Friday, February 27, 2015

42.1.7 Andrew Durnford and Mary Hadley - Background on her lineage - Her father served in NSW.


Mary's parents were William Hadley and Sarah Felton.


Like the Durnford forebears, the Hadley family appear to have been a Saxon family, whose lands, as we know, were seized at the time of the conquest.


The family lands may have been first settled in Shropshire.






William Fitz Alan (1105–1160) was a nobleman of Breton origins. He was a major landowner, a Marcher lord with large holdings in Shropshire, where he was the Lord of Oswestry, as well as in Norfolk and Sussex. He took the side of Empress Matilda during the Anarchy and underwent considerable hardship in the Angevin cause before regaining his lands and former status. William's younger brother, Walter fitz Alan (d. 1177), was to become 'the undoubted ancestor of the royal House of Stuart'


It was probably between 1130 and 1138 that Fitzalan made the first recorded grant to Haughmond Abbey: a fishery at Preston Boats on the River Severn, near Shrewsbury. It is possible that there was a hermitage or a small religious community at Haughmond even in his father's time, and a small church from this earlier period has been revealed by excavations on the site, so it is not clear that William was the founder of the abbey.

However, it was he who set it on a secure financial basis, with a series of important land grants in Shropshire and Sussex, which were reciprocated by other magnates in the region. Haughmond even received lands from the Empress, confirmed by Stephen and Henry II. 

William continued to make benefactions to it when he returned from exile, including the wealthy portionary church of Wroxeter, declaring his intention to increase the number of priests there too. He also made grants to nearby Lilleshall Abbey, another Augustinian house. Though not the founder of Wombridge Priory, a smaller Augustinian house, he sanctioned its foundation by the Hadley family, his vassals. It was, however, Haughmond that became the FitzAlan shrine, with all heads of the family after William buried there for a century and a half.

He was a bit of a colourful character, his father Alan Fitz Alan was given extensive lands in Shropshire by King Henry I, around the beginning of his reign.  He succeeded his father in 1114.  He later joined a revolt against King Stephen, and he fled with his family, including his wife, a niece of the Earl of Gloucester, leaving his castle to be defended by his uncle Ernulf, who when he surrendered, was hanged by the King!

He is also related to our tree, as his son William Fitz Alan married Rosamond Fitz Henry whose father was King Henry II, our 23rd great grandfather with his mistress Rosamund Clifford



*A vassal or feudatory is a person who has entered into a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. The obligations often included military support and mutual protection, in exchange for certain privileges, usually including the grant of land held as a fiefdom.
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British History Online

The founders of the Augustinian priory of St. Leonard at Wombridge were Shropshire barons of middling rank, and the modest scale of their possessions determined the size and endowment of their family monastery. William of Hadley, who died in 1136 or soon after, was a vassal of William FitzAlan with a small estate;  his wife Seburga was more powerfully connected, since she was a natural daughter of Hamo Peverel, and the lands that she and her sons, Alan of Hadley and William of Ercall, gave to Wombridge lay in places in which she had acquired an interest from her father.

The earliest grant to the canons of a small clearing in Hadley Wood and a half virgate in High Hatton, record of which is preserved in a confirmation of William FitzAlan,  was in the names of William and Seburga and their son Alan and dates from before c. 1136. William's foundation was, therefore, a little later than the earliest charters of Haughmond Abbey.

The site chosen, a remote clearing in woodland outside the territory of any parish, was strikingly similar. William of Hadley may have imitated his lord: a 13th-century lawsuit in which the canons of Bricett and the canons of Haughmond were at issue over the subjection of Wombridge priory suggests that there may have been personal connections of some kind when the first communities of Augustinian canons were settled in Shropshire, though Wombridge successfully established its independence.

 Another grant of land in Cherrington, north of the Weald Moors, where Seburga had a small feoffment, probably belongs to the foundation period, since a papal bull of 1187 attributes it to William and Alan of Hadley jointly.  Land in High Ercall was given by Seburga's second son, William of Ercall, after 1187: it became the nucleus of the canons' grange of Shirlowe.

The land for their fourth grange was at Wichley in Uppington; to all appearances this was granted c. 1189 by Roger Mussun after the Peverel claim had been completely extinguished and the manor regranted by Henry II on a serjeanty tenure. When Roger Mussun gave the canons all his waste and woodland in Wichley, as well as the chapel of Uppington, he assumed responsibility for the alms and obligations of the family whose former lands he had received from the king.

