T is for Tattaila

My husband Greg’s great-great-great grandfather was a gold-rush digger named George Young. He and his wife Caroline had thirteen children, including twins, Charlotte and Harriet, who were born on 13 July 1861 in Lamplough, a mining settlement about four miles south of Avoca, Victoria.

On 2 October 1882 Charlotte married George Edward Wilkins at the Avoca Anglican church, St John’s. Charlotte was 21, employed as a domestic servant. George was 25, a miner from Percydale, five miles west.

St John’s Church, Avoca

Charlotte and George had three children: Ethel born in 1883 in Avoca, and George and Eva, born in 1884 and 1886 at Tattaila (sometimes spelt Tataila or Tattalia), near a large grazing run of that name at Moama in New South Wales, across the Murray river from Echuca.

Satellite view of Tattaila and countryside from Google maps

Google street view of Tataila Road

They had moved to Tattaila because, no longer a gold miner, George Wilkins had become a teacher, appointed in October 1884 to the school there, with his position formally recorded as Classification 3B on the New South Wales Civil Service list in 1885.

Sadly, George and Charlotte’s daughter Eva, born on 21 January 1886, died three days later, according to her death certificate from premature birth and inanation (exhaustion caused by lack of nourishment). She was buried on 25 January in the grounds of the Tattaila Public School.

Why in the school-grounds? Sadly, there seems to have been nowhere else, no suitable burial place within range. Perhaps this arrangement provided some consolation for the parents.

In July 1887, a year and a half later, with George Wilkins still the Tattaila schoolteacher, Lord Carrington, Governor of New South Wales, passed through on a tour of inspection. The Sydney “Australian Town and Country Journal” wrote:

'EDUCATIONAL.-Not long ago I was in the Moama State School, listening to the children practising " God Save the Queen" for the Governor's visit. On that occasion the children of Latalia [sic], under the charge of their teacher, Mr. Wilkins, amalgamated with those of the Moama School under the charge of Mr. Bruce, and the practising was done under Mr. Wilkin's tuition. The children acquitted themselves admirably, subsequently earning praise from Lord Carrington, and, what was, perhaps, much dearer to the infantile heart, a whole holiday. I was considerably impressed with the progress evidently being made by the children, and not a little astonished at the advanced curriculum of the State schools in this colony. Children in New South Wales are being educated in many things of a practical as well as a scientific nature which are neglected across the border. The inference is obvious.'

The local “Riverine Herald“, published in Echuca, had predicted on 16 July that:

'Mr Wilkins has taken a good deal of pains to coach the scholars up, and their singing yesterday showed that they had profited by his teaching. The children kept time very well and sang the Anthem with considerable expression, so that they should acquit themselves very favourably on Tuesday next.'

His Excellency Lord Carrington, Governor of New South Wales, photographed about 1887. Retrieved from the National Library of Australia.

In 1889 George E Wilkins of Tattaila was promoted by examination to Classification 3A.

At the end of that year, he transferred to the Victorian education system, appointed in December 1889 as head teacher at School 1798, Major’s Line, near Heathcote. (‘Major’s Line’ refers to wheel tracks left by the NSW Surveyor-General Major Mitchell in his 1836 journey of exploration.)

On 1 January 1891 George was ‘certificated’—approved to teach, and appointed as a teacher—by the Victorian Department of Education. In October 1891 he transferred to School 1567 in Richmond and appointed junior assistant on probation. It was noted on his file that George gambled, but otherwise the probation inspection was satisfactory.

In 1892 George Wilkin’s appointment was confirmed, and he was also qualified to teach military drill. In 1893 he was transferred to School 2849, Rathscar North. His annual reports were positive. In 1899 he was
transferred to School 1109, Mount Lonarch. In 1901 he transferred to School 3022, Warrenmang. In 1902 he was at School 2811, Glenlogie. Later that year he returned to Warrenmang. In 1907 he was transferred to Homebush School, 2258. All these schools were in in the Central Highlands administrative region. He remained at Homebush until December 1921, when ill-health forced his resignation.

George Wilkins with his pupils in about 1896 at Rathscar North. From the 1988 book by Neville Taylor (1922 – 1992): Via the 19th Hole : Story of Convicts, Battlers and High Society. Neville was the son of Eva Taylor nee Squires.

George Wilkins, his children Ethel (1883 – 1955) and George (1884 – 1909), and wife Charlotte. Photograph about 1898.

Though not formally employed by the Education Department Charlotte Wilkins helped her husband with his teaching duties, brought up their children, and raised two of her nephews after their mother, her sister-in-law, died in childbirth. Charlotte was also busy in her local community. I have found no mention of Charlotte in Tattaila district newspapers, but in later years the Avoca newspapers give some better account of her activities there. for example as a hostess for various functions associated with the Homebush Soldiers Comforts Fund during World War I.

Lower Homebush School photographed some time between 1910 and 1920. In the back row are Laura Squires, Charlotte and George Wilkins. Laura Squires was sewing mistress from 1910 to 1920. She married George Wilkins after Charlotte’s death in 1925.

