H is for Heathcote – renovated

One of my third great grandfathers, Philip Chauncy (1816 – 1880), was educated as a surveyor.

In 1839 he emigrated from England to South Australia. Two years later he married Charlotte Kemmis, a fellow emigrant, and moved to Western Australia to take up a government appointment as assistant surveyor. Charlotte died in 1847.

In 1848 Chauncy remarried, to Susan Mitchell, second daughter of the Reverend William Mitchell, a chaplain of the Colonial Church Society in Western Australia.

Philip Chauncy 1878

Susan Chauncy nee Mitchell

In June 1853 the family, which then included three young children, left Western Australia for Victoria. On their arrival in Melbourne the Chauncys stayed with Philip’s brother William in Sandridge, now known as Port Melbourne. Within a month Philip bought a small cottage and allotment in the suburb of Prahran “at a very high price”, took an office in the city, engaged a clerk, and went into business as a land surveyor and commission agent. This venture was unsuccessful, however, and he “soon discovered the only thing I could do well was spend money”.

Rescue came soon in the form of an offer of appointment as Surveyor-in-Charge of the McIvor district, present-day Heathcote. This he accepted in August 1853. His yearly salary was was £400, the equivalent of several hundred thousand Australian dollars today, with an additional £200 annually for travelling expenses and equipment, rations for himself and five men, forage for one horse, and firewood.

In “Memoirs of Mrs Chauncy”, a biography of his wife Susan which Chauncy wrote in his retirement, he describes their 72 mile journey from Melbourne to Heathcote. It took ten days, nine of them rainy. The axle of their wagon broke, they became bogged, they were robbed, and their servant abandoned them.

At that time the McIvor diggings had about three thousand diggers and storekeepers. The Commissioner’s camp housed some 150 Government employees, all living under canvas. Philip, fortunately, had brought four tents of his own.

Philip laid out the town of Heathcote, and conducted other surveys in the district, notably a survey of the Murray River settlement which became the town at Echuca. His office was also responsible for land sales in the district. Chauncy’s staff included four assistant surveyors and their subordinates.

Living and working under canvas was uncomfortable and Philip wrote often to the Government authorities in Melbourne asking to be provided with better accommodation. He recorded in his diary that on Christmas Day 1854 the temperature in his tent was 114 degrees Fahrenheit (45°C).

The Government provided £1546 (roughly $AUS 1.5 million today) towards the construction of a stone building on the main street in the centre of Heathcote. This was to serve as the Survey Office, with living quarters for Chauncy and his family. The Chauncys lived in the Government camp for over a year; their new house was completed in February 1855. It was the Chauncey’s home for five and a half years. Philip made a garden with vines and fruit trees. This was extended into an adjoining block he purchased in 1854 (now occupied by a house at 49 Wright Street).

1857 sketch of the Survey Office, Heathcote, by Philip Chauncy. The children playing are Therese born 1849 and William born 1853. Image retrieved from the Public Record Office Victoria VPRS 14517/P0001/25, K493

Philip also bought land in the district, including a farm six miles from Heathcote, which he name Datchet after his birthplace in Buckinghamshire. As well, he built a brick house, ‘Myrtle Cottage’, in Heathcote’s High Street (probably at about 152 High Street, since demolished).

From a map of Heathcote township drawn by Philip Chauncy in 1853 showing the survey office (red *) and blocks of land bought by Philip Chauncy (blue *)
Note the spelling of present-day Chauncey Street is Chauncy Street on this map
Public Record Office Victoria VPRS 8168/P0002, DIST65; HEATHCOTE TOWNSHIP; CHAUNCY P

In 1860 Philip was transferred to the Dunolly Survey District, sixty miles west of Heathcote. He moved there in 1861.

The Survey office and Chauncy residence (where my great great grandmother Annie Frances (1857 – 1883) was born) still stands. When I first saw it on a visit to Heathcote in 2007 it was very run down.

Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office in 2007 viewed from Chauncey Street

Renovations in progress on the Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office in March 2020

The restored former Heathcote Government Surveyor’s Office in March 2022

Extensive renovation since then has considerably restored its colonial mid-Victorian character and charm. It now operates as a fine restaurant, named Chauncy.

Related posts

• E is for emigration
• Charlotte Kemmis (1816-1847); first wife of Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy
• Remembering Susan Augusta Chauncy née Mitchell (1828-1867)
• 1854 : The Chauncy family at Heathcote
• H is for heartbreak in Heathcote
• Heathcote revisited
• D is for drama in Dunolly
• Provenance of a photograph of Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy

Further reading:

• Chauncy, Philip Lamothe Snell Memoirs of Mrs. Poole and Mrs. Chauncy. Lowden Publishing Co, Kilmore, 1976.
• Conservation management plan 2011 for the Former Survey Office, 178 High Street, Heathcote, https://www.vgls.vic.gov.au/client/en_AU/search/asset/1147925 The documentation and the photos of the state of the building before restoration highlight the enormous work done by Ron and Elva Laughton in bringing the building back to life
• Chauncy restaurant: website
  • Breheny, Emma. “Chauncy Brings Euro Poise to 16-seater in Historic Heathcote.” Good Food, 21 Jan. 2022, www.goodfood.com.au/eat-out/just-open/chauncy-brings-european-poise-to-16seater-in-historic-heathcote-20220120
  • Cody, Gemima. “Proof in Cheesy Puff: Chauncy is a Story You Have to Love.” Good Food, 22 Feb. 2022, www.goodfood.com.au/chauncy-heathcote/chauncy-heathcote-review-20220221

Wikitree: Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816 – 1880)

F is for Finniss Point

In 1856 in West Tamar, Tasmania, one of my fourth great aunts Theresa Walker nee Chauncy (1807 – 1876) married George Herbert Poole. He had been a teacher in the Royal College of the British Indian Ocean possession of Mauritius; she was an artist and sculptor.