His widow gave land in Harrington in Sutton Maddock;  this also was a former Peverel manor, regranted by Henry II,  and here too Wombridge was heir to the goodwill of the new recipients. In 1186-7 Madoc son of Gervase Goch surrendered to the canons any right he might have had in the church, but a charter of Henry II making an independent grant of the church to Wombridge refers to an earlier agreement made with the canons; the donors may have been honouring a promise made during a time of conflicting legal rights.

Apart from the Hadley family and their heirs and dispossessors the chief benefactors of the priory were the lords of neighbouring manors. Some of these men were benefactors of numerous monasteries, including Wombridge casually as a local house. John and Hamo Lestrange, who gave pasture rights and rights to assart in the wood of Wombridge, and Fulk Lestrange, who exchanged a small-holding in Broctkon,  were of this kind; their interest did not extend beyond the next generation.


The system of Sherrifs was first appointed by King Alfred, who divided the lands into Shires, in 872.

In Shropshire during the reign of King Richard I  William de Hadley was appointed sheriff in 1192



This is an English locational surname of Anglo-Saxon origin, deriving from one of the places called Hadley in Hertfordshire, Shropshire and Worcestershire, or from any of the places called Hadleigh in Suffolk, Essex and elsewhere. 




The early recordings of the placename in the Domesday Book of 1086, for instance, are as "Haethlege, Hatlege" and "Hadlega", showing the derivation from the Olde English pre 7th Century "haeth", heathland, heather, and "leah", wood, clearing. Hadley in Worcestershire, however, is recorded as "Haddeleye" in 1327, and derives from the Olde English personal name "Hadda", a short form of the personal names beginning with "heard", hardy, brave, strong, with "leah", as before. The surname was first recorded in the late 12th Century (see below), and other early recordings include: Warin de Hadlai (1212, Yorkshire); Richard de Hadlege (1311, Cambridgeshire); and John Hadley (1390, Essex).



Our Hadley family connections begin with Mary's marriage to Andrew Durnford, and while concentrating on trying to finish the Durnford story before the end of the year, some of my research was based on the old information that had been sourced years ago.  Consequently a mistake was made relating to her great grandparents!

Walsall Market



Our 6th great grandfather was Michael Hadley, from Wolverhampton, who married Ann Short from Walsall on 8th August 1733 at St Peter's Wolverhampton.






Michael and Ann had at least two sons, John Hadley b 1734  d 1736  and Isaac Hadley  b 1735 - 1798, he was christened on 18th January 1735 at John Street Presbyterian Church in Wolverhampton.


They lived in Wolverhampton.

(Probably classed as a suburb of Birmingham, so many people live in this area now, changed from the farming community it was in the mid 1700's)

Wolverhampton, parliamentary. and municipal. borough. and manufacturing town, parish., and township, Staffordshire, on an eminence, 12¾ miles NW. of Birmingham and 125 miles from London by rail - par. (containing Bilston, Wednesfield, Willenhall, 



Their son Isaac Hadley married Ann Glover on 30th May 1765 in St Bartholomew's Wednesbury







Persistence in the midst of Persecution

In their mission to bring the Christian message to every town and village in Great Britain, the 18th century Methodist preachers travelled extensively.  They would arrive at a place, attempt to preach in one of the churches or, failing that, in a market place or at a fair. Their style was engaging and they spoke with authority and grace. Wesley described their work as ‘offering pardon to sinners’.
But they didn’t always receive a warm welcome. While many thousands gathered to hear the message, some reacted negatively. Sometimes fuelled by jealous clergy, or fearful ‘Gentlemen’, and sometimes by a basic reaction of anger, the preachers faced violence fairly regularly. This was a different type of spiritual warfare.    

John Wesley in Wednesbury, West Midlands
One famous incident in the life of John Wesley took place in October, 1743.

He writes, ‘Thursday 20th Oct, 1743 – ‘I rode to Wednesbury.
At twelve I preached in a ground near the middle of the town, to a far larger congregation than was expected, on, ‘Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today and forever.’


The birth of one of Wednesbury’s most famous industries took place in 1811 when John Russell, gunbarrel maker, and landlord of the Turk’s Head Inn began to make wrought iron tubes.

