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| ====== Matilda and TLM-P's children ====== | |
| Matilda and TLM-P had 12 children. Four (William, Weeta, Lodge and Matilda) died when babies. Of the 6 sons who survived, only the eldest (Thomas) led a relatively untroubled life. Hervey and Hugh died in their 30s; Morres died lonely and depressed when he was 44. Redmond and Egerton also struggled. As suggested below, their schooling might provide an explanation, but so too was their aspiration to make a living from rural pursuits without the backing of substantial capital.((Janet McCalman, 'To Die without Friends: Solitaries, Drifters and Failures in a New World Society', //Body and Mind: Historical Essays in Honour of F. B. Smith//, eds. G. Davison et al, Melbourne University Press, 2009, pp.173-194. <https://search-informit-com-au.ezproxy1.library.usyd.edu.au/documentSummary;dn=212683401745250;res=IELHSS> ISBN: 9780522857177. [cited 10 Aug 18].)) Of the two surviving daughters, Rosa became a hugely successful novelist with female misery a major theme and she later found refuge in spiritualism; Lizzie married for love, but no-one could be too surprised when the property her husband bought with her father was a financial failure. It was a failure which adversely affected many in the family, especially her step-siblings.\\ | |
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| The below photos, unless otherwise stated, are from Nora C. M-P's photo album. Other photos and some duplicates are, when stated, from TLM-P's album.((Provenance of both albums: J. Godden.))\\ | |
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| 1. **[[Thomas_de_montmorenci_florence_mary_m-p|Thomas de Montmorenci]]** (27 January 1848-11 December 1902).((Qld Death registration C1918.)) For more on this Thomas M-P, go to [[thomas_de_montmorenci_florence_mary_m-p|Thomas de Montmorenci, Florence and Mary M-P]]\\ | |
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| 2. **William** Augustus* (18 August 1849-17 January 1850)((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) had the same name as his late [[william_augustus_murray_prior|uncle]]. Like his elder brother, he was born at Bromelton; he was also buried there.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) His birth and death both took place before compulsory registration, and neither event appears to have registered. However, Colin Roderick ((p.11)) describes how baby William had [[wp>Dysentery|dysentery]]. Disastrously, the conventional medical routine at the time for someone with this form of diarrhoea including purging, that is, giving medicine designed to discharge whatever was causing the problem. That remedy increased any diarrhoea/vomiting and heightened dehydration. It is not surprising that so many babies with dysentery died, either from the original cause or because of the medical intervention by their desperate carers. In dying this way, 5-month-old William was one of many - but to his grieving family, it was a uniquely tragic event.\\ | |
| {{:baby_william_grave.jpg?400|}} William's solitary grave in Bromelton's garden.((Thanks to Dr John Thearle who took this photo on 19 October 1997 and gave it to J. Godden.))\\ | |
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| 3. **Rosa** Caroline (27 March 1851((Qld Births registration no. BBP473; her birth was not registered until her sister was born in 1854))- 2 April 1935). She was born at Bromelton station and, like her elder brother, baptised by the Rev. Benjamin Glennie.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Her family called her 'Rosie'. Like her sister Lizzie, she had a deeply loving relationship with her ailing mother. While the boys went to school, the girls were educated at home. When she was 12 years old, Rosie wrote to her grandmother mentioning a governess, Miss Medley, who came to them on a daily basis.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p. 80 citing letter of 11 April 1863))\\ | |
| {{:rosie_m-p.jpg?200|}} Rosa Praed {{:campbell_praed_ca_1867.jpg?150|}} Campbell Praed c. 1867, photo at State Library of Queensland:\\ | |
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| Rosa made what seemed the ideal marriage for an Anglophile colonial writer when she married Arthur Campbell Bulkley Mackworth Praed on 29 October 1872. As she later wrote, her family and friends 'all wanted to be English', and Praed seemed a particularly dashing member of the English gentry, with a lifestyle bankrolled by his father's interests in a bank and brewery in London. Perhaps the clinching detail to the aspiring writer was that his uncle was a well-known poet [[wp>Winthrop_Mackworth_Praed]]. Other current and future members of the family were also artistic, as indicated by a well-executed portrait of Rosa in the SLNSW attributed to an Emily Praed.((SLNSW, ML1039)) To the young Rosa, her suitor embodied cultured English gentry. Sadly, neither of the couple lived up to the other's ideal. Divorce then was very difficult, expensive, condemned by churches and entailed social disgrace, so the unhappy couple did not divorce. They separated in 1899. Today it is probable that Rosa would identify as a lesbian; as it was, she wrote to her friend and co-author Justin McCarthy that (by implication, heterosexual) sex was 'a side of life that has always repelled me.'((Patricia Clarke, 'Rosa Praed's Irish Connections', //The Australian Journal of Irish Studies//, vol. 1, 2001, p.120 citing Rosa Praed to Justin McCarthy, typescript extracts, Praed papers 8/13/1.)) It did not help that Campbell Praed had a reputation for unfaithfulness. The heroine who was reared in the Victorian ideal of female innocent/ignorance, and then married someone unsuitable, became a common theme in Rosa's books. That theme resonated with many women's experiences as well as Rosa's.\\ | |
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| The marriage did not start well. Their first home was the romantically named 'Monte Christo', a 500 square mile property on Port Curtis Island near [[wp>Gladstone,_Queensland|Gladstone]]. The property was a joint venture by Campbell Praed and a former veterinary surgeon, Dr Samuel Joseph Wills.((__ BROKEN-LINK:https://www.secretbrisbane.com.au/home/2017/7/13/suburban-dentist-a-salt-works-and-one-of-queenslands-most-important-female-novelists))LINK-BROKEN__ Rosa's romantic dreams were dashed by the reality of scrubby land and hordes of mosquitoes.((Roderick, //In Mortal Bondage//, p.65.)) Four years later, they left the island with Praed's hopes of making a colonial fortune ended.((Roderick, //In Mortal Bondage//, pp.102-03, 115.))\\ | |
