Ellen Hargreaves, nee White, (mother of Frederick, our great, great grandfather) who
was married (aged 15) to William Hargreaves - carter, contractor
and Caversham Borough Council Inspector of Works, Dunedin. They had
fifteen children!
All I knew about Ellen was that she is called Helen rather than Ellen on
her death certificate and on son Frederick' death cert. Ellen's death
cert said she was born in Dublin, Ireland. Also on these two docs it
says her maiden name was SMITH but no mother's name listed. Plus,
another son had Smith as a middle name. And according to the Cemeteries
website there is a George SMITH buried with our Hargreaves folk in the
Southern cemetery so naturally, I assumed he was her father. However his
death cert states that he had no children. Hmmmmm ..... bit of a
mystery.....
Then I stumbled across a family tree of Frederick's sister which had the marriage cert of William Hargreaves and Ellen - nee WHITE !!
So Smith or White, Ellen or Helen - all very confusing! I messaged saying I was also researching this line and was confused - could there
have been two different Hargreaves families, both with 15 kids in
Dunedin at this time? The distant cousin didn't know about the different names but was interested to help solve the mystery if he could.
In the meantime I had been pottering about on PapersPast using keywords 'Hargreaves' and 'death' I was
hoping to find death notices which might throw some light on the family.
One item of interest was a memorial notice for a Mrs Martha SMITH who
died 1896. The notice said "Inserted by her daughter Mrs William
Hargreaves and her son Mr Robert Walsh" (Walsh surname indicating a second marriage I should investigate). Anyway, again I thought, well,
Ellen's maiden name must surely be Smith if her mum is Mrs Smith.
Now that I was sure Martha SMITH was Ellen's mother I sent away for her death cert (bdmnz).
It was very interesting!
I
noticed she had been married 3 times!
First marriage in Dublin to a
William WHITE (oh, he must be Ellen's father!)
Second marriage in Tasmania
to Chambers WALSH (Robert's father)
Third marriage also Tasmania to George SMITH. Ah, so he was the stepfather - glad to have solved the
name mystery at last!
More from the death certificate:
Martha's father was Denis ?Kirwell, later discover it's actually Kirwin.
Her mum was Ellen, nee O'Neill.
Now I was wondering what on earth Martha had been doing in Tasmania ? ...... you can maybe guess ...... she was a convict!
Transported for 10 years to Tasmania Land for stealing some clothes.
She
was 21 years old when she went by ship with her little 3 year old
daughter Ellen with her. I felt sad thinking of wee Ellen going
all that way on a convict ship. Crikey, such harsh penalties for minor
crimes back then. This was 1853. Their ship was the 'Blackfriar'.
Convict records describe Martha;- brown hair, fair complexion, grey eyes, height 5ft, 4inches.
Here is a link to the surgeon's report from the convict ship Blackfriar on which Martha and Ellen were transported: http://www.femaleconvicts.org.au/docs/ships/Blackfriar1851_SJ_GR.pdf
This line made me laugh:
One woman when ordered to wash a dirty, squalid child, replied "Glory be to God she had
reared nine of them and never put a drop of water on one of them"
Martha's second husband (Chambers Walsh) must have died and then after she
married George Smith (both pardoned by now) they came out to NZ, for a
better life I guess. Robert Walsh (son) went on to have a large family
in South Dunedin. He was a blacksmith and is mentioned in William
Hargreaves will.
Martha ended her days in Dunedin, dying of breast cancer aged 67 and is buried in the Southern Cemetery.
Line of descent: Me - Dad - Freda - Mary Ellen - Frederick - Ellen White - Martha Kirwin
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