(One of Ann's  grandsons was an Iron monger, Benjamin, the son of Benjamin Hadley)


Ann Glover was the daughter of William Glover (d 1758) and Jane Allcraft  of Wolverhampton.

William and Jane were married 1st June 1740 in St Peter's Wolverhampton, and had at least 3 daughters.  

Mary born 1748;  Ann Glover born 1749  d 1802   and Esther born 1752

Around this time the industrial revolution was making changes to the country, coal was being mined, mills were spinning cotton and wool, and possibly the Glover family were involved in the clothing industry making gloves.  Searching through the census records of the times, so many ladies were knitters!

Ann and Isaac had many children, with a high number dying as infants.

Isaac Hadley                  b  1769  -   1847     m  Margaret  They lived in Dudley, Worchestershire
Henrietta Hadley           b  1769       1770          She died in Wolverhampton
Amelia Hadley              b  1770
Cornelius Hadley          b  1771
Isabella Hadley             b  1773        1773          She died in Wolverhampton, she was baptised at the                                                                                 John Street Presbyterian Church
Josiah Hadley               b   1775        1775          He died in Wolverhampton
Josiah Hadley               b   1776
William Hadley            b   1777       1852      m  Sarah Felton St Peter's Wolverhampton  Our lineage
Benjamin Hadley          b   1778       1861     m   Hannah Phillips he liver in Rowley Regis then                                                                                  Birmingham, and Lutley were he was a farmer with 40                                                                            acres of land, with several houses.
                                                                       He died at Rowley Regis in 1861.  They had 8 children.

Susannah Hadley          b   1779       1779      She died in Wolverhampton.
Rowley Regis 1900

The history of Rowley Regis began in the 12th century, when a small village grew around the parish church of St. Giles, approximately two miles south-east of the town of Dudley. It began to develop substantially between the two world wars, when thousands of privately owned and local authority houses were built in the surrounding area. During that time Rowley Regis became a borough, and incorporated the communities of Blackheath, Old Hill, and Cradley Heath. 

These places were all within the ancient parish of Rowley Regis, which (despite being in the county of Staffordshire) was in the diocese of Worcester. The parish contained the manors of Rowley Regis and Rowley Somery, the latter being part of the barony of Dudley, but the extents of these manors and the relationship between them are not clear.

All those children and only three sons survived.  


Isaac Hadley died 17th August 1798 in Wolverhampton, and he may have owned lands in Handsworth, Staffordshire.     Ann died 26th May 1802 in Wolverhampton.



William Hadley was born 1st February 1777, he married Sarah Felton born 1779, at St Peter's Church.  At the time of the marriage both were under age  (21).


Sarah's family have been described in an earlier post, however she did have a sister, Mary who was born in 1778.  Mary married John Amber, and they lived a long life at Leamington Spa, in Warwickshire.  

(Another beautiful part of the country)
    
Leamington Spa










William and Sarah's children and their birth places.    The birth dates are from other researchers information, unless the dates have been confirmed.  Some family members may have access to family records which indicate the birth dates.  

However there are inconsistencies with what the children say is their date of birth and some that are recorded, so to try to paint a picture of the military timelines, in relation to the birth of the children, the following information is provided.


1.  Ann Felton Hadley                 born  19th March 1797  in Wolverhampton
2.  Mary Hadley                         born  25 February 1799  in Wolverhampton
3.  William Henry Stone Hadley  born 10th April 1803 in Birmingham
4.  Sarah Hadley                         born 10 February 1805  (no records sourced)
5.  Amelia Hadley                       born  19 December 1806 or 1811 according to her census records                                                      she states she was born n 1811 in Foreign Parts.No records                                                                                                                                            sourced)
6.  Charlotte Hadley                      born 22nd October 1808 (No records sourced)

7.  Benjamin Henry Stone Hadley  born  10 August 1810  in Paramatta, (No records sourced)
8.  Henrietta Hadley                      born 14 December 1815 in St Hellier Jersey (No records sourced)
9.  Susannah Hadley                     born 16 October 1817. Christened 6th January 1820 St Peter's
10. Elizabeth Hadley                    born 8 June 1819  She was also christened 6th January 1820 at St                                                          Peters Wolverhampton