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| The Praeds left Australia in 1876 to live in England, but again - at least initially - reality was no match for Rosa's colonial fantasies. Praed's family circle tended to more insular gentry/business people rather than cultured sophisticates. Despite personal tragedy, Rosa forged her own way in England, becoming a prolific novelist and moving in literary circles. She wrote over 50 novels, many of them with controversial social themes. The height of her fame was the 1880s and 1890s. Almost half her novels had Australian settings or characters, though she returned to Australia only a few more times.((Roderick, //In Mortal Bondage//pp.92-93,102-03, 115: Rosa and Campbell Praed returned for a visit in 1882; and Rosa again in 1894-95,Kay Ferres, ‘”I must dree my weird”: A colonial Correspondence’, Hecate, 31:2, 2005, p.74; //New Zealand Herald//, 7 February 1895, p.6.)) For her 1894 trip, she took her daughter Maud with her not just to Australia, but also visiting on the way Singapore, Hong King, Japan and Canada.((Jessica White, //Hearing Maud//, Crawley, WA: UWA Press, 2019)) Rosa relied not just on her memory but her family, initially mostly her step-mother and father, to refresh her mind regarding Australian details. After her father's death and her step-mother's move to England, Rosa gained much of her Australian details from her sister Lizzie Jardine and other siblings.((M-P family papers, NLA MS 7801, 16/33)) In particular, she directly incorporated the experiences of her brothers Morres and Hugh into her stories.((Patricia Clarke, 'A Paradox of Exile: Rosa Praed's Lifelines to her Australian Past', in //Landscapes of Exile: Once Perilous, Now Safe//, eds. Anna Haebich and Baden Offord, Oxford: Peter Lang, 2008; amongst other news, Rosa used her brother's story of a toddler who wandered off and died at his sister Lizzie's home, Aberfoyle station: //The Australasian Sketcher with Pen and Pencil// 31 October 1889, p.171.)) \\ | |
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| In keeping with her father's ideals, Rosa supported Irish home rule, largely through collaboration with fellow writer and Irish nationalist [[wp>Justin_McCarthy_(1830–1912)|Justin McCarthy.]]((Patricia Clarke, 'Rosa Praed's Irish Connections', //The Australian Journal of Irish Studies//, vol. 1, 2001, pp.118-25.))\\ | |
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| For an overview of Rosa's life see her entry in either {{http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/praed-rosa-caroline-8095|The Australian Dictionary of Biography}} or Wikipedia [[wp>Rosa_Campbell_Praed|Rosa Praed]] or the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. For a definitive biography, see Patricia Clarke, //Rosa! Rosa! A Life of Rosa Praed, novelist and spiritualist//, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1999. There are many articles about Rosa Praed and her writing: a search in the database AustLit yields 393 hits.((https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/search/page?query=Rosa+Praed&scope=all&facetSampleSize=0&facetValuesSize=0&blendMax=y&count=50)) Most anthologies of 19th and early 20th century Australian writers include her, especially those on female authors. She was extensively reported in the newspapers of her day; when she died leading Australian newspapers acknowledged her as, for example, 'The first Australian-born novelist of any importance.'((//SMH//, 20 November 1936)) and 'the first Australian-born novelist worthy of consideration in Australian literature'.((//The Courier-Mail//, 27 April 1935.)) More recently her writings have been explored for the impact of indigenous dispossession. ((McKay, Belinda. 'A Lovely Land ... by Shadows Dark Untainted'?: Whiteness and Early Queensland Women's Writing [online]. In: Moreton-Robinson, Aileen (Editor). Whitening Race: Essays in Social and Cultural Criticism. Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press, 2004: 148-163. Availability: <https://search-informit-com-au.ezproxy.sl.nsw.gov.au/documentSummary;dn=413912230742820;res=IELIND> ISBN: 0855754656; Jennifer Rutherford, 'Melancholy Secrets: Rosa Praed’s Encrypted Father', Double Dialogues, no. 8, summer 2007-06. Both accessed September 2018; Patrica Grimshaw and Julie Evans, 'Colonial women on intercultural frontiers: Rosa Campbell Praed, Mary Bundock and Katie Langloh Parker', //Australian Historical Studies//, 27:106, April 1996.pp.79-96.)) \\ | |
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| **For more on Rosa and Campbell Praed, click on [[Rosa Praed]].** For their children, see the next generation on the sidebar.\\ | |
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| 4. **Morres**(15((TLM-P has 16th, TLM-P, genealogical notes in John & John B. Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland: M to Z//, London: Henry Colburn Publisher, 1846. He was born before compulsory birth registrations and it appears his birth was not registered.)) May 1853 - 18 October 1897)((Qld Death registration C937; his death registration calls him 'Morris' despite the informant being his eldest brother.)) Morres was born and baptised at Bromelton Station;((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) he never married and had no known children.\\ | |
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| Morres was apparently a surveyor. Darbyshire notes that he was at a Survey Camp Eton Vale in February 1876, and on 30 March 1878 he qualified as a licensed surveyor - 'exhibited evidence of competence as surveyor and licensed to survey under land Act 1876 and real Property Act 1861.In march 1881, he was at Jundah to lay out a township when locals were hoping for an extension of the telegraph from Isisford.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, pp.82-83.)) Gambling debts apparently meant that he did not continue with a career as a surveyor.\\ | |
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| In April 1880, TLM-P registered a mortgage on Morres' property at Cleveland, Brisbane.((Andrew Darbyshire, //A Fair Slice of St Lucia//, p.122.)) In the late 1880s/early 1890s, like his brother Hugh, Morres was living on Aberfoyle Station, jointly owned by his father and his brother-in-law, John Jardine.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) His step-mother considered that one 'cannot help loving him - his heart & impulses are so good', but that 'Morres, poor handsome, weak fellow, is a constantly recurring disappointment & heartbreak.... [he causes his father] bitter trouble'.((Nora to Rosa, 14 March 1883 and 3 December 1883)) Nora's letters to Rosa make numerous references to Morres' debts incurred through gambling: in 1880, he was contacted to do fencing for two years to help pay off a £957 debt (around $154,098 in 2019 values).((Nora to Rosa, 29 August 1880))\\ | |
