The Field Family Newsletter, Edition 23

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The FIELD Family Newsletter

23rd Edition, August 2005, Edited by Dorothy Cefarin
Reprinted here with permission

CONGRATULATIONS

To Hilton and Nicky Field who celebrated their silver wedding anniversary in 2005. They were originally married at “The Alliance Church” of the Christian Missionary Alliance on Windsor Road, Baulkham Hills in 1980.

They gathered together with 90 of their family and friends to renew their vows and give thanks to God for His faithfulness over the years. Their long time friend Ken Graham, whom Hilton met as an apprentice draftsman back in 1976, officiated over the service, entertaining the crowd with humorous yet revealing stories of the life within the Field household.

“The day was warm and a happy occasion despite the overcast weather. Luke, our youngest son, pulled together a DVD of photos and video footage, leaving many family members with the realization that life is indeed short. Our time of celebration and reflection has been very important to us, yet the more important purpose, was to look to the future as “empty nesters” and believe that the best is yet to come.”

Two minds but with a single thought,
Two heart that beat as one.

OBITUARY

Agnes Ganey Piercy
11/7/1909 - 23/5/2005

The death took place in the Forbes District Hospital after a short illness of Agnes Ganey Piercy (nee Field) aged 95 years of “Yileen” Bedgerabong, loved wife of the late Malcolm Ray Piercy. Loving mother and mother-in-law of Mildred and Clarie Churchill, loving grandmother of Paul and his wife Michele, Wayne and his wife Margaret, loved great grandmother of Aaron and Shauna, Paige and Corey and much loved sister of Mervyne, Merle, Ron, Gordon, Laurie, Noel, Isabel (all deceased) and Mavis.

‘Aggie’, as she was known as, was the daughter of Orton Field and Jessie Peasley, her line goes back through Josiah Field and Sarah Morris, Edward Field Jnr. And Esther Lees, Private Edward Field and Elizabeth Mitchell.

The cortège left Michael Hanley’s Funeral Home, Forbes, for Bedgerabong War Memorial Church and thence for interment in the family portion of the Bedgerabong Cemetery on Friday 27th May,2005.

She was loved by all who knew her and will be greatly missed.
Agnes is now,

“Safe in the arms of Jesus”

BABIES ARE BEAUTIFUL

CONGRATULATIONS

To Jennifer Anne Doyle and Simon Cole on the birth of their son Jed Cole born in 2005. Jed weighed in at 8lb 4oz and was 52cm in length. A brother to Jarvis and all are doing well...
Grandparents are Darrell and Dale Doyle (nee Ross) formerly of Condobolin.

Also Kaye and John Cole.

Great grandparents are Lorna Ross (nee Pirie) and Robert Ross (deceased) of Condobolin.

To Susan Mulherin and Chris Worrell on the birth of their daughter Emily Elizabeth Worrell in 2005 at the Birthing Centre, Surry, England.

Grandaughter for Kerry and Beverley Mulherin (nee Hill).Emily is a descendant from Maria Collits, Strickland, Field.

HELP! HELP! HELP!

I had an accident with my computer and lost the addresses of some people who receive the Field Newsletter. The names of the missing ones are listed below. If you know them or their addresses PLEASE LET ME KNOW!

Dorothy Cefarin,
24 Eggleton St.
Blacktown, NSW, 2148
Phone 02 9671-2129
E-mail:doff202@comcen.com.au

• Alan Williams
• Joy Young
• F.A. Morrison
• Merlene Edwards
• George Tait
• Maureen Watson
• Patricia Woodland
• Elvy Quirk

CONGRATULATIONS

To Renaye Stevie Straton (known as Buttriss) and Michael Ian Knight on their marriage in 2005.

Renaye is the granddaughter of Alf (deceased) and Monica Hutchinson (nee Strickland) and is a descendant from Maria Collits, Strickland, Field.

