Q is for Questions

Genealogy to me feels like a never-ending attempt to answer the question Where did I come from? or perhaps the more existential Who am I? I attempted to answer the first question in this blog's infancy with the creatively titled Where do I come from? Obviously a very literal answer! The second question is a little harder and may take a lifetime.

Q therefore is for Questions. As in an ever-growing and seldom-ending list of questions that begin:

Who is?

What was?

Where is?

Why did?

How much?

Why?

The questions that are in the forefront of my mind whenever I time travel through documents, websites, articles and photos, (and the ones that can't really be answered with facts and dates, or names or numbers) tend to begin WHY?

Why did Robert come to Australia? Why did he marry Betsy? Why did three of his four daughters not marry? Why did Elspeth come to Australia? Why did their brother Alexander stay behind?

The talk I attended at the beautifully housed Society of Australian Genealogists on Kent Street last Saturday threw up a handful of reasons to help answer why Robert and Elspeth may have come to Australia like: greater opportunities for their kids, better pay and economic conditions, encouragement from family or to join family, financial incentives like their way being paid, and perhaps landownership that would otherwise escape them. All very reasonable answers... But short of finding a diary, or letters, (or creating a real time machine to ask them myself) the answers I formulate are purely speculative.

And so the journey continues...

*the cool image above was created thanks to Wordle which I heard about on Genies Down Under!

P is also for Podcasts

I mentioned the National Archives Podcast that I enjoy listening to as I delve into our past. But, this is just the tip of the iceberg, or one tree in a forest of podcasts available to an amateur genealogist. Or, anyone really. There is pretty much a podcast available for every subject, language, topic, interest, point in history, science... you get the message! Even more amazing is that every podcast I have ever come across is free! The passion that people have for their area of expertise means that they are incredibly generous is sharing their knowledge and so for geeks like me, it's a feast.

One podcast that I really must mention though is Genies Down Under expertly put together by Maria.

Released monthly, Genies Down Under is an hour or so long podcast with tips and tricks for enhancing your search or presenting your results. All with an Australian bent. Almost all of the other genealogical podcasts I have found tend towards an American accent. As a result the records and techniques being related are slightly different. She has definitely filled a gap in the market in an interesting and informative manner.

So, if you're looking for a companion while doing your search - put Maria on in the background!

P is for Photographs

Aunty Tine's Photos, a set on Flickr.

O is for Occupations

A friend likes to find out what someone does for a living by asking "What do you do to keep the wolves at bay?" This can elicit any number of responses, from "I'm a teacher" or "I drink" to "I'm a lawyer" (and yes, I know that some may say that the lawyers are the wolves that people are working so hard to keep away!).

I have one friend who, in response to such a question, would most like say that she is professionally unemployed. For me, I get to say that I'm a travel agent (or if I'm feeling particularly poetic, that I make people's dreams come true). Formerly, it would have been that I was a wolf lawyer having managed to try out these two very different careers so far (out of the average three that we Gen Xers are supposed to have in our life time).

I still don't really know what I want to be when I grow up but I think I get to say that I am the first travel agent in the family, at least I think I do. I know though that I wasn't the first lawyer in Cam's Fam (or on my paternal line for that matter). Having been staring at a number of census responses recently, which often notes the occupations of those being 'census-ed' (that's word, I'm sure) I thought I would share with you how some of our forebears kept the wolves at bay!

And so today O is for Occupations. As in:

Seaman - like John and James Cameron, Robert's younger brothers
Master Mariner - like Torquil Harold Urquhart
Fenar* - like Janet Cramond
Domestic servant - like Janet Ann Crighton, Jessie's recently discovered daughter
Miliner - like Janet Ann Cameron, daughter of Alexander, brother of Robert (so our Robert's niece)
Scholar - like pretty much every family member who grew up in Scotland and went to school
Journeyman hatter - like Pa
Nursing Sister - like Didi, Mum, Aunty Tine and a few others!
Baker - like Betsy Murdoch before she married our Robert
Teacher - like our Robert's daughter, Margaret Sim Cameron
Farmer - like Didi's dad, Stan Clark
Accountant - like Didi's mum, Violet Jowett
Bootmaker - like Thomas Clark, Didi's great grandfather
Baptist Minister - like Didi's paternal grandfather Rev. Henry Clark
Painter - like Albert Jowett, Didi's maternal grandfather
And, as is most common amongst the men in Cam's Fam who at some stage were born or lived in Garmouth:
Shipwright - our Robert, his father Alexander and his brother Alexander.

