A visit to Charlton

Yesterday Greg and I drove to Charlton to look at the Wimmera land selected in 1875 by his great great uncles Thomas Edwards (1826 – 1908), James Edwards (1835 – 1916), and John Gilbart Edwards (1829 – 1912).

Last week I had found the properties on the parish plans, through the website of the Public Record Office Victoria. Thomas and James were in Narrewillock Parish north-east of Charlton. Comparing the plan to Google maps I discovered the road adjacent to the property was named—conveniently for us—‘Edwards Road’.

The land selected by Thomas and James Edwards from the Narrewillock Parish plan

John Gilbart Edwards settled at Yeungroon southwest of Charlton.

The land settled by John Gilbart Edwards from the Yeungroon parish plan.

Map of places visited near Charlton

We first found the property at Yeungroon, on Five Mile Road. The countryside nearby was in splendid condition after the rain. We stopped to look at a mob of sheep. They had a lot to say, much of it ‘maa’ rather than ‘baa’. Perhaps they were maa lambs, not baa lambs, a different breed.

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Yeungroon

Afterwards we looked through the Charlton Golden Grains Museum. The volunteers there had sent me a comprehensive list of newspaper articles about the Edwards, including obituaries for Thomas and James. At the museum we saw photos of the Charlton H.E.S. (Higher Elementary School) Basketball team of 1925. A couple of the photographs had the granddaughters of James Edwards Gwen (1910 – 2006) and Freda (1913 – 2008) Edwards in them .

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Charlton Golden Grains Museum is housed in the former Mechanics Institute. Gwen and Freda Edwards were part of the 1925 basketball team. F J Edwards was master of the Charlton Lodge in 1928.

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Charlton: statue of Pompey Elliott who was born in Charlton; WW1 memorial; the Avoca River and flood markers; the main street.

Thomas died in 1908 at Charlton and was buried in Charlton cemetery. James, who died in 1916, was buried in Terrappee cemetery. We found their graves.

Charlton Cemetery is a mile west of the town.  From the obituary published in the East Charlton Tribune, which had been shared with us by the Charlton Golden Grains Museum, we knew that Thomas was buried there. At the cemetery is a directory of the site, erected by the Rotary Club, which lists all the graves and their location. The grave of Thomas Edwards has no headstone, but we were able to determine which plot was his by confirming the location of the neighbouring headstone. It is rare to find such a useful finding-aid at a cemetery.

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Charlton Cemetery: Thomas Edwards is buried in an unmarked grave.

On our way to Terrappee we drove past Mount Buckrabanyule which is covered with Wheel Cactus (Opuntia robusta), an invasive noxious weed, now listed as a Weed of National Significance.

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Wheel cactus on Mount Buckrabanyule

The view west from Mount Buckrabanyule

Afterwards we visited the grave of James Edwards at Terrappee Cemetery, about 10 km northeast of Charlton. We knew in advance from FindAGrave that James’s grave there has a headstone.

James’s son Frederick James Edwards is buried next to James. Strangely, his gravestone has the wrong date of death. Frederick James died on 15 December 1974, the date confirmed by his death notice in The Age of 16 December.

Terrappee cemetery is a small bush graveyard, peaceful and calm, surrounded by enormous cultivated paddocks. It has a large peppercorn tree.

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Terrappee Cemetery. Frederick James Edwards is buried next to his parents, unfortunately his gravestone records the wrong date of death.

Then we found their property, formerly known as “Lamorna”, which had been selected by James and Thomas Edwards. A new crop of wheat had sprouted. James Edwards’s diary recorded that he sowed his first patch of wheat in 1876, a year after his arrival.

The land settled by Thomas and James Edwards in 1875 with a new crop of wheat.

From Terrapee we came back to Charlton and after a pleasant roast lunch sitting in the sun on the verandah of the Cricket Club Hotel drove home to Ballarat.

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Lunch on the verandah of the Charlton Cricket Club Hotel

Wikitree links:

• Thomas Edwards (1826 – 1908)
• John Gilbart Edwards (1829-1912)
• James Edwards (1835 – 1916)
• Frederick James Edwards (1884 – 1974)

Heathcote revisited

In 1852 there was a large rush to a newly-discovered gold field at McIvor Creek, sixty miles north of Melbourne.

The following year, Philip Chauncy (1816 – 1880), my 3rd great grandfather, was appointed surveyor-in-charge of the McIvor district. He laid out the town there, naming it Heathcote. The origin of the name is unclear. The town may have been named after named after Sir William Heathcote, a British member of Parliament 1854-68, or after the prolific wild heath in the area.

The Victorian government provided Philip Chauncy with funds to erect a stone house in the main street. This served as both the Survey Office and his residence. The Chauncys – Philip and his wife Susan (1828 – 1867) and their children- lived there for six and a half years.

Philip Chauncy 1878, image attached to my ancestry.com family tree

After 167 years the Survey office and Chauncy residence is still standing. We visited it yesterday. The last time we saw it, in 2007, it was overgrown and falling down. Now the main structure is being renovated and an extension added. A wooden two-storey 1897 add-on at the front has been demolished.

Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office 2007 from Chauncey Street

Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office in 2007 – this building was added in the 1890s and had been demolished by 2020

Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office March 2020

Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office from High Street in 2020 – the two storey wooden building built in te 1890s has been demolished

Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office from the corner of High Street and Chauncey Street. There is a new fence around the property since 2007.

Chauncy’s oldest child Philip died less than week after the family moved into their new stone house. He was 3 years and 2 months. The death was put down to ‘croup’.

Philip was the first interment at the Heathcote cemetery. As District Surveyor Chauncey had selected the site, and as a trustee held helped to lay laid out the fencing, divisions, and walks.

drawing by Philip Chauncy of his son’s grave

to the memory of PHILIP LAMOTHE CHAUNCY the eldest and beloved Son of PH. L. S. & S. A. CHAUNCY Obit. 19th May 1854 aged 3 years & 2 mos. He died for Adam’s sin He lives for Jesus died

 

In a memoir of his wife and his sister, Philip wrote that while they lived in Heathcote Susan visited the child’s grave every Sunday. On a drawing of it, she wrote, “The last earthly dwelling place of my much-loved child, and the grave of my chief earthly joys.”

Philip and Susan had nine children. The other eight all survived childhood. Three of the children were born at Heathcote, including my great great grandmother Annie Frances Chauncy (1857 – 1883).

Source

• Chauncy, Philip Lamothe Snell Memoirs of Mrs. Poole and Mrs. Chauncy. Lowden Publishing Co, Kilmore, 1976.

Related posts

• Remembering Susan Augusta Chauncy née Mitchell (1828-1867)
• H is for heartbreak in Heathcote
• 1854 : The Chauncy family at Heathcote

Trove Tuesday: A Patriotic Family – the Butcher family of Bridgetown WA

In my post for Remembrance Day yesterday I listed only our closest relatives, up to first cousins. We also had many second cousins who fought in the war. In one family, named Butcher, six sons enlisted. Against the odds, all six returned to Australia.

ILLUSTRATED SECTION (1916, July 14). Western Mail (Perth, WA : 1885 – 1954), p. 23. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article37438960

 

I do not know if my great grandfather’s family, the Cudmores, knew the Butcher family. Before 1900 they lived at Wentworth, New South Wales, close to their Cudmore cousins, and the families may have been in contact, but around the turn of the century the Butchers moved to Bridgetown, Western Australia. (Recently I discovered that I share DNA with two descendants of Rachel Butcher née Gunn, the cousin of my great great grandmother Margaret Cudmore née Budge.)