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| Morres died, lonely and depressed, when he was 45 years old. As historian Janet McCalman outlines, it was not an unusual fate for people in an emigrant society.((Janet McCalman, 'To Die without Friends: Solitaries, Drifters and Failures in a New World Society', //Body and Mind: Historical Essays in Honour of F. B. Smith//, eds. G. Davison et al, Melbourne University Press, 2009, pp.173-194. <https://search-informit-com-au.ezproxy1.library.usyd.edu.au/documentSummary;dn=212683401745250;res=IELHSS> ISBN: 9780522857177. [cited 10 Aug 18].)) When he died, Morres had been living for at least two years at Bulliwallah Station in the Clermont District, some 920 km northwest of Brisbane. He wrote a sadly revealing letter to his step-sister Dorothy a month before he died. **For more click on [[Letter]].**\\ | |
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| His death certificate states that Morres died after suffering for 9 days from 'inflammation of the kidneys'.((Qld Death registration C937.)) This is not incompatible with Isobel Hannah's claim that he died 'from the scourge of the "Out-back," berri berri'.((Isobel Hannah, 'The Royal Descent of the First Postmaster-General of Queensland', Queensland Geographical Journal, vol. LV, 1953-54, p.12.)) [[wp>Thiamine_deficiency|Beriberi]] is a severe and chronic form of thiamine (B1) deficiency caused by, among other things, dehydration. One of the problems of all migrants was adjusting to new conditions. An entry in TLM-P's diary when Morres was 10 years old gives an indication how difficult it was to adjust to a semi-tropical climate: 'Morres had a sort of sun stroke and was very bad at first but recovering ... poor little fellow'.((19 January 1863, p.19)) If Morres had a weakness in his kidney function, then the heat and lack of water in summer in outback Queensland was a lethal combination.\\ | |
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| There are numerous photos of Morres in Nora and TLM-P's albums: the one below is from TLM-P's. It bears out Nora's description of him as handsome. See entry on Thomas de M M-P for a photo of him with his eldest brother. {{:morres_3.jpg?200|}}\\ | |
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| **For more photos of Morres and his grave, click on [[Morres]]**\\ | |
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| 5. Elisabeth (**Lizzie**) Catharine (29 October 1854((Qld Births registration no. BBP1252)) - 10 December 1940). She was baptised in Brisbane on Ash Wednesday 1855.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.))\\ | |
| {{ :lizzie_jardine.jpg?250|}} This photo is of Lizzie in fancy dress.((Provenance: J. Godden))\\ | |
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| From c. February 1879 to early 1881, Lizzie was away visiting her sister Rosa in England. TLM-P arranged the trip to discourage her relationship with John (Jack) Robert Jardine.((TLM-P, Diary, e.g. 29 May 1882; Kay Ferres, ‘”I must dree my weird”: A colonial Correspondence’, Hecate, 31:2, 2005, pp.69-70)) His misgivings about the character and lack of financial acumen of Lizzie's chosen mate was shared by her step-mother Nora. Lizzie's frail health added to their misgivings.((there are many references to Lizzie's health, e.g. that 'Lizzie not strong and had gone to Brisbane', TLM-P, Diary, 16 August 1882)) Nora wrote to Rosa that "Jack has had full warning that he is marrying an invalid to be nursed, & not a general servant to look after __his__ comfort, & says that he quite understands."((Nora to Rosa, 7 February 1883))\\ | |
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| Lizzie married Jack Jardine at Maroon Station on 14 June 1883.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Nora had been close to Lizzie, seeing her as 'very necessary for my full happiness, the one I have most rapport with' in the family. Nora also wrote warmly of Jack being dependable though she worried that his mind was very different from Lizzie's. ((Nora to Rosa, 22 November 1882)) But the marriage caused a permanent rift; words that could be accepted in a father, was not forgiven in a step-mother. Three years into her marriage, Lizzie wrote to Rosa: '//When I married Jack I knew that for years to come I should have plenty to contend against. But there is much to sweeten toil. Someday I look forward to a more civilised home. Meantime we are content and live for each other ... [I think Nora] only pretends to like Jack for my sake and [I] cannot forget the hard things she said about him ... He is only an Australian bushman, but he is true, loyal and the tenderest of husbands and we love each other. When I say that I say everything.'//((Lizzie Jardine to Rosa Praed, 1886, Praed Papers, QJO.))\\ | |
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| Jack Jardine was part of a North Queensland family whose English gentry antecedents impressed TLM-P.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Jack's father (His first name was also John) was famed for pioneering feats and for founding the settlement of [[http://www.cape-york-australia.com/somerset-australia.html|Somerset]] at Cape York(([[http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/jardine-john-3850]] - but also for his savage brutality towards the indigenous people.((Kay Ferres, ‘”I must dree my weird”: A colonial Correspondence’, Hecate, 31:2, 2005, p.70.)) The name Jardine was also well-known due to the transgressive marriage in 1873 of Jack Jardine's eldest brother Frank to Sana Solia nee De Boos, a niece of the king of [[wp>Samoa|Samoa]].(({{http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/jardine-john-3850}}))\\ | |
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| Jack Jardine had taken charge of Vallack Point Station, near Somerset (Cape York), in 1868 when he was only 21 years old. At some time he appears to have been in the Barcoo area in Central West Queensland, as Nora wrote to Rosa reassuring her that, if Lizzie did live there, it was no longer //'the unattainable uninhabitable 'terra incognita' ... You can't stretch a line 80 miles in a given direction there now without touching a piano or a sewing machine - Ladies and babies are as thick as bandicoots ... and the former are very angry if you hint there may possibly be a more desirable place of residence.'//((Nora M-P to Rosa Praed, 13 May 1883, Praed papers, QJO)) Despite this reassuring description of the Barcoo, after their marriage, Lizzie stayed with the Jardines in Rockhampton while her husband set up a home for her at Aberfoyle Station in western Queensland (just over 1,000 km northwest of Brisbane), breeding sheep and cattle.((For more on this property see 4pp of loose 1888 balance sheets for Aberfoyle station, now in ML. It was with a report of Queensland post service for 1864, donated to the ML with TLM-P's diaries.)) TLM-P became a partner with Jack Jardine of Aberfoyle in 1885 to try to secure Lizzie's future.((Kay Ferres, ‘”I must dree my weird”: A colonial Correspondence’, Hecate, 31:2, 2005, p.70.)) Lizzie's brothers Morres, Hugh and Egerton subsequently worked at the property at various times.((Burke; ‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Nora had hoped that Jack and Lizzie would settle at Rathdowny, both for her own pleasure in Lizzie's company and because of Lizzie's ill-health, but it was not to be.((Nora to Rosa, ?22 march 1882)) \\ . | |