Theresa self-portrait in cast wax, about 1860. In the collection of the National Gallery of Australia.

In a memoir of Mrs Poole, Theresa’s brother Philip Chauncy wrote:

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 New Jerusalem Church] 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.

From the Hobart Colonial Times of 19 September 1856:

MARRIED. On the 15th instant, at the Manse, West Tamar, by the Rev. James Garrett, GEORGE HERBERT POOLE, Esq., late professor in the Royal College, Mauritius, to THERESA SUSANNA, widow of the late John Walker, Esq., Lieutenant, R.N.

It appears that Poole may have had a connection with Truro, in Cornwall, for a notice in the Cornish West Briton on 16 January 1857 states he had resided there:

At the Manse, West Tamar, Australia, of the 15th of September last, Mr. George Herbert POOLE, formerly of Truro, to Theresa Susana, widow of the late John WALKER, Lieutenant, R.N.

Following their marriage the Pooles began a farm in Tasmania, bought, her brother notes, “with Theresa’s money”. Two years later they sold the farm and moved to Victoria, where George, with no great success, tried gold mining. In 1861 the Pooles became partners in a vineyard near Barnawartha on the Murray near Albury. Among others in this arrangement was Theresa’s half-brother William Chauncy (1820-1878), who at that time lived in Wodonga. George Poole “was supposed to be a thorough vigneron, as well as a connoisseur of the best methods of tobacco growing.” (Although in 1843 Mr G.H. Poole wrote about the cultivation of the vine for the South Australian Register, unfortunately Poole was accused of plagiarising this piece. The Geelong Advertiser reported Poole had 20 years experience of growing vines in southern Europe but I am not sure this fits with the facts of his life.)

Poole was appointed local manager of the vineyard.

The scheme was successful for a couple of years but in 1864 it collapsed. George Poole returned to Mauritius in November and Theresa followed in April 1865.

Port Louis, Mauritius.
This scene was recorded by the British naturalist Charles Darwin, who visited this island in April and May 1836 during the five years of the second survey voyage of HMS Beagle.

In late 1866 both husband and wife became ill with an epidemic fever. They shifted to India, then 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 Finniss Point near Riverton, about sixty miles (80km) north of Adelaide. In 1869 he became ill and died.

From the Adelaide Evening Journal 2 August 1869:

Deaths: POOLE.—On the 29th July, at Finniss Point, near Kapunda, George Herbert Poole, Esq., aged 63 years.

From The South Australian Advertiser 7 August 1869:

The remains of Mr. George Herbert Poole, licensed teacher of Finniss Point, were interred in the Riverton Church burial-ground on Saturday, the 31st ult. The deceased gentleman had been ailing for some time past, but suffered severely during the last month of his earthly pilgrimage from disease of the liver.

Finniss Point, also known as Finnis Point, is a few miles south of Riverton. The settlement no longer exists.

Finnis Point is about 10 km south of Riverton and about 85 km north of Adelaide. From Google Maps.

Finnis Point Road in 2008 from Google Street View

Related posts

• T is for Theresa

Wikitree:

• Theresa Susannah Snell (Chauncy) Poole (1807 – 1876)
• George Herbert Poole (abt. 1806 – 1869)

S is for William Snell

When I planned this series of posts about my Irish forebears I had in mind S for Snell, my 6th great-grandfather William Snell, born Ballymoney, County Antrim, the son of William Snell of Coleraine, County Londonderry.

Ballymoney and Coleraine are in the north of Ireland

S for Scanty might have been better. I didn’t expect to find so few documented facts about him. But that’s genealogy, I suppose: sometimes we’re overwhelmed by information, sometimes there’s almost nothing.

The source for William Snell’s place of birth – and his father’s name – is Stephen Isaacson Tucker (1884), ‘Pedigree of the family of Chauncy’, privately printed, with additions, p. 25. (This can be read at Google Books.) I have been unable to locate any other records of my Snell family in Ireland.

from page 25 of Tucker’s Chauncy pedigree

Sometime during or before 1749, William Snell moved to London, and from this point his story is comparatively well-documented. On 12 December that year he married Martha Chauncy, at St Margaret Lothbury, in the City. They had three sons: William, Charles, and Nathaniel.  Martha died in 1765. On 8 November 1766, William married a second time, to Mary Snell, daughter of Reverend Vyner Snell, at St George’s Bloomsbury. William and Mary had a son John.

In his London years William Snell made a career as a merchant and slaver in the West India trade. He died in 1779 aged 59.

William had been left property in Liffey Street Dublin by his uncle Robert Shaw. This he passed on to his own son William.

While his later career is interesting, it has been frustrating not to be able to find a William Snell associated with Coleraine, County Londonderry, nor a marriage of a William Snell to the sister of Robert Shaw, and although I have found some deeds from the right period mentioning Robert Shaw of Dublin I cannot confirm that this Robert Shaw was William Snell’s uncle.