Rachel Butcher née Gunn (1853 – 1937) was born in Wick, Caithness. In 1863, when she was ten years old, Rachel Gunn arrived in South Australia with her family on the “Ocean Chief”. Three more children were born to the Gunns in South Australia including a son named William Cudmore, whose second given name seems to indicate that the Gunns had, or wished for, a connection with their wealthy Cudmore relatives.

In 1869 at Wentworth, New South Wales, Rachel’s father William Gunn was kicked by a horse and died. It appears that the Gunn family had moved to Wentworth shortly before.

At Wentworth in 1875 Rachel Gunn married George Butcher (1852 – 1928). Between 1876 and 1898 they had ten children, all born in Wentworth.

The Butcher family moved to Bridgetown, Western Australia, in the early 1900s. In 1905 a son died there.

Frank Gunn Butcher, born 1886, enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) on 19 October 1914. He was 28 years old, unmarried, and his occupation was orchardist. He had been apprenticed to a blacksmith.

Robert Rae Gunn Butcher, born 1891, enlisted in the AIF on 15 June 1915. He was 23 years old, unmarried, and gave his occupation as horse trainer.

Kennewell Gardiner Gunn Butcher, born 1895, enlisted 26 July 1915. He was 19 years old, unmarried, and gave his occupation as farmer.

George Henry Butcher, born 1881, enlisted in the AIF on 30 August 1915. He was 34 years old, a timber worker, married, no children.

Horace Butcher, born 1883, enlisted 20 November 1915. He was 32 years old (he said he was 35) and married. His occupation was labourer.

Ruben Murray Gunn Butcher, born 1888, enlisted 20 January 1916. He was 27 years old, married and living in Melbourne. His occupation was driver.

All six men were sent overseas. All returned to Australia.

Robert Rae Gunn served with the 2nd Field Company Engineers. He was gassed in January 1918 and returned to Australia on 17 June 1918. In January 1918 he was awarded the Military Medal.

PERSONAL. (1918, June 29). South Western Times (Bunbury, WA : 1917 – 1929), p. 5. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article210426837

George served with the 28th battalion. He returned to Australia 28 July 1918. He was recorded as suffering from a debility, trench fever (a fairly serious infection, transmitted by lice).

Ruben served with the 3rd Tunnelling Company and returned to Australia 19 April 1919. When he was discharged from the AIF in Melbourne he was stated to be unfit but is disability was not stated.

Horace also served with the 3rd Tunnelling Company and returned to Australia 19 April 1919. In the course of his service he was promoted to sergeant. He does not appear to have been wounded or hospitalised during the war.

Frank served with the Australian Army Medical Corps 7th sanitary section. He returned to Australia 3 July 1919.

Kennewell Butcher returned to Australia 10 July 2019. He served with the 10th Light Horse.

While five of the brothers lived to the 1950s and 60s, George died in 1923 at the relatively young age of 42.

George was buried at Karrakatta cemetery. I have recently learned that his headstone was removed from the gravesite in April 2006; the headstone apparently did not survive. Karrakatta have a “renewal” program, described on the cemetery’s website as “the redevelopment of existing cemetery burial areas to accommodate new gravesites and memorial locations.” George’s grave has been redeveloped.

I am very appreciative that the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board provided me with a photograph of George Butcher’s headstone taken prior to redevelopment.

Karrakatta Cemetery record information for George Henry Gunn Butcher

 

On Remembrance Day 2011 a friend visited the gravesite and laid a poppy and sent me a photo

The grave site of George Butcher Remembrance Day 2019 – we have not forgotten

George is now remembered with a bronze plaque in the Western Australia Garden of Remembrance is situated adjacent to Perth War Cemetery in Smythe Road, Nedlands. A staff member kindly sent me an image of the plaque.

 

George’s parents are buried in the Wesleyan section, at EA grave 594. The ashes of two of the brothers, Robert and Kennewell were placed at the family grave. The headstone commemorates only George and Rachel. This area is scheduled for redevelopment but I have been advised that this grave has been designated an Official War Grave and will remain.

The grave of George and Rachel Butcher Karrakatta Cemetery Wesleyan Area or Denomination EA Section 0594 Photographed 11 November 2019

Frank was cremated and his ashes were scattered at Karrakatta. Horace was cremated. His ashes are at Karrakatta Lawn 5, Wall 10, position 121. Reuben was also cremated. His remains are in the crematorium Rose Gardens, Wall O position 333.

Links to First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers

• B2455, BUTCHER F G Butcher Frank Gunn : SERN 607 : POB Wentworth NSW : POE Bridgetown WA : NOK F Butcher G
• B2455, BUTCHER R R G Butcher Robert Rae Gunn : SERN 2580 : POB Wentworth NSW : POE Blackboy Hill WA : NOK F Butcher George
• B2455, BUTCHER K G G Butcher Kennewell Gardiner Gunn : SERN 1749 : POB Wentworth NSW : POE Blackboy Hill WA : NOK F Butcher George
• B2455, BUTCHER G H G Butcher George Henry Gunn : SERN 935 : POB Wentworth NSW : POE Blackboy Hill WA : NOK W Butcher Annie
• B2455, BUTCHER H Butcher Horace : SERN 936 : POB Wentworth NSW : POE Perth WA : NOK W Butcher Mary
• B2455, BUTCHER R M G Butcher Ruben Murray Gunn : SERN 2440 : POB Wentworth NSW : POE Melbourne VIC : NOK W Butcher Ellen

 

A visit to Cheltenham

My 4th great grandparents are buried at Leckhampton near Cheltenham. On Friday 3 May I met one of my Hughes cousins at the churchyard. She had previously photographed the graves for me. I was pleased to see them in person.

 

The inscriptions are starting to wear. In the casket are buried my 4th great grandparents Eliza Julia Champion Crespigny nee Trent (1797 – 1855) and Charles Fox Champion Crespigny (1785 – 1875), and their grandson Constantine Trent Pulteney Champion Crespigny (1851 – 1883). The daughter of Eliza and Charles, Eliza Constantia Frances Champion Crespigny (1825 – 1898), is buried nearby with a simple cross marker.

 

The church was open and, inside, surprisingly warm. There was soon to be a wedding and the ladies of the church were doing the arrangements.

Over lunch at a pub nearby my cousin and I chatted about family history.

Then we visited Cheltenham, very close to Leckhampton, where we saw the house of my 4th great grandparents at 11 Royal Parade. Cheltenham, a Regency spa town, is pretty with many Georgian terraces.

On the way back to Bath we stopped at Chedworth, a National Trust Roman villa site.

 

We drove through pretty countryside and along more narrow lanes.

Back in Bath Peter and I bought some local gin from a distillery not far from where we were staying. Delicious.

Related posts

• L is for Leckhampton
• Charles Fox Champion de Crespigny (1785 – 1875)
• Constantine Pulteney Trent Champion de Crespigny (1851 – 1883)

V is for volunteer

Between 1914 and 1918, 350,000 Australians enlisted in the armed services to fight for their country and the Empire.