Frances Field

I am always asking for you to send me your stories about your ancestors and how they lived. Here is a remark from Glenys about Sue James’s article, “I think your piece on Eliz Mitchell was just great”. See how your stories are appreciated, keep it up. Well some time ago I received the following story from Cathy Macken. Thank you Cathy for your great story.

But first the genealogy:
Edward Field and Elizabeth Mitchell,
Edward Field and Esther Lees ,
Josiah Field and Sarah Morris
then Frances Field.

From what I can gather Frances my great grandmother had a somewhat sad and short life. Her parents seem to be farm workers who had no land and moved from place to place. When Frances was in her early twenties and not married, she had a daughter she named Sarah, obviously after her mother who died eighteen months previous. Sarah is raised by the Tearle family, it is said that the father is Sarah’s father (though not listed). Possibly Frances was ill used by him. Later Frances is with the Rodgers family, maybe she is a mothers help. Ellen the first wife of John Rodgers has small children. Sadly, Ellen dies leaving her young family without a mother.

Well before the anniversary of Ellen’s death, Frances is pregnant to John Rodgers. On 17/8/1897 she marries John at Carrobolin. Shortly after on 18/12/1897 she gives birth to my grandfather Angus at Bedgerebong. Norman is born at Bedgerebong on 16/11/1899 and sadly dies on 24/11/1899. Not long after Frances is pregnant again. This time things don’t go well and she dies from this pregnancy on 7/5/1900. John Rodgers farms out his children to various relatives. Angus his youngest son is raised by his sister Ruby McCann.

Angus grows up a tall slender young man who rides race horses for his father. They call him “Splinter”. His trade is shearing. In 1925 he marries Catherine Broderick from “Avondale” Bogan Gate near Forbes. They buy a house in Johnson Street Forbes. Angus works as a shearer. He is a reliable hard worker through the depression years. They have 3 children, Kevin, Raymond Francis (Frank) and Marie. Kevin leaves for Sydney and work. Frank joins the Marist Brothers at age 14. Sadly he died on 22/12/2002 after a good and long life in the Brothers. They moved to West Street Crows Nest with Marie about 1940. Marie marries in 1958 and has five children. She is my mother. Angus and Catherine live at Crows Nest for the rest of their lives. They were devoted to each other. Each Sunday they walked to Mass at Crows Nest and each night they said the Rosary together. On a February morning Catherine was suddenly ill when travelling out with Angus to visit their daughter. She was taken to North Shore Hospital and died the next morning of a heart attack (18/2/1969). Angus never got over her death and died 18/2/1972. They are buried in the same grave at Northern Suburbs Cemetery, Catholic section.

Some interesting facts:

• John Rodgers is a Catholic and Frances is not. She must have converted for them to marry.
• The Rodgers are a land owning family and the Fields are farm worker who live in the village of Bedgerebong.
• Frances lay in a unmarked grave in the Catholic section of the Bedgerebong cemetery for one hundred years before a group of her descendants put some money together and bought her a head stone.
• John Rodgers is buried in a well marked grave in the Forbes cemetery. So is his first wife Ellen.
• John Rodgers leaves his property at Bedgerebong to his oldest son. (I think his name is John). This son has a fiancé but somehow never gets round to marry her. When he dies he leaves the property to her. This is where the property leaves the family.
• On their marriage certificate, Angus lists his mother as Elle Frances, raising the question, what did he know of his mother?

A letter from Pan Wilcox about the name Dixon on which Sue James made a query.

“Sue James may be interested to know the origin of the name Elizabeth Dixon.

I have in my possession a very tattered exercise book dated 31st December,1909, in which my late mother recorded her ancestry.

Prior to her marriage on 2nd February, 1910 I know she spent a lot of time looking after her grandparents, Lydia (nee Field) and James Brown, whom I assume, prior to their deaths, gave her the relevant information.

During the 70’s my late sister Ruby Olsson joined the 1788-1820 Association and submitted to them the information which was contained in this booklet. As you are aware, in those days living in the country, records were not readily available.

