Mary Cudmore née Nihill (1811 – 1893)

My third great grandmother Mary Cudmore née Nihill (1811 – 1893) was born near Adare, County Limerick, Ireland, to Daniel James Nihill (1761 – 1846) and Dymphna Nihill née Gardiner (1790 – 1866). Mary was the oldest of their eight children, seven of whom were girls.

Mary Cudmore née Nihill probably photographed in the 1850s

For some period, Mary’s father Daniel James Nihill, was employed as a schoolmaster at Cahirclough (Caherclogh), Upper Connello, about ten miles south of Adare. Daniel’s father James owned a large stone farmhouse near Adare called ‘Rockville’. Daniel and his family lived with James Nihill and cared for him until his death in 1835. The house and its associated estate, Barnalicka, were then passed to the daughters of Daniel’s older brother Patrick Nihill (died 1822).

[Rockville House, now known as Barnalick House, operates as bed-and-breakfast tourist accommodation.]

On 15 January 1835 Mary married Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore who was from a village near Cahirclough, called Manister.

The Limerick Chronicle of 24 January 1835 reported the marriage:

At Drehedtarsna Church, in this County, by the Rev. S. Lennard, Daniel Cudmore, Esq. son of the late Patrick Cudmore, of Manister, Esq. to Mary, eldest daughter of Daniel Nihill, of Rockville, near Adare, Esq.

The Cudmores were poorer than the Nihills. Daniel’s parents had separated and his father had died in 1827 . About 1822 their mother, a Quaker, sent Daniel and his older brother Milo to be educated by fellow Quakers in Essex, England. In 1830, when Milo finished his apprenticeship to a baker and flour dealer, Daniel and Milo returned to Ireland.

Daniel seems not to have trained for a trade, but his mother found a position for him with John Abell, a family friend, who ran a hardware store in Rutland Street, Limerick. There he gained a working knowledge of the hardware business, which perhaps proved useful to him in his later career.

In January 1834 Daniel Cudmore sought permission to emigrate as an assisted immigrant to New South Wales, proposing that he would undertake to ‘explore the interior of New Holland’. His application was turned down. A newspaper notice in the Freemans’ Journal of 15 April 1834 made it clear that assisted emigration was available only to young and married agricultural labourers who intended to take their wives and families with them.

Daniel had known Mary Nihill for a some time. In 1833 he wrote a poem to her:

To Mis N—-l
Dear Mary, since thy beaming eye
First raised within my heart a sigh –
Since first thy tender accents clear,
More sweet than music, charm’d my ear,
My heart beat but for thee, love.

This heart which once so blythe and gay,
Ne’er owned before Love’s gentle sway,
Now bound by Cupid’s magic spell!
O! Words would fail were I to tell
The half I felt for thee, love.

Though far from Erin’s vales I stray’d,
I never met so fond a maid;
Though England’s fair ones vaunt their gold,
With all their wealth their hearts are cold –
I leave them all for thee, love.

And should Australia be my lot,
To dwell in some secluded spot,
Content and free from want and care,
Would’st then my humble fortune share? –
My hopes all rest on thee, love!

The handwritten original is in the possession of one of my cousins. It appears that ‘Australia’ in the last verse was added well after its composition. This suggests that Daniel had decided to emigrate but had not yet decided where.

In 1835, as Mary’s grandfather James Nihill approached the end of his life, Daniel Nihill, perhaps recognising that he could have no expectations, and with little to keep him in Ireland, decided to emigrate to Australia. By their marriage, Mary and Daniel Cudmore qualified for assistance. On 11 February 1835 they left on the “John Denniston” for Hobart Town. Mary’s mother and two of her sisters travelled with them.

Six months later, after the death of Daniel’s father James in July, Daniel Nihill and Mary’s other sisters followed.

On his arrival in Hobart Daniel Cudmore applied for a teaching position. However, a review of his application found that it was not written by himself. Mary had written the document on his behalf. Nevertheless, such was the shortage of trained people, Daniel was engaged as a teacher and clerk at Ross, in the Midlands, seventy miles north of Hobart.

On 22 July 1836 Mary gave birth to her first child, a daughter called Dymphna Maria, at George Town, where Mary’s parents were teachers. George Town was a small settlement on the Tamar River thirty miles north of Launceston.

By the end of 1836, however, Daniel had moved back to Hobart, where he found work at De Graves Brewery, later to be known as Cascade Brewery.

A year later Daniel and Mary decided to try their luck in Adelaide, which had been proclaimed a colony on 28 December 1836. Daniel arrived on 15 April 1837. Mary, leaving her 14 month old daughter in the care of her mother, travelled on the “Siren” from Launceston to Adelaide with her father and sister Rebekah. Mary was pregnant, and on 11 October 1837 gave birth prematurely to a son, James Francis, on the “Siren” off Kangaroo Island.

On 3 December 1837 visitors from England, who were friends of Daniel’s mother Jane, called on the Cudmores. They wrote:

… at a hut we saw an elderly man sitting at the door, reading, we found it was the dwelling of Daniel Cudmore, son of Jane Cudmore of Ireland…and the old man was his father-in-law. D. Cudmore has greatly improved his prospects temporally by removing from Tasmania, where he was an assistant in the undesirable business of a brewer; he is here occupied in erecting Terra Pisa buildings and both himself and his wife are much respected.

Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore and his wife Mary probably taken in the 1850s

Daniel acquired his first block of land in North Adelaide in December 1837. By 1838 he was a partner in a new brewing company. Daniel farmed at Modbury, ten miles north-east of the main Adelaide settlement. In 1847 he inherited property in Ireland. This he sold to take up a pastoral lease in South Australia. In the 1850s and 1860s he acquired more pastoral leases in Queensland and New South Wales. Mary Cudmore appears to have had an active involvement in the management of the Cudmore properties. In 1868, for example, it was she who gave the instructions for the sale of a farm called Yongalain 1868.

Beside the two children mentioned above Mary Cudmore had 7 more:

• Mary Jane Cudmore 1839–1912
• Margaret Alice Cudmore 1842–1871
• Daniel Henry Cashel Cudmore 1844–1913
• Sara Elizabeth (Rosy) Cudmore 1846–1930
• Robert Cudmore 1848–1849
• Milo Robert Cudmore 1852–1913
• Arthur Frederick Cudmore 1854–1919

Mary Cudmore née Nihill (1811-1893): portrait in the collection of the Art Gallery of South Australia donated by her grandson Collier Cudmore

In 1862 Daniel Cudmore bought and extended a villa in the Adelaide Hills
at Claremont, Glen Osmond, five miles south-east of the city. There he
retired with Mary. Daniel died in 1891, she in 1893. They were buried in
the Anglican cemetery at Mitcham. In his retirement he had published a
volume of poetry, including the poem he wrote to Mary in 1833.

Claremont, Glen Osmond

The Advertiser TUESDAY, MARCH 7, 1893. (1893, March 7). The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1889 – 1931), p. 4. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article25351396

Grave of Daniel and Mary Cudmore Mitcham (St Michaels Anglican) Cemetery

Grave of Daniel and Mary Cudmore Mitcham (St Michaels Anglican) Cemetery

The theme of this week’s post is ‘prosperity’. It is pleasing to suppose that beside Daniel and Mary’s material success, they prospered as a couple, joined together, through richer and poorer, for fifty-six years.

Related posts

• Portraits of Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore and his wife Mary in the Art Gallery of South Australia
• H is for the Cudmore family arrival in Hobart in 1835
• Q is for questing in Queensland

Sources

• In the 1990s James Kenneth Cudmore (1926 – 2013), my second cousin once removed, of Quirindi New South Wales, commissioned Elsie Ritchie to write the Cudmore family history. The work built on the family history efforts of many family members. It was published in 2000. It is a very large and comprehensive work and includes many Cudmore family stories and transcripts of letters and documents. (Ritchie, Elsie B. (Elsie Barbara) For the love of the land: the history of the Cudmore family. E. Ritchie, [Ermington, N.S.W.], 2000.)
• P. A. Howell, ‘Cudmore, Daniel Michael (1811–1891)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/cudmore-daniel-michael-6335/text9913, published first in hardcopy 1981
• Gunton, Eric Gracious homes of colonial Adelaide (1st ed). E. Gunton, [Adelaide], 1983.

Further reading

• Cudmore, Daniel.  A few poetical scraps : from the portfolio of an Australian pioneer : who arrived at Adelaide in the year 1837  Printed by Walker, May &Co Melbourne 1882

N is for Nellie

One of my first cousins four times removed was Eleanor Mary (Nellie) Niall (1858-1891). She was the first cousin of my great great grandfather James Francis Cudmore (1837-1912).

Her father was James Niall (1823-1877), son of Daniel James Nihill (1761-1846) and Dymphna Nihill nee Gardiner (1790-1866). The Nihill family emigrated from Ireland to Australia in 1835, settling first in Tasmania, then moving to South Australia.

James Niall was an auctioneer and pastoralist. In 1857 he married Eleanor Mansfield (1833-1883) at Trinity Church, Adelaide.

 

They had eight children:

• Eleanor Mary Niall 1858–1891
• James Mansfield Niall 1860–1941
• George Franklin Niall 1862–1875
• Alice Louisa Niall 1863–1876
• Charles Arthur Niall 1864–1888
• Robert Gardiner Niall 1870–1932
• Dymphna Niall 1871–1871
• Margaret Rebekah Niall 1872–1875

Eleanor Mary, known as Nellie, was the oldest.

Her brother James Mansfield Niall (1860-1941), who became a successful pastoralist, was the only child who married and had children.

In 1875, at the age of 13, George died from what was described as “anaemia“. His illness and death were noted by his aunt Rebekah Nihill (1817-1901) in her diary:

2 Jul 1875 : George Niall very ill of swelling in the glands of his throat.

28 Aug 1875 : Rec’d a letter from Nelly Niall telling us dear George Niall died last Tuesday the 24th inst, whilst taking a drink of water. We feel his loss much as he was a very intelligent boy and extremely clever and cheerful.

4 Sep 1875  :  Our brother James and his wife came. They both looked sadly cut up after the loss of their dear children, particularly their dear boy George.

Alice died in 1876 aged 13 of tubercular phthisis, also known as tuberculosis.

Charles died in Sydney as a young man aged only 24. I am not sure what caused his early death.

Robert went on to the land as a grazier and station manager in Queensland. He died in Sydney, unmarried.