Among these were my husband’s grandfather, Cecil Young (1898 – 1975) and his brother, John Percy (Jack) Young (1896 – 1918).

Both men and both their parents were been born in Australia.

When war threatened in August 1914, Australia, a Dominion of the British Empire, knew she was bound to join in. On 31 July 1914 in an election speech at Colac in Victoria, the Opposition Leader Andrew Fisher (ALP) famously declared that ‘… Australians will stand beside the mother country to help and defend her to our last man and our last shilling’. A few days later, on 4 August 1914, Britain declared war against Germany. On 5 August, attempting to prevent a German ship escaping from Port Phillip, Australia fired her first shot against the enemy.

In October 1916 Jack Young, aged 20, signed up, becoming, as a member of the Australian Imperial Force, a soldier of Australia and the Empire.

The war was not going well for the Allies.

On 19-20 July that year Australians had suffered heavy losses at the Battle of Fromelles in France. The cost in Australian lives was the highest in any 24 hour period of the war. Among those killed in the fighting was Jack’s half-brother Leslie Leister.

From 23 July to 3 September 1916 Australian forces suffered badly at the Battle of Pozières in northern France. The Australian official historian Charles Bean wrote that Pozières ridge “is more densely sown with Australian sacrifice than any other place on earth.” Among those killed were Wes Rowlands of Homebush, an acquaintance of Jack and Cecil.

The slaughter in France left the Australian forces under-strength, and it was widely believed that conscription was necessary to maintain troop levels. This was view of the Australian Prime Minister, Billy Hughes, which the losses at Pozières seemed to confirm. Not all Federal politicians supported Hughes, however, and the matter was put to a
plebiscite. After a divisive public debate and strong campaigning on both sides, on 28 October 1916, the “No” vote narrowly prevailed

Jack Young’s enlistment – he signed his attestation papers on 3 October 1916 – came at the height of this conscription debate.

Jack Young was not yet 21 and would not have been conscripted anyway.

After 6 weeks in the AIF Signal School Jack sailed on the ‘Medic’, leaving on 16 December and disembarking in Plymouth 18 February 1917. He was first at Hurdcott camp, 7 miles from Salisbury. A few weeks later he marched out to Sutton Mandeville, 15 miles west. There was a camp at Fovant nearby. From Fovant he was transferred on 7 April to Durrington 20 miles to the north-east; the military settlement of Larkhill is nearby. On 1 January 1918 he sailed for France.

Fovant Badges The badges were cut into the chalk hills near the miltary camp and originate from 1916. From the left:- The Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry, 6th London Regiment and the Australian Commonwealth Military Forces.

The Australian Rising Sun emblem cut in the side of a hill. Australian War Memorial ID number H13577

Group portrait of the Signal Section of the 10th Infantry Brigade, outside the Chateau at Querrieu, 7 July 1918. Pte J. Young is in the back row eighth from the left (fourth from the right). Australian War Memorial photograph E03830

On 26 August, wounded in a mustard gas attack, Jack was admitted to a Line of Communications hospital. On 28 August he was invalided to England and admitted to Beaufort Hospital near Bristol.

On 26 September Jack was discharged on furlough from Beaufort hospital, but on 6 November he was in hospital again, the 3rd Auxiliary Hospital Dartford. At 11:40 a.m. on 9 November 1918, two days before the war ended, Jack died of pneumonia. He is buried at Brookwood Cemetery, Surrey.

Wooden crosses mark graves in the AIF section at Brookwood Cemetery January 1919. Photograph from the Australian War Memorial Accession Number D00190

I have written about Cecil’s war experience at Cecil Young and family: Cecil’s early life up to end World War I . I have previously remembered Jack at John Percival Young (1896 – 1918).

M is for Marylebone

Claude Champion Crespigny (1620-1695) and his wife Marie née de Vierville (1628-1708), my eighth great grandparents, were Huguenots, French Calvinists. After the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, the family fled France, abandoning most of their property.

Claude and Marie died in London and are buried at Marylebone. Their gravestone indicates that they were refugees from France.

The couple’s memorial originally had this inscription:

Hic jacet in fornice Claudius Champion de Crespigny et Maria de Vierville ejus uxor

E Galliae persecutione profugierunt cum integrâ octo liberorum familiâ

tandem in cǽlum veram patriam transmigrarunt

Ille: Ann.Sal: MDCXCV; Ǽtat LXXV

Haec: Ann Sal:MDCCVIII; Ǽtat LXXX

In English this means:

In this vault lie Claude Champion de Crespigny and Marie de Vierville his wife

who, on account of persecution, fled from France with all eight members of their family and have at last reached their true home in the heavens:

He in the Year of Salvation 1695, at the age of seventy-five;

She in the Year of Salvation 1708, at the age of eighty.

The original inscription is recorded in a manuscript held at Kelmarsh Hall with other family papers.

Photocopy from the “Kelmarsh Book” a manuscript of the Champion de Crespigny family history held at Kelmarsh Hall, Northamptonshire.

At the beginning of the twentieth century the stone was still in the churchyard of St Marylebone but much of the inscription was illegible. A new memorial was set up, with an inscription in English.  The year of Claude’s death is given wrongly as 1697, not 1695:

The Burial Place of Claude Champion de Crespigny a refugee from France, Died April 10, 1697 Also of Marie de Vierville his wife, Died June 21, 1708

A cousin recently visited the memorial stone of Claude and Marie at Marylebone

To know more about Marylebone, I read W.H. Manchee’s paper on ‘Marylebone and its Huguenot associations’ published in 1916 in the Proceedings of the Huguenot Society of London.

The parish of St Marylebone has had four churches on three different sites. The first church was built in about 1200 AD. It was demolished in 1400. The second church was located on a new site. It fell into decay and was demolished in 1740. The interior of the second church is depicted in one of William Hogarth‘s ‘Rake’s Progress‘ paintings from between 1732 and 1734.

Rake’s Progress number 5 of 8 paintings by William Hogarth – The marriage: Tom Rakewell attempts to salvage his fortune by marrying a rich but aged and ugly old maid at St Marylebone. The shabby setting of Marylebone church, the second parish church building, was then a well-known venue for clandestine weddings on the northern fringes of London. In the background, Tom’s fiancee Sarah arrives, holding their child while her indignant mother struggles with a guest. It looks as though Tom’s eyes are already upon the pretty maid to his new wife’s left during the nuptials.

In 1916 the parish church, built in 1742, was the third in that  location. The second church was erected in 1400 and demolished in 1740. Manchee notes that as late as 1779 it was considered a country walk through fields to get the church in Marylebone. A fourth parish church was constructed between 1813 and 1817 on the Marylebone Road. In 1916 the third church was a chapel-of-ease for the parish church, that is a church building other than the parish church, built within the bounds of a parish for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently. The 1742 church building was on High Street Marylebone and the churchyard backed on to the National School. The 1742 church was demolished in 1949, and its site, at the northern end of Marylebone High Street, is now a public garden.

Manchee mentions the gravestone and its replacement (page 75). In 1916 it seems both the old and the new gravestones were in the same garden. He describes the churchyard as one of the prettiest spots in the neighbourhood, and writes that the “old tombstones are still in situ and in the centre is the pillar forming the memorial to Charles Wesley. Near by under the shade of a tree, is to be found the memorial stone to Sieur Claude de Crespigny.”

pages 75 and 76 of the article by Manchee

In his discussion of the family, Manchee is wrong about which Philip escaped from Paris during the reign of terror. I have written about that previously.