*In the 1871 census Janet Cameron (nee Cramond) was referred to a "Fenar". In the 1861 census she had been noted as a House Proprietor, which is basically the same thing. As best I can tell, a fenar is an old word for someone who is in the actual possession of or entitled to receive the rents of lands.  

N is National Archives

Both Australia, England and Scotland have National Archives. Mahoosive great buildings that store thousands upon millions of documents/records pertaining to the Nation's past. We are so lucky that so many of these documents are being digitised - it's a slow, expensive project but it has already made my job easier. The National Archives of Australia (NAA) has a searchable online database, through which I have found and ordered (for a sum) records relating to the family.

What I have found, though, that are fantastic are podcasts on iTunes created and published by the National Archives of the United Kingdom. Each podcast provides background to topics are varied as "Anxiety, Dread and Disease: British Ports 1834 - 1870", "When a Woman is not a Woman" (something to do with pensions?) and Nineteen Century merchant seafarers and their records". 


Free for all, I strongly recommend checking them out: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheNationalArchivesPodcastSeries

M is for Mistake

Soooo, I have to admit to an error. They happen. Because I'm only human, M is for Mistake.

There are a few cardinal rules of genealogy which include [1]:

5. ALWAYS have at least two separate sources of proof for each event...
6. REMEMBER that everything is only speculation until verified...

You remember Jessie Cameron? The younger sister of our Robert? Born 1839 and mentioned in the 1841 census as a 2 year old?  

I didn't find any mention of a Jessie in the 1851 or 1861 census. Coupled with the inscription on Cameron Family gravestone in Urquhart Old Graveyard that reads "Jessie who died in infancy" I jumped to the conclusion that Jessie (born 1839) died young and didn't follow her line any further. I  had what I thought were the two necessary separate sources of proof...

Confusion was the state I was living in when I read the 1871 and 1881 census for mum Janet who is noted as living with her granddaughter "Jessie Ann Crighton". Which daughter married a Crighton? I have Elspeth in Australia and Jane marrying a Horn and Jessie buried with her father... And our Camerons, steeped in tradition, probably weren't progressive enough to have the boys take a wife's name!

And therein lies the problem - names! I assumed that a. Jessie on the tombstone was born a Jessie and that b. the Jane Cameron I found who married a John Horn in 1845 was our Jane because, well, they were both living in Garmouth and our Jane, if the bride, was at the very marriageable age of 22 years! 

And, of course, the universe has made an ass out of me because I now have evidence which suggests that little Jessie born 1839 and presumed dead actually lived long enough to marry and have a daughter! 

The next reasonable conclusion then is that the child born Jane in 1823 is the child referred to as Jessie on the tombstone, (because Janet = Jane = Jessie and they seem to be used interchangeably) and Robert's older sister Jane therefore died in infancy.  

Let me rewrite history then and note the following:

Jane Cameron born 1823 died in infancy

Jessie Cameron born 1839 married Philip Crighton in Garmouth on 14 December 1864 [2].  

On 27 August 1866 they had a lawful daughter named Janet Ann Crighton (aka Jessie Ann) [3]. 

Sadly, Jessie died on 5 Aug 1867 when she was only 28 and Janet Ann was about 1. I don't have any record (yet) of what her dad was up to until his death in 1909 aged 69 while Janet Ann lived until 71, dying on 7 Apr 1938. [4]

[1] Thanks to U3A Lismore Inc

[2] 1864 Marriage record for the parish of Urquhart for Jessie Cameron and Philip Crighton duly records the mother of the bride as Janet Cameron (Crammond) and the father as Alexander Cameron (Shipwright). And the bride is aged 25 which means she was born in about 1939.

[3] 1866 Birth records in the parish Urquhart including Janet Ann Crighton. Father is Philip Crighton (Seaman) and mother Jessie Crighton (Cameron) married 14 December 1864. Informant of the birth is Janet Cameron (grandmother).