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| As with so many of TLM-P's ventures - not to mention Jack Jardine's - the property was not profitable, with the 1890s drought the last straw.((Anne Alloway and Roberta Morrison,//Tales from Bush Graves. A study of bush graves in north-west Queensland,// Brisbane: Boolarong Press, 2012, p.2.)) A key reason was its unreliable water supply.((//Otago Witness//, issue 2668, 3 May 1905, p.8.)) TLM-P's 1892 will states that the property cost him £10,070 and that, by then, the partnership had a £8,000 mortgage.((copy of will with J. Godden.)) Aberfoyle was sold after TLM-P's death and, in 1905, the Queensland Supreme Court was told that the loss that entailed was the chief reason the estate could not afford to pay the bequests.((//The Richmond River Express and Cas%%i%%no Kyogle Advertiser//, 3 November 1905, p.6.)) By 1911, Lizzie lived at //Fairview//, Old Sandgate Road, Brisbane. When Jack Jardine died from pneumonia((M-P family papers, NLA Ms 7801, folder 25, Ruth? M-P to Rosa Praed?, 1 October 1911.)) at [[wp>Southport,_Queensland|Southport]] in 1911, he worked for Messrs Aplin, Brown and Co., a major mercantile company operating in north Queensland.((Wiki entry for Aplin, Brown and Co; Jill Fleming, email to J. Godden, 18 January 2018))\\ | |
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| Perhaps due to Lizzie's poverty as a widow, in 1924 her sister-in-law [[thomas_de_montmorenci_florence_mary_m-p|Mary M-P]] left her an annuity of £50 (i.e. paying her £50 a year for the rest of her life).((Mary Bundock, will, in F.F. Bundock papers, MLA5396)) In October 1933, Lizzie was living at Langhram, Scarborough St., Southport. The JOL has a photo of her in her later years.\\ | |
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| Lizzie Jardine, like her father and brother, died from stomach cancer - in addition she had bronchopneumonia. She had been ill for two years before she died at her daughter Rose Molle's home at Orchid Avenue, Surfers Paradise. She was cremated at Brisbane Crematorium.((Queensland death certificate, 1940/50317))\\ | |
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| **For more, including photos of Aberfoyle, click on the [[Jardines]].**\\ | |
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| 6. **Hervey** Morres (9 September 1856((Qld Births registration no. C543))-1 January 1887.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry. Queensland online death registration C1359 gives his first name as 'Henry', an easy mistake to make.)) His godmother was his English step-aunt Jemima Prior.((TLM-P, diary, 17 July 1864)) {{ :hervey_m-p.jpg?200|}} Photo: Hervey as young man, full of promise.((Provenance: J. Godden))\\ | |
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| Hervey was born at Hawkwood Station, baptised by the Rev. Mr Dodd, and was buried in South Brisbane (later called Toowong) Cemetery.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) After school in Tasmania, Hervey gained a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Sydney, where he lived at St Paul's College. Is is said to have gained a classical first class honours.(([[http://www.stpauls.edu.au/home/contribute/benefactors/founders-of-scholarships-and-prizes]]; M-P family papers, NLA MS 7801, 15/30; Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.87.)) Despite his alcoholism, in 1879 he became a barrister. As Darbyshire outlines, Hervey appeared as the barrister in court cases in and around Brisbane, For example, in 1881, he was a prosecutor in the City Police Court on a forgery case ((The Queenslander, 30 April 1881.)) and in the Southern District Court at Ipswich and later Dalby.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 23 November 1881)) By 1882, he was appointed to the Board of Examiners for Attorneys.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 23 November 1881)) He was also a member of the 'Colony of Queensland Society'.((Bernard Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Colonial Gentry//, Melbourne: E.A. Petherick, 1891-95, p.50.)) From the early 1880s until 1885, Hervey leased one of Brisbane's historic houses, [[wp>Middenbury_House|Middenbury]] which now has the address of 600 Coronation Drive, Toowong.((ABC Studios, Heritage Register, entry for Middenbury))\\ | |
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| Hervey married Margaret (Maggie) Macdonald in 1881 - with various spellings of Macdonald'. She was described as the daughter of the late Alexander Macdonald.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 24 August 1881, p.2.)) While the extended clan of the McDonalds lived on the neighbouring [[wp>Dugandan,_Queensland|Dugandan]] Station, TLM-P indicated that her father (had?) lived in Brisbane.((cf. Woolcock, Helen, M. John Thearle, Kay Saunders, '"My beloved chloroform'. Attitudes to Childbearing in Colonial Queensland: a case study', //Social History of Medicine//, 1997, p.441.)) It was a short-lived and troubled marriage, with Hervey dying aged 30 when his son, Hervey McDonald M-P, was four. Even before Hervey's death, TLM-P and Nora assumed responsibility for Maggie and her son. In August 1882, when TLM-P was away, they came to stay at Maroon.((TLM-P, Diary, 16 August 1882)) Maggie and her son also accompanied TLM-P, Nora and other family members on their visit to England in 1885.((//The Queenslander//, 5 December 1885, p.909.))\\ | |
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| The following report of Hervey's death highlighted his potential: that 'at Sydney University ... he ... graduated B.A. with great credit, being nearly at the head of the list in his year. Shortly afterwards he was called to the Queensland Bar, and in March, 1883, was appointed Crown Prosecutor for the Southern district. In July, 1884, he was appointed Master of Titles, which office he held up to his death. He bore a good reputation as a barrister, and his knowledge and grasp of the laws relating to real property are said to have been very considerable.'((//The Queenslander// 8 January 1887 p.55.))\\ | |