In an appendix Manchee includes a list of Families of foreign names resident in the Parish of Marylebone for the years 1728 – 1780 which has at

• page 115 Mrs Cripigny [sic] living at 20 Orchard Street in 1770. At the same address also in 1770 was Philip Crespigny. In 1780 Ann Crespigny was living at 29 Duke Street.
• page 118 Mrs Fonnereau living at Welbeck Street 1750, 1760; Philip Fonnereau living at 37 Upper Seymour Street in 1780

The scene is quite different today, of course:

Claude and Marie’s gravestone is in the Garden of Rest at 65 High Street Marylebone, around the corner from the nineteenth century parish church. Other family gravestones, such as that of Betsy de Crespigny nee Handley (1743 – 1772), second wife of Philip de Crespigny (1738 – 1803) which was mentioned in the 1795 Environs of London, have not survived.

Related post

• F is for fleeing from France

Sources

• https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/12471
• Lysons, Daniel. “Marylebone.” The Environs of London: Volume 3, County of Middlesex. London: T Cadell and W Davies, 1795. 242-279. British History Online. Web. 11 April 2019. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/london-environs/vol3/pp242-279 .
• Manchee, W. H. ‘Marylebone and its Huguenot associations’, Proceedings of the Huguenot Society of London, Vol. XI. No. 1, pp 58 – 128 retrieved from https://archive.org/details/proceedingsofhug1113hugu/page/58

L is for Leckhampton

A family history trip would not be complete without a visit to a cemetery.

A cousin of mine has very kindly sent me photographs of the graves at Leckhampton near Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, of my fourth great grandparents Eliza Julia Champion de Crespigny nee Trent (1797 – 1855), and Charles Fox Champion de Crespigny (1785 – 1875), and their grandson, Constantine Pulteney Trent Champion de Crespigny (1851 – 1883), my 3rd great uncle. Also the grave of their daughter, my fourth great aunt, Eliza Constantia Frances Crespigny (1825 – 1898).

The Gloucestershire Family History Society have transcribed the tombstone inscriptions for the burials in St Peter’s Churchyard, Leckhampton.

St Peter’s Leckhampton. I think the Champion Crespigny tomb can be seen on the right hand side underneath a cyprus.

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The south side of the grave of Eliza and Charles Fox Champion Crespigny can be seen in the background – it is a large casket. In the foreground is the grave of their daughter Constantia, a cross on a three stepped plinth. The inscription on this side of the chest tomb has been transcribed: M11 Chest-tomb, on base, inward sloping sides, worn, once painted. Sc: LEWIS.Sc. South: IN MEMORY OF / CHARLES FOX CHAMPION CRESPIGNY, / BORN AT HINTLESHAM HALL NEAR IPSWICH 30TH AUGUST 1785, / DIED AT CHELTENHAM 4TH MARCH 1875. / IN SURE AND CERTAIN HOPE OF BEING RAISED WITH THE FAITHFUL IN CHRIST / TO EVERLASTING LIFE. / ALSO OF CONSTANTINE TRENT PULTENEY CHAMPION CRESPIGNY. / LATE OF H.M. 69th REGT BORN 5TH MAY 1851. DIED 26TH JANUARY 18–. / YOUNGEST SON OF PHILIP ROBERT CHAMPION CRESPIGNY / OF ST KILDA, MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA / – – – – – – LL YE THAT LABOUR AND – – – HEAVY LADEN – – – WILL OF – – –

The verse under Constantine’s inscription is Matthew 11:28: Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. The verse for his grandfather is derived from the Book of Common Prayer but is not a direct quote.

The inscription on the tomb of Eliza wife of Charles Fox Champion Crespigny. Transcribed as IN MEMORY OF / ELIZA JULIA, THE BELOVED WIFE OF / CHARLES FOX CHAMPION CRESPIGNY ESQUIRE, / WHO DIED THE 17TH DAY OF JULY 1855, AGED 59 YEARS. PURE AND INNOCENT OF MIND, KIND AND BENEVOLENT, “HER WAYS WERE WAYS OF PLEASANTNESS, AND ALL HER PATHS WERE PEACE.” PROVERBS. III.17. UNTO YOU THAT HAVE MY NAME SHALL THE SUN(sic) OF RIGHTOUSNESS ARISE WITH HEALING IN HIS WINGS. MALACHI IV 2 I WILL RANSOM THEM FROM THE POWER OF THE GRAVE I WILL REDEEM THEM FROM DEATH. HOSEA XIII.I. – -EL- – – – NOT SHARE OUR SORROW, S——– THE -OT-E— BLESSED – – – – – – – A FUTURE LIFE – – – – – – – – – -SAVED – – – – – .

L164 Cross on three plinths with kerbs, all of very worn concrete and extremely difficult to read. In the Registers was found: Eliza Constantine Frances Crestigey buried May 26 1898 aged 73 of 29 Kingsholm Road, Gloucester. The grave plan has Eliza Constantia Frances Crespigny, died 1898. Cross: JESU MERCY East. Plinth 1: IN LOVING MEMORY OF – – – – – – – – – – YOUNGER – – – – – – OF – – – – – – Plinth 2:——CHARLES?CRESPIGNY? ————R BORNATBO——-1825? DIED AT GLOUCESTER 2- — OF MAY 1898 AGED 75? Eliza was born July 1825 at Boulogne, France. She died 23 May 1898.

 

I am grateful for the photographs of the grave and I look forward to seeing it in person. I enjoy being at a place I’ve heard about and of course part of the fun is the journey there.

Charles Fox Champion de Crespigny inherited a considerable fortune but it dwindled away. I don’t know how he lost his money. Perhaps some of his investments failed or a bank collapsed. He does not appear to have been a gambler. Perhaps he was extravagant. The grave he erected for his wife and was later interred in certainly seems more overdone than most.

I am not sure why the family was living in Cheltenham, nor what the connection was to Leckhampton and why it was chosen for the grave of Eliza. Charles grew up in Suffolk. They married in London, and their children were born in Suffolk, Belgium and France. In 1841 they were living in Cheltenham, and although they were at Harefield Surrey in 1851 living with Charles’s brother Philip, they returned to Cheltenham after Philip’s death and were living there at the time of Eliza’s death. Leckhampton is only two miles south of Cheltenham. Perhaps it was the nearest graveyard to their residence, at 11 Royal Parade.

Around 1908, Charles Stanley Champion de Crespigny (1848-1907), another of the grandsons of Charles Fox Champion de Crespigny, wrote of his grandfather:

Ah well he lies buried in an old world Churchyard in the shadow of the Cotswold Hills & may the turf lie lightly upon him. I do not think he left an enemy behind him & if he had as many thousands a year at the beginning of his life as he had of fifty pounds at its close I believe he lived the life.

I look forward to visiting the old world churchyard in the shadow of the Cotswold Hills where my fourth great grandparents rest in peace.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree’s shade, 

         Where heaves the turf in many a mould’ring heap, 

Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, 

         The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. 

Extract from “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” by Thomas Gray (1716–1771).