On 2 April 1925, following three years of paralysis, Charlotte died in Lower Homebush at the age of 63 and was buried in Avoca Cemetery.

Related posts

• Y is for Young family photographs
• W is for George Wilkins writing from Western Australia
• Cecil Young and family: Cecil’s early life up to end World War I

Wikitree:

• Charlotte Ethel (Young) Wilkins (1861 – 1925)
• George Edward Wilkins (1857 – 1944)

The tristate tour February 2021 part 1

Greg and I took our first holiday in a year to Mildura to visit some family history places nearby. A combination of illness and various lockdowns due to the Covid pandemic had prevented any travelling away from home overnight in the last twelve months. We decided to take the opportunity of some free time to meet with a cousin and see some of the places we had only read about.

Tuesday 9 February we drove north to Mildura via Warracknabeal. We travelled through the Wimmera region and the scenery matched that captured in the recent film ‘The Dry’ which I had seen only a few weeks ago.

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The drive north from Ballarat to Mildura via Warracknabeal

We came upon some painted silos at Rupanyup, part of a 200 kilometer series of portraits of local people painted on grain silos from 2016. A few kilometers further on we paused to admire the pretty weatherboard St John’s Lutheran Church in Minyip.

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  Rupanyup painted silos

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  St John’s Lutheran Church at Minyip

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  there are unpainted silos in the Wimmera

We had a terrific lunch at Warracknabeal at The Creekside Hotel in a very nice beer garden beside the Yarriambiack Creek. The hotel’s staff were very Covid-conscientious with masks, check in, sanitiser, and ordering lunch via an online webpage retrieved by a QR code; we even managed to order a jug of iced water and 3 glasses for the table, free, through this page.

We planned to have lunch at the Warracknabeal Hotel but it was closed. The hotel had been owned by the great grandfather of a friend and passed down to our friend’s father who finally sold it. Our friend commented “Wheat all sown and harvested by Collins St contractors so pubs shut.” Sadly the hotel seems to have been stripped of its wrought iron which had still been in place in 2010 but was gone by 2019. The hotel was registered on the Register of the National Estate but that register was closed in 2007 and is no longer a statutory list and is maintained on a non-statutory basis as a publicly available archive and educational resource. It seems a pity that heritage buildings are not better protected.

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  The Warracknabeal Hotel

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  Town Hall

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  The Creekside Hotel Warracknabeal

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Yarriambiack Creek at Warracknabeal

Yarriambiack Creek was fairly full and attractive to look at. There was a park across the creek with some cages of birds and an enclosure of kangaroos.

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Painted silos at Brim, Roseberry, and Lascelles

Our trip north continued with more silos and a stop in Ouyen. Ouyen had been famous for its vanilla slices having hosted a competition from 1998 to 2011 initiated by Jeff Kennett, the then premier of Victoria. Kennett acted as guest judge until 2005. In 2011 volunteers relinquished the competition to another small town. This afternoon the bakery and many other shops were closed and there were no vanilla slices to be bought.

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  former Ouyen Court House

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  empty shop Ouyen

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  Ouyen main street

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  Hotel Victoria at Ouyen

Ouyen

Wednesday 10 February we visited the Australian Inland Botanic Gardens just across the Murray River in New South Wales and also the confluence of the Murray and Darling Rivers at Wentworth. When we visited the confluence last in 2010 you could see the muddy Darling joining the clearer Murray. This time the two rivers were a similar colour.

Trip into New South Wales

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  a Mallee tree

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  the roots of a Mallee tree

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  Dip tins used for drying sultana grapes

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  Murray lily, Crinum flaccidum

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  Sturt’s Desert Pea, Swainsona formosa

Australian Inland Botanic Gardens

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  Murray Cod carved into tree trunk

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  viewing tower at the confluence

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  confluence of the Darling on the left and the Murray on the right

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  lock 10 near Wentworth

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Junction Park at Wentworth: viewing the confluence of the Murray and Darling Rivers. Lock 10 slightly downstream.

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  old Wentworth gaol

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  Wentworth Post Office

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  Royal Hotel Wentworth

Wentworth

On Wednesday afternoon we visited Avoca Station and met one of my fourth cousins, AL, and her mother, JA, my third cousin once removed. JA’s grandfather (AL’s great grandfather), George Agars (1864 – 1943) was the son of Margaret Alice Agars nee Cudmore (1842 – 1871) and grandson of Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore (1811 – 1891) and Mary Cudmore nee Nihill (1811 – 1893).

George’s mother Margaret died in 1871 at 29 from an ear infection. George was brought up by his grandparents Daniel and Mary Cudmore. He was educated in Adelaide to become an accountant for his Uncle Dan at Avoca Station. George later became an irrigation pioneer in Mildura when the Chaffey Brothers arrived from Canada. My cousin commented “He did not do that well on the land and should have followed his dream of being a writer and poet.”

The current owners of Avoca Station are Barb and Ian Laws who have owned the property for 21 years. They bought the house with 104 acres. 