Wikitree: William Snell (abt. 1720 – 1779)

F is for Fire following Plague

Earlier this year we were forced to flee from a catastrophic bushfire on the Australian east coast. It burnt out an area the size of England. Now, just a few months later, we’re self-quarantined against the COVID-19 plague, at home with the doors shut, permitted out only to buy food.

We Antipodeans, of course, got it the wrong way around. London had its plague first, from 1665, then its fire, in 1666. Whatever the order of events, of course, catastrophes are no fun for anybody.

In a year and half, the Great Plague of London – a rapid-spreading bacterial infection, rather than a virus – killed nearly 100,000 people, a quarter of the city’s population.

As it spread, a system of quarantine was introduced. A house where someone had died from plague would be locked, with no one allowed to enter or leave for 40 days. A plague house was marked with a red cross on the door and the words “Lord have mercy upon us”, and a watchman stood guard in the street.

Nine images of the Great Plague of London in 1665 from The great plague in London in 1665 by Walter George Bell From the Wellcome Trust CC-BY-4.0,  retrieved through Wikimedia Commons 

 

I have an ancestor who was a doctor at the time, probably a plague doctor. This was Ichabod Chauncy (abt 1635 – 1691), one of my 8th great grandfathers. Like his father, Ichabod Chauncy was a clergyman, but in 1662 he was forced to leave the clergy, one of some 2,000 Puritan ministers forced out for what were deemed to be their unorthodox beliefs. He took up the profession of medicine instead, and in 1666 he was admitted to the College of Physicians. It seems very probable that Ichabod Chauncy treated victims of the plague and wore the plague-doctors’ beak-like mask filled with aromatic herbs designed to protect the wearer from putrid air, which according to the miasmatic theory of disease was the cause of infection.

1661 Medical costume for the plague:  illustration opposite page 142 from Thomas Bartholin (1661). Thomae Bartholini Historiarum anatomicarum [et] medicarum rariorum centuria V. [et] VI. Accessit Joannis Rhodii Mantissa anatomica. Typis Henrici Gödiani. p 142.

 

Then came the fire, a huge conflagration which burned for four days in September 1666, completely destroying the medieval City of London inside the old Roman city wall. The homes of 70,000 people, more than three-quarters of the population of the city, were burnt to ashes. There were officially only six deaths; many went unrecorded.

Great Fire of London by an unknown artist about 1675 retrieved from Wikimedia Commons. “This painting shows the great fire of London as seen from a boat in vicinity of Tower Wharf. The painting depicts Old London Bridge, various houses, a drawbridge and wooden parapet, the churches of St Dunstan-in-the-West and St Bride’s, All Hallow’s the Great, Old St Paul’s, St Magnus the Martyr, St Lawrence Pountney, St Mary-le-Bow, St Dunstan-in-the East and Tower of London. The painting is in the [style] of the Dutch School and is not dated or signed.”

After the fire, London was rebuilt on essentially the same street plan. About three-fifths of the City of London had been destroyed: 13,200 houses, most great public buildings, St Paul’s Cathedral and 87 parish churches. Rebuilding housing took until the 1670s. Public buildings took longer, with St Paul’s finished only in 1711. This program had a modernising effect, for the city was now less dense, with only 9,000 houses rebuilt and not all churches and public buildings replaced.

Map of central London in 1666, showing landmarks related to the Great Fire of London. Drawn by Wikipedia user Bunchofgrapes and retrieved from Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA 3.0)

 

It is interesting that despite being separated from the events in London by 355 years and half way around the globe, we are experiencing similar catastrophes and coping along the same lines.

E is for emigration

In June 1839, at the age of twenty-three, Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816 – 1880), one of my 3rd great grandfathers, sailed from London for Adelaide in South Australia on the “Dumfries“, arriving in October 1839. On the passage Philip made the acquaintance of  Charlotte Kemmis (1816 – 1847). They married two years later, in 1841. Neither Philip nor his wife ever returned to England.

The “Dumfries” From an original watercolour by John Ford F.A.S.M.A. 2004 and reproduced with permission. The “Dumfries” was a barque, sometimes spelled bark, a square-rigged ship with the aft (mizzen) mast rigged fore-and-aft. Barques were easier to handle than fully square-rigged ships and so required a smaller crew. At some points of sail they were almost as fast. However, John Ford has let me know that according to his records the “Dumfries” was shipped rigged not a barque.

Late in life Philip Chauncy wrote a memoir including a description of his departure from London. A copy of the manuscript is deposited in the State Library of Victoria. Below are images of some of the pages.

On 14 June Philip did some sightseeing around London, visited the famous Tower, then went aboard the “Dumfries” moored immediately downstream of it at St Katherine’s Dock. There he shared a bottle of wine with his father, a brother and two of his sisters to celebrate his coming departure.

from page 75 of London Volume III: Knight, Charles, 1791-1873, (editor), London Volume III . London Charles Knight & Company, 1842. Retrieved from archive.org

St Katherine’s Docks marked with an x is just downstream of the Tower of London and the Tower Bridge.

On 15 June Philip went to the zoo, and later he visited his various Snell and Chauncy relatives. He spent 17 and 18 June packing and getting his goods on board. On 19 June he visited his father at his home in Clapham. On 20 June he slept on board, where he had, he said, a bad bilious attack. He went ashore again the next day, his 23rd birthday, and dined with his family. They later came on board with him and bid him farewell.