Dymphna died aged 5 months of convulsions. According to the diary of her aunt Rebekah Nihill, Margaret Rebekah, known as Rebekah, died when she was 3 of scarletina and diphtheria.

In 1877 Nellie’s father James died at the age of 54. Nellie’s mother died in 1883 aged 45 years.

On 13 November 1891 Eleanor Mary (Nellie) Niall died of typhoid. She was 33. (Typhoid is a bacterial disease, spread by eating food or drinking water contaminated by the faeces or urine of patients and carriers.)

Family Notices (1891, November 14). South Australian Chronicle (Adelaide, SA : 1889 – 1895), p. 4. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article91566625

 

The authorities kept a close watch on infectious diseases. There was no major outbreak of typhoid at the time, but Eleanor’s death was noted by the South Australian Board of Health, as was one other death from typhoid in the same week.

BOARDS OF HEALTH. (1891, November 20). Evening Journal (Adelaide, SA : 1869 – 1912), p. 3 (SECOND EDITION). Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article198423918 (Click to enlarge)

 

Eleanor was buried on 14 November at the cemetery beside St George’s Anglican Church, Magill, a suburb of Adelaide  close to where she had lived.

Advertising (1891, November 13). The Express and Telegraph (Adelaide, SA : 1867 – 1922), p. 2. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article208577463

The gravestone of Nellie, her parents and some of her siblings at Magill St George cemetery. The photograph is courtesy of “Gravesecrets at your Fingertips!” and reproduced with permission.

 

I am sorry to say that I have not been able to find out more about Nellie and her siblings. She is not mentioned in any digitised newspaper reports that I have seen. I have not found any photograph of her or mention in any family papers I have access to. I know almost nothing about her.

Sources

I am grateful to my cousin Robert Niall for sharing his information about the causes of death of Nellie’s siblings and providing extracts from the diaries of Margaret and Rebekah Nihill, the sisters of James Niall, Nellie’s father.

Related post

• Trove Tuesday : Nihill v. Fox

H is for the Cudmore family arrival in Hobart in 1835

Engraving of Hobarttown, Vandiemensland in the 1830s from the Rex Nan Kivell collection held by the National Library of Australia image reference PIC Drawer 3080 #S3410

Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore (1811 – 1891) and his wife Mary Nihill (1811-1893) were my great great great grandparents. Daniel and Mary married on 15 January 1835 in County Limerick, not long before embarking on the John Denniston which left Liverpool on 11 February. They arrived in Van Diemen’s Land on 7 June, after a voyage of more than four months.

Van Diemen’s Land. (1835, June 22). The Sydney Herald (NSW : 1831 – 1842), p. 4. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12852462

 

Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore and his wife Mary probably taken in the 1850s.  Image from the Cudmore History For the Love of the Land page 59

Besides Mary, other members of the Nihill family sailed with the newly-married couple on the John Denniston: Mary’s mother Dymphna Nihill née Gardiner (1790-1866), two of Mary’s six sisters, Rebecca (1817-1901) and Sarah (1826-1915), and Mary’s brother James Nihill later Niall (1823-1877). Mary’s father Daniel (1761-1846) and Mary’s other four sisters arrived in Hobart separately six months later.

Classified Advertising. (1835, June 12). The Hobart Town Courier (Tas. : 1827 – 1839), p. 3. Retrieved December 21, 2013, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article4180594

Hobart was first settled by Europeans in 1804. By the 1830s the town had 29 Government primary schools, a Supreme Court Building, Government House, and the Botanical Gardens had been laid out. In 1835 John Lee Archer designed and oversaw the construction of the sandstone Customs House facing Sullivans Cove, with construction completed in 1840. The building was later used as Tasmania’s parliament house. The economy depended on primary industries, including wheat farming, apple growing, sheep for wool and meat, and whaling, sealing, brewing, and wattle oil extraction.

Not long after the Cudmore and Nihill families arrived, Charles Darwin visited Hobart Town arriving there on 5 February 1836 as part of the HMS Beagle expedition. He wrote about Hobart Town and the Derwent estuary in his Voyage of the Beagle:

…The lower parts of the hills which skirt the bay are cleared; and the bright yellow fields of corn, and dark green ones of potatoes, appear very luxuriant… I was chiefly struck with the comparative fewness of the large houses, either built or building. Hobart Town, from the census of 1835, contained 13,826 inhabitants, and the whole of Tasmania 36,505. If I was obliged to emigrate I certainly should prefer this place: the climate & aspect of the country almost alone would determine me.

Pages 470-1 of The Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin published about 1909 retrieved through archive.org (click on image to enlarge)

On several occasions both the Cudmores and Nihills applied for government positions. Not all the applications survive, but the following letter to the rural Dean, the Reverend Philip Palmer, has been transcribed:

30 Murray St. 28th July 1835,

Revd. Sir, In respectfully applying for the appointment of Schoolmaster at Ross I beg to assure you that shall you have the goodness to recommend me my conduct shall ever be such as will give you no reason to regret your having done so.

I am married and am twenty four years of age. I was for some time receiving instruction at the Academy of the Reverend Mr. Phillips at Chelsea and others and trust my education has been such as to under me perfectly competent to the proper discharge of the duties of that situation. As to the responsibilities and moral character I can produce testimonials which I hope will induce you to feel sufficient degree of confidence in me.