The property was established on the west bank of the Darling River in 1871 by Daniel Henry Cashel Cudmore (1844 – 1913), the fifth of nine children of Daniel Michael Paul and Mary Cudmore. Daniel H  purchased the western half of Tapio Station on the Darling from Messrs. Menzies and Douglas, and named it Avoca, said to be  after his father’s hometown in Ireland; however Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore was born in Tory Hill, Limerick near Adare, 230 km west of Avoca.

Avoca Station had frontages of ten miles (16 km) to the Murray and twenty-five miles (40 km) to the Darling. Other properties in the area were acquired and in 1885 Daniel Henry and two of his brothers, Milo Robert (1852 – 1913) and Arthur Frederick (1854 – 1919), managed 709,000 acres including Avoca and Popiltah Station to the north of Avoca. 120,000 sheep were shorn at Avoca in 1888 with new Wolseley shearing machines. The wool clip was transported by paddle steamer from the woolshed downstream via the Darling River to the Murray River. Daniel Henry retired in 1895 to Victor Harbour. Avoca Station was sold in 1911.

The homestead was built in two stages. In 1871 the first stage was constructed of cypress pine drop logs. Many of the outbuildings are believed to have also been built at this time. In 1879 a second stage stone wing of the homestead was added.

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Avoca homestead. The surrounding area is in drought. The two buildings: the stone 1879 extension on the right and the 1871 log building on the left. The rooms are in the 1879 part of the house.

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Most of the outbuildings were built in 1871. In the office stencils to mark wool bales hang on the wall alongside rabbit traps; a display of emu eggs is compared with onewhite ostrich egg

I have previously written about Ernest Osmond Cudmore (1894 – 1924). He was the second of four sons of Milo Robert Cudmore and a cousin of my great grandfather Arthur Murray Cudmore. In 1908 Ernest was holidaying at Avoca when he jumped from a horse as he feared he was about to collide with a portion of the stable. He broke his leg and it was badly shattered; the bone did not set and his leg had to be amputated below the knee.

the stables

Sara Kathleen de Lacy Roberts (nee Cudmore) (1883 – 1972), the daughter of  Arthur Frederick Cudmore, was another cousin of my great grandfather Arthur Murray Cudmore. In 1971 Kathleen Roberts was interviewed by a granddaughter of Milo Robert Cudmore, Helen Bewsher nee Cudmore (1928 – 2001). Kathleen lived at Avoca as a teenager and young adult from 1895 until her marriage in 1909. She was educated at boarding school in Melbourne and travelled to and from school via train and the paddle steamer, Trafalgar. Her recollections of Avoca, when she was 88 years old in 1971, were as follows:

One cook, one housemaid, one nurse at Popiltah. No Aborigines in the house at Popiltah, one at Avoca. A camp of 30 as stockmen. 

The Avoca vegetable garden was on the river. A huge steam engine, between the vegetable and flower gardens, pumped river water to them. In the hot weather this was done at night and made a terrible noise. A Chinaman worked full time on these gardens and would come to the kitchen door every morning to enquire on what vegetables were required that day. All the linen was made at Avoca, the girls spending their time sewing, making visitors’ beds and preserving.

Staff of 10 men at Avoca, jackaroo and overseer. 

Bred horses there – had about 100. Every second year, one of the men spent two or three months breaking in – always gently.

reminiscence of Kathleen Roberts nee Cudmore

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An old corrugated iron pump house which had a belt driven pump to draw water from the river. This pump that was installed for irrigation in 1963; before 1963 a steam driven pump existed on this site. Daniel H. Cudmore installed pumps to irrigate lucerne and other fodder crops adjacent to the homestead. Parts of the irrigation system were established early, and irrigation is mentioned in records in the 1880s. The Avoca vegetable garden was on the river. A huge steam engine, between the vegetable and flower gardens, pumped river water to them. In the hot weather this was done at night and made a terrible noise.

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The river is just below the house. The garden and the surrounding country is suffering from drought.

1911 sale poster on display at Avoca Homestead

Ian and Barb Law, the present owners of Avoca, gave us afternoon tea and showed us around the property. It was delightful to meet them and our cousins too.

Sources

• Silo Art Trail.” Silo Art Trail, siloarttrail.com/home/.
• Flickr photos
  • phunnyfotos user on Flickr (2010).  Warracknabeal Hotel, VIC, Australia. 
  • John Jennings (2019). warracknabeal warracknabealhotel hotel pub victoria australia.
• “Warracknabeal Hotel, 44 Scott St, Warracknabeal, VIC, Australia Place ID 4137.” Australian Heritage Database, Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment, Australian Government, Accessed 13 Feb. 2021.
• P. A. Howell, ‘Cudmore, Daniel Henry (Dan) (1844–1913)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/cudmore-daniel-henry-dan-270/text9913, published first in hardcopy 1981
• “Avoca Homestead Complex | NSW Environment, Energy and Science.” NSW Environment, Energy and Science, 12 15, www.environment.nsw.gov.au/heritageapp/ViewHeritageItemDetails.aspx?ID=5062573.
• Wentworth (1908, July 16). The Register (Adelaide, SA : 1901 – 1929), p. 8. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article60318056
• Wentworth (1908, September 10). The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1889 – 1931), p. 12. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article5181294
• Ritchie, Elsie B. (2000). For the love of the land : the history of the Cudmore family. E. Ritchie, [Ermington, N.S.W.]. Pages 253-4.