The “Dumfries” set sail on 22 June at 5.45 pm and drifted 30 miles down the Thames to the Nore, a sandbank at the mouth of the Thames, where they anchored near the lightship.

Philip, of course, was sorry to be leaving his family. But he was joining his two sisters, Martha and Theresa, who had already emigrated and he believed his father would follow him out to Australia shortly. Everybody except for his sister Eunice did indeed emigrate as he had hoped. On the whole it appears that Philip left England without regret, looking forward to a new life in a new country.

On 23 June the “Dumfries” sailed from the Nore and anchored off the North Foreland, a chalk headland on the Kent coast. Philip wrote to his father and amused himself by fishing.

1848 chart showing the position of the Downs off the coast of Kent. (depths are in fathoms). From Admiralty Chart No 1895 England south coast sheet 7 Dungeness to the Thames including Dover Strait, Published 1848. Retrieved from Wikimedia Commons.

Vessels in the Downs Sketch in a book entitled ‘The Marine sketch book by H. Moses 1826‘. Retrieved from Wikimedia Commons.

On 25 June they anchored in the Downs off the Kent coast. The next morning Philip and six fellow cabin passengers went ashore a mile below Deal. They walked through the town, made some purchases, and returned on board with a cat.

From that time Philip began to keep a proper sea journal in a log book he bought for the purpose. He also started to read the two volumes of Major Mitchell’s recently been published “Three Expeditions Into the Interior of Eastern Australia“.

The ship “Dumfries” had been built quite recently. This was her second or third voyage. Philip notes that there were 16 cabin passengers including 3 children, 29 adults and 15 children in the intermediate class, 23 in steerage. There were 22 in the ship’s company, a total of 105 persons on board. (An Airbus A380 can carry 868 passengers.) Philip took a cabin with Henry Kemmis, his future brother-in-law, and they each paid 70 pounds. A school teacher’s annual salary was then about 80 pounds. An air ticket from London to Adelaide is for most people less than a weeks wage, and even a first class fare is a fraction of the annual salary of a school teacher.

The wind had been blowing a gale from the west. It finally moderated and veered to the east and at 3pm on 26 June they sailed from the Downs, tacking between Beachey Head and the coast of France. The “Dumfries” finally cleared the Channel on 1 July. During the stormy weather most of the passengers, including Philip, were seasick.

Map showing the places on the journey of the “Dumfries” as it left London. The ship sailed from St Katherine’s Dock on 22 June 1839 and anchored at the Nore sandbank. On 23 June they anchored off the North Foreland. On 25 June they sailed to near Deal and on 26 June Philip and some of his fellow passengers went ashore. In the afternoon of 26 June they sailed from the Downs near deal and it took them til 1 July to clear the channel tacking between Beachey Head and the coast of France.

The “Dumfries” arrived in Port Adelaide on Sunday October 11, 3 months 10 days after clearing the Channel on 1 July and 3 months 19 days after leaving London.

On page 91 of the memoir Philip wrote he was persuaded by his brother William to take out as a servant a man named Lowerburgh (or similar, MS unclear) and his wife and daughter. Philip wrote, “William had known them at Ascot, I did not want them but this was a cheap way for them to emigrate under the Commisr’s regulations.” I assume that the Lowerburgh’s are among the unnamed 27 in steerage mentioned in the South Australian Register‘s report of the arrival of the “Dumfries” on 19 October 1839. However, I have found no trace of them in South Australia under that surname or variants of it.

In later life Philip Chauncy expressed no regret about leaving England. He had made sure to do some sightseeing of London before emigration. He was consoled by the fact that his family intended to emigrate too (and that intention was indeed mostly fulfilled).

Below are pages from Philip Chauncy’s memoir concerning his departure from London, retrieved from the State Library of Victoria.

Source

State Library of Victoria: Chauncy, P. Papers 1839-1878, [manuscript]. http://search.slv.vic.gov.au/permalink/f/1ojgog/SLV_VOYAGER1634281

Related posts

• Charlotte Kemmis (1816-1847); first wife of Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy
• X is for excess exiting England
• P is for phthisis (tuberculosis) concerning the emigration of the Plaisted family:Sally Plaisted (1826 – 1900), one of my 3rd great grandmothers, left London on 27 November 1849 on the barque “Rajah“. Sally, twenty-three, was travelling with her parents John Plaisted (1800 – 1858) who was ill with tuberculosis, and Ann Plaisted née Green (1801 – 1882). With her were her five brothers and Ann Plaisted’s sister Abigail Green (1797 – 1880). The family arrived in Adelaide South Australia in April 1850. Sally never returned to England.
• Constantine Pulteney Trent Champion de Crespigny (1851 – 1883), one of my 3rd great uncles, joined his parents and siblings in Australia. On 17 August 1875 he sailed from London on the iron clipper ship “Melbourne“, her maiden voyage. He arrived in Melbourne on 16 November 1875, twenty-five years since he had seen them. Con returned to England shortly before his death from tuberculosis.
• T is for Theresa : one of Philip Chauncy’s sisters who had emigrated to South Australia with her sister Martha in 1836 arriving 1837.
• Martha Berkeley : The first dinner given to the Aborigines 1838 (Adelaide)

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

A Colonial Dinner

This week’s Sepia Saturday prompt photograph has men sitting at long tables for a formal dinner. This reminded me of a painting by my fourth great aunt, Martha Berkeley née Chauncy (1813 – 1899), sister of Philip Chauncy (1816 – 1880), my third great grandfather.