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| **For more on Hervey and Margaret M-P and their son, click on [[Hervey]]**\\ | |
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| 7. **Redmond** (26 October 1858((Qld Births registration no. B781/1858; TLM-P, genealogical notes in John & John B. Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland: M to Z//, London: Henry Colburn Publisher, 1846; T.A M-P's Family Bible states he was born 25 October 1858 at Cleveland but this would appear to be incorrect.)) - 21 January 1911((Qld Death C198/1911.)) 'Reddie' or 'Red', as his family called him, was born at [[wp>Eskgrove|Eskgrove]] house, Kangaroo Point, Brisbane and baptised there by the Rev. B.E. Shaw. THM-P gave his occupation at the time of Redmond's birth as 'gentleman'.((Qld Births registration no. B781/1858;‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Redmond was a family name; TLM-P visited the house at Brighton where an earlier Redmond M-P had lived.((TLM-P, Diary, 25 June 1882)) At least n 1873, Redmond attended the High School at Ipswich, then the following year, the Grammar School at Toowoomba.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.88.))\\ | |
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| In 1882, the 24 year old Redman was being 'obstinate', causing problems for his step-mother while his father was away.((TLM-P, Diary, 16 August 1882)). The following year he did 'a runner' from where he was supposed to be working at Rathdowney. Nevertheless, Nora wrote that 'Red has real force of character & will do well I think, I wish that his body were as strong as his mind, but I believe that he has been stronger lately.'((Nora to Rosa, 3 December 1883)) Against this is his appearance on 22 March 1894 in the Police Court for disorderly conduct, for which he paid a 5 shilling fine.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 22 March 1894, cited by Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.88.))\\ | |
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| He died aged 52 on Proserpine railway station, reportedly boarding a train so that he could see a doctor at Bowen. His death certificate indicates that he had seen a doctor the day he died, and that his cause of death was pneumonia. His sister Lizzie was the informant and described him as a 'farmer'.((Qld Death C198/1911.)) Redmond had lived in [[wp>Proserpine,_Queensland|Proserpine, north Queensland]] for over 20 years. He had pursued mining interests (the area is known for its gold) in the district and had, shortly before his death, acquired an interest in a farm at nearby Kelsey Creek.((//Bowen Independent//, 24 January 1911, p.2.)) To date we have no more information about the adult Reddie, other than a comment by his step-mother in 1880 that Alice Bundock was attached to him (Alice's sister Mary became the second wife of Redmond's eldest brother Thomas de M. M-P).((Nora to Rosie, 29 December [1880?], Praed papers, QJO OM64-1, 4/2/1-4)) The attachment did not come to anything and they both died unmarried. Red had no known partner nor children.\\ | |
| The photo, from TLM-P's album, is of Reddie (right) and his brother Hugh. {{:reddie_and_hugh.jpg?300|}} **For more photos, click on [[Reddie]]**.\\ | |
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| 8. **Weeta** Sophia* 12 June 1860((Qld Births registration no. B208))- 8 July 1860.((Qld Death registration B488; TLM-P mistakenly gave the year as 1861,‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) She was born at Cleveland, dying there from influenza 26 days later, before she was baptised.((Queensland death certificate B488. Note she is listed as Prior not M-P; 'Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Her name is engraved on the marble at the front of the family grave at [[family_burial_site_toowong_cemetery_brisbane|Toowong cemetery]].\\ | |
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| 9. **Hugh** (26 July 1861((Qld Births registration no. B695; TLM-P gives 26 July 1861, TLM-P, genealogical notes in John & John B. Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland: M to Z//, London: Henry Colburn Publisher, 1846; Robert M-P has 25 July as does T.A. M-P's Family Bible.)) - 28 December 1896).((Burke has 1895; Robert M-P states he died c.27 December 1897; His death was registered in 1896, Qld Death registration C6; T.A.M-P's Family Bible has his death in 1896 at Annie Vale station.)) If later belief is correct, Hugh's half-sister was born less than a fortnight after Hugh, to TLM-P and [[wait_there_s_more|Annie Smith]]. \\ | |
| {{:reddie_and_hugh_enhanced.jpg?250|}} The photo is of Hugh (right) with his older brother Redmond.((Like the one above, the photo is from TLM-P's album. Provenance: J. Godden)) Hugh was born at Cleveland and baptised at Brisbane by the Rev. John Bliss.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) He is believed to have attended Hobart High School in 1874-79.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.89.)) | |
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| In 1882, when TLM-P was away in England, his family became very worried about Hugh. He was apparently working for the law firm Little & Brown but was seen as lazy, over-weight and succumbing to the 'frightful yearning for drink'. His family, including TLM-P, wrote to him, hoping 'it will have some effect upon him.'((TLM-P, Diary, 16 August 1882)) and his eldest brother Tom offered him a home where he hoped work 'in the healthy rough bush would do him good'. One of Tom's letter implies that Hugh was guilty of the 'despicable' crimes of 'drunkenness and theft'; he attributed Hugh and Morres' poor character as due to being too young when they went to school as well as the 'want of principle among the Tasmanian boys'.((T de M. M-P letters to Nora, 13 & 27 August & 3 September 1882, NLA, Box4?, MS 7801.)) After TLM-P returned, Hugh again ran away - initially, it was thought he had joined a travelling theatre group. His venture into independence was not a success and finally Hugh, via his brother Hervey, obtained money from his father to return home.((Nora to Rosa, feb? date? 1883)) Nora considered he had returned 'so manly & self reliant & so much improved in every way'. His brother Tom wanted Hugh to be a bushman, but Nora did not think his talents lay that way.((Nora to Rosa, 3 December 1883)) She was probably correct.\\ | |
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| By the late 1880s or early 1890s Hugh, like his brother Morres, was living on Aberfoyle Station, jointly owned by his father and his brother-in-law, John Jardine.((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) Isobel Hannah wrote that he died 'from sunstroke on a lonely track between Annie Vale and Doongmabulla', in central Queensland.((Isobel Hannah, 'The Royal Descent of the First Postmaster-General of Queensland', Queensland Geographical Journal, vol. LV, 1953-54, p.12.)) He never married but possibly had two children.\\ | |