As all the other information has proved to be correct, it can only be assumed that the name ”Dixon” was perhaps used to cover the fact that Elizabeth was a convict. I can clearly remember my mother telling us, as told by her mother, that there was no convict blood in the family. I wonder what they would think of that to-day.”

Next is a couple of letters from David Rawsthorne, the first being along the same lines as Pan’s on “convicts”.

“I have always found it interesting when I managed to trace an ancestor line back to a convict, and in my family there seems to be no shortage of them at all. When I began researching my family history I began by tracing the lines back as far as I could, and regularly kept my grandparents informed of my findings. They had been a great source of family stories and information, so I felt it a duty to relay other information to them as I discovered it.

Because I began researching my father’s line, I discovered a number of convicts, much to the amusement of my grandmother. You see, her line was entirely composed of free settlers, and “none of those dirty convicts” as she regularly reminded us. This lack of convicts was also confirmed by all her brothers and sisters that I spoke to during my early research. Any convicts that I came across while researching that line were definitely not part of the family.

I always wondered why some of the older generation had such a problem with being descended from Convicts. Australia was born from these convict roots, and besides, many of the people transported here were convicts of very minor things. Today you would receive a good behaviour bond, a bit of community service, or simply a warning, but back in the late 1700’s it was death or transportation to Australia - a hard decision to make!

After doing the basic line on my grandfather’s side, I started on my grandmother’s “convict –free” line. Apparently there were problems with my methods, as what had worked well before, seemed to turn up convict after convict. Surely this could not be right? I soon confirmed that I was correct, and there was a high percentage of convict ancestors in her family. My only mistake turned out to be telling my grandmother, and I soon found myself unable to get even the most basic information from her. No amount of discussion helped, and I received no more information on her family from her at all.

After this, I decided that maybe in future it might be best to leave sleeping dogs (or is that sleeping convicts?) lie.”

Website Move

“The Rawsthorne Family Tree has recently moved to a new server. This family tree includes the Field, Morris, Lees, Collits, Strickland and Rawsthorne lines to name but a few. When I informed Dorothy that the sight had moved, I felt it necessary to explain why.

Back in 1998 I began a website dedicated to the writings of Stephen King. This began as simply a few pages on my local ISP’s site, and progressed to a very popular site aptly named Horrorking Com. My local ISP hosted the website for a moderate fee, but in recent times they have noticed an increase in traffic, making it uneconomic for them to continue unless they charge more.

It was this decision that started me looking at hosting Horrorking somewhere else. If I was going to move the site, then I may as well incorporate other websites I run into the one place, and my family tree and photograph site was an obvious site.

The combined family tree and picture sites totalled over 100MB (That’s 100 million bytes of information – about 70 floppy discs), so I needed decent storage space as I was rapidly approaching the limit of the existing host. After a few months of searching, and trialling various hosting companies, I chose a new location.

I have now combined the family tree and photographs into one site, and am currently working on a brand new design and feel for the site, as well as replacing and re-scanning many of the pictures currently on the site to improve the look of them. This will take time, so I hope people will bear with me as I do the upgrades. Also in the recent months there have been a number of requests to “Privatise” the site, and this has been done. Any living individual born after 1930, or married after 1945 has their date of birth automatically removed from the file. This process is not foolproof, but seems to work well enough for most people.

Because the family tree trips to take photographs are done on a very low budget, I will continue to increase their numbers as time and money aloe. Thanks to the work of Dorothy and her excellent newsletter, the site receives a good number of visitors, so it will continue to grow over time. Thank you to the many people that have offered accommodation in various places through NSW in the past as well, and I hope to travel through the Hunter Valley and further north in the next 6 months to take photographs in those areas. The next trip will be in a few weeks to the Sutherland area to do Woronora Cemetery, and considering the number of people I have there, it will be a very big trip!
The new website address, and hopefully permanent home of the family tree is:
http://ozfamily.horrorking.com

EDIT: The website has moved to http://www.davidrawsthorne.comand will remain there. Out of interest in 2005 the size of the site was 100MB. Some 5 years later it is in excess of 300MB and growing!