In memory of lost homes

The cynical French epigram “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” (The more change she is paid [when shopping], the more a lady will choose…)* describes it nicely: someone who has money left over from his purchase of a house will use it to choose additions and alterations and then, unsatisfied with the change he’s got out of it, will bowl the whole thing over and build a new home for himself on the cleared site.

* [perhaps I have not translated exactly 😉 ]

Many of the houses I recall from my childhood and later years have been destroyed by their new owners.

Of course the new owner is entitled to rebuild, and – who knows? – the new house may be more comfortable. It is not cheap to maintain an old house, and some new houses may be measurably better in every way. Even so, it is sad to see a place you knew and loved simply discarded like a worn-out shoe.

The house I grew up in and where we spent the first 30 years of our married life was bulldozed by its new owners.

Arnhem Place Red Hill May 2003

The beach house my parents built when I was a child was badly damaged by termites, which had penetrated the concrete foundations. This was discovered too late for the house to be saved and it had to be torn down.

My parents’ beach house when it was newly built in the 1960s

My paternal grandparents’ house in Adelaide was bulldozed by the people to whom it was sold.

81 Esplanade abt 1966 (dating based on other pictures nearby including Nicholas)

Me as a young child on the verandah of my paternal grandparents’ house

My maternal grandparents’ house was extensively renovated after their death.  Although parts of it remain unchanged, the re-modelled house has quite a different feel to it.

Me on my scooter outside my maternal grandparents’ house

The house of my mother-in-law, in Albury, was sold after her death. Then her pretty garden was cleared. Soon afterwards the house itself went.

Greg’s mother Marjorie Young nee Sullivan in front of her bush house in the back garden

1966: Greg sitting on the bonnet of a 1959 Plymouth. Jim Windsor, a family friend and the car’s owner is behind the wheel. Not sure who is in the passenger seat, probably Greg’s mother Marjorie. The car is parked in the street outside the Young family home.

Greg outside his home in Albury 1966

My children liked playing in the garden, my son took some of his first steps clinging to the front fence, and there was the most magnificent and prolific lemon tree in the back garden.

Greg’s maternal grandparents’ house in Castlemaine, which he remembers as a lovely old place with chooks and a vegetable garden, has gone. Next door there’s now a car-wash. Down the road is a large estate of new houses, all made out of ticky-tacky. They all look just the same.

There is an exception. The house of Greg’s early childhood in Ballarat still stands. Out the back Greg can remember a large stable. It’s still there.

1949 snowman in the back garden of the Ballarat house

For the most part the houses as physical structures have gone, but I will continue to remember them as warm homes I used to know and love.

Fires at Batemans Bay

For most of my life our family has been coming to Batemans Bay for our summer holiday. Our house is close to the beach, in the bush surrounded by large gum trees. It’s a lovely setting but a bad bushfire risk.

This summer the fire danger period seems to have arrived earlier. As I write, fires are burning out of control just north of Batemans Bay and the Princes Highway, the main road from here to Sydney, is closed. Last weekend a fire came within a kilometre of Braidwood, a small town on the way to Canberra, and the highway to Canberra was closed.

Bushfire map 2 December 2019 The map has no scale however the drive from Batemans Bay to Canberra is about 150 km or just under 100 miles.

 

In March 1965 Batemans Bay was threatened by bushfires. I was too young to remember. In those days we used to rent a house for the holidays;  this was before my parents had built a beach house of our own.

Batemans Bay facing crisis (1965, March 9). The Canberra Times (ACT : 1926 – 1995), p. 1. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article131759934

 

In 1971 there were bushfires again, but we were overseas. Our house came close to being burnt down. The Briggs and Bailey holiday cottages are very near my parents’ house.

Bushfire service in Letters to the Editor (1971, October 7). The Canberra Times, p. 2. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110680827

Fires sweep areas of Queensland and NSW (1971, October 5). The Canberra Times, p. 3. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article110680476 (These days it is suggested you dress in more than a t-shirt when near bushfires.)

 

In 1980 there were worries about the fire season

HOLIDAYS with The Canberra Times (1980, December 15). The Canberra Times, p. 10. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article126164236

 

The summer of 1993 /94 was a bad summer for fires, and our house was threatened once again. The flames came very close. My mother, cooking dinner in the kitchen, looked out the window: there was the fire, coming down the hill. My father was busy putting out embers. The wind changed just in time.

My parents’ beach house when it was newly built in the 1960s

Worst of fires yet to come (1994, January 7). The Canberra Times, p. 1. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article126921130

 

As you can guess, I follow the fire news closely. From today’s news we are reading about fires just north of us:

from https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-02/currowan-fire-burns-residents-told-too-late-to-leave/11755264

U is for Una

Una Elizabeth Dwyer née Sneyd (1900-1982), first cousin twice removed of my husband Greg, was the daughter of Samuel Charles Sneyd (1863-1938) and Emily Sneyd née Way (1868-1952).