Martha arrived in Adelaide South Australia in February 1837 on the John Renwick with her husband and her unmarried sister Theresa (1807 – 1876). They landed just six weeks after the Proclamation of the Province on 28 December 1836 when, by Vice-regal proclamation, South Australia was established as a British province

Martha was an artist. Several of her works are held by the Art Gallery of South Australia. One of the more notable is a watercolour of The first dinner given to the Aborigines 1838.

Berkeley Martha, The first dinner given to the Aborigines 1838, Art Gallery of South Australia

A notice appeared in the South Australian Gazette and Colonial Register on October 27 announcing a conference with the Aborigines of the Province with a dinner to be given to them.

Advertising. (1838, October 27). South Australian Gazette and Colonial Register (Adelaide, SA : 1836 – 1839), p. 1. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article31750198

Martha’s watercolour was:

Her major work … a large watercolour, The First Dinner Given to the Aborigines (AGSA), depicting the three Adelaide tribes being entertained by Governor Gawler on 1 November 1838. The Aborigines sit awaiting the distribution of biscuits, meat, tea and blankets, while their three chiefs, dressed in new jackets provided by the settlers, stand together at the inner edge of the circle surrounding the Governor, the Protector of Aborigines and their wives. Behind the Aborigines is a standing ring of settlers, which includes obvious portraits. Berkeley added a pencil description of the event on the back of the painting in 1847, which confirms her aim of recording an important historical event for posterity. (Kerr, Joan. “Martha Maria Snell Berkeley.” Design & Art Australia Online. Design & Art Australia Online retrieved from http://www.daao.org.au/bio/martha-maria-snell-berkeley/biography/ )

This description aligns with a newspaper account of the event in the Southern Australian of 3 November 1838.

THE ABORIGINES.—On Thursday last, in pursuance of an advertisement issued by the Governor, a dinner was given to the natives, and the occasion excited much interest in the town. Soon after the hour appointed for the assembling, a vast concourse of the inhabitants had collected on the ground, and were enjoying the fineness of the weather in promenading for upwards of two hours before the ceremonies commenced.

About two o’clock a band of about 160 natives were assembled, and their appearance was certainly highly pleasing and orderly ; their huzzas would have done great credit to the lungs and voices of English-men, and their general, demeanour upon the occasion was very orderly. The native men were dressed in gaudy coloured cottons and the women had new blankets and rugs; and the tout ensemble of the group had a very striking effect.

Soon after they arrived, His Excellency said a few words, which were translated by Mr. WYATT, expressive of his desire that they should imitate the good qualities of the whites, learn to fear and love God, learn English, cease from quarrels with each other, and pay respect to the property of the whites.— Whether they understood what was said, we know not, but the vacant stare and senseless faces of many evidently bespoke utter ignorance of the meaning of His Excellency.

Immediately after, they squatted on the ground in a series of groups, and were regaled with roast beef, biscuit, rice, and sugar water, and if we may judge of their enjoyment of their repast by the quantity consumed, we should say they certainly did enjoy it. Trials of throwing the spear followed, and at a late hour in the afternoon the company dispersed. The Governor had very politely provided a luncheon on the ground, for the ladies and gentlemen visitors, which was also rather numerously attended, but whether with the same effect we have not the means of ascertaining ; however, every one appeared highly to enjoy the holiday.

Of the usefulness of this ceremony we have some doubts, but we trust it may be productive of good. To some part of it we most decidedly object—that was, rewarding and cheering those who could throw the spear with the greatest accuracy. An hour before, the Governor had told them to respect the white man’s property, and not to spear his sheep and his cattle, and immediately afterwards they were regaled with fine fresh beef, and exercised in the art of throwing the spear! Surely we should induce them to abandon a practice so dangerous to the peace of the colony, and the very source of all broils, and not encourage them in perpetuating their knowledge of such an art.

In May 1838 there had been another dinner of about 200 ladies and gentlemen assembled to farewell Governor George Gawler who was leaving London for South Australia. In Gawler’s speech he spoke of the Aborigines:

There is one interesting circumstance connected with the colony on which I can –
not help remarking; it is with regard to the aborigines. A great many here perhaps are acquainted with a report of parliament on the subject of the aborigines, in which it appears that colonization has been almost every where (I believe there is not an exception save South Australia) either the cause of the destruction or demoralization of the aborigines. I hope South Australia will continue to be an exception to that rule, and I hope I shall never forget towards the aborigines of South Australia, what I never forget to any other men, that as children of one common parent, they are “bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh.” I never yet heard of a man so wild that judicious Kindness did not in some degree succeed in taming, and I hope that this particular case will not prove an exception. (DINNER TO GOVERNOR GAWLER AND THE SOUTH AUSTRALIAN COLONIZATION COMMISSIONERS. (1838, May 9). South Australian Record (SA : 1837 – 1840), p. 5. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article245932046 )

Gawler arrived in South Australia on 12 October 1838 after a four month journey. One of his early gestures as a Governor was the Dinner for the Aborigines. It is a great pity that colonisation in South Australia did not become the exception but also led to the destruction and demoralisation of the South Australian Aboriginal people.

Provenance of a photograph of Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy

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

The photograph above, “Philip_Chauncy 1878”, first shared by me on 27 March 2012 on my online public tree at Ancestry.com, has been saved and added by at least 13 people to their public Ancestry trees.