Related Posts

• Charles Fox Champion de Crespigny (1785 – 1875)
• Constantine Pulteney Trent Champion de Crespigny (1851 – 1883)

Sources

• http://leckhamptonlhs.weebly.com/tombstone-inscriptions-at-st-peters-church.html

Temperance Crew nee Bray (abt 1580 – 1619)

My 11th great grandmother was Temperance Crew nee Bray (abt 1580 – 1619). She was the wife of Sir Thomas Crew (1564 – 1634), a lawyer and politician. His entry in the History of Parliament online mentions his marriage to her, noting that she was the daughter of Reynold Bray of Steane and a kinswoman of the 7th Earl of Shrewsbury, Gilbert Talbot (1552 – 1616). Temperance, her father who died in 1583, and her and Thomas’s son John, are also mentioned in her husband’s entry in the Dictionary of National Biography.

Temperance was the fourth of five daughters of Sir Reginald (or Reynold) Bray (c. 1550 – 1583) and his wife Anne Bray nee Vaux (c. 1550 – 1619). She was baptised on 6 November 1580 at Hinton in the Hedges, Northamptonshire.

Reginald Bray died in October 1583 and was buried at Hinton in the Hedges on 18 October 1583. Reginald was aged about 44.

An inquisition post mortem was held (Esc. 26 Eliz. n. 119.) This was a local enquiry into the lands of a deceased person, held to discover what income and rights were due to the crown. Information from this inquisition was used to produce a family tree by George Baker in his 1822 book History and Antiquities of the County of Northampton (page 685).

Reginald had one son, William, who died in his father’s lifetime aged about 7. Reginald had five daughters who were his coheirs:

• Mary, aged 14 in 1583 thus born about 1569. On 16 August 1586 at Eaton Bray, Bedfordshire,  she married Sir William Sandys (c 1562 – 1641) of Fladbury, Worcestershire. She appears to have died by 1597 about which time  Sir William Sandys married secondly to Margaret Culpepper. She appears not to have had children.
• Anne, aged 10 in 1583 thus born about 1573; she was later the wife of John Sotherton (1562 – 1631), a judge and later a Baron of the Exchequer. John Sotherton married two more times and had two sons and a number of daughters – it is not certain if Anne was the mother of these children. Anne had died by 1602.
• Alice, aged 6 in 1583 thus born about 1577. In 1592 she married Nicholas Eveleigh, a lawyer. Nicholas Eveleigh died aged 56 in 1618 when the Chagford Stannary Courthouse collapsed killing him, two of his clerks and seven others, also leaving a further 17 injured. She secondly married Elize (Ellis) Hele, a lawyer and philanthropist who died in 1635. The trust from his will was used to found a number of schools including Pympton Grammar School. Alice died on 20 June 1635, it would seem she had no children. She and her second husband are buried at Exeter Cathedral but there is a monument to both of her husbands at Bovey Tracey Church.
• Temperance, aged 3 in 1583 (see below)
• Margery, age 2 in 1583 thus born about 1581. She married Francis Ingoldsby of Boughton and they had a son John.

The chancel of Bovey Tracey Church, Devon looking eastward. On the left (north) side , the monument with effigy of Nicholas Eveleigh (d.1618); on the south side the monument with effigy of Elize Hele (d.1635), who married Eveleigh’s widow Alice Bray. Photograph by Wikimedia commons user Lobsterthermidor [CC BY-SA 3.0], retrieved from Wikimedia Commons

Effigy in Bovey Tracey Church, Devon, of Nicholas Eveleigh (d.1618) of Parke in the parish of Bovey Tracey. Photograph from Wikimedia Commons by user Lobsterthermidor [CC BY-SA 3.0]

Monument to Elize Hele in Bovey Tracy Church, Devon. Below his effigy are the kneeling effigies of his two wives, facing each other in prayer, behind the left one kneels his young son. Photograph from Wikimedia Commons by user Lobsterthermidor [CC BY-SA 3.0]

In 1596 Temperance married Thomas Crew (1665 – 1634). Temperance was a kinswoman of Gilbert Talbot, 7th Earl of Shrewsbury (1552 – 1616). Thomas Crew was in the service of the Earl. Thomas had been educated at Shrewsbury School and the Inns of Court.

Thomas Crew was first elected to Parliament in 1604 representing Lichfield.

Temperance and Thomas had nine children:

• John Crew (1598 – 1679)
  • My 10th great grandfather. Married Jemima Waldegrave and had six sons and two daughters. Was a Member of Parliament and was mentioned in the diaries of  Samuel Pepys.
• Anne Crew (1599 – ?)
  • married Sir Edward Stephens, a Member of Parliament. They had three sons and a daughter
• Thomas Crew (abt 1602 – after 1682)
  • Attended Queen’s College, Oxford: matriculated 1618, BA 1622, MA 1625.
• Nathaniel Crew (abt 1606 – 1692)
  • Attended Lincoln College, Oxford, matriculated 1623. Admitted Gray’s Inn January 1622.
• Patience Crew (abt 1608 – 1642)
  • Patience married Sir John Curzon (1598 – 1686), a Member of Parliament. They had seven children. Patience and John are buried at Kedleston, Derbyshire.

Memorial to Sir John Curzon, All Saints’ Church, South Transept, Kedleston Photograph from Geograph.org.uk

• Temperance Crew (abt 1609 – 1634)
  • Temperance married John Browne (c 1608 – 1691) and died without having children. She is memorialised at Steane. In June 1660 Samuel Pepys recorded in his diary that he went to visit Mrs Browne. The 2000 edition published by University of California Press has annotated  that Mrs Browne was Elizabeth, second wife of John Browne, Clerk of the Parliaments: his first wife (d. 1634) was Temperance Crew, aunt of Montagu’s wife.
• Silence Crew (abt 1611 – 1651)
  • Silence married Sir Robert Parkhurst (1603 – 1651) of Pyrford, Surrey, Member of Parliament. They had one son.
• Salathiel Crew (1612 – 1686)
  • Attended Lincoln College, Oxford, matriculated 25 November 1631. Was a soldier. In 1641 there was a Certificate of residence showing Salathiel Crew (or the variant surname: Crewe) to be liable for taxation in Northamptonshire, and not in the half-hundred of Newport, Buckinghamshire, the previous area of tax liability. Salathiell Crew was appointed sherif of Rutland in 1652. Salathiel Crew was buried at Hinton in the Hedges. His will mentions his brother Thomas and two granddaughters, Isabella and Elizabeth. I have found no record of Salathiel’s marriage, children or military career other than the mention of militis in Oxford University Alumni.
• Prudence Crew (1615 – 1641)
  • Prudence Crewe died unmarried in 1641. She left a will probated 10 June 1641.

Temperance Crewe died in 1619.