Usually in my family work I am able to find a considerable quantity and variety of information about the person I’m looking researching. I gain, I hope, some small insight into their circumstances and perhaps one or two events of their lives.

Una Sneyd and her family, however, managed to keep a very low profile. They didn’t write to the paper with bright ideas about burials in wicker baskets, weren’t imprisoned for bankruptcy, and weren’t exiled for their religious views. Thoreau said that the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation; the Sneyds apparently just led quiet lives, and left few traces of themselves for a family historian to work with.

Una’s mother Emily was the seventh of ten children of John Way and Sarah Way née Daw. She was born in Grenfell, New South Wales in 1868 but her family moved to Parkes, New South Wales, when she was about five years old.

In 1892 Emily married Samuel Charles Sneyd, a police constable, in Hughenden, Queensland. I don’t know why Emily, then aged 24, was in Queensland; Hughenden is two thousand kilometres north of Parkes. As far as I know, no other members of her family were in Hughenden. At the time of her marriage Emily was living at Hughenden.

1892 marriage certificate of Charles Samuel Sneyd and Emily Way

Emily and Samuel Charles had six children:

• Lionel Walter Sneyd 1894–1976
• Cecil Sneyd 1896–1954
• infant daughter Sneyd 1898–1898
• Una Elizabeth Sneyd 1900–1982
• Ruth Dawes Sneyd 1904–1996
• Jasper Samuel Sneyd 1906–1991

Lionel was born in Hughendon but the others were born in the Emmaville district of north-east of New South Wales. Samuel Charles Sneyd worked as a miner.

When Emily’s father John Way died in 1911, four daughters were mentioned in his obituary, so it would seem Emily was still in touch with her family. When her sister Mary Ann Waine died in 1938, Mary Ann’s obituary mentioned only one sister, Eliza: the family seemed to have lost touch with Emily.

The Sneyd family moved to Sydney sometime after 1913. In August 1915 Lionel Sneyd enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force. He gave his father as his next of kin. At the time, he was living in Marrickville, an inner-west suburb of Sydney

Lionel served overseas in France, was wounded in action in July 1916, and was repatriated with a fractured left ankle.

Only limited number of electoral rolls for New South Wales have been digitised. In these I have been able to find  Una Elizabeth Sneyd listed in 1930 as living at  39 Tupper Street, Marrickville. Her occupation was shop assistant. She was living with her parents and younger brother Jasper, who was also a shop assistant. Samuel was a carpenter. Emily’s occupation was listed as home duties.

In 1932 Una Sneyd married Patrick George Dwyer, an engine driver. In 1935 the Dwyers were living at 11 Audley Street, Petersham. Una’s occupation was given as home duties. Petersham is immediately north of Marrickville.

By 1936 the Dwyers had moved to 6 Brightmore Street, Cremorne. The suburb of Cremorne is on the lower North Shore in Sydney, 13 kilometres north-east of Marrickville, across the harbour. The Dwyers were still at the same address at the time of the 1980 electoral roll.

Samuel Charles Sneyd died in 1938 and Emily Sneyd died in 1952.

I have not ordered her death certificate, but I notice from the index that Emily’s mother was named Ruth; her family appear to have known very little about Emily’s parents.

Patrick and Una seem to have had only one child, called John. He is listed on the 1958 electoral roll as living with them and is named in their death notices. As the voting age was 21, he was born between 1936 and 1937. I have not found a newspaper birth notice.

Patrick George (Paddy) Dwyer died 29 December 1981 in hospital. His death notice stated that he was from Cremorne, loved husband of Una. The notice names his son and two grandsons. Una died on 13 February 1982, also in hospital. Her death notice also named her late husband, son and two grandsons. In May 1982 there was a notice in the Sydney Morning Herald associated with the estate of Patrick George Dwyer, retired council employee.

In researching Una I have been able to verify dates, places and relationships with the aid of birth, death and marriage indexes, electoral rolls and notices in the newspapers. The Sneyd and Dwyer families, however, did not attract much notice in the newspapers and it has been hard to find any events that enable me to get to know Una Dwyer née Sneyd.

J is for John

One of my husband’s great great grandfathers was John Way (1835-1911).

When he died on 11 June 1911, in Parkes, New South Wales, John Way was buried in  Parkes cemetery with his wife and son. His gravestone noted the death of his grandson Leslie Leister, killed World War 1.

The local paper, recording John Way’s death, provided a  brief obituary.

MR. JOHN WAY. (1911, June 16). Western Champion (Parkes, NSW : 1898 – 1934), p. 16. Retrieved December 4, 2017, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article111914465

Sadly, the headstone of John Way’s grave was broken in two by vandals in 2010 (after this photo was taken).

Because the marble is too soft and hollow to drill and pin, it could not be completely restored.

As a community service, J.T. Cock & Sons, a Parkes monumental masonry firm, repaired the headstone as best they could, picking it up off the ground and laying it flat. Unfortunately, some of the lead lettering, fractured in the damage, has come away, making the inscription harder to read.

