In 1906 Stott was appointed borough valuator for Pietermaritzburg.

Stott's hobby was geology and mineralogy and by 1903 he had been elected a Fellow of the Geological Society of London. Later he wrote A primer of South African geology (45pp, with map), which was published in Pietermaritzburg in 1909. During the years following the Anglo-Boer War he joined several scientific and professional societies. He was a foundation member of the Institute of Land Surveyors of Natal (established in 1903, incorporated in 1905), served a term as president in 1923, and was its honorary secretary for 26 years. In 1903 he became a member of the South African Philosophical Society and remained a member when it became the Royal Society of South Africa in 1908. In 1902 he became a foundation member of the South African Association for the Advancement of Science; and when the British Association for the Advancement of Science held its annual meeting in South Africa in 1905 he became a member of that too. In 1916 he became a foundation member of the South African Biological Society.

As early as 1904 Stott was elected on the City Council of Pietermaritzburg. He resided in the city until at least 1920. Later he moved to Durban and from 1932 served on the Durban City Council - as deputy mayor from 1935 to 1937. He was a provincial councilor for a number of years from 1933.

List of sources:

British Association for the Advancement of Science. Report of the seventy-fifth meeting... South Africa, 1905, list of members.

Clement Horner Stott. Ancestry. Retrieved on 17 December 2020 from https://www.ancestry.com/genealogy/records/clement-horner-stott-24-3znmy

(The) Institute of Land Surveyors of Natal. South African Survey Journal, 1979, Vol. 17(1), pp. 21-30.

Malherbe, D.F. du T. Family register of the South African nation. Stellenbosch: Tegniek, 1966.

Natal Colony. Civil service list, 1895, p. 114; and 1906, p. 180-181: Land surveyors.

Natal who's who, 1906.

National Automated Archival Information Retrieval System (NAAIRS) http://national.archives.gov.za/naairs.htm Documents relating to Stott, Clement H. / Stott, C.H.

Royal Society of South Africa. Transactions, 1908-1910, Vol. 1 and 1917, Vol. 6: Lists of Fellows and members.

South African Association for the Advancement of Science. Report, 1903, 1905/6, 1910, 1918: Lists of members.

South African bibliography to the year 1925. London: Mansell, 1968-1980.

South African Journal of Natural History, 1918, Vol. 1(1), pp. 8-15: Roll of Foundation Members [of the SA Biological Society]; 1920, Vol. 2(2), pp. 293-301: Roll of Members.

South African Philosophical Society. Transactions, 1906-1907, Vol. 16, 17: Lists of members.

South African who's who, 1939.

Stott, Clement Horner. Artefacts. Retrieved on 17 December 2020 from https://www.artefacts.co.za/main/Buildings/archframes.php?archid=1639

University of the Cape of Good Hope. Calendar, 1903/4.

Compiled by: C. Plug

Last updated: 2026-01-01 12:04:22