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| **For more information and photos, click on [[Hugh]].**\\ | |
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| 10. **Lodge** (29 March 1863((Qld Births registration no. B1669)) - 19 April 1863).((Qld Death registration B1158; ‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) He was born and baptised at Brisbane, dying when 21 days old. He was buried in the family plot at [[family_burial_site_toowong_cemetery_brisbane|Toowong (then known as the South Brisbane) Cemetery]].((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) His cause of death was given as 'atrophy' - a vague diagnosis that went out of fashion in the next century, which could mean anything from prematurity to feeding problems leading to general decline.\\ | |
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| Not surprisingly, after baby Lodge died Matilda wanted a holiday. A month later TLM-P decided to vacate their Brisbane house so it could be let out while Matilda and the children went to Tasmania for six months. Matilda, he wrote, wanted a change. According to Darbyshire, TLM-P allocated £600 for the trip, his entire year's salary as Postmaster-General.((TLM-P, diary, 29 October 1863, MLMSS 3117/Box 1; Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.16. Mistake?)) Matilda, two daughters and three sons left on 14 November 1863 and returned on 24 April 1864 - at least on the the forward trip, a servant went with them.((Passenger list for //Briton's Queen// arriving from Hobart to Sydney, 18 April 1864, accessed on Ancestry.com; Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.64)). The break may have helped Matilda recover but appears to have proved too much for TLM-P's fidelity: [[wait_there's_more|Clara van Zuethem]] gave birth to a son on 25 January 1864 whose father was believed to be TLM-P. As well, Matilda was pregnant again almost immediately she arrived back.\\ | |
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| 11. **Matilda** (26((Qld Births registration no. B3500;TLM-P has 27th, TLM-P, genealogical notes in John & John B. Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland: M to Z//, London: Henry Colburn Publisher, 1846.)) January 1865 - 11 May 1865.((Qld Death registration B2324; ‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) She was christened in Brisbane but died when three and a half months old. She joined her brother Lodge in the family plot at [[family_burial_site_toowong_cemetery_brisbane|Toowong (then known as the South Brisbane) Cemetery]].((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp.)) No cause of death was given on her death certificate; the section specifying the duration of the illness and when last seen by a doctor, is also blank. One possibility is that her's was a [[wp>Sudden_infant_death_syndrome|SIDS]] death so had no known illness and had not been recently seen by a doctor.\\ | |
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| 12. **Egerton** (5 October 1866((Qld Births registration no. B6322; TLM-P, genealogical notes in John & John B. Burke, A// Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland: M to Z//, London: Henry Colburn Publisher, 1846.))- 1 September 1936). Egerton was born at Maroon((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) and was only 2 years-old when his mother died. 'Egerton' appears to be a family name through TLM-P's mother. Significantly for TLM-P, it had aristocratic connections as the [[wp>Egerton_family|family name]] of the Dukes of Bridgewater and Sutherland, as well as of various earls. In 1882, TLM-P stayed with John Skynner Egerton Bishop who lived at Brighton.((TLM-P, Diary 27 June 1882)) **For more, click on [[Bishop]].** \\ | |
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| Egerton inherited his grandfather's (and mother's?) love of poetry, publishing his //Poems// (Brisbane: Watson, Ferguson & Co. Printers) in 1893.((This 16pp booklet was selected for digitalisation by the John Oxley Library in 2016, but it doesn't appear to have happened yet.)) Poetry was a skill likely to have been nurtured by his step-mother. Egerton was 6 years old when Nora married his father, and she agreed to help educate him home at Maroon.((Woolcock, Helen, M. John Thearle, Kay Saunders, '"My beloved chloroform'. Attitudes to Childbearing in Colonial Queensland: a case study', //Social History of Medicine//, 1997, p.441; Nora to Rosa, Praed papers, 25 July 1880, JOL.)) He went to school (at least May 1878) at the High School, Hobart((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.90.)) and at some stage school in Brisbane, boarding nearby, perhaps with his brother Hugh at his brother Hervey's place.((Nora to Rosa, Praed papers, 14 March 1883)). In 1883, his step-mother described Egerton as 'growing very handsome, is steady & affectionate, & tho he has not set the Brisbane river on fire, has made himself a great favourite with his masters. He was 17 last Oct. & I do not think when he comes home this time, that he will go back to school again.'((Nora to Rosa, 3 December 1883)) In around 1888, he appears to have tried working on Bulli station with his brother Tom de M M-P, but he did not think he was suited to managing a station.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.90.))\\ | |
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| {{:egerton_poetry.jpg?300|}} Cover of Egerton's poems, ML A821/P658.2/1A1. **For more, click on [[Egerton's poetry]].**\\ | |
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| Egerton and Sara Arbuthnot Crawford (b. St James' Park, London) married on 30 April 1894 at St Andrew's Church of England, Lutwyche in Brisbane.((This church has since been replaced, see {{http://www.lutwycheanglican.org.au/about-us/history}})) They appeared to lead a somewhat nomadic rural life in south-west Queensland. In 1895, they lived on a station called Killarney at [[wp>Augathella|Augathella]].(( //The Queenslander//, 11 May 1895, p.909.)) When TLM-P filled in family details for Burke's //Colonial Gentry//, they lived at Moorlands, Malvern Hills, [[wp>Blackall,_Queensland|Blackall]].((‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry.)) By 1900, their address was Hoganthulla Downs in the Darling Downs; Sara's sisters lived at Eton, the Church of England school at Nundah.((//The Queenslander//, 7 April 1900, p.670.))\\ | |
