The Convict Trail II

Eliza Rose.

My assignment (with a bit more added):

On the 4th of August 1842 the ship Waverley left Dublin with 149 convicted women on board bound for Van Diemen’s Land. 

The previous year, 1841, Governor Franklin had complained about the wretched state of the female Irish convicts on their arrival to Van Diemen’s Land. He also complained about the 30 young children aboard the MaryAnne who had to be admitted to the orphanage at a cost to the government of £10 a year.[1]

 Perhaps his complaints had been heeded, as the Waverley’s Surgeon Mr Samuel Mackey reported that all 149 women arrived in a clean and healthy state with no deaths on the voyage, and two births. He attributed the healthiness of the prisoners to the Water Closets and berths being kept clean and ventilated, fortunate fine weather during the voyage and the prisoners and children on deck every day from 9 o’clock in the morning till 6 o’clock in the evening.[2]

Eliza Rose, my ggg grandmother was one of these women. Eliza, a widow, had been charged with larceny in Carlow, Ireland on the 5^th of April 1842. [3]From 1836 a depot had been provided for the female convicts in Dublin, so it was here in the Grange Gorman Female depot in Dublin that Eliza spent four months until her transportation. [4]

Widowed Eliza had three children. Perhaps it was these difficult circumstances that had led her to shoplift several times.

hubpages.com/education/Grangegorman-Female-Penitentiary-Stoneybatter-Dublin-7-female-convicts-transportation-to-Australia

Grangegorman Prison, Dublin

 I’m fascinated how we love to make connections. You see it on ‘Who Do You Think You Are’ all the time. The famous guest looks back and discovers a connection. They discover an ancestor who was in theatre, was artistic, or something else that reaching back through time connects them.  Is it real genetic fabric, or is it conformation bias, I don’t know, but when I discovered Eliza stole twelve yards of calico, I was excited. A woman after my own heart. 

It probably had nothing what so ever to do with the fabric. She was probably desperate to feed her children and could resell the calico.

Upon arrival registers and reports were made and the equivalent of today’s mug shot was recorded detailing physical characteristics. Eliza’s description list states she was a short woman, 4/9”, age 24, fresh faced with very dark brown hair, black eyebrows, dark blue eyes and thick lips. She stuttered and had a scar in her forehead.[5]

Eliza’s conduct record states she was transported for Larceny. Gaol Report, ‘well behaved widow’. She stated her offence, Shoplifting 2 or 3 times. ‘Quiet and well behaved’. [6]

Eliza’s Indent record states she had only one child with her on the journey.[7] There was no definite policy on the transportation of children at the time, but outcomes followed were usually the ones that were cheapest for the government, and transportation of children with their mothers was the cheaper option.[8] Eliza’s children were admitted to an orphanage while their mother served her sentence. Emily Rose, presumably the child listed as accompanying Eliza on the voyage, was admitted to the Queen’s Orphan School on the 20^th December 1842 at age 4 years, five days after arrival of the Waverley. Life at the orphanage in New Town was bleak. It was effectively a prison, with the crime either being born to a convict or the loss of a parent. Much like the convict stain, there was a stigma attached to being in the Orphanage. Children were abused, malnourished and treated badly and deaths common. The years 1841-1844 were particularly bad, with many deaths recorded. [9]

                         Queens Orphan Asylum New Town, 1863, courtesy of Tasmanian Images: Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office

 Eliza had three children, but with only one documented as accompanying her on the Waverley, the records of herother children are a little confusing. Her son James was admitted to the Orphanage in 1841. Considering Eliza with the Waverley arrived in 1842, James’ childhood is unknown. Her other daughter Amelia also spent time at the Orphanage, admitted in 1846 at age six, her whereabouts during the previous four years, also unclear.[10]

Eliza was reprimanded for disorderly conduct in Liverpool St in December 1843. By June the following year she was marked as 3 Class. However, announcements from the Comptroller-General’s Office, December 21, 1844 were pleased to grant tickets-of-leave to ninety-five convicts, including Eliza. [11]

 

These often were granted before the sentence end, as convicts with a ticket could then earn their own money and become less strain on the Government’s purse. [12]