Yesterday someone asked me how I knew the subject was really Philip Chauncy, an excellent question. To able to substantiate your facts is the foundation of every sort of history.

Over twenty years ago, before Greg and I moved from Canberra to Ballarat, we spent an evening with one of my third cousins once removed, like me a descendant of Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816 – 1880), my 3rd great grandfather. My cousin and his wife very generously shared the results of their family history research with me, including a copy of “Philip_Chauncy 1878”, which I remember they said came from the Anglican Cathedral in Ballarat.

Philip Chauncy was appointed Registrar of the diocese of Ballarat in August 1878. He had lost his position as Government surveyor in January 1878 when around 400 public servants were sacked by the Victorian Government. He resigned as Registrar in late 1879 and died the following April. He had held the Registrar’s position for just over a year. The Church of England Messenger and Ecclesiastical Gazette for the Diocese of  Melbourne and Ballarat published an obituary on 7 June 1880.

THE LATE MR. PHILIP CHAUNCY. (1880, June 7). The Church of England Messenger and Ecclesiastical Gazette for the Diocese of Melbourne and Ballarat (Vic. : 1876 – 1889), p. 6. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article197135316

Three years ago Greg and I went to the Anglican Cathedral in Ballarat in search of “Philip_Chauncy 1878”, naturally expecting to have to make an appointment to view the archives. To our surprise the gentleman who met us at the door was able to take us directly to the photograph, which was hanging on the wall close to the entrance of the Diocesan offices. The photograph was captioned “Philip Chauncy Esq. Registrar of the Diocese 1878”, and signed “Richards & Co Ballarat”. It was indeed the image passed on to me by my cousin.

Anglican Diocese of Ballarat: Cathedral and Diocesan Offices Lydiard Street September 2016

Portrait of Philip Chauncy hanging in the Diocesan Offices of the Anglican Diocese of Ballarat in September 2016

It is one of only two photographs of Philip Chauncy that I have come across, the other being a family portrait taken shortly after the death of Philip’s wife Susan in 1867.

Philip Chauncy and children shortly after the death of Philip’s wife Susan Chauncy nee Mitchell in 1867. From left to right Auschar Philip (1855–1890), Amy Blanche (1861–1925), Theresa Snell (1849–1886), Frederick Philip Lamothe (1863–1926), Philip (1816 – 1880), on Philip’s lap Clement Henry (1865–1902), William Snell (1853–1903), Constance (1859–1907), Annie Frances (1857–1883)

Sources

• Notes. (1878, September 13). The Church of England Messenger and Ecclesiastical Gazette for the Diocese of Melbourne and Ballarat (Vic. : 1876 – 1889), p. 6. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article197135877
• MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1878. (1878, September 16). The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 – 1957), p. 4. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article5948571
• Advertising (1879, December 2). The Church of England Messenger and Ecclesiastical Gazette for the Diocese of Melbourne and Ballarat (Vic. : 1876 – 1889), p. 10. Retrieved September 6, 2019, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article197136149http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article197136149
• THE LATE MR. PHILIP CHAUNCY. (1880, June 7). The Church of England Messenger and Ecclesiastical Gazette for the Diocese of Melbourne and Ballarat (Vic. : 1876 – 1889), p. 6. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article197135316
• Photographs taken by Anne Young 15 September 2016.

 

Z is for zealot

My ninth great grandfather Charles Chauncy (1592-1672) was a non-conformist Divine, at one time imprisoned for his views by Archbishop Laud, who emigrated to America and later became a long-serving President of Harvard College.

Harvard president Charles Chauncy

In “Highways and Byways in Hertfordshire” (1902), H. W. Tompkins mentions Charles Chauncy in connection with Ardeley Bury:

To mention Ardeley, or to think of Ardeley Bury, is to call to mind the Chauncys, a good Hertfordshire family, whose talents were exercised in several spheres of usefulness. First, though not foremost from the standpoint of literary or historic importance, was old Charles, somewhat renowned in his day as a Nonconformist divine. Where he was born I am unable to say ; he was baptised in the church here on 5th November, 1592. He was an indefatigable reader and student, and was eminent as an oriental and classical scholar. For some time he gave the benefit of his learning to the townsmen of Ware ; but managed to fall foul of Archbishop Laud, as so many pastors did, and was summoned to appear before the High Commission Court on two occasions. I believe the precise nature of his misdemeanours, theological or political, is known to the learned, with whom I leave them. However trivial we might deem them now, they were heinous offences in the eyes of Laud, and Charles Chauncy was deprived of his living and placed in prison. I am sorry to remember that he was but a weak-kneed brother, and presently, finding that to him, at least, stone walls did make a prison, he submitted in the most abject manner before the mitred bigot. For this humiliation he never forgave himself. In 1637 he landed at Plymouth in New England, where he became for a short time an assistant pastor, going from thence to a town called Scituate. There he preached for several years, and then, the Puritans having triumphed over their enemies, the men of Ware besought their pastor to return. But his work now lay elsewhere. He was almost on the point of embarking for England when he was invited to become President of Harvard College — a position for which he was eminently qualified — and in November, 1654, he was installed as the second President of that now famous institution. At Harvard he laboured for the rest of his life, and dying there in 1672, was buried at New Cambridge. He was a rare and racy preacher of the old sort, whose mouth uttered quaint sayings in abundance, and who kept tongue and pen alike busy. The Plain Doctrine of the Justification of a Sinner in the Sight of God, was one of his productions — doubtless a pithy, profitable, and long discourse, which probably no man or woman now in Hertfordshire has ever read, and which rests in a few libraries in a repose almost as deep as the bones of its author.