Related blog posts

• Immigration on the Trafalgar in 1854 of John Way and Sarah née Daw
• Sepia Saturday 329: shepherding near Murrumburrah, New South Wales
• Mapping the birthplaces of the children of John Way and Sarah née Daw
• Trove Tuesday: Leslie Leister died at Fromelles 19/20 July 2016

Fishing for the right word

This week’s Sepia Saturday prompt image is of a small boy with a fish. I invited my husband Greg to write an entry for my online research journal.

Our Sepia Saturday theme image this week features a small boy and a large fish. The identity of the boy is unknown (and, come to think of it, the precise identity of the fish is also unknown) but the photograph was seemingly taken at the Bon Echo Inn, in the Bon Echo Provincial Park, Ontario, Canada. The photograph forms part of the Flickr Commons Stream of the Cloyne & District Historical Society.

 

In Australian country towns you used to know your place. We were Upper Lower Middle Class (somewhere, perhaps, on George Orwell‘s mocking scale), which meant for one thing that although Dad worked as a labourer on the railways—transhipping goods from five-foot-three inch gauge Victorian trains to four-foot-eight-and-a-half NSW trains and vice versa—his wages reached Mum on Friday night untaxed by the six-o’clock swill at Ryan’s Hotel. It helped to be Protestant too. We looked down on the Irish Catholic kids next door, whose father, a plasterer’s labourer, weaved from side to side on his way home along Macauley Street.

That made them Lower Lower Middle class, the necessary foundation of our superior status. But when their old man got a skinful of Victoria Bitter and sang Roll out the barrel‘ with his mates in their backyard, they got indulged by their parents, at least at the maudlin sentimental stage of the booze-up, while we could only peer through the paling fence in jealous disapproval.

This principle also applied to the way we spoke. Rough kids had a richer and freer vocabulary, but we knew how to employ the second-person plural personal pronoun correctly and that to use the wrong form marked you as an ignoramus, destined for an early exit from schooling followed by a dismal apprenticeship in panel-beating or something of the sort.

One day my brother and I, fishing in the river, began talking to a boy—we were about 10 or 12 years old—whose smart rod and reel but shabby clothes and worn shoes marked him as the usual product of poverty: combined parental indulgence and neglect. When he got a bite and missed he damned the uncooperative fish as a ‘bloody black Assyrian bastard’.

We were profoundly shocked and delighted. Here was a phrase crying out for use and re-use. It had alliteration, rhythm, a racial slur, and two powerful swearwords fore and aft. The ‘Assyrian‘ bit was a puzzle, but it seemed to imply contempt for foreigners, a good thing, and it sounded Biblical too, so as a bonus it was probably also sacrilegious.

I am grateful to that Lower Lower boy for introducing me to his splendid incantation. Over the years I have found it very useful for opening screw-top jars and starting small petrol engines.

Sepia Saturday 329: shepherding near Murrumburrah, New South Wales

This week’s Sepia Saturday image is of a shepherd, photographed by Joseph Gale in the 1890s. The title of the photograph, Ninety and Nine, refers to the Parable of the Lost Sheep told in both Luke 15: 3-7 and Matthew 18:12-14. In the parable a shepherd leaves his flock of ninety-nine sheep to search for one that is lost.

John Way (1835-1911), my husband’s great great grandfather worked as a shepherd in New South Wales in the 1860s.

We know from the birth and death certificates of his children what jobs John Way had.

In 1859 when his daughter Mary Jane died in the Melbourne inner city suburb of Collingwood,  John was a labourer.

In 1865 when his daughter Elizabeth was born at Brittons Dam Station, Kitticara near Murrumburrah, John was a shepherd.

I have been unable to find a birth certificate for the birth in 1863 of Sarah Jane Way. All other documentation states she was born at Barbara / Bobbarah Creek near Murrumburrah. I suspect that John would have been working as a shepherd then too.

Bobbarah Creek is probably close to Binalong.  There is a Mount Bobbara just under 7km from Binalong.

Mt Bobbara near Binalong July 2007

the road near Mt Bobbara July 2007

In 1868 when his daughter Emily was born in Grenfell, New South Wales, John was working as a sawyer.

It seems that for some years between 1859 and 1868 John Way worked as a shepherd on properties near Murrumburrah, New South Wales. At 560 km north-east of Melbourne, it was a long way from Collingwood.

Perhaps John and Sarah Way answered an advertisement like this one, which appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald in September 1859 seeking a married couple, Scotch or English, to shepherd two flocks.
.

In the early 1860s there were few fences, and men were employed as shepherds. Fencing became more widespread during the decade, and by the mid-1880s, over ninety-five per cent of sheep in New South Wales were in fenced paddocks. The use of wire fences was spreading rapidly, and the cost of fences was falling.

A shepherd’s hut in South Australia

Sweet, Samuel White (1869). Shepherds hut.Retrieved from Trove http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/22433904

 

“Shepherding” in Australia. Wood engraving published in The Australian news for home readers 25 May 1864. Image from the State Library of Victoria.