11. Louisa Hadley                        born 2 January 1814 6 January 1820 on Isle of Wight 
                                                                   (Her information from census)  No records sourced.
12. Maria Hadley                          born either 12 July 1812 on Isle of Wight ( her information 1820)

13. John Felton Hadley                  born 30 June 1821.  He was christened on 23 July 1824 at St                                                                       Mary's Newington  Surrey   Death 21 Jan 1840 
                                                                                                               (no records sourced)

It is intriguing that they have named their sons with a middle name, and not the daughters other than the first born, and usually the middle name would be a family name. Henry Stone must feature in the family somewhere.  There are countless number of family members of the Stone family in Wolverhampton.

William Hadley was in the British Army.  Initially he was a member of the Royal Birmingham Fencibles.  He joined on 3rd May 1799, and was a member for 5 years before joining the 37th Regiment as an Ensign.

The places where the children were born give an idea of just where the family were living during his time in the Military.

Prior to joining the military William, Sarah, and Ann and Mary lived in Wolverhampton.

Birmingham

He joined the Royal Birmingham Fencibles in May 1799, and the family would have been living in Birmingham between 1799 and 1804, while he was based there.   

Son William Henry Stone Hadley was born 10th April 1803 in Birmingham.  

Cape of Good Hope

His next posting with the 38th Regiment from their records appears to be  

1805: Birr; Fermoy; Cork; August - to Cape of Good Hope
1806: Cape of Good Hope; Saldanha Bay; Cape Town; to South America; Maldonado 

He was only with the 38th for 8 months. 

Sarah and Amelia were born between 1805 and 1806, although Amelia states she was born 1811 in Foreign Parts, which would tie in to the time they were in Australia.  

West Indies

He transferred from 38th Foot in January 1806 into the 2nd West Indies Regiment and served for 2 years from January 1806 to January 1808, he was a Lieutenant serving under Colonel Richard Earl of Caven.

In 1806 there was a plot in St George, and in 1808 a Mutiny of the 2nd West India Regiment and plot in Kingston, Jamaica.

1806. Writing to his London headquarters, Simon Frazer, Royal Artillery, Commissioner for the UK military in St. Georges, noted the potential value of Bermuda if held by enemies of Britain or, if armed by the British, against the United States. As a direct result. three years later,,the Dockyard was built and Bermuda was fortified.

1806. James Gosling, the son of a wine and spirit merchant from England set out for America by chartered ship with a quantity of merchandise, ready to start a new life.  After 91 days his charter ran out and he was forced to dock in the nearest port, which was Bermuda.  Deciding to set up shop in Bermuda instead, Gosling’s Rum was born several years later as a result of his experimentations in barrel-ageing rum distillate.  Gosling’s Black Seal (named after the black was used to seal the bottle) is still produced using a blend of pot and column still rums imported into Bermuda and aged 3 years in ex-bourbon barrels

Australia

In January 1808 he transferred to the 102nd Foot, The Red Coats and traveled to Australia.

Of the children either Charlotte or Amelia could have been born in Australia along with Benjamin, as William arrived in November 1808 and left November 1811. 

England

After leaving Australia they returned to England, probably around June, and he returned to duty with the army.

West Indies

In January 1813 he went to the West Indies, and in December 1813 he was promoted in the 8th West India Regiment to Captain.

Major Cassidy and Captain Winkler were each presented with a sword of honour by the major-general; and the order of the Fleur de Lys was transmitted to them by Louis XVIII., for their services in Guadaloupe.

Major Cassidy and the detachment of the 1st West India Regiment, remained in Guadaloupe until the 10th of October, 1815, on which day they embarked for Barbados, arriving at that island on the 26th. The regiment being then very much below its strength, on account of the heavy losses which it had sustained during the expedition to New Orleans, it was determined to transfer the majority of the privates who remained to the 3rd, 4th, 6th and 8th West India Regiments, and reform the regiment from a body of some 700 American negroes, who, in the late war with the United States, had served with the British, and had been temporarily organised as Colonial Marines.



On the 14th of December, the skeleton of the regiment embarked in H.M.S. Niobe for Bermuda, where the Colonial Marines were then stationed, and arrived at St. George's on the 9th of January, 1816. 