Charles Chauncy graduated from Cambridge in 1613, and became a fellow of his college, Trinity College, and professor of Hebrew and Greek. In 1627 he was appointed Vicar of Ware, Hertfordshire, and from 1633 to 1637 vicar at Marston St Lawrence, Northamptonshire.

Chauncy had Puritanical opinions that placed him in opposition to the church hierarchy, including its most senior member, the Archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud. He asserted in a sermon that “idolatry was admitted into the church” and he opposed, as a “snare to men’s consciences” placing a barrier – the altar rail – around the communion table. He was suspended by Archbishop Laud for refusing to perform his duty to read from the pulpit the “Book of Sports”, which set out permissible Sunday recreations. He was brought before the Court of High Commission in 1629 and again in 1634. In 1634 he was imprisoned. He made a formal recantation in 1637 which – it is said – he later regretted.

In 1638 Charles Chauncy emigrated to America. From 1638 to 1641 he was an associate pastor at Plymouth, Massachusetts. However, the Plymouth church community was dissatisfied with Chauncy’s advocacy of baptism of infants by immersion. From 1641 to 1654 he served as pastor at Scituate, Massachusetts. From 1654 until his death in 1672 he was President of Harvard College.

Charles Chauncy and his wife Catherine Chauncy nee Eyre (1604 – 1667) had six sons and at least two daughters. All six sons were said to have been “bred to the ministry and graduates of Harvard”. I have previously written about Ichabod, their third child and second son.

I think Charles Chauncy is close to the definition of a zealot: a person who has very strong opinions about something, and tries to make other people have them too. Chauncy only seemed to compromise reluctantly.

Related post

I is for Ichabod

Source

• Tompkins, Herbert W (1902). Highways and byways in Hertfordshire. Macmillan, London ; New York viewed through archive.org https://archive.org/details/highwaysandbywa03griggoog/page/n10

A natural conclusion

In a memoir of his sister Theresa Poole formerly Walker nee Chauncy (1807 – 1876), Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816 – 1880), who was my third great grandfather, wrote:

[Her grandfather] William Snell Chauncy was the proprietor of the Winkfield Estate in Berkshire, where he resided for many years ; he was also possessed of slave estates in Antigua and St. Kitts, in the West Indies, of house property in Sackville Street, Dublin, and of considerable funded property.

Her father was his only son, born in London, on the 14th August, 1781, and died at Leamington on 1st August, 1845.

In giving this information, however, Philip Chauncy neglects to mention that his and Therese’s father was illegitimate, the natural son of William Snell-Chauncy (1756-1829).

Here was the explanation for something that had puzzled me: why had published pedigrees of my Chauncey forebears failed to include Philip Chauncy’s father William (1781-1845)?

On 14 August 1781 William Brown, the son of Eunice Brown and William Snell-Chauncy, was born in London.

Eunice (1753 – 1836) was the daughter of Captain Robert Brown (1713 – 1769) and his wife Margaret Brown nee Cosnahan (1718 – 1769). The Brown family was from the Isle of Man. Eunice was the seventh of nine children. William Brown was brought up on the Isle of Man by his mother’s family, with financial support from his father.

On 6 June 1783 William Snell-Chauncy married Sarah Toulmin (1757 – 1834). William and Sarah had two daughters, Sarah (1786 – 1841) and Catharine (1788 – 1858). William Snell-Chauncy and his wife Sarah separated in 1789. The Deed of Separation, issued in 1789, stipulated that William should not have the management of his two daughters.

Philip Chauncy’s father, William, married Rose Therese Lamothe on 5 May 1804 at Malew on the Isle of Man. Marriage records give his name as William Snell Chauncy; it appears William had adopted his father’s name. William’s children were all known by the surname Chauncy.

Philip wrote that his sister Theresa was “sent on a visit to my grandfather at Wingfield, where she rendered 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 think Theresa must have been at Wingfield for several years”. This would have been in the late 1820s.

William Snell-Chauncy died in 1829. In his will he named his son as William Brown, later referring to his “natural son William Brown”. The children of William Brown were also provided for, as was Eunice Brown, William’s mother. Only after providing for the Browns does William’s will turn to his daughters Sarah and Catharine. He made no provision for his wife Sarah, stating he had provided for her in his lifetime.

In 1831 William Snell-Chauncy’s daughter Mrs Catherine Snell Burke challenged the legal validity of the will and its codicil on the grounds of insanity of the testator. One of the executors was a man called Robert Westwood; the case was named ‘Westwood against Burke and Others’. The challenge was put forward in June 1831 and the case came to court in November and December 1831. The bulk of William Snell-Chauncy’s estate of £25,000 had been left to his natural son.

Martha and Theresa Brown [sic], Philip Chauncy’s sisters, were noted as having lived with the deceased, their grandfather. The court heard evidence alleging that William Snell-Chauncy’s behaviour had been childish, that he was a habitual drunkard, and that he had conducted himself in an insane and irrational manner. It was also alleged that the signature on the will was not in his hand-writing. The counter allegations were that the deceased, though eccentric, was not of unsound mind; he had conducted his own affairs, had received and paid money, played at cards, spoke French; that he was charitable and benevolent; and that he entertained great regard for his natural son and his family.