My wife (who is twenty three years of age) possesses every necessary qualification for instructing children in the rudiments of English and needlework of all descriptions.

I have the honour to be Revd. Sir your most obedient humble Servant (sign) Daniel Cudmore.

On the Reverend Palmer’s recommendation William Bedford, superintendent of schools, interviewed Daniel Cudmore. Bedford wrote to Palmer:

Reverend Sir With reference to your letter of the 3rd instant recommending Mr. Cudmore for the situation of Clerk and schoolmaster at Ross, I have the honour to inform you that on proceeding to examine him in the usual way, I was surprised to find that his application which I forwarded to you on the 28th ultimo was not written by himself. I therefore requested him to write a letter on the same subject in this office, which I herewith transmit to you for your information. He appears to be sufficiently conversant with arithmetic to answer the purposes the appointment for which he is proposed, nut under such circumstances I think it advisable to communicate with you before any decisive step is taken; if you approve I will recommend his appointment on three mont probation.

After more letters, including confirmation of the appointment by the Colonial Secretary’s office, Cudmore was appointed as schoolmaster at Ross,  118 kilometres north of Hobart, at £55 per annum and clerk at £25 per annum.

About the same time, James Nihill was confirmed as the post master at George Town, 128 kilometres north from Ross, at £25 per annum, and Mr and Mrs Nihill were Master and Mistress of the public school at George Town at salaries of £50 and £25 per annum.

In 1836, Daniel Cudmore left his position at Ross and moved back to Hobart, where he became Assistant Brewer at De Graves Brewery, now known as the Cascade Brewery. Daniel Cudmore was a Quaker and attended monthly meetings of the Friends at Hobart. Although many Quakers abstain from drinking alcohol, he seems to have had no objection to working in a brewery.

The first Quaker Meeting House in Hobart. A cottage at 39 Murray Street which was bought by James Backhouse in 1837 with a loan from Meeting for Sufferings, London. Image retrieved from Quaker life in Tasmania webpage by the University of Tasmania

In 1837, shortly after the colony of South Australia was founded, Daniel Cudmore moved to Adelaide, South Australia, where he became a house builder (many of these he built in pise). He also established several breweries, and later became a pastoralist. Mary joined Daniel in Adelaide six months after his arrival; her son James Francis Cudmore was born on the voyage from Tasmania to Adelaide.

Daniel Cudmore’s obituary in the Adelaide Observer of 7 November 1891:

Cudmore, Daniel Michael (1811–1891)

We regret to have to record the death of Mr. Daniel Cudmore, of Claremont, Glen Osmond, who passed away at the ripe old age of eighty years. Mr. Cudmore was one of South Australia’s pioneers. He arrived with his wife at Hobart in the merchant ship John Denison, Captain Mackie, in 1835, en route to Sydney, but was persuaded by his cousin, Surgeon Russell, of the 63rd Regiment, to try his fortune in Tasmania. When the province of South Australia was proclaimed Mr. Cudmore left for the new country early in 1837. Possessed of indomitable energy and pluck, and gifted with physical strength above the average, Mr. Cudmore was enabled to endure the many rough experiences which were the lot of the first settlers. Soon after coming to the colony he engaged in the pursuit of sheep-farming in the North, being the first to take up the now valuable Yongala Estate. He afterwards acquired large squatting properties in Queensland and New South Wales. He took an active interest in exploring works. About the year 1863 he made a five months’ trip into the interior of Northern Queensland, afterwards publishing a narrative of his experiences, and on other occassions he did no inconsiderable service to the cause of setttlement. In 1864 he went to live at Claremont. He leaves a widow, four sons, and three daughters. The remains of the late Mr. Cudmore were buried on Wednesday afternoon in the Anglican Church Cemetery at Mitcham. Service was first conducted in St. Michael’s Church by the Revs. W. H. Mudie, of Glen Osmond, and F. W. Samwell, of Mitcham, the organist playing the “Dead March in Saul” and other appropriate music. The chief mourners were:– Messrs. Milo and Arthur Cudmore (sons), Dr. Sprod (son-in-law), and Messrs. A. M. Cudmore, H. C. Cudmore, and John Sprod (grandsons of the deceased). At the grave amongst many others who had come to pay their last tribute of respect were Messrs. R. Barr Smith, P. B. Coglin, A. S. Chapman, Peter Waite, George Boothby, J. S. Lloyd, J. Howard, C. Smedley, B. Moulden, J. J. Watson, H. H. Mudie, and R. J. Rigaud. The funeral arrangements were in the hands of Mr. P.Gay.

‘Cudmore, Daniel Michael (1811–1891)’, Obituaries Australia, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://oa.anu.edu.au/obituary/cudmore-daniel-michael-6335/text28381.

 

 

Sources

• In the 1990s James Kenneth Cudmore (1926 – 2013), my second cousin once removed, of Quirindi New South Wales, commissioned Elsie Ritchie to write the Cudmore family history. The work built on the family history efforts of many family members. It was published in 2000. It is a very large and comprehensive work and includes many many Cudmore family stories. (Ritchie, Elsie B. (Elsie Barbara) For the love of the land: the history of the Cudmore family. E. Ritchie, [Ermington, N.S.W.], 2000.) Chapter 4, written by Peter A. Cudmore (1929-1996) my second cousin twice removed, contains an account of the voyage and arrival of the Cudmore and Nihill family.
• P. A. Howell, ‘Cudmore, Daniel Michael (1811–1891)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/cudmore-daniel-michael-6335/text9913, published first in hardcopy 1981.