Sir Thomas rebuilt the chapel of St Peter at Steane in memory of his wife who was buried there and an altar Tomb bears her figure and that of Sir Thomas dressed in his Sergeants robes.On a tablet is this inscription:

“Temperans Crewe, the wife of Thomas Crewe, esq. And one of the daughters and coheirs of Reginald Bray, esq. By his wife Anne, his wife, daughter of Thomas Lord Vaux, died in the year of our Lord 25 October, 1619, in the year 38 of her age, and now restith from her labours, and hir works follow hir:
A daughter of Abraham here doth lye
Returned to her dust
Whole life was hid in Christ with God
In whom was all her trust
Who wifely wrought while it was day
And in hir spirit did watch and pray
To heare God’s word attentive was her care
Hir humble hart was full of holy feare
Hir hande which had good blood in every vaine
Yet was not dayntye nor did disdayne
Salve to applye to Lazarus fore
And was inlarged to the poore
Lyke God’s Angells she honor’d those
That taught his word and did his will disclose
And persons vile her hart abhor’d
But reverenst such as fear’d the Lord
A true Temperans in deed and name
Now gone to heaven from whence she came
Who with her lott was well contented
Who lived desired and dyed lamented.
Premissa non amissa, discessa non mortua
Conjux casta, parens foelix, matrona pudica,
Sara vivo, mundo Martha, Maria deo.”
[Having never lost, went out without having died, = Not lost, but gone before
A chaste wife, a happy parent, a modest lady,
A living Sara, a worldly Martha, Maria of god.]

Photographs of the chapel and the monument can be seen by clicking the links below:

• The outside of the chapel
• Photographs by by Northamptonshire Historic Churches Trust

Thomas Crew served as speaker of the House of Commons from 1623 – 1625. Thomas Crew was knighted in 1623.

To the end of his life Sir Thomas Crew continued to practice law.

Portrait of Sir Thomas Crewe, Speaker 1623 – 1625. Given by his descendant Ralph Cartwright, Esq. 1805. In the collection of the UK Parliament (catalogue number WOA 2702) Crew displeased James 1 by upholding the liberties of Parliament as ‘matters of inheritance, not of grace’ but later said by the King to be the ‘ablest Speaker known for years’.

Crewe died on 1 Feb. 1634, aged 68, and was buried with his wife under the  marble effigy in the chapel he had built at Steane. His funeral sermon praised the quickness of his wit, the firmness of his memory, and the readiness of his expression. He was said to be one who ‘set the stamp of religion on all his courses, in his whole conversation’, ‘a man exceeding conscionable’, ‘a marvellous great encourager of honest, laborious, religious ministers’, ‘the poor man’s lawyer’, and ‘a great lover of his country’.

Sources

• Archive.org
  • Family tree of Reginald Bray retrieved from Baker, George. “History and Antiquities of the County of Northampton.” 1822, page 685 retrieved electronically through Archive.org archive.org/stream/HistoryAndAntiquitiesOfTheCountyOfNorthamptonBakerVol1/History%20and%20Antiquities%20of%20the%20County%20of%20Northampton%20-%20Baker%20Vol%201#page/n687/mode/2up.
  • Ingalsbe, Frederick W. “Ingoldsby Genealogy, Ingoldsby, Ingalsbe, Ingelsby and Englesby, from the 13th Century to 1904 ” Archive.org, archive.org/details/ingoldsbygenealo00inga/page/8.
  • Philipot, John. “The Visitation of the County of Buckingham Made in 1634 by John Philipot, Esq. .” Archive.org, College of Arms, 1909, archive.org/details/visitationofcoun58phil/page/76.
• History of Parliament online
  • CREWE, Thomas (1566-1634), of Gray’s Inn, London and Steane, Northants.; later of Serjeants’ Inn, Fleet Street, London.
  • other links in text
• British History online : ‘House of Commons Journal Volume 7: 12 November 1652’, in Journal of the House of Commons: Volume 7, 1651-1660 (London, 1802), pp. 214-215. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/commons-jrnl/vol7/pp214-215
• Google books
  • William Cotton (1859). Some account of the ancient borough town of Plympton St. Maurice, or Plympton Earl. With memoirs of the Reynolds family. John Russell Smith. pp. 28–29.
  • George Lipscomb (1847). The History and Antiquities of the County of Buckingham. J. & W. Robins. p. 169.
  • Samuel Pepys (30 July 2000). The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Vol. 1: 1660. University of California Press. p. 177. ISBN 978-0-520-22579-4.
  • The Gentleman’s Magazine (London, England). F. Jefferies. 1790. p. 420. (Monument at Stean in honour of Temperance Crew nee Bray)
  • England; John Britton (1810). The beauties of England and Wales; or, Delineations… of each county, by J. Britton and E. W. Brayley [and others]. 18 vols. [in 21]. pp. 83–5.
• National Archives (UK)
  • Chancery: Inquisitions post mortem: Bray, Reginald: Northampt.  Esc. 26 Eliz. n. 119. Reference C 142/204/119
  • Certificate of residence showing Salathiel Crew (or the variant surname: Crewe) to be liable for taxation in Northamptonshire, and not in the half-hundred of Newport, Buckinghamshire, the previous area of tax liability.  Reference E 115/112/113
• ancestry.com
  • England, Select marriages ,1538 – 1973
  • Wills probated in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury
  • Dictionary of National Biography (UK)
• Wikipedia: links in text

The wreck of the “Casino”

My third great aunt Helena Gill was drowned in a shipwreck in 1932.

Helena Lucy Gill née Hughes (1866-1932 ), seventh of the eight children of my 3rd great grandparents Samuel Hughes (1827-1896) and Sally Hughes née Plaisted (1826-1900), was the younger sister, by twelve years, of my great great grandfather Edward Walter Hughes (1854-1922).

Recently I came across a transcription of her headstone (in the Ancestry.com series ‘Victoria, Australia, Cemetery Records and Headstone Transcriptions, 1844-1997’), which reads:

Name Helena Lucy Gill
Death Date 10 Jul 1932
Burial Place Victoria, Australia
Cemetery Melbourne
Section B
Religion Baptist
Transcription In loving memory of dear mother Helena Lucy GILL died heroically helping others in shipwreck of “Casino” at Apollo Bay, 10 Jul 1932, age 65 Duty nobly done.

Helena married Luther Albert Gill in 1892. They had two children:

• Gwendoline Ruby Phyllis Gill (1893-1977) who married Henry Vincent Budge in 1910
• Vera Ila Gill (1903-1986), known as Ila, who married Charles Dudley Care in 1926.

In 1909 Helena, then living in Maribyrnong Road, Moonee ponds, sued her husband in the Prahran Court for maintenance. His address was Chapel Street, Windsor. The court found in her favour.

From 1914 Helena appears on the electoral rolls as ‘stewardess’ with her address ‘SS Casino, Prince’s Wharf, S.M.’ On the 1913 roll her address was 68 Maribyrnong Road, Moonee Ponds, and her occupation home duties. It seems that when her daughter Ila turned 11, Helena went to work as a stewardess.

The Belfast & Koroit S.N. Co’s S.S. “Casino” . Image from the State Library of Victoria. Image no. H92.302/23 http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/195620

The SS Casino, 160 feet, was an rivetted-iron coastal steamer, based in Port Fairy on the south-west coast of Victoria, owned by the Belfast and Koroit Steam Navigation Company (Belfast was the early name for Port Fairy).  The company was formed in March 1882 and took delivery of the Casino the same year.

The ship, built in Dundee, Scotland and launched in February 1882, was intended to service the north coast of New South Wales and was named for the town of Casino, New South Wales. The owners of the new company successfully bid for her when she was travelling through Warrnambool, Victoria, and the Casino arrived in Port Fairy on 29 July 1882.

She carried cargo and 25 passengers between Melbourne and Portland, stopping at Apollo Bay, Warrnambool and Port Fairy, over the next five decades making around 2,500 voyages.