On the 1^st September 1845, Eliza’s conduct record states her being in bed with a T. (ticket) of Leave man and she was sentenced to two months of hard labour at the Cascades Female Factory. Her son Charles was born at the Female Factory two months later, on 1^st November 1845. [13]

Charles must have stayed with his mother as there is no record of him at the Orphanage. Presumably Eliza stayed out of trouble over the next few years as her other children survived their Orphanage years and were released to her. Convict John Williams and Eliza applied for marriage permission twice in 1849 but it was refused both times.[14]

Eliza was granted her certificate of freedom on 13^th September 1852, almost ten years after her arrival, and finally in November 1852, John and Eliza were married at the “light on the hill” church, St Georges.

This church sits on the highest point of Battery Point and is also known as the mariner’s church. Appropriately, John was a shipwright.  John Williams was 49 and Eliza an understated 30. [15]

Watercolour by henry Grant Lloyd, 1848
Digitised item from: Allport Library and Museum of Fine Arts, Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office

 Presumably their prospects were now better than ever, and they were happy to be building a new life for themselves in their antipodean home. They registered the birth of their first child, a male, in August 1853. John and Eliza were then living at Stoney Steps, a stone’s throw from the Female Factory, quite a way out of the town of Hobart.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

                                                       View from Stoney Steps.                     National Library of Australia   nla.pic-an8368182-v

Sadly, after all the high-risk ordeals she had endured, Eliza died twenty days later. Cause of death was listed as influenza, but almost certainly her recent childbirth would have contributed to her death.[16] Another twenty days later their baby, now named Samuel Peter died too.[17]

Eliza’s short life left her legacy in her children and grandchildren who settled in the Huon Valley. Who raised Eliza’s children isn’t known. Once James and Emily left the Orphanage, I’ve found no records of them.  Amelia married convict Andrew Lumsden. Her surname had by then become Williams, perhaps her stepfather raised her. Perhaps he remarried. She and Andrew had at least six children. Charles Rose married Elizabeth Lovell had at least twelve children.  [18]  Charles was my maternal grandmother’s grandfather.

I visited Stoney Steps in Hobart. Now well and truly encompassed by the city, it is a tiny little lane at the end of Davey Street with a fabulous view. An old sandstone cottage on the left could easily have been where Eliza lived and died, or perhaps there was an old house up the old stone wall and steps at number 3.

Eliza's descendants populated and built the colony, started businesses, planted fields of apples and sent their sons and grandsons back to the other side of the world to defend their country. They pushed their convict forebears to the back of the closet and conveniently denied them.

Our UTas lecturer recommended a trip back to Ireland if any students had Irish ancestors. Hmmm, I must do that.

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[1] “Sources in the National Archives for research into the transportation of Irish convicts to Aus 1791-1853”Rena Lohan, Archivist, Nat Archives Journal of the Irish Society, Spring 1996

[2] Discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/record>catid=5039006&catln=6

[3] search.archives.tas.gov.au/ImageViewer/image_viewer.htm?CON40-1-8,244,225,F,60 accessed 10 May 2018

[4] itsfilemaker2.its.utas.edu.au/fmi/webd#Female_Convicts_in_VDL_database accessed 15 May 2018

[5] Linctas.ent.sirsidynix.net.au/client/en_AU/all/search/results?qu=eliza&qu=rose

[6] Search.archives.tas.gov

[7] Linc tas names search convicts

[8] Convict Lives: Women at Cascades female factory/Female Convicts Research Centre Convict Women’s press 2012

[9] www.orphanschool.org.au/suffer.php

[10] www.orphanschool.org.au/listorphans.php

[11] Trove.nla.gov.au Colonial Times 28 December 1844 news article8755874

[12] Colonial Times28Dec1844 nla.gov.au/nla.news-article8755874

[13] www.femaleconvicts.org.au/docs/lists/ChildrenUnderSentence.pdf

[14]linctas.ent.sirsidynix.net.au/client/en_AU/names/search/results?qu=eliza&qu=rose&qf=NI_INDEX%09Record+type%09Marriage+Permissions%09Marriage+Permissions accessed 5 May 2018

[15] linc tas name search marriages

[16] linc tas name search deaths

[17] linc tas.name search deaths

[18] linc tas name search marriages/births