Related posts

• Q is for questing in Queensland
• DNA analysis: matching the DNA results to the”paper tree”
• Beginning to look at my Irish family history
• My grandmother’s cousins

DNA analysis: matching the DNA results to the"paper tree"

My first DNA results from AncestryDNA were a surprise to me.I could find no matches to my family tree. How was I going to break the news to my parents that I had been swapped at birth?

I had DNA matches to other people’s DNA results but no links to my tree. This seemed odd for I have been researching my tree for many years. I can identify all my 3rd great grandparents and a large number of my more remote forebears.

At present I have 98 pages of matches on AncestryDNA. At 50 matches per page this is just under 4,900 people who seem to share DNA with me and have tested with ancestry.com. Of these, 21 are estimated to be 4th cousins or closer, the closest being an estimated 3rd cousin who shares 127 centimorgans of genetic linkage across 8 segments; statistically, there is a high confidence we are related. The most distant match shares 6.0 centimorgans across 1 segment. (That match is linked to a private tree. I don’t know how we might be related.)

AncestryDNA summary as at 4 February 2017, as of 5 February I have 21 matches calculated to be at the 4th cousin level or closer.

On my ancestryDNA summary page I now have 6 green leaves, which in the AncestryDNA system indicates shared DNA together with a connection in our trees. I can see our connection in 5 of these. The sixth has a private tree, so I cannot see the link. When my DNA matches were first made there were only two green leaves and both these were to my 7th great grandparents, Daniel Dana (1663-1749) and Naomi Cresswell (1670-1751), a connection too remote to be reliable. (We may connect differently on an as yet undocumented part of our tree.) Without a chromosome browser, which shows shared segments with other matches who have the same ancestry, I cannot be sure I have correctly identified our most recent common ancestors.

a shared DNA match where both our trees include common ancestors

My 6th great grandfather Richard Dana (1700-1772), portrait by John Singleton Copely painted about 1770. Portrait now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

It is not surprising that the matches were to the Dana branch of my tree. The Dana were early emigrants to the United States. As the Dana family is well-documented I would expect members of it to show up in people’s trees and to find connections on that branch. A chromosome browser would give me more confidence that the connections have been made reliably.

Of my top 21 matches, that is, matches predicted to be 4th cousins and closer, I have managed to identify the most common recent ancestor in four cases. Only one of my AncestryDNA green leaf hints is estimated to be a 4th cousin and it would appear she is actually a 7th cousin once removed. Even when there are only small trees that do not connect with my family tree I have had some success in working out the connections with my DNA matches .

Spreadsheet analysis of my matches who are estimated to be 4th cousins or closer (click to enlarge)

AY, whose kit is administered by JB, is estimated to be my 4th cousin with 40 centimorgans shared across 3 segments. The match shows there is no family tree linked to the kit. However, when viewing the match, although a family tree has not yet been linked to the DNA results there are trees created by JB that can be previewed. In this case there were 3 trees,  

• one with 27 people and no surnames I recognised and no apparent link to AY whose DNA was tested
• The second was similar, with only 5 names
• The third, although it had only 6 people, had a name I thought I recognised and seemed to have AY as the initial person. I searched my tree for the surname Yeates and found that in 1857 my 3rd great aunt, Dymphna Maria Cudmore (1836-1899) married Sydney van Butchell Yeates (1831-1918). 

screenshot of my DNA match with AY showing public but unlinked trees in the bottom left of the screen

AY and I are 3rd cousins once removed. Our most recent common ancestors are Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore (1811-1891) and his wife Mary Cudmore née Nihill (1811-1893).

More recently I had a shared match with AY. TH was estimated to be a 4th cousin and we share 20.7 centimorgans across 2 DNA segments. TH had no tree. However, because of the shared match I speculated that we might be connected on the Cudmore or Nihill lines.

shared matches are shown when you click on the middle tab; the green contact button is on the top-right of the screen but is not always effective as there is no email notification that a message has been sent

profile page showing brown contact button in top-right-hand of screen

In September 2016 I contacted TH using the green button on the top right hand side of  the DNA match screen but did not hear back. After reading that communication with DNA matches using the brown contact button on the top-right-hand side of a person’s profile page, was likely to be more successful, I tried contacting TH by that method and providing my email address in the message. He replied by email almost immediately and confirmed a connection to the Nihill or Niall or Nihell family. We are 4th cousins once removed.

Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore (1811-1891), my 4th great grandfather, about 1865. Image from the State Library of South Australia reference B30912

Mrs Mary Cudmore née Nihill (1811-1893), my 4th great grandmother, about 1865. Image from the State Library of South Australia reference B 30913

If your research is like mine I have a few suggestions:

• Although a DNA match may show as having no tree, check if there is an unlinked public tree available to view. In my top 21 matches, 8 apparently had no tree, but in 4 cases there was an unconnected tree.
• A connection can be made with a tree of very few people. (I found two connections by following the descendants of a 3rd great aunt.)
• Shared matches give hints as to how other DNA matches might be connected.
• DNA matches might not be ancestry subscribers and, even if they are they might not log in often. Consider contacting them by using the brown contact button on their profile page, providing your own email address. Contacting by the brown button provides an email alert. There is no similar alert for contacts made by the green button.