South-west coast of Victoria from Google maps

The saloon of the SS Casino with “swivel chairs that were bolted to the floor to allow passengers more comfort when the ship was moving through rough seas”. Image from the Port Fairy Historical Society retrieved from https://victoriancollections.net.au/items/5555779e998fc21654210769

Early on the morning of 10 July 1932 the SS Casino sank in Apollo Bay while trying to secure a mooring. There was a south-easterly gale and a heavy swell. Coming alongside the jetty the Casino grounded on its anchor, fatally piercing the hull. The captain first tried to get an offing, but realising the vessel was sinking, turned to beach her. A few cables from the shore she was overwhelmed and sank in three or four fathoms.  Captain Middleton and nine other members of the crew were drowned, Helena one of them.

S. CASINO WRECKED (1932, July 11). The Age (Melbourne, Vic. : 1854 – 1954), p. 7. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article203804052

(1932, July 11). The Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 – 1954), p. 1. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-page26392479

Drowned Stewardess (1932, July 11). The Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 – 1954), p. 1. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article242973343

Helena’s body, with the bodies of four other crew, was recovered. She was buried in Melbourne General Cemetery.

STEWARDESS OF CASINO BURIED (1932, July 13). The Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 – 1954), p. 6. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article242978243

The wreck of the Casino, now a scuba diving site, lies in nine metres of water 400 metres from the shore. Her propeller and bell are part a memorial to the ship at King George Square in Port Fairy. The ship’s wheel is displayed in the Apollo Bay Hotel.

Postscript

The name “Franklin Gill” is transcribed with the dedication on Helena Gill’s gravestone. I do not know who he was or how he was related to Helena. I have since visited her grave at Melbourne Cemetery and there is no mention of Franklin Gill – apparently a transcription error. I have amended my copy of the transcription above.

Headstone on the grave of Helena Lucy Gill at Melbourne General Cemetery Baptist section B grave 731.

Sources

• PRAHRAN COURT. (1909, September 25). Malvern Standard (Vic. : 1906 – 1931), p. 3. Retrieved May 11, 2018, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66385277
• MORE DOMESTIC INFELICITY. (1909, September 25). The Prahran Telegraph (Vic. : 1889 – 1930), p. 5. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article144516207
• “S.S. Casino.” Victorian Heritage Database, Heritage Council Victoria, vhd.heritagecouncil.vic.gov.au/shipwrecks/108/download-report.
• “SS Casino.” Curated by Lynda Tieman, Port Fairy Historical Society, Victorian Collections, Museums Victoria, 3 Mar. 2017, https://victoriancollections.net.au/stories/ss-casino.
• “S. S. Casino.” Monument Australia, Monumentaustralia.org.au, monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/disaster/maritime/display/33118-%22s.s.-casino%22.
• Riddiford, Merron. “Trove Tuesday – S.S. Casino.” Western District Families, Merron Riddiford, 9 July 2013, westerndistrictfamilies.com/2013/07/09/trove-tuesday-s-s-casino/.

 

T is for Theresa

One of my fourth great aunts was Theresa Susannah Eunice Snell Poole formerly Walker née Chauncy (1807-1876).

Theresa Walker in 1846 painted by her sister Martha Berkeley. Oil on metal. In the collection of the Art Gallery of South Australia.

Theresa was the oldest daughter of William Snell Chauncy née Brown (1781-1845) and Rose Theresa Chauncy née Lamothe (1748-1818).

Her brother, Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816-1880), wrote a memoir of his sister, Memoir of the late Mrs. G.H. Poole by her brother, first published in 1877.  In 1976 it was reprinted, with a memoir of his wife, as Memoirs of Mrs Poole and Mrs Chauncy. Much of my information about Theresa comes from these memoirs and I quote from them below.

Philip Chauncy modelled in wax by his sister Theresa in about 1860. The model is in the collection of the National Gallery of Australia.

Her father [William Chauncy] was sent from England to be educated by his relative, the Rev. Hugh Stowell, Rector of Balaugh, in the Isle of Man, and used as a child, to play with her mother [Rose Lamothe] when she was ten years old. In after years an attachment sprang up between them, and he frequently visited the island, where they were married in 1804 – the year in which the Bible Society was founded, and in which Napoleon crowned himself Emperor of the French.

In the course of time her father and mother went to reside at Keynsham, near Bath, and on the 19th February, 1807, was born the subject of this memoir, whom they named Theresa Susannah Eunice.

I believe her mother lost one or two of her first children in early infancy, so that Theresa was the only one living at her birth. On the 18th August, 1813, Martha, now Mrs Berkeley, was born. I [Philip Chauncy] first saw the light on 21st June, 1816, and our mother died after childbirth in 1818. Our father married again in 1819, and had five children by this marriage.

In November, 1820, we went to France, where we resided, chiefly in the south, for four years and nine months. We lived at Angoulême [between Poitiers and Bordeaux] for two-and-a-half years, and while there I became ill, and well do I remember how lovingly my dear sister attended to me.

Theresa’s education was conducted chiefly at home by our father. She was but a brief period at school, for he considered it injurious to the faith and morals of his children to send them to school in France. At Angoulême, M. Labouchér was her music master, but whether for want of taste or perseverence, she never continued the practice of music. She soon became proficient in the French language, and at Mont D’Or [near Lyons] took lessons in Italian.

The memoir goes on with other incidents including hearing the Reverend Caesar Malan [Henri Abraham César Malan (1787–1864), Swiss Calvinist minister] preach at Geneva and losing Theresa’s little Italian greyhound. Theresa was sent on a visit to her grandfather at Wingfield, “where she tendered us good service by watching and partially defeating the intrigues of another branch of the family who were using every exertion to obtain an undue share of property from my grandfather in his old age. I [Philip] think Theresa must have been at Wingfield for several years”.

In the 1830s Theresa lived in London.

While in London she and Martha became members of Mr Edward Irving’s [(1792-1834), charismatic preacher and prophet] church at 13 Newman-street, Oxford-street, and there, too, they studied the fine arts under good masters – painting, drawing, and modelling; in these, especially the last, she was decidedly clever.

In 1836 Theresa and Martha, who had very recently married Captain Charles Berkley (1801-1856), emigrated in the “John Renwick“ to the new colony of South Australia, arriving in February 1837, just weeks after its proclamation.

Unfortunately there was “an incompatibility of temper and disposition between the two sisters that rendered their further residence together undesirable”, so that in 1837, Theresa left Adelaide to visit some friends in Tasmania.

On 17 May 1838 at Launceston, Tasmania, Theresa married John Walker (1796-1855), a retired naval officer. They moved to Adelaide, where Walker carried on business as a general merchant and shipping agent. The suburb of Walkerville is named after him.

John Walker painted in 1846 by his sister-in-law Martha Berkeley. The painting is now hanging in the Art Gallery of South Australia.

Kertamaroo, a Native of South Australia, modelled by Theresa Walker in about 1840. This is possibly one of the two models of Aborigines exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1841.

Havering about 1839 pastel on paper by Theresa Walker. Havering was a farm established by the Walkers on the banks of the upper Torrens, Adelaide.