 

Gill, Samuel Thomas & Hamel & Ferguson (1864). Homeward bound. Printed in colors by Hamel & Ferguson, Melbourne. Retrieved from the National Library of Australia.

Further reading

• Pickard, John. Cambridge University Press; 2007. The Transition from shepherding to fencing in colonial Australia.  Retrieved from http://www.researchonline.mq.edu.au/vital/access/manager/Repository/mq:6065

Related post

•  Mapping the birthplaces of the children of John Way and Sarah née Daw

Typhoid epidemic in Parkes in 1896

Headstone in Parkes cemetery of John Way and his parents, with a memorial inscription recording the death of his nephew

On 21 April 1896, John Way, 24 years old, died of typhoid, perforated bowel, and peritonitis after an illness of three weeks. John Way, from Parkes in central New South Wales, was a miner like his father, also called John.

Typhoid is a bacterial disease caused by eating food or drinking water contaminated by human faeces. Its spread is prevented by efficient sanitation and careful public hygiene.

John Way’s death was reported in the Evening News, a Sydney newspaper, on the next day:

Death from Typhoid.
PARKES, Wednesday.— Another death from typhoid has occurred a young man named John Way being the victim.

I came across this article by accident while browsing the National Library of Australia’s ‘Trove’ collection of digitised newspapers. I broadened my search to look for typhoid in Parkes in April 1896.

On 1 April, the Queanbeyan Age reported that there were 21 cases of typhoid in Parkes hospital. On 17 April the Sydney Evening News reported that since the beginning of the year there had been 59 deaths in Parkes, 19 of these due to typhoid. The source of the outbreak was yet to be traced. The mayor was taking steps to have cesspits filled in and the pan system generally adopted. On 24 April the Albury Banner and Wodonga Express reported there were over 100 typhoid cases in Parkes and district under medical treatment.

PARKES. (1896, April 24). Albury Banner and Wodonga Express (NSW : 1896 – 1938), p. 17. Retrieved June 29, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article99431481

Towards the end of May a report on the epidemic was tabled in Parliament.The Riverine Grazier summarised the report on 23 June:

• Dr Tidswell, medical officer, was sent by the Board of Health to inquire into the prevalence of typhoid fever and the insanitary state of that town with special reference to the recent outbreak.
• Although certain by-laws were passed in 1890 requiring the adoption of a dry earth system, the by laws were not enforced as the validity had been disputed and in 1894 a bylaw was passed permitting the use of cesspits . Despite the requirement that they be constructed so as not be a nuisance, the bylaws were neglected and the arrangements were most primitive. The soil was polluted from slops, drainage and nightsoil.
• The excreta from typhoid patients was not treated before being buried in back yards or gardens.
• The supply of water was defective. Rainwater collected in tanks was very largely used in Parkes. The report pointed out that the roofs from which the water is collected are often covered with dust, sometimes to the extent that the gutters are blocked. During dry weather dust storms are no uncommon and the town is a dusty one. The rains carry the dust into the water tanks. the dust from the polluted soild carried the typhoid bacilli into the rain water collected in the tanks.
• Tidswell pointed out that soil pollution was the primary evil. The combined influence of natural conditions and the absence of an efficient drainage system meant that Parkes was specially liable to diseases fostered by soil pollution. The neglect of the by-laws resulted in excessive soil pollution.

In 1895,according to the cemetery register, there were 22 burials in Parkes cemetery. This in
cluded seven people burnt to death in a fire in April, mainly members of a family called Quinn. Twenty people were buried in the cemetery in 1896 but ten of the burials were in April. The cemetery register does not appear to include all those affected by the typhoid epidemic but the disproportion of the deaths in April 1896 gives some idea of the tragedy.

Usually there were no more than three burials a month in Parkes cemetery. The exceptions are in April 1895 when there was a fire killing seven people and in April 1896 when there was a typhoid epidemic. The figures are derived from the Parkes cemetery register.

In May 1879, John’s sister Harriet Way, nine years  old, died in Parkes of typhoid after an illness of three weeks.

John and Harriet Way were my husband’s great grand mother’s siblings, that is his great grand uncle and great grand aunt.

In my family tree, Eleanor Mary Niall (1858-1891), my first cousin four times removed, died of typhoid in Adelaide in November 1891.  My great great grand uncle Daniel Budge (1842-1895) died of typhoid in Coolgardie, Western Australia, in January 1895. One of his obituaries mentions that typhoid was firmly established at Coolgardie.

It is estimated that worldwide today there are 21 million cases of typhoid and 200,000 deaths each year. “Typhoid Fever.” National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 14 May 2013. Web. 30 June 2014. <http://www.cdc.gov/nczved/divisions/dfbmd/diseases/typhoid_fever/technical.html>.

L is for Eliza Leister

I have decided to continue the story of Leslie Leister by writing about his aunt, Eliza, who became his foster mother.

Eliza Way was born 22 August 1865 on Brittons Dam Station, Kitticara, near Murrumburrah, New South Wales. Her father John Way (1835-1911) was a shepherd. She is named Elizabeth on her birth certificate.