Limerick fact and fiction

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – At this the whole pack rose up into the air and came flying down upon her. Illustration by Arthur Rackham 1907. Like Alice I feel a bit overwhelmed by the information.

One of the sources of information about the Nihill branch of my family is the reminiscences of Sarah Jane Nihill who died 1 September 1915 aged 89 years and six months. Her recollections were dictated to Mary E. Hennessy nee Brooks (c. 1878 – 1926). Mary was not a blood relative but Sarah’s adopted niece. Sarah Nihill is my 3rd great grand aunt, the sister of my 3rd great grandmother.

Obituary of Sarah Nihill from the Adelaide Chronicle of 11 September 1915

Sarah Nihill’s reminiscences are held by the State Library of Victoria as a typed manuscript (MS 9228 ). I have a copy through my 3rd cousin once removed, Rob Niall. There are also excerpts in the history of the Cudmore family, For the Love of the Land, compiled by Elsie Ritchie in 2000, at pages 67 – 70.

Sarah Nihill, as reported by Mary Hennessy, remembered

Daniel Joseph James Nihill, of Rockville, County Adare, Limerick, Ireland, who died at the age of 90 years, who could read without glasses and retained his perfect set of teeth until his death, had two sons, Paul the eldest and Daniel James, all Roman Catholics.

Paul married Lady Anna Maria Quin, daughter of Lord Dunraven, of Dunraven Castle, Adare and had one daughter, the Lady Anna Maria Dunraven Nihill, whose mother died at her birth and who was reared by her grandparents, the Dunravens.

Sarah then remembers that Paul became

a renegade, deserting his faith and embracing the church by law established, which gave the eldest son the power to take all his own father possessed if he remained a Catholic, even to the coat off his back if he so desired. Hence the reason for the family coming out to Australia. [ … ] About the time of his father’s death, remorse overtook Paul Nihill, he repented his act of deserting his faith, wrote a pamphlet of treason against the King and to save his life had to fly across the country. He had in his possession a small red Cornelian Cross, carrying a legend of a talisman against evil, which had been in the Nihill family for generations. It is surmised some time afterwards he returned and lived the life clad as a fisherman, amongst the village folk who knew him as a boy and man. At any rate a very sad silent fisherman appeared one day and lived at Larry and nancy O’Connor’s wee home.

One night a fire broke out at Dunraven Castle and the motherless infant’s life was in danger, with little hope of saving her, when a man clad as a fisherman rushed into the burning building and after a time appeared at an upper window.   All hope of helping him was out of the question.He leaped from the upper story.When they rushed to him the child was alive, but he was dead and inside where it had been hurriedly thrust, was the red cross against the child’s breast. Then his identity became known. The cross passed on to Daniel James Nihill and at last to Sarah Jane, the last of that branch of the family. and is now in my (M. E. Hennessy’s) possession, having been hung around my neck by my dear adopted aunt’s hands on my 18th birthday as a talisman against evil. So this is how the Rockville Estate passed from the family, having been willed by Paul to his child.

I can find no evidence for the existence of a Paul Nihill. The entry for Lord Dunraven in an 1828 Debrett makes no mention of a daughter Anne who married Paul Nihill (John Debrett (1828). Debrett’s Peerage of England, Scotland, and Ireland. [Another]. pp. 743–4.)

I have also found no written account of this fire at Dunraven castle.

Daniel James Nihill did have an older brother Patrick. Perhaps Sarah Nihill was confusing Paul with Patrick

Notices in the Limerick Chronicle have been indexed and digitised by the Limerick City Library.

I have confirmed the death of the father of Daniel James Nihill died in 1835. The Limerick Chronicle of 29 July 1835 reported:

At Rockville, near Adare, James Nihill, Esq. at the advanced age of 84 years.

His death at age 84 means he was born about 1751. On the 1840 South Australian census, James’s  son Daniel stated that he was born in 1761. The age on one or the other document must be incorrectly stated.

My second cousin twice removed, James Mansfield Niall (1915-1986),  wrote an article on the Nihill family history published in “The Irish Genealogist”, Vol.4, No.5, 1972, pp 496-505 titled Nihell of Co. Clare and Co. Limerick. I have a copy through his nephew, my 3rd cousin once removed, Rob Niall. The article states that Patrick died at his residence Ash Hill, Co. Clare, about 4th May 1822

Ancestry.com member nmurp1708 wrote in 2009:

Barnalick House … was built shortly after 1784 when a James Nihill leased all 272 acres of “Baurnalicka” from Mary St. Leger. Nihill was a wealthy man who had leases for over 900 acres in Co. Limerick and Co. Clare. He built the house in the shape of a letter “T”. He called the house “Rockville House”. His eldest son Patrick lived on some family land in Co. Clare with his wife Prudence Dickson and their two daughters, Anne and Jane. Patrick died before his father in 1822 and when James died in 1831 the two daughters became heirs to all the lands including Barnalick. Anne married in 1814 a William Dodd and Jane married in 1829 a Thomas Davenport. Patrick had a younger brother, Daniel, who married in 1810 a Dymphna Gardener. He lived with his father James and no doubt looked after him in his old age. However when James died, Daniel had to move out of Barnalick and he and his family departed to Australia in 1835.
A survey done in 1840 gives an Anthony St. Leger as the owner of Barnalick estate with a Thomas Davenport and a Mrs. Dodd as the leaseholders under a Col. John Dickson as middleman.