[4] Monumental Inscriptions: Urquhart Old Churchyard edited by Helen Mitchell and Bruce B Bishop p. 24, ref. 147

L is for Language

My mother tongue is English (Australian English to be precise). Je parle un peu francais[1]. Och jag kan  svenska [2]. I have studied Latin and Japanese but remember very little and like many travellers, I can order a beer in Russian, Spanish and German! Notwithstanding, I have had a learn a number of new terms and phrases to assist my genealogical journey that I didn't know before.

And so, L is for Language.

When I do come across an unfamiliar word or phrase I happily look it up. I've never shied from dictionaries and Google is a my best friend, providing answers to questions just as quickly as I can think of them. Knowledge is power and some words and phrases are tiny windows into the past.

I've already noted some words, including "exlineal" (that I'm determined to get back into common usage!) and most recently "kirk". In that same post was "antenuptial" which is probably self-evident but which I looked up just to be certain!

Some other phrases and terms that had cropped up in my journey include (in no particular order and thanks largely to Wikipedia):

banns: the public announcement in a Christian parish church of an impending marriage between two specified persons. 
a burgh of barony: a type of Scottish town. They were distinct from royal burghs as the title was granted to a tenant-in-chief, a landowner who held his estates directly from the crown. They were created between 1450 and 1846, and conferred upon the landowner varying trading rights (for example the right to hold weekly markets or to trade overseas). 
apoplexy: used to describe "bleeding" in a stroke or also to describe any sudden death that began with a sudden loss of consciousness, especially one in which the victim died within a matter of seconds after losing consciousness
shipwright: an old-fashioned term for a ship builder or ship carpenter which may involve anything from physically constructing or repairing a ship to being involved in its design.
brig: a sailing vessel with two square-rigged masts
Laird: a member of the gentry; historically Lairds rank below a Baron and above an Esquire and is a heritable title in Scotland. The title is granted to the owner of a substantial and distinctive landed estate in Scotland, not part of a village or town and that lies outwith a burgh. 



[1] I speak a little French.
[2] And I can speak Swedish.

K is for Kirk

Kirk is not just a guy's name. In Scotland it is both a general word for "church", which is derived from an ancient Greek word (according to Wikipedia) and also "the Church". As in the Church of Scotland.

The Church of Scotland was responsible for the formalisation of relationships and recognition of births in most cities and towns in Scotland two centuries ago and most Scots were members. Certainly, our family was no different as all of Alexander and Janet's children were baptised in the Kirk and Robert and Betsy were married "after banns according to the forms of the Church of Scotland". I only know this (and have been able to trace as far back as I have) because the Kirk's agents were in the practice of noting the major life events of its members well before it was required by law. It wasn't mandatory to note important things like births, death and marriages until 1855 and even after then it was generally the Church clerk who continued this practice.

I began my search for Cam's Fam through digitised parish records on Scotland's People and it's the first place I go to locate and confirm the existence of dead rels.  The Kirk's records often contain juicy information like parents' names, occupations, area of residence and of course dates of birth. They note whether it was a "lawful" birth (ie. in the parents were married) or, in the case of John Horn, barely!

John Horn is the husband of our Robert's sister Jane [addendum: our Jane died 'in infancy' so John Horn is not related but married a different Jane Cameron - see post M is for Mistake]. Jane and John were married on 28 June 1845 and as best I can tell, had three daughters. According to census records, he was a ship's carpenter in Garmouth and was born in Banff (a neighbouring shire) in about 1819. Last night I threw out a net to fish a little more for details about John and came across what I believe is the parish record of his birth:

It reads:  

July 18th 1819: Alexander Horn servant at Braes has a child by his in antenuptial fornication, by his wife Christian Grant, baptised and named John. Witnesses, John Grant, and Adam Thomson. 

While John's parents were married, the Church was very bothered by the timing of conception... If I can get a hold of the Kirk Session records it would probably indicate the fine they had to pay for their fun...

J is for James

J is for James. As in the name meaning 'supplanting' or 'seizing by the heel' in Hebrew (originating from something biblical). As in the 16th most popular baby name for boys in Australia in 2010. As in the name shared by my brother, my grandfather, my great great grandfather, my third great grand uncle, my fourth great grand uncle...

Cam's Fam is pretty traditional in the naming game. Not only do we have Alexanders populating the tree in every generation but also James. There are Jameses in every generation, sometimes two, and in each different branch of the tree. It makes researching challenging and reinforces the need to have at least two sources for each 'event' that you're claiming as fact. Even more complicating is that James is a popular name generally and then add a little more confusion with a common surname like Cameron!

Just some of the 26 Jameses that I have in our family tree are as follows (yes - twenty-six, including blood and marriage connections) :

1. My brother James

2. James Murdoch Cameron (aka Cam, Jim or Pa)

3. James Alexander Cameron born 1864 (Pa's grandfather and Robert's eldest son)

4. James Cameron born 1833 (our Robert's brother)

5. James Cameron born 1856 (Robert's nephew, son of his brother Alexander)

6. James Cameron born 1787 (Robert's uncle, brother to his father Alexander)

7. James Murdoch born abt. 1790 (Robert's father-in-law, Betsy's dad)

8. James Moir born abt. 1787 (husband of Jean Cramond, sister of Robert's mum and so his uncle)

9. James Sim born 1769 (Betsy's grandfather)

10. James Badenoch born before 1740 sometime (Betsy's great grandfather and so my 4th great grandfather)

I is for Internet

'I' should be for Immigration but it's probably a little premature to write about something I know very little about! I'm attending a talk entitled Scottish Immigration to Australia being presented by the Society of Australia Genealogists next Saturday and hope that I will informed enough afterwards to share more information with you then. 

Instead, I is now for Internet. As in what I spend waaay too much time on (or is it more accurate to say where I spend too much time?)! As in this intangible 'thing' rocks my world daily and has revolutionised communication and information-sharing on a global scale. As in the greatest weapon in a genie's arsenal.

I honestly don't think I would be as active in my investigations if I had started B.C (before computers). My compliments to all the genealogists, amateur and professional, (like Didi) who did it old school: writing letters to distantly related family members or local historical societies and waiting weeks or even months for responses; visiting Births, Deaths and Marriages offices to inspect and photocopy original records; heading to local libraries and fighting motion-sickness on the microfiche machines to view old newspapers. While I was one of those kids who had pen friends all over the world, who asked a lot of questions and who loved looking up encyclopaedias or dictionaries (just to know "why" or "how" or "who"), it makes me impatient just thinking about having to wait!

I'm not Gen Y - definitely Gen X - but I have become very used to information being immediately accessible and the convenience of it  literally being at my finger tips. I love the instant gratification of typing "robert AND cameron AND (newcastle OR wickham)" into a site like Trove and seeing the results appear. Of websites such as Ancestry.com.au, Findmypast.co.uk, Scotland's People and Familysearch.org with their vast repositories of history (my history) available for me to search at any time convenient to me. Of being able to email people like the Melbourne-based genie and, within 24 hours of first contact, have a full bio of a previously little-known ancestor complete with photos and primary source material. Many of the sites I find useful are listed to the right, filed under the original heading "Useful Links" and I am continually adding to it. 

Not everything is available online so I know I have a few pilgrimages in my future. In the meantime I will continue digging through cyberspace for the little pieces of our family's history that have been electronically fossilised. 

H is for Harold

H is for Homes Hats Harold. 

If you've checked out the tab headed April 2012's A to Z Blogging Challenge Details you will have noticed the list of the topics I have written about/plan to write about. You're then probably wondering how on earth I have changed from 'Homes' to 'Hats' to 'Harold'? 

H was going to be for the various houses our ancestors called home but that will be more fun when I have photos. 

H was then going to be for 'hats' as Pa was a hat salesman, as was his father but I don't have enough detail yet so I'll save that topic for another time. 

So now H is for Harold. As in Captain Torquil Harold Urquhart (more commonly known by his middle name than his awesomely Norse-sounding first name). 

I should note that this post is not so much about what I know of Harold, rather how I found him and why this finding is so important (I'm very excited by this finding. I know. I need a life!).  

He first came to my attention a few years ago thanks to a reference on the Stockton Historical Society's old webpage next to our Robert's name as partner in the Flying Cloud. A few lazy searches then didn't turn up anything more about this Mr Urquhart (not even a first name!) so I left him alone. That is, until more recently, when I was sifting through the treasures on Trove relating to the Flying Cloud. I found that Mr Urquhart was Captain Torquil Harold Urquhart, and the captain at the helm when the Flying Cloud was wrecked.  

Enter my friend Google. Searching this long full name returned a small post made by a Melbourne-based genie requesting information anyone might have had relating to such a named person and his marriage to an Elspet Cameron who had also been married to an Alexander Mearns. Elspet hadn't come to Australia, had she?

A faint little bell rang... there was a very short mention of a wedding at our Robert's residence in Wickham in 1886...

The names of the blushing bride, a Helen Mearns, and groom, James M'Lauchlin, were completely unfamiliar at the time of first reading. That our Robert was the 'uncle of the bride' though meant it was probably a married sister's daughter walking down the aisle. By a process of elimination: Jane married a Horn and had remained in Scotland, Jessy died in infancy... of course! The newest dead rel, Elspet! Coupled with the suggestion she had married a Mearn and then Harold meant that a whole new branch began flowering. More exciting is that I hadn't realised that Robert had any family from the old country join him in Australia and here he was, living in the same area as his little sister! 

A few more searches on Trove, Ancestry.com.au's assisted immigrant lists and NSW Births, Deaths and Marriages and I worked out the following:

Elspet emigrated to Australia in 1857 onboard the Monica.  

She married Alexander Mearns in 1960. Their only child, Helen Innes Elizabeth Mearns, was born in 1861. Sadly Alexander died in 1864.

Not long after, in 1866, Elspet married Torquil Harold Urquhart. 

When Flying Cloud wrecked off the coast of South Australia on 4 April 1870 not only was Capt. Urquhart at the helm but he was onboard with his family - a Mrs Urquhart and Miss Urquhart. (I have jumped to the conclusion that this is Helen Mearns as Harold and Elspet didn't have any children together).

Elspeth died aged 42 in 1871.  

Not long after it seems, Harold stopped sailing and moved to Launceston where he remarried and remained until his death in 1894. 

I have to say a massive thanks to the Melbourne-based genie who I emailed in response to his post and who so quickly and generously shared his research and documents with me, and so has splashed a bit more colour and shed more light to an otherwise dark and unexplored corner of the family line. With his permission I will hopefully share these findings in due course! 

And, this whole discovery - that Elspet came to Australia and began her own family and therefore branch of a tree - goes to show that exlineal family are just as important as direct ones!

G is for Gravestone

I referred earlier to a selection of books I recently ordered from overseas with such engaging titles as The Forgotten Tombstones of Moray that I can't believe you haven't all asked to borrow them! [*] 

Reading such stimulating subject matter lately G is, therefore, for Gravestone. 

Genealogy today is so much faster and easy thanks largely to the internet. Not all records are digital though and we then rely on the hard work of people who visit out of the way places and publish their findings. As our funny genealogist shares in Rule 4 of the Rules for Genealogy:

http://www.abdnet.co.uk/burialgrounds/  

"The ceme­tery where your ances­tor was buried does not have per­pet­ual care, has no office, is acces­si­ble only by a muddy road, has snakes, tall grass, and lots of bugs … and many of the old grave­stones are in bro­ken pieces, stacked in a cor­ner under a pile of dirt."

That was certainly the experience Mum and I had driving around Garmouth looking for Old Urquhart Cemetery which we found next to an empty house and a few paddocks just off Station Road in Urquhart. One mob of hard-working people busting axels down muddy roads and fighting the bugs is the Moray Burial Ground Research Group (MBGRG). Their hard work transcribing the gravestones in Morayshire helped us to not only locate where our Robert's parents were buried so Mum and I could visit them but also identify/confirm the identity of a couple of his siblings: John and James. (See the post about Jessy for more detail on the gravestone and its inscription). 

Deaths weren't often recorded in parish records because of the cost involved to the family in paying "mortcloth dues", so gravestones are sometimes the only record of death and manner of death. They also give us more clues to occupations, locations etc...

My readings through the loving inscriptions left on the gravestones of the residents of Garmouth and surrounds haven't thrown up any earth-shattering discoveries (yet) but I have found reference to a few exlineal family members including Betsy Murdoch's sister (our Robert's sister-in-law): 

Erected by ANN MURDOCH in memory of her beloved husband
JAMES BRANDER, Shipmaster, Garmouth
who died 8th November 1880 aged 50 years.
Also of the said ANN MURDOCH
who died 10th January 1929 aged 89 years.
Their son ALEXANDER ROBERT BRANDER
who died 4th April 1944 aged 64 years.

"Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord" [1]

[*] The delivery included:

The Lands and People of Moray (Part 14): Garmouth, Kingston, Essil, Lunan and Newtown by Bruce B Bishop

Monumental Inscriptions: Urquhart Old Churchyard edited by Helen Mitchell and Bruce B Bishop

The Forgotten Tombstones of Moray (Vol 4): Lhanbryde Old Churchyard, Urquhart Churchyard, Spynie Old Churchyard by the Moray Burial Ground Research Group

The Lands and People of Moray: Mortcloth Dues and Miscellaneous Death Records by Bruce B Bishop

Speyside monumental inscription pre 1855 edited by Alison Mitchell

The Forgotten Tombstones of Moray (Vol 1): Dipple and Essil and Kirkhill by the Moray Burial Ground Research Group

Monumental Inscriptions: Essil Old Churchyard edited by Helen Mitchell and Bruce B Bishop

You know, just in case you'd like to read them!

[1] The Forgotten Tombstones of Moray (Vol 1): Dipple and Essil and Kirkhill by the Moray Burial Ground Research Group, page 30, Old Essil Churchyard, ref. 337.

F is for Flying Cloud

Not as in the 1851 clipper that set the fastest sailing time between New York and San Francisco. 
Not as in the immigrant ship that brought typhus to Sydney in 1864 and which was criminally under-rationed on its arrival. 
Not as in the Airship R-505 (also known as a blimp). 
Not as in the mining holding.
And, not as in the "very handsome" thorough-bred horse once owned by Mr E. Mitchell Esq. 


F is for the brig Flying Cloud built in Omaha, New Zealand in March 1867, sold at auction on 29 August 1867 after some serious controversy in New Zealand (which I am still investigating) and put on berth to Sydney where it was purchased by our Robert, in partnership with Messrs. Urquhart and McLaughlan, on 5 October 1867 for the sum of £2450. 

22 August 1867 Daily Southern Cross 

Variously referred to in newspaper records as a brig, a barque and a schooner (which are actually all quite different types of ships) the Flying Cloud was approximately 323 tons of Kiwi construction and timber. As best I can tell she was actually a "brig" which traditionally are squared-rigged, two masted ships. 
 She was put to use sailing between Australian ports such as Adelaide, Sydney and Newcastle, and as far as Hong Kong and Mauritius carrying shipments of coal and sugar. On one such journey between Mauritius and Australia, a seamen by the name of James Harris was lost overboard. Sadly,  she was wrecked off of Cape Banks in South Australia on 4 April 1870, thankfully, with all crew saved.
She is just one of a handful of ships owned by our Robert but not the only to end in pieces.


Because of the popularity of the name it's hard to determine which ship is being referred to in various articles so I will update you as I know more!

E is for Exlineal

Nothing came immediately to mind with the letter E when preparing for this challenge. So I googled inspiration! Amongst the thousands of genealogy-related "e" words, a little gem popped up on the unusually titled website The Phronistery and its Compendium of Lost Words. 

As the title suggests, the words have been lost from English, probably because no one could pronounce them! Amongst tongue-twisteres like celeripedean and adnascentia though, was the easy to articulate "exlineal".

E, therefore, is for Exlineal.  As in 'out of the direct line of descent'. [1]

Although no longer a word (and apparently only in use in 1716!) I reckon genealogists should look at bringing exlineal back into usage. It sure beats 'cousin three times removed'! It's also a helpful way to describe what it is I am doing with our family tree. At the moment I am following the direct line of ascent from my maternal grandfather, or the paternal lineal path from Pa. 

Let me demonstrate with pictures:

For our purposes, Pa (1) is a lineal descendant of Alexander Cameron as is Alexander Cameron (2) and Jessy Horn (3). Pa is also a lineal descendant of Robert Cameron but Alexander (2) and Jessy (3) are exlineal descendants of Robert ie, they are not part of the direct line. 

But don't think for a minute that they are any less important to the tree. It's important to follow the exlineal branches cos you'll never know where they might lead you and who you might find... As another genealogist said:

"Treat the broth­ers and sis­ters of your ances­tors as equals … even if some of them were in jail." [2]

So, who's for bringing back 'exlineal'?

[1] Definition from The Phronistery: Compendium of Lost Words

[2] Twigs & Branches: Rules for Genealogy 

E is for Excuses...

And for Exhaustion.

E is for Easter Friday so I can get both my E and F post to you today!

 - sorry for the delay!

D is for Death

As in the Leveller. As in the other certainty in life (after taxes of course). As in the accidental death of "a young man working at Mr. Cameron's sawmills at Wickham". [1]

In times past I think it's fair to generalise that occupational health and safety probably wasn't a priority. Deaths at work for those who relied on their physicality to earn a living were unfortunately all too common: in factories and mines, on building sites and in shipyards. From the gravity of the injury suffered by our Robert  and the nature of work undertaken in sawmills generally, it's clear that this was a risky business. Such deaths, while always tragic, would no doubt have occurred more regularly than they should have and have been reported in the newspaper (if for no other reason than to publicly acknowledge the loss of someone's father / brother / husband). And the seriousness of this awful work-place accident was such that it was always going to be reported and reported widely, but what surprised me when I found it (again, on Trove) was the detail with which it was reported.

The "melancholy and fatal accident" [2] of nineteen year old Andrew Crossley, who was employed as an engine driver at the Wickham sawmill owned by our Robert, occurred on Thursday, 11 May 1871. It was reported that Saturday in the Maitland Mercury [3] and then in the Empire in Sydney on Monday [2]. On Tuesday, by which time there had been an inquest into the incident, the Sydney Morning Herald featured an article which painted as blood-spattered a picture of the event as "the scene of the terrible casualty" was at the time the article's author visited it. It wasn't enough to communicate that poor Andrew Crossley "had been completely cut in two by one of the circular saws" the reporter writes [if you're feeling queasy, probably best not to read on...]:

"the travelling bench, the saw, the adjacent timber, the tie-beams, and even the interior of the roofing thickly be-splattered with blood and portions of the bone and flesh from the body of the unfortunate deceased. The corpse presented a frightful spectacle, a deep gash extended from immediately under the sternum to the vicinity of the right knee, completely severing the chest and laying open the whole of the intestines, and the pallor of the body showed it to be completely emptied of blood." [1]

How exactly he came to be on the saw is a little bit speculative. There is no suggestion that it was anything sinister. In fact, the inquest made a verdict of accidental death with no blame to be attached to anyone connected with the works. But, while many of his workmates were present when the accident happened and in fact helped pull him off the saw, none of them witnessed exactly how he came to be on the saw. They either "heard a noise from the saw, as if it was cutting through a piece of wood, .. turned around and saw deceased lying on the front of the saw", "heard a crash; ... looked up and deceased was across the saw" or "stopped down to put some sawdust into the bag: when [they] looked up [they] saw him fast on the saw; [they] heard no noise".[1][*] What was suggested was that he took a route through the machinery to short-cut a task or caught his heel on the saw and in one short moment of poor judgement, making one tiny mistake - he paid with his life. 

Unidentified sawmill, NSW.
This image was scanned from a negative in the Bert Lovett collection.
It is part of the Norm Barney Photographic Collection,
held by Cultural Collections at the University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

[1] 1871 'THE FRIGHTFUL SAWMILL ACCIDENT AT NEWCASTLE.', The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), 16 May, p. 3, viewed 4 April, 2012, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article13238822

[2] 1871 'MELANCHOLY AND FATAL ACCIDENT.', Empire(Sydney, NSW : 1850 - 1875), 15 May, p. 3, viewed 4 April, 2012, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article60872068

[3] 1871 'LOCAL NEWS.', The Maitland Mercury & Hunter River General Advertiser (NSW : 1843 - 1893), 13 May, p. 3, viewed 4 April, 2012, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18753993


[*] It's always interesting reading witness account as no one person ever remembers the same details (or maybe that's just the lawyer in me?)