A wax portrait by Theresa Walker in the Town of Walkerville Civic Collection is of the artist herself, made in 1840. From the Town of Walkerville Collections Policy 2014-2018 : This wax portrait of Theresa Walker is described as neo-classical in style and regarded as one of her finest works. While the association of the Walkers with the settlement of Walkerville was short lived, (as the unfortunate Captain Walker ended up bankrupt and in prison in 1841) nearly a hundred years later in May 1948, the great-nephew of Theresa Walker, Sir Trent de Crespigny, gifted these valuable and rare artworks to the Town of Walkerville. Sir Trent de Crespigny [my great grandfather] stated that these gifts were in recognition of Theresa Walker’s historical connection to the township. These works are of national significance because of their historical association with Australia’s first female colonial sculptor and because they are of great aesthetic merit and provide a rare and unique representation of the people themselves.

 

Philip emigrated to South Australia in 1839. When he arrived he found the Walkers were doing very well and entertaining in style. Unfortunately, in 1841 John Walker became insolvent, having “failed for a large amount”. He was imprisoned.

In 1846 John and Theresa Walker moved to near Sydney, New South Wales, and then to Tasmania where John Walker became Port officer at Hobart and later, Harbour Master at Launceston. John Walker died in 1855 aged 58.

Theresa had for some time fallen in with the religious tenets of Mr. George Herbert Poole (1806-1869), who was the founder of “The New Church” [Swedenborgian] in Adelaide. He [Poole] had returned from Mauritius, where he had been a professor in the Royal College, to Sydney in January 1850, had left Melbourne for England in 1852, and returned to Launceston in 1856, where they [George Poole and Theresa] were married.

The Pooles first had a farm in Tasmania bought, her brother notes, “with Theresa’s money”. About two years later they sold the farm and moved to Victoria where George Poole tried gold mining. In 1861 the Pooles joined a vineyard enterprise near Barnawartha on the Murray near Albury with, among others,  Theresa’s half brother William Chauncy (1820-1878) who was then at Wodonga. George Poole “was supposed to be a thorough vigneron, as well as a connoisseur of the best methods of tobacco growing.” He was appointed local manager. For a number of years all went well but the scheme collapsed in 1864.

While at Barnawartha Theresa collected some of the first drawings of the Aboriginal artist Tommy McRae (1835-1901) who was also known as Tommy Barnes.

Drawing by Tommy Barnes / an aboriginal of the Upper Murray / in 1862. Given to P. Chauncy / by Mrs G.H. Poole. This drawing showing Dancers with weapons; Hunting and fishing; European house and couple has been woven into a tapestry woven in 2001 for the Centenary of Federation and now in the collection of Museum Victoria.

.

Lithograph of Ocean Perch (Helicolenus percoides) hand coloured by Theresa Poole for The Prodromus of the Zoology of Victoria. From Museum Victoria. in 1861 Theresa was commissioned to hand colour 1000 copies of this plate.

My great great grandmother Annie Chauncy (1857-1883), daughter of Philip, modelled in wax by her aunt Theresa. The cast wax model is in the collection of the National Gallery of Australia. They believe the model was made about 1860. Annie would have only been 3. I think it possible the model was made in 1864 when Theresa stayed with the family and Annie was 7.

 

George Poole returned to Mauritius in November 1864 and Theresa followed him in April 1865. They lived there for about four years. While in Mauritius Theresa made wax models of eighty species of fruits. These were displayed at the Paris exhibition of 1867 and she was awarded a silver medal, even though some had been damaged in transit.

In late 1866 the Pooles both became ill with fever in an epidemic. They moved to India and, after a brief return to Mauritius,  in February 1868 moved back to Adelaide. George Poole gained a job as a teacher of a school at Navan near Riverton, South Australia about 100 kilometres north of Adelaide. In 1869 he became ill and died. This left Theresa almost penniless.

In 1870 she stayed for a while with William in Wodonga and then came to live with Philip and help with his children, his wife Susan having died in 1867. She lived with Philip for four years. In 1874 she visited friends in the Western District of Victoria, there taking up the position of Lady Superintendent at the Alexandra College in Hamilton. Later, ill with breast cancer, she went to Melbourne to live. In April 1875 she underwent an operation to remove her breast.

On 17 April 1876, Easter Monday, Theresa died at her house in East Melbourne.  Her brother Philip was with her when she passed away.

She was buried at St Kilda cemetery. Philip arranged for her to be interred, in accordance with her wishes, in  a wicker ‘mortuary cradle’ rather than the conventional coffin.

Theresa had written about mortuary cradles to the Melbourne Herald in September 1875 and apparently had ordered her own.

MORTUARY CRADLES. (1875, September 23). The Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 – 1954), p. 3. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article244179646 [Note from Greg: The reference to ‘a Mr Home’ in the “Herald” quote is an allusion to the spiritualist medium D.D. Home, who had frequently demonstrated his power to defy gravity. He could levitate at will, or so it was said, and would hover in the air to write on the ceiling. He once flew out a third-floor window, returning through the window of the next room.]

 

A Novel Coffin. (1875, September 20). The Herald (Melbourne), p. 3. Retrieved rom http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article244179533 This was Theresa’s coffin as she referred to the article in her letter of 22 September. In his memoir Philip says he used the coffin for her burial.

 

Sir Francis Seymour Haden (1818-1910), an English surgeon and etcher, was a proponent of earth-to-earth burial. In 1875 he wrote a number of letters to The Times and held an exhibition of wicker coffins in London.

A sketch from The Graphic 17 June 1875 illustrating wicker coffins on show at the London House of the Duke of Sutherland from http://victoriancalendar.blogspot.com.au/2011/06/june-17-1875-coffins-of-wicker.html

Theresa Walker is thought to be Australia’s first female sculptor. She was the first resident Australian artist to be shown in the Royal Academy of Arts in London.

Sources and further reading

• Chauncy, Philip Lamothe Snell Memoirs of Mrs. Poole and Mrs. Chauncy. Lowden, Kilmore, Vic, 1976.
• Hylton, Jane, Berkeley, Martha, 1813-1899, Walker, Theresa, 1807-1876, Art Gallery of South Australia. Board and South Australia. Women’s Suffrage Centenary Steering Committee Colonial sisters : Martha Berkeley & Theresa Walker, South Australia’s first professional artists. Art Gallery Board of South Australia, Adelaide, 1994.
• Transcribed journal of Theresa Chauncy of the first three months of her time in the Colony of South Australia digitised by the State Library of South Australia https://collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/resource/D+7604/1(L)
• INSOLVENCY COURT. (1841, August 10). Southern Australian (Adelaide, SA : 1838 – 1844), p. 3. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71615117 also related articles:
  • • INSOLVENT DEBTORS’ COURT. (1841, August 24). Southern Australian (Adelaide, SA : 1838 – 1844), p. 3. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71615200
    • Advertising (1845, September 6). Adelaide Observer (SA : 1843 – 1904), p. 4. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article158920785
    • Correspondence. (1845, July 1). South Australian (Adelaide, SA : 1844 – 1851), p. 2. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71601992
    • THE HAVERING PROPERTY, THE LAWYERS, AND THE SUPREME COURT. (1845, July 29). South Australian, p. 3. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article71602239
• Roughley, Julianne, et al. “Design and Art Australia Online.” Theresa Walker :: Biography at :: at Design and Art Australia Online, Design & Art Australia Online, 1995, www.daao.org.au/bio/theresa-walker/biography/.
• National Portrait Gallery: Theresa Walker
• The Town of Walkerville Collections Policy 2014-2018

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