Eliza was the sixth child of John and Sarah (1837-1895). The birth certificate stated three males living and two children deceased. There was a mistake on the certificate, Eliza in fact had three older sisters, and a boy and a girl had died before she was born. There were also four younger siblings.

• • Louisa 1855-1926
  • William John 1857-1758
  • Mary Jane 1859-1859
  • Mary Ann 1860-1938
  • Sarah Jane 1863-1898
  • Elizabeth / Eliza 1865-1940
  • Emily 1868-1952
  • Harriet Elizabeth 1870-1879
  • John 1872-1896

from an advertisement in the Grenfell newspaper in 1868

• Martha 1874-1875

From the birthplaces of her siblings we can see that the Way family had moved to Grenfell by 1868, when Emily was born. John’s occupation was then as a sawyer. In 1870 Harriet was also born in Grenfell, “near Reece’s foundry” (‘The European Iron Foundry’). John was still a sawyer. In 1872 his son John was also born at Grenfell. In 1874 when Martha was born in Parkes, John Way’s occupation was as a miner.

By the 1890s, and perhaps earlier, the Way family were living at Bogan Street Parkes.

Eliza’s sister, Sarah Jane, married Robert Whiteman, a miner on 12 July 1882 at Parkes. They had two children: Robert Henry, born 1883, and Mary Ann, born 19 August 1884. Six months before Mary Ann was born, Sarah Jane’s husband Robert  died of pneumonia after an illness of four days. Sarah Jane probably relied on her parents and sisters for help in bringing up her two infant children. Sarah Jane remarried on 26 September 1894 in Melbourne to John Young, a miner, who had spent some time in New South Wales, presumably including a period in Parkes.

On 13 August 1894, just before her second marriage, Sarah Jane gave birth to a boy, Jack Walsh Whiteman. The father was not named on the birth certificate. The birth was registered on 21 September, with Sarah Jane the informant. Her mother had been a witness, assisting at the birth. There was no doctor and seems to have been no other nurse or midwife.

It appears that Sarah Jane left her baby Jack behind with her mother in Parkes when she went to Melbourne to marry John Young.

Sarah Way, the mother of Sarah Jane and Eliza, died on 7 April 1895 of what is described on the death certificate as biliary colic and an impacted gallstone. The length of her illness was described on her death certificate as chronic. Four of Sarah’s daughters were married: Louisa in 1873, Mary Ann in 1883, Sarah Jane in 1894 and Emily in 1892. Four children had died. Eliza and John junior were unmarried and probably still living with their parents. It would seem to have become Eliza’s responsibility to care for the grandchild Jack.

On 1 July 1896 Eliza married Robert Watson Duncan Leister at her father’s residence in Parkes. The witnesses were Hugh Leister and Caroline Harrison.

Robert Leister was 25 years old, a blacksmith, born at Maryborough, Victoria. His father was a carpenter. Eliza was 29 and her occupation was given as “living with her father”.

From Leslie Leister’s war record, we know that Eliza was his foster mother. We don’t know when Jack’s name was changed to Leslie. There were no formal adoption laws in New South Wales at this time. The first legislation in NSW to regulate adoption was the Child Welfare Act 1923. (Releasing the past : adoption practices, 1950-1998 : final report / Standing Committee on Social Issues. [Sydney, N.S.W.] The Committee, 2000. – 1 v. (various pagings); 30 cm. (Report 22, December 2000) (Parliamentary paper; no. 600) retrieved from https://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/committee.nsf/0/56e4e53dfa16a023ca256cfd002a63bc/$FILE/Report.PDF 12 April 2014)

Robert and Eliza continued to live with Eliza’s father John at Bogan Street, Parkes. When John died in 1911, Robert Leister is given as the informant on his death certificate. John’s will left his estate to his daughters Eliza and Louisa and appointed Eliza as his executrix.

Taking load of wheat to silos by horse – Corner of Bogan & Dalton Streets, Parkes, NSW. , 1925-26. Image from the State Library of New South Wales retrieved from http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/10508626 The Way and Leister families lived two blocks away on the corner of Bogan and Church streets.

Robert Duncan Leister died on 31 March 1925 at Bogan Street, Parkes. He was 56 years old. His occupation was upholsterer. He had been ill for several years with chronic nephritis (inflammation of the kidneys) and for 24 hours with uraemia (the illness accompanying kidney failure). He had been 26 years in Victoria and 30 years in New South Wales; he had arrived in New South Wales about a year before he married Eliza. Robert and Eliza had no children of their own.

In 1929, William Charles Waine, husband of Eliza’s sister Mary Ann, died in Orange. By 1930 according to the electoral rolls, Eliza was living at Byng Street, Orange. She had no family left in Parkes. Perhaps she was helping her sister or perhaps they enjoyed each other’s company.

Eliza died after a car accident in February 1940. She was hit by a car when walking to church.

 

Eliza is buried at Orange. The grave at Parkes beside her husband remained empty. Parkes is 100km from Orange and there were no other members of the family living in Parkes at the time of Eliza’s death.

grave of Robert Duncan Leister at Parkes Cemetery

 

grave of Eliza Leister at Orange Cemetery