It was only then discovered that the number of men with whom it was intended to reform the regiment, did not exceed 400; most of whom were of but poor physique, and, moreover, unwilling to engage. At first the authorities determined to force these men to enlist, but ultimately the whole plan was abandoned; and the skeleton of the regiment left Bermuda on the 18th of March to return to the West Indies. It arrived at Barbados on the 1st of April; and the men who had already been transferred being sent back to it, the corps was completed with drafts from the late disbanded Bombor Regiment.


1813. With the start of the American War of 1812 Bermuda's Militia Act, 1813 was passed as a wartime expediency. Once again, Bermuda was empowered to have its own Militia after its importance had been substantially reduced after the end of the American War of Independence and declaration of peace in the 1790s. The Act reorganized Bermuda's nine-company regiment of foot into two battalions. The total strength of the local militia was, by then, nominally 450 men, but, as always, this was, at any moment, effectively reduced by half due to the seafaring occupations of the better part of the colony's men. 

Evidently, the militia no longer included any of the colony's black population, whether free or enslaved, as Lt. Colonel Francis Gore, on assuming the Governorship of Bermuda, felt it advisable to boost the militia's strength by raising a colored corps, though this was not, in fact, done. Despite the state of the Militia at the War's start, on the occasion of an emergency being declared (when strange vessels were spotted lurking offshore), the colonists responded admirably in full strength, standing watch through the night.

The War Office in London had begun the War considering the Bermudians to be of dubious loyalty. This was largely due to the theft of a large quantity of gunpowder from a St. George's magazine during the American War of Independence, in 1775. That powder had been sent to the rebel army of the American colonies, under the Virginian General George Washington, and at his personal request.

The close blood-lines and common history of Bermuda and Virginia, particularly, just as many in 1813 as there were in 1775 were also worrying. The Governor was prompted to try to get the Colonial Assembly to en-act a permanent Militia. Throughout the Militia's history, its strength and efficiency had waxed and waned, more with the response to declarations of wars, and to the scarcity of manpower due to the maritime industry, than with any dictum of the Colonial Assembly.

The British Army in Britain wanted something a little more reliable. The Colonial Assembly, lacking any strong self-interest, and perhaps wary of obliging itself to the maintenance of a force that, with the growth of the Regular Garrison, must become ever less under its control, would only agree to provide funds on a temporary basis.    


On 14th April 1816, the slaves revolted in Barbados.  In October 1817 St Lucia was struck with a violent hurricane.

 In 1812 a West African recruiting depot was established on Blance Island in Sierre Leone to train West African volunteers for the West India Regiments. By 1816 the end of the Napoleonic Wars and the reduction of the West India regiments to six enabled this depot to be closed.

Between 1814 and 1816 served in West Indies, which indicates that perhaps Susannah and Elizabeth were born in the West Indies, and then christened when the family returned home.


1814. July. HMS Dictator, and HMS Diamond, both 64s, along with HMS Royal Oak, 74, arrived at Bermuda between July and August from England with the 4th, 44th, and 85th Foot regiments aboard. Altogether a brigade of 3,500 troops disembarked on the North Shore, near Devonshire Dock, at a place still called "Forces Point", under the command of Maj-Gen Robert Ross of an Ulster family.
1814. July. 6 British frigates arrived at Bermuda  from "up the Straits" having on board the 7th Fusiliers and 3 other regiments. They were soon joined by those brought on HMS  Royal Oak, Dictator, and Diamond. 
1814. July. British soldiers under the command of Major General Robert Ross arrived in Bermuda from Britain and camped out near Devonshire Dock in their hundreds, for two weeks on the island. In Murray’s Anchorage, some 18 ships of the line, including the flagship, HMS Tonnant (86 guns, originally the French Le Tonnant, captured by Nelson in 1798 at the Battle of the Nile) and HMS Royal Oak (74) lay at anchor, awaiting a signal for departure for the continent. The Admiral in overall command, Admiral Sir Pulteney Malcolm, was able to view the entire fleet from his strategic hill-top home at Mount Wyndham in Hamilton Parish, his official residence rented from Stephen Outerbridge.
1814. July. One of the British men-o-war which assembled at Bermuda to attack the American coast was the HMS Royal Oak, with Major (later Lt-Gen) Sir Harry Smith (1787-1860) age 27 who wrote an account of the arrival at Bermuda. She left Bermