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| tlm-p_s_childhood [2020/03/22 22:06] – judith | tlm-p_s_childhood [2021/09/15 11:44] – judith |
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| ====== TLM-P's childhood ====== | ====== TLM-P's childhood ====== |
| TLM-P, Thomas and Eliza Prior's elder son, is the focus of this history & was the 3rd Thomas M-P in an unbroken line. In 1834 he left his home and family to emigrate to Australia. What was he like, and what drove him to leave his family for a penal colony some five months away by sailing ship? We have a huge amount of evidence, but that requires sifting and appreciating the different perspectives of the writers. He appears to be an energetic man with a driving need to restore his family fortunes. In this he was a typical man of his time: 'There was a general anxiety about status in New South Wales, and most inhabitants were attempting to assert their social respectability.'((Christine Wright, //Wellington's Men in Australia: Peninsula war and the making of empire c.1820-40//, Houndsmills, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011, p.31.)) That social respectability was crucial because it opened up opportunities and networks which enabled fortunes to be made. In TLM-P's case, in later life there was another consideration: of his father's 5 children, he was the only male to survive until middle age, and the only one to have children to carry on his surname. If he failed, his family line failed.\\ | TLM-P, Thomas and Eliza Prior's elder son, is the focus of this history & was the 3rd Thomas Murray Prior in an unbroken line. In 1834 he left his home and family to emigrate to Australia. What was he like, and what drove him to leave his family for a penal colony some five months away by sailing ship? We have a huge amount of evidence, but that requires sifting and appreciating the different perspectives of the writers. He appears to be an energetic man with a driving need to restore his family fortunes. In this he was a typical man of his time: 'There was a general anxiety about status in New South Wales, and most inhabitants were attempting to assert their social respectability.'((Christine Wright, //Wellington's Men in Australia: Peninsula war and the making of empire c.1820-40//, Houndsmills, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011, p.31.)) That social respectability was crucial because it opened up opportunities and networks which enabled fortunes to be made. In TLM-P's case, in later life there was another consideration: of his father's 5 children, he was the only male to survive until middle age, and the only one to have children to carry on his surname. If he failed, his family line failed.\\ |
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| In the following, we hope to give you enough evidence to make up your own mind about him, his family and their contribution to Australian life. Their varied lives are also a window into colonial life, including the tragic story of white settlement and black dispossession, and the fate of women faced with constant pregnancies.\\ | In the following, we hope to give you enough evidence to make up your own mind about him, his family and their contribution to Australian life. Their varied lives are also a window into colonial life, including the tragic story of white settlement and black dispossession, and the fate of women faced with constant pregnancies.\\ |
| {{ :duckworth_s_action_off_san_domingo_6_february_1806_nicholas_pocock.jpg?direct&400|}}//'Duckworth's Action off San Domingo, 6 February 1806' painted by Nicholas Pocock. HMS Donegal is on the left, engaging the Jupiter. Courtesy Wikicommons.// | {{ :duckworth_s_action_off_san_domingo_6_february_1806_nicholas_pocock.jpg?direct&400|}}//'Duckworth's Action off San Domingo, 6 February 1806' painted by Nicholas Pocock. HMS Donegal is on the left, engaging the Jupiter. Courtesy Wikicommons.// |
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| We don't know why he left the navy, but one likely factor is that the long peace after the Napoleonic Wars meant that a naval career no longer provided opportunities for ambitious middle-class young men. That he joined the navy rather than followed his father in the army was likely to be due to economic reasons: promotion was not by purchase in the navy. However, it helped to have a patron who could recommend you for an improved position or better ship.(({{ https://www.quora.com/In-the-days-when-officers-bought-their-commissions-in-the-British-Army-was-it-the-same-in-the-Royal-Navy}})) TLM-P’s patron was [[wp>Edward_Brace|Admiral Sir Edward Brace]], who was unable to take up his command, so TLM-P served instead under Admiral Sir John Ommaney.((//Australia's Representative Men//, ed. T.W.H. Leavitt, Improved Edition, Melbourne: Wells and Leavitt, c.1889, entry for T.L. Murray-Prior. The book used is the one TLM-P owned, signed by him and dated 14th June 1889.It is likely that TLM-P provided the information. Provenance: J. Godden.)) Service without a patron was another bar to ambition, so it is understandable that TLM-P soon resigned.\\ | We don't know why he left the navy, but one likely factor is that he was prone to being sea-sick. As well, the long peace after the Napoleonic Wars meant that a naval career no longer provided opportunities for ambitious middle-class young men. That he joined the navy rather than followed his father in the army was likely to be due to economic reasons: promotion was not by purchase in the navy. However, it helped to have a patron who could recommend you for an improved position or better ship.(({{ https://www.quora.com/In-the-days-when-officers-bought-their-commissions-in-the-British-Army-was-it-the-same-in-the-Royal-Navy}})) TLM-P’s patron was [[wp>Edward_Brace|Admiral Sir Edward Brace]], who was unable to take up his command, so TLM-P served instead under Admiral Sir John Ommaney.((//Australia's Representative Men//, ed. T.W.H. Leavitt, Improved Edition, Melbourne: Wells and Leavitt, c.1889, entry for T.L. Murray-Prior. The book used is the one TLM-P owned, signed by him and dated 14th June 1889.It is likely that TLM-P provided the information. Provenance: J. Godden.)) Service without a patron was another bar to ambition, so it is understandable that TLM-P soon resigned.\\ |
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| Traditionally, as seen, the men of the family had three career options: the military; as a member of the landed gentry; and (in the sole case of [[john_murray_murray-prior|John Murray]]) the clergy. Despite his mother, TLM-P showed no sign of wanting to be a minister of the church; the military was no longer offering opportunities for impoverished men; and the family no longer had the land to support them as members of the gentry - at least in the United Kingdom. Like so many others at this time, TLM-P decided he had a better chance in one of the many British colonies. If his family's downward social mobility and lack of opportunity in Britain were the major 'push' factors, glowing descriptions of opportunities in the colonies from the time of his birth was likely the key 'pull' factor.\\ | Traditionally, as seen, the men of the family had three career options: the military; as a member of the landed gentry; and (in the sole case of [[john_murray_murray-prior|John Murray]]) the clergy. Despite his mother, TLM-P showed no sign of wanting to be a minister of the church; the military was no longer offering opportunities for impoverished men; and the family no longer had the land to support them as members of the gentry - at least in the United Kingdom. Like so many others at this time, TLM-P decided he had a better chance in one of the many British colonies. If his family's downward social mobility and lack of opportunity in Britain were the major 'push' factors, glowing descriptions of opportunities in the colonies from the time of his birth was likely the key 'pull' factor.\\ |