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| Sara died, aged 38, in a Toowoomba private hospital in 1903.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 21 January 1903, p.4; Qld death registration C1358)) He was a diary farmer at [[wp>Nambour,_Queensland|Nambour]] in Queensland, but went bankrupt((M-P family papers, NLA MS 7801, special set 15/83))in 1904. Egerton paid his creditors 16 shillings in the £(20 shillings).((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.90.)) In a codicil to his will just before he died in December 1892, TLM-P provided for Egerton's £3,000 legacy being paid to him before his father's death; presumably to protect the money from creditors, he also stipulated that no income be paid to Egerton (or his younger brothers) while bankrupt, although it could be paid to any wife or children.((codicil, copy with J. Godden.)) Sara and Egerton had one son. For more information click on [[Rosa Praed's, Lizzie Jardine's, Hervey & Egerton M-P's children without known direct descendants]] \\ | |
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| In 1905, Egerton married again, to Annie Grace (known as Grace) Crawford, his late wife's sister.((Qld marriage registration C2010; Annie was born in 1879, daughter of Fergus and Agnes Crawford, Birth registration number B24396)) Marriage with a deceased wife's sister was common but still fiercely opposed by sections of the church.((Charlotte Frew, Marriage to a Deceased Wife's Sister in England and Australia 1835-1907, PhD, Macquarie University, 2012.)) In 1908, Egerton and Grace reportedly still lived at Nambour.((//The Queenslander//, 19 September 1908, p.12.)) In August 1911, Ruth M-P wrote to Rosa Praed that she had seen Egerton and Grace - he was looking prosperous and had just bought his neighbour's farm but, she added, Egerton's 'swans are often geese'.((M-P family papers, NLA MS 7801, folder 25.)) In 1912, still at Nambour, he was one of a large group of people fined 5 shillings for 'Omission to furnish sugar cane producer's return; Omission to cut beer duty stamp' thereby contravening the Excise Act.((//Commonwealth of Australia Gazette//, 6 July 1912 [Issue No.45], p.1239.))\\ | |
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| Some time after Egerton retired from farming, he and Grace left Nambour. By 1924, they were reported as living in Melbourne.((//The Week//, 24 October 1924, p.26.)) He was living at 'Moorlands' (also the name of his home in the 1890s), Palm Avenue, Harbord, Sydney when he died on 1 September 1936.((//The Courier-Mail//, 10 October 1936, p.4.)) He and his son are buried in the family plot at Toowong Cemetery, Brisbane. Grace M-P lived to receive her share (£1,300) of TLM-P's estate when it was wound up in 1945.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.90.)) Grace died in November 1950 at her home in another Sydney beach suburb, Bondi.((//The Sydney Morning Herald//, 28 November 1950, p.22.)) \\ | |
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| Photos of Egerton: {{:egerton_1.jpg?200|}} {{:egerton_from_tlmp.jpg?200|}}{{:egerton_2.jpg?200|}}((Provenance: J. Godden)).\\ | |
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| This next photo, in a beautiful tooled leather case, was donated by Colin Roderick to the ML((MIN 333)). He identified one of the boys as possibly Egerton. {{:img_0419_edited.jpg?300|}} | |
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| Later generations believed that, around five months after Egerton's birth, another child was born to TLM-P, this time with [[wait_there_s_more|Mary Ingoldsby]].\\ | |
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| ==== Boys' education ===== | |
| In 1862, Thomas de M. M-P and Morres went to 'Mr. Shaw's school, Brisbane': this was the Collegiate School - a Church of England school whose headmaster was the Rev. Bowyer E. Shaw. It was designed for 'sons of the gentry' and charged accordingly: £80 per year for boarders. Perhaps for that reason, it did not last long.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 17 February 1912, p.12)) In 1862 Tom won the prize for English and Morres the Fourth class prize for Latin.((The Courier, 22 December 1862, p.3)) \\ | |
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| Patricia Clarke asserts that Matilda and her children avoided the worst of Brisbane's summer heat by spending some summers in Hobart. Matilda's sons Morres, Hervey, Redmond, Hugh and Egerton (and the eldest, Tom too), 'became boarders at the private, highly regarded, non-sectarian High School in Hobart'.((Patricia Clarke, //Rosa! Rosa!// p.22; //The Telegraph// (Brisbane), 29 March 1901 p.8; Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p. 43 TLM-P diary 3 April 1862)). \\ | |
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| Hervey M-P was reported as 'a distinguished pupil at the Ipswich Grammar School, and subsequently at the High School, Tasmania, where he gained one or two important scholarships'.((//The Queenslander// 8 January 1887 p.55.)) While at Ipswich Grammar, in 1872, Hervey was awarded The Tiffin Scholarship worth £20 and his brother Hugh the Thorn Scholarship worth £12.((//Queenslander//, 12 May 1932 cited in Darbyshire)) Table Talk ((12 June 1902, p.17.)) reports that Thomas de M. M-P attended the High School in Hobart in the early 1860s, when it was run by the Rev. R. D. Poulett Harris and was a 'notable' private school attracting boys from various regions of Australia. The school's eminence lasted until 1878; it closed in 1885.((E. L. French, 'Harris, Richard Deodatus Poulett (1817–1899)', //Australian Dictionary of Biography//, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/harris-richard-deodatus-poulett-3726/text5855, published first in hardcopy 1972, accessed online 14 August 2018.)) It is not to be confused with the later state-run Hobart High School which operated 1913-66, nor with its prestigious rival, the Hutchins School.\\ | |
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| Even given the school's reputation, it was a long way to go for a cool summer retreat and difficult to understand sending young boys from Queensland to school there. One consideration was the strong belief at the time that Queensland's tropical climate sapped the vitality of young Britons, resulting in a degenerate 'race'.((Shirleene Robinson and Emily Wilson, 'Preserving the traditions of a "great race": youth and national character in Queensland, 1859-1918', //Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society//, 94:2, December 2008, pp.166-85; Warwick Anderson, //The Cultivation of Whiteness. Science, Health and Racial Destiny in Australia//, Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2002; David Walker, //Anxious Nation: Australia and the Rise of Asia 1850-1939//, Brisbane, 1999.)) Certainly when the school advertised in Queensland, it emphasised its healthy location.((//Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser//, 7 January 1869, p.2)) Yet there were limits to the fear of degeneration: only the boys were sent to school while all the girls were taught at home by governesses, Matilda, Nora and older siblings.\\ | |