There is a marriage notice for Patrick who married Prudence Dickson in the Waterford Herald of Tuesday 27 Sept 1791 (From http://www.limerickcity.ie/media/limerick%20families%2071.pdf)

Married on Thursday morning in Limerick Mr Patrick Nihill to Miss Dickson, daughter of Mr Daniel Dickson, Woolen Draper. (Miss Prudence Dickson)

 Prudence died in 1847. Her death notice appeared in the Limerick Chronicle of 25 August 1847:

retrieved from http://www.limerickcity.ie/Library/LocalStudies/ObituariesdeathnoticesetcfromtheLimerickChronicle/1847/

from Ireland Births and Baptisms (through familysearch.org):

Name: Anne Nihill
Christening Date: 17 Feb 1793
Christening Place: SAINT JOHN,LIMERICK,LIMERICK,IRELAND
Birth Date: 12 Feb 1793
Father’s Name: Patrick Nihill
Mother’s Name: Prudence

The baptism record of Jane Nihill, Anne’s sister, does not appear on Family Search indexes. Jane Nihill married Thomas Evans Davenport and it was at the Davenport’s house that Prudence died in 1847.

In the 1972 article published in “The Irish Genealogist” which I mentioned earlier, the following excerpt mentions Patrick and Daniel Nihill:

In August 1817 Daniel petitioned the Viceroy, the Earl of Whitworth, to remove the threat of a legal process for £50 to cover his guarantee for the appearance in Ennis of his brother Patrick to answer an unspecified charge. At the Summer Assizes in 1815 the case was adjourned for want of evidence, and finally at the Spring Assizes Patrick had not appeared (note 54). I do not know the result of this petition.

Note 54:  Limited family sources suggest that Patrick wrote an indiscreet letter possibly relating to the current state of relations between France and England.

I want to follow up on some of the items mentioned and try to find the original sources.

Beginning to look at my Irish family history

Until this week I had put my Irish research pretty much in the too-hard basket. Yesterday I started a four-week course at the Genealogical Society of Victoria on Irish family history. I have had a bit of a tinker in the past but I thought I would try to come to grips with the area with some guidance from experienced researchers.

Relatives I will be looking at:

• Margaret Smyth, my husband’s great great grandmother, born about 1834 in County Cavan. She arrived on the Persian in 1854. 

Her  parents were William Smyth, a farmer, and Mary Cox according to her marriage certificate but Joseph Smyth and Ann according to her death certificate.

Her death certificate states she was born in Bailieborough, a town in the townland of Tanderagee in County Cavan in the province of Ulster and part of the Border Region.

In 1855 Margaret married John Plowright in Victoria. She died in 1897. I have a copy of her marriage and death certificates.

I have done some searching on Roots Ireland for Margaret’s parents and family but without success.

When she arrived in Australia, Margaret went to stay with a cousin called John Hente. At least the surname looks like ‘Hente’ on the Assisted Migrant record; but the writing is hard to read and I have no other information about him.

•  Ellen Murray, my husband’s great great grandmother, born 1837 in Dublin Ireland. She also arrived on the Persian in 1854 with Margaret Smyth. It appears that the two became friends. Also on board was Bridget Murray age 24, also from Dublin, perhaps a sister.

Ellen’s parents were George Murray, a glass blower, and Ellen Dony (writing hard to transcribe, perhaps Dory).

In 1856 Ellen married James Cross in Victoria. She died in 1901. I have a copy of her marriage and death certificates.

I have done some searching on Roots Ireland for Ellen’s family without success. I have not been able to find out what happened to Bridget.

• James Gordon Cavenagh is my third great grandfather. He was born 1766 in Innishannon, County Cork. He died in 1844 in Castle House, Wexford. In fact he lived mostly in Hythe, Kent, England. I have inherited quite a lot of family history information but have never looked at it properly.

• Daniel Michael Paul Cudmore (1811 – 1891) and his wife Mary Cudmore née Nihill (1811 – 1893) were my great great great grandparents.

Daniel and Mary married on 15 January 1835 in County Limerick, not long before embarking for Australia on the John Dennison which left Liverpool on 12 February. Daniel was a Quaker but they married in the Church of Ireland at Drehidtarsna Church, County Limerick, two miles south-west of Adare.

Members of the Nihill family, including Mary’s mother, Dymphna Nihill née Gardiner (1790 – 1866), were also aboard the John Dennison. 

Classified Advertising. (1835, June 12). The Hobart Town Courier (Tas. : 1827 – 1839), p. 3. Retrieved December 21, 2013, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article4180594

Other members of the family emigrated about six months later including Mary’s father Daniel James Nihill (1761 – 1846) with three of his daughters. They came on the James Pattison arriving in Sydney 7 February 1836 after a 91 day voyage from Cork, Ireland.. They then sailed on the Integrity which sailed from Sydney on 22 March 1836 and took 15 days to reach Hobart.

I have previously written about the re-interment of Daniel Nihill from the Protestant to the Catholic section of West Terrace cemetery.

The Nihill family came from Rockville House, Adare Parish in County Limerick.