We have often heard about the great floods of the Nepean River, one in 1867 and one during 1861. Read On...

“Herald ”
13/6/1861

On the 13/6/1861 the valley of the Nepean, in common with many northern and southern districts of NSW was visited by a flood as severe as any within the recollection of the old residents there, Emu Plains, Castlereagh and the lower parts of the town of Penrith nearest the river, were all under water causing immense loss of property and loss of life.

Those who had remained in their houses at Castlereagh and up to Emu Plains were now hemmed in by the rising water, and could only hope to reach high ground by the aid of boats..

One family residing at Castlereagh were taken off the roof of their hut on Saturday; the man, his wife and four children, one a baby only a month old. They were driven out of their house and took refuge with a neighbour on higher ground. Here too, the water encroached, and they were compelled to seek safety in the loft. From this they had top get on the roof, from which they were taken by the boats. They had been in the loft and on this roof since Thursday without food.

Another family of nine were rescued from the same locality. Two of the children were ill from measles, and this family also had an infant only three months old. They had been on the roof of their hut for some 24 hours, exposed to the ‘pelting of the pitiless storm’ , drenched to the skin, without food. When brought on shore they were all in the last stage of exhaustion.

1867.. Re the Flood

Penrith people complained that misfortunes never came singly, alluding to the flood and the extension of the railway to Weatherboard (Now Wentworth Falls).

Some say the flood and the railway together will completely ruin the town…

A farmer named Staunton (could this be Stanton?), residing about four miles below the town, has lost all his furniture, etc. His house is standing, but it is so covered with drift and mud that nothing can be got out. He has a wife and family dependant on him for support, and he is an utterly ruined man.

Mr. William Landers, a farmer, living about 9 miles down the river, has lost all that was on his farm at the time of the flood. Everything was swept away.

All the above named persons are resident in the Parish of Castlereagh. The Castlereagh township could not be reached at all nor was it possible to get near the river. There are scores of persons, not mentioned whose farm houses could not be visited at all. Barlow’s and Lander’s farms formed the extreme points, and from one to the other is nine miles.

People on the Woodriff Estate. The house of Constable Rutledge, on the Western bank, was nearly washed away and would have been had it not been fastened with chains to the bridge. A house next door to it fell into the river, and now lies just below the bridge with the cables out of the water..

The Catholic graveyard at Windsor two headstones commemorates the tragedy. One erected by Michael McMahon, father of Catherine Eather (wife of William) records simply that she was drowned in the flood with her five children. The other beside the graves of her parents, James and Elizabeth Staples, lists Emma (Mrs. Thomas Eather (lv) and her children, Annie, James, Eliz. Angelina and Emma, ranging in age from 14 to 2 1/2.

Since writing this article David has been to the Woronora Cemetery and says cemeteries are a very dangerous place to visit. He was hit by a car and suffered some bruising and scratches, the driver was a learner. David is getting better.

David Rawthorne’s CD on our Family Tree is now available.

On the internet site David has taken off the birth, deaths and marriage dates before 1930, some people were upset about this being made public knowledge on their private lives. They could take legal action if necessary so they have been deleted. The CD that is available has all this information as it is for private use only.

David has 1505 individual pictures of headstones in 1015 photographs taken from more than 54 cemeteries across NSW.

There are 32848 individual names and 10939 families representing 4636 surnames on file and he has put ALL of the photos and names on a CD for you to see for yourself. David has stated his line which includes the Collits etc. and many more. No need to go on the internet, just slip in the disc.

Here is your chance to get a copy... Don’t miss out, for only $20 which includes postage and handling, you can have it all.. Just send the $20 to:
David Rawsthorne
PO Box 139
Lithgow NSW 2790
For more information phone: 02 6353 1843
Email: daviddth@iinet.net.au

Note: The CD is no longer available