On 19 December 1831 The Times reported the proceedings of the Prerogative Court for December 17. The King’s Advocate on behalf of the executors observed that the party opposing the will was really Captain Burke on behalf of his wife and her unmarried sister and that Captain Burke’s difficulty with the will was not that the testator was incapable of making a will but only a will more in favour of the legitimate children. The King’s Advocate noted that previous wills made by William Snell-Chauncy in 1799, 1816 and 1820 had all provided for his natural son. Given that the 1789 deed of separation from his wife had stipulated he should not have the management of his two daughters, it followed that there was less intimacy with his legitimate family. But he had had constant interaction with his natural son and his family.

Dr Lushington on behalf of Captain Burke stated that in the course of evidence there were “charges brought against the Misses Brown [Theresa and Martha Chauncy] [which] were not a substantial part of the case, but solely with the view of discrediting the testimony of a witness.”

Portrait of Sir John Nicholl (1759-1838), Welsh politician and judge. Artist William Owen Collections of St John’s College, University of Oxford Retrieved from https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/sir-john-nicholl-223355

The Times of 5 January 1832 reported the decision of Sir John Nicholl, judge of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury. More than 50 witnesses had been examined and there were depositions from more than 100 witnesses. There was a larger body of evidence on the case than in any case of the records of the Court. Nicholl found that no act of insanity had been proved and that the whole conduct and history of the testator naturally led to the conclusion of the probability of the dispositions in the will. The judge

“referred particularly to the charges alleged against the Misses Brown, in an interrogatory address to a witness named Gould, and which he had positively denied. Where, he asked, was the necessity of attacking the character of these two young women? It was an act of justice to them that the Court should declare thus publicly, that the character of these young women had been attacked without any just cause, and that the single witness by whom the charge had been attempted to be supported, was unworthy of any sort of credit whatever.”

Mr and Mrs Burke were condemned to all costs as it was deemed unfair that the estate should bear any of the costs.

From the judge’s summing up it appears that Martha had most certainly earned the comment from her brother that “…she rendered 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”.

Sources

• Philip Lamothe Snell Chauncy (1816 – 1880) wrote a memoir of his sister Mrs Poole, Theresa Poole formerly Walker nee Chauncy (1807 – 1876). It was first published in 1873 as Memoir of the late Mrs G.H. Poole by her brother. It was republished in 1976 together with a memoir of Philip’s second wife as Memoirs of Mrs. Poole and Mrs. Chauncy.
• Tucker, Stephen, 1835-1887. Pedigree of the Family of Chauncy. Special private reprint, with additions. London: Mitchell and Hughes, 1884. Viewed online at https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=wu.89062913470 [see printed page 10]
• Will of William Snell Chauncy Esquire probated 26 March 1832 PCC  Class: PROB 11; Piece: 1795
• “Prerogative Court, Tuesday, Nov. 15.” Times [London, England] 16 Nov. 1831: 4. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 30 Sept. 2018.
• “Prerogative Court, Saturday, Dec. 17.” Times [London, England] 19 Dec. 1831: 7. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 30 Sept. 2018.
• “Prerogative Court, Wednesday, Jan. 4.” Times [London, England] 5 Jan. 1832: 4. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 30 Sept. 2018.

Related links

• The Gazette (London Gazette) Publication date: 12 December 1780 Issue: 12144 Page: 4 William Snell, later William Snell-Chauncy, was born in 1756 at Wingfield, Berkshire to William Snell (1716 – 1779) and Martha Snell nee Chauncy (1720 – 1765). Martha was the daughter of Charles Chauncy (1673 – 1763). In his will, Charles Chauncy specified that his grandson William Snell should take on the name Chauncy when he was twenty four years old and that he should quarter Charles Chauncy’s coat of arms with his own. Charles Chauncy’s three sons had no male issue and William Snell was the oldest of Charles Chauncy’s three grandsons by his daughter Martha. William Snell of Edmonton was granted license in accordance with the will of his late grandfather Charles Chauncy late of Newington to add Chauncy to his name in December 1780.
  • Will of Charles Chauncy probated 28 February 1763 : The National Archives; Kew, England; Prerogative Court of Canterbury and Related Probate Jurisdictions: Will Registers; Class: PROB 11; Piece: 884
• ‘William Snell Chauncy ne Snell’, Legacies of British Slave-ownership database, http://wwwdepts-live.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/person/view/2146645369 [accessed 1st October 2018].
• From MeasuringWorth.com
  • In 2017, the relative price worth of £25000 0s 0d from 1831 is:
    • £2,160,000.00 using the retail price index
    • £2,450,000.00 using the GDP deflator
  • In 2017, the relative wage or income worth of £25000 0s 0d from 1831 is:
    • £20,200,000.00 using the average earnings
    • £30,900,000.00 using the per capita GDP
  • In 2017, the relative output worth of £25000 0s 0d from 1831 is:
    • £114,000,000.00 using the GDP
• UK National Archives: it seems the court records are available: Reference: PROB 37/883 Description: Westwood v Burke and others Testator or intestate: Chauncy, William Snell formerly of Bishopsgate Common, Surrey; afterwards of Windlesham, Surrey; late of Winkfield, Berks.; esq. Date: 1830-1832 Held by: The National Archives, Kew

Related post

• T is for Theresa