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| When we consider the early death and alcoholism of some of Matilda's sons, to the modern mind a question that can't be avoided is: what kind of experience did the boys have at school in Tasmania? Was it simply because, as their eldest brother thought when he wrote to his step-mother deploring the character of his brothers Hugh and Morres, that they had been too young to be sent so far from home?((M-P family papers, NLA MS 7801, 14/36)) If TLM-p's plans for Egerton are any guide, the boys were sent away to school when they were around 10 years old. This is confirmed by Hugh, then 11 years old, being at school in Hobart when his father and Nora married.((Woolcock, Helen, M. John Thearle, Kay Saunders, '"My beloved chloroform'. Attitudes to Childbearing in Colonial Queensland: a case study', //Social History of Medicine//, 1997, p.441.)) Matilda's illness and death, however, may have meant that the boys were sent there at a younger age.((Nora M-P to Rosa Praed, 21 November 1874, Praed papers, Box 4, QJO.))\\ | |
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| This was the age of 'spare the rod and spoil the child', when severe physical punishment was routine in schools. Yet the High School's Headmaster, the Rev. Harris, 'was charged with assaulting boys with a cane in March 1860 and June 1868, the first case being dismissed and the second settled out of court'. In the first case, the boy apparently was returned to school by his father; in the second the issue appeared to be that the boy was no longer a pupil there, and had grabbed the cane from Harris when the later tried to cane him. Were these incidents a reflection of a too-ready recourse to the cane, even for this time? Is it relevant that Harris was 'prone to depression', with a daughter who was committed to a mental hospital? That his 5-year old son burned to death in a bonfire accident in 1860 may also be relevant.((E. L. French, 'Harris, Richard Deodatus Poulett (1817–1899)', //Australian Dictionary of Biography//, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/harris-richard-deodatus-poulett-3726/text5855, published first in hardcopy 1972, accessed online 14 August 2018; //Launceston Examiner//, 13 March 1860, p.2 & 13 March 1860, p.2; //The Mercury//, 4 June 1868, p.1; The Maitland Mercury, 7 January 1860, p.7.)) Whatever was the case, TLM-P was satisfied, as he allowed himself to be named as a referee when the School advertised for Queensland pupils.((E.g., //Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser//, 7 January 1869, p.2 and 21 February 1871, p.1; //The Brisbane Courier//, 31 August 1872, p.1.)) In January 1877 it was reported that three Queensland boys were at the school, including 'young Prior', only identified as TLM-P's son, winning a special prize for proficiency in French. It is not know if the two other 'Queensland boys' were his brothers.((//The Brisbane Courier//, 11 January 1877, p.2.))\\ | |
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| Yet again, we need to be cautious assuming childhood difficulties resulted in adult problems. Heavy drinking by all classes was a feature of Queensland colonial life, so perhaps no other explanation is needed than the boys reflecting the social conditions around them.((Ross Fitzgerald, //From the Dreaming to 1915. A History of Queensland//,St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1982,pp.277,305.)) Yet doubt remains: why did the younger boys have such difficult lives? Why did their loving step-mother later find them difficult, and their father write about their behaviour, that it was 'all very hard, and cut me up.'((TLM-P diary, 16 August 1882))\\ | |
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| {{:lyndhurst.jpg?300|}} The M-P family papers includes this photo, identified on the back as Lyndhurst, New Town Road, Hobart Town, Tasmania.((Provenance: J. Godden)) Lyndhurst was a popular name and nothing has yet been found about the homes in this photo, but does it hold a clue to why the children were sent to Hobart? Or was it where Matilda and her children stayed when they went to Tasmania in November 1863- April 1864?((TLM-P diary, November 1863-April 1864)) or where Matilda stayed when she returned to Hobart in February 1868, accompanying by a daughter and two sons as well as Maroon employee Mr Pearse and his wife.((//The Tasmanian Times//, 3 February 1868, p.2; //The Mercury//, 3 February 1868, p.2.))\\ | |
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| ==== Evidence ==== | |
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| One source of information are the family bibles with names and dates of family members written it them, as shown by the next 3 photos of one family bible. {{:mp14.jpg?400|}} {{:mp13.jpg?400|}} {{:mp12.jpg?400|}}((Provenance, M.T & Tom A. M-P.))\\ | |
| The next pages are from the Family Bible, as shown in the first photo, given to TLM-P by his half-sister Jemima((Provenance: E.S.M-P to Glenn M-P, Photos by Suzanne M-P)): {{:family_bible_glenn.jpg?300|}} {{:family_bible_glenn_title_2.jpg?300|}}{{:family_bible_glenn_list2.jpg?300|}}{{:family_bible_glenn_3.jpg?300|}} {{:family_bible_glenn_list.jpg?300|}} | |
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| **Key Genealogical Sources**: Bernard Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Colonial Gentry//, Melbourne: E.A. Petherick, 1891-95, pp.49-50; TLM-P, ‘Questions to be answered by T.L.M-P’, 6pp Memoranda by the Herald Office, Somerset House, London re Burke’s Colonial Gentry; [Thomas M-P], [Thomas A. M-P], Murray-Prior Family, booklet, October 2014; Thomas Bertram M-P, //Some Australasian Families Descended from Royalty//, ms, n.d, pp.7-14, NLA; TLM-P, genealogical notes in John & John B. Burke, //A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain & Ireland: M to Z//, London: Henry Colburn Publisher, 1846; Robert M-P, //The Blood Royal of the Murray-Priors//, ms written 1901-05 NLA Nq929.2M984.\\ | |
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| **N.B.** The above references give contradictory information regarding names and key dates, hence the references to births, deaths and marriage registrations. See __ BROKEN-LINK:https://www.bdm.qld.gov.au/IndexSearch/querySubmit.m?ReportName=BirthSearch,notingLINK-BROKEN__ that certificates need to be bought to find out more than year and parents' names. | |
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