Ancestor Biography:
Hookey Jack
Lovell
‘You can’t
see the tree for the leaves.’ Useful for the home family tree researcher, or
recreational genealogist as it is now called. You find yourself out on some
distant limb, swaying precariously, picking up every leaf and seeing if it is
sprouting from the correct tree or not. This is how I came across John Isaac
Lovell.
I was
looking for information on his sister, an unnamed baby girl born somewhere in
the Huon River district to Samuel Lovell and Elizabeth Smith on Christmas Day,
1852. A side note scrawled in a different hand noted she was baptised in the
Wesley Church as Elizabeth Margaret. Confusingly, this girl was always known as
Mary. John Isaac was the eldest and only son of the family of five, and Mary,
the youngest. The other three sisters remain equally as elusive as Mary. Their
mother Elizabeth died in 1854, when little Mary was fifteen months old.
John Isaac popped up in plenty of family tree matches on genealogy websites with varying siblings and parents, but always called “Hookey Jack” Lovell. What a great name!
A census reveals John Isaac and his parents in Franklin between 1848 and 1851. They lived in Geeveston and then Castle Forbes Bay. John grew up when the Huon Valley was an isolated but rapidly emerging area. The pioneers were bushmen who felled the forest giants, milled the timber and shipped it to Hobart and the mainland to the growing colony’s cities.
At age eighteen, John was employed by a Mr Kellaway at Woodstock. He had not been working there long, when he was out one day shooting parrots. He signalled to his companion to keep quiet, knocked the trigger of his gun causing it to explode and the ensuing charge shattered his forearm. Mr Kellaway conveyed young John to the doctor at Franklin. Without the use of chloroform or any type of anaesthetic, reportedly, young Lovell watched the amputation of his forearm without flinching. As soon as the limb was healed, he was fitted with an iron hook, thus explaining and validating the truth of his wonderful nick name.
After
leaving Kellaway’s he went to work for Lucas’ Mill at Baker’s Creek. It was
here he met and married the daughter of John Bell. On October 10, 1864 when
Sarah Bell was seventeen, and he was twenty, they were married by Richard Cook
in the house of E. Dowling, Franklin. On Christmas Day that same year, their
first child was born.
The young couple bought land in Baker’s Creek and gradually laid out a farm of apples, pears and small fruits, in what would become the predominant agricultural industry of the Huon Valley for the next one hundred years.
While the orchard
was establishing, Hookey Jack worked as a timber getter. Despite his physical
handicap, he worked at phenomenal speed. He was the champion pailing- splitter
of the district, frequently tallying 800 a day, with a record of about 5000 in
one day.
His orchard
grew as did his family. Hookey Jack and Sarah went on to have seven more sons
and seven daughters.
Sarah died in 1915, in her late 60’s, several months after a stroke.
Two
shocking events occurred for the family in the ensuing few years. On Wednesday
11th of June, 1919, John Isaac jnr, then aged forty, was taking 28
cases of apples from Baker’s Creek to the Huonville sales. The cartwheel hit a
sandy rut and he was thrown to the road, became entangled in the reins and was
dragged along the road and eventually run over by the cart, causing dreadful
injuries. “Don’t touch me, I’m cooked,” was what John told his employee who was
with him at the time when he came to his aid. Hookey Jack had the sad duty of
identifying his son’s body in Hobart on Saturday when the man finally succumbed
to his dreadful injuries three days later.
In 1923 another son, James met his sad and awful death too.
On Tuesday the 19th
of June, James was at the box-mill of Mr Chas Woods at Ranelagh. James began to
push some billets through when one jammed. A piece five inches thick was hurled
through the air at tremendous force and hit James in the head. An unconscious
James was motored by Mr S Shepperd to the Hobart hospital, arriving at 2:30 pm,
a trip which took them three hours. His injuries consisted of fractures to the
skull, nose, cheek and upper jaw. Part of the brain was exposed and missing.
During the evening he regained consciousness but relapsed towards morning. At
11:00 he took a bad turn, and everything was done to relieve the unfortunate
man. He appeared to suffer distressing agony and died at one o’clock on
Wednesday afternoon. The newspaper reports that ‘the deceased was thirty-four
years of age and left a widow and two young children to mourn their loss. He
was a well respected as a hard-working orchard labourer and much sympathy is
felt throughout the Ranelagh district for the bereaved family.’
Hookey Jack himself ‘joined the great majority’ early on Sunday morning, the 1st of June 1924 aged eighty years and four months.
Sadly, the risks these pioneers faced in the timber and orchard industry, played out badly for Hookey Jack, with two of his son’s deaths.
His
obituary states that fortune did not always smile on his efforts, but that he
carried his troubles lightly, always finding something to be thankful for and
always ready with a cheery word or helping hand for others. His hardy
constitution was taxed several times through serious accidents.
It was in
the research of Hookey Jack that I found two little hints about his sisters.
The first was Mary.
From the
Huon Times 19th of August 1924: A southern correspondent writes:
“The
passing of Mrs Rose, of Dover, is another break in the list of old
Huon pioneers. Deceased was well known in her young days at Castle Forbes Bay,
Franklin and Cradoc. At the last-named place, deceased and her husband were
employed for a time by the late Mr J. Rowe. Her brother, Mr John Lovell, of the
Grove passed away only a few weeks ago reference to which sad event was made in
the ‘Huon Times.’” It is always pleasing to get confirmation such as this that
you have the correct Lovell on the correct tree.
The second hint was mention of another sister at the end of his obituary: “Deceased had a long
line of descendants- 96 grandchildren and 68 great grandchildren. A younger
sister, Mrs Rowe, is living at Hastings.” Ah-ha. This must be the elusive
Hannah, or perhaps the thrice married Susanna, and has given me a new branch to climb out upon.
Sources
Libraries
Tasmania NAME_INDEXES:957161
Libraries
Tasmania NAME_INDEXES:1192210
Libraries Tasmania NAME_INDEXES:479319
Libraries Tasmania NAME_INDEXES:479321
Trove: nla.gov.au/nla.news-article15690252
Trove: nla.gov.au/nla.news-article136200553
Trove: nla.gov.au/nla.news-article135820121
Trove: nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12361766
Trove: nla.gov.au/nla.news-article136182511
Trove: nla.gov.au/nla.news-article136036077
Libraries Tasmania Archive images