Ritchie, Elsie B. (Elsie Barbara) (2000). For the love of the land : the history of the Cudmore family. E. Ritchie, [Ermington, N.S.W.] Page 54

Other members of the family have researched the Cudmores and the Nihills and most of it is included in the book For the love of the land: the history of the Cudmore family compiled by Elsie Ritchie in 2000. I haven’t reviewed and understood the research as it concerns our Irish background.

I need to follow up the following obituaries that have been indexed by the Limerick City Library from the Limerick Chronicle:

• Nihill Daniel Australia 29/05/1847 late of Barnalickey, near Adare

• Nihill James Rockville, Adare. 29/07/1835

I also need to follow up the following information about Rockville House retrieved from a 2009 posting to an ancestry.com message board concerning the Vokes family:

Barnalick House … was built shortly after 1784 when a James Nihill leased all 272 acres of “Baurnalicka” from Mary St. Leger. Nihill was a wealthy man who had leases for over 900 acres in Co. Limerick and Co. Clare. He built the house in the shape of a letter “T”. He called the house “Rockville House”. His eldest son Patrick lived on some family land in Co. Clare with his wife Prudence Dickson and their two daughters, Anne and Jane. Patrick died before his father in 1822 and when James died in 1831 the two daughters became heirs to all the lands including Barnalick. Anne married in 1814 a William Dodd and Jane married in 1829 a Thomas Davenport. Patrick had a younger brother, Daniel, who married in 1810 a Dymphna Gardener. He lived with his father James and no doubt looked after him in his old age. However when James died, Daniel had to move out of Barnalick and he and his family departed to Australia in 1835.
A survey done in 1840 gives an Anthony St. Leger as the owner of Barnalick estate with a Thomas Davenport and a Mrs. Dodd as the leaseholders under a Col. John Dickson as middleman.
Samuel Dickson is the middleman in 1850 in Griffith’s Valuation and it must have been Samuel Dickson who employed Simon Vokes as Land Steward and placed Simon in residence in Barnalick House.

Related posts:

• Australia Day: Climbing our family’s gum tree
• Trove Tuesday : Nihill v. Fox

Trove Tuesday : Nihill v. Fox

This strange case concerns the grave of my fourth great grandfather.

Daniel James Nihill (1761 – 1846) died at SeaView, Adelaide, South Australia on 14 October 1846. He is now buried in the Old Catholic section of West Terrace cemetery, but was first buried in the Protestant section.

The South Australian Register on 30 March 1860, reported a dispute between two of his seven children, James Nihill (1823 -1877) and Frances Fox née  Nihill (1826 – 1895), over the place of burial of Daniel Nihill. James had arranged for his father to be buried in the Protestant section of West Terrace Cemetery. In September 1859, however, he found that his sister Frances had arranged for her father’s remains to be exhumed and reburied in the Roman Catholic section. James took his sister to court over the matter.

Their mother, Daniel’s wife, Dymphna Nihill  née  Gardiner (1790 – 1866), was a witness in the court case. She was quite frail and rather deaf. 

At the time that Daniel Nihill’s grave was opened, all that was left were some bones in the place of a decayed coffin.  The bones were placed in a new coffin for re-interment.

Daniel Nihill was said not to have been interested in religion.  James Nihill asserted that his father made only an outward profession of Roman Catholic faith in Ireland because “it was a disturbed period”. However Daniel did not, as far as James knew, attend a Roman Catholic Church while living in South Australia. 

Frances was a Catholic. In the court case it was stated she became a Catholic in 1847.  She married Arthur Fox (1817 – 1853) on 26 July 1846.  Arthur Fox was said to have meddled in the Nihill  family’s Protestantism, to the extent of arranging for a priest to visit the day before the death of Daniel Nihill.

Arthur Fox had been in partnership with James Nihill. After Arthur’s death in 1853, James Nihill was a trustee of his estate but had been asked to resign. 

There seems to have been several disputes that went to court between James Nihill and Frances Fox since the death of Arthur Fox.

The jury’s verdict was in favour of James Nihill, awarding him 40 shillings and stipulating that the the tomb was to be restored at the expense of the defendant, Frances. However, the judge decided that effect could not be given to the restoration of the tomb. The outcome of the case was thus that Frances Fox had to pay her brother 40 shillings but the body of Daniel Nihill was to be allowed to remain in the Catholic section of the cemetery.

The expenses incurred by James in erecting the tomb and enclosing the site in the Protestant section of the cemetery were reported as being between £30 and £40.  

James had retained the South Australian Attorney-General to represent him in court.

I contacted the Adelaide Cemeteries Authority about the case.  They have few records from the 1840s and 1850s. There is a notation in a lease register book that the lease taken out by James Nihill was surrendered in 1856 but with no other detail.  Perhaps this is when Frances arranged the re-interment, although from the newspaper report it seems that James only discovered in September 1859 that his father’s body had been moved.  The Adelaide Cemeteries Authority do not have records about when the Fox family purchased the grave site.  As the Protestant grave site lease was surrendered in 1856, the Authority cannot identify who is using the site now but it seems it was not reused by a member of the Nihill family.

“LAW AND CRIMINAL COURTS.” South Australian Register (Adelaide, SA : 1839 – 1900) 30 Mar 1860: 3. Web. 24 Sep 2013 <http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article49896301>.