Norvell founded the Philadelphia Inquirer after leaving the Gazette and later moved to Michigan, where he was elected as one of the new state's first U.S.
Among his siblings were his older brother, Benjamin Franklin Bache, a controversial newspaper publisher who died of yellow fever at the age of 29.
While in service, Bache guarded the Mexican general Antonio López de Santa Anna after the Battle of San Jacinto.
In 1842, Bache settled in Galveston, Texas, where he afterward held a number of appointed government posts.
He became commissioner of the navy yard and was appointed as collector of customs, and later as a justice of the peace for Galveston County.
He was the only elected official to vote against annexation, allegedly because he did not wish to enlarge the domain of his brother-in-law, George M. Dallas, then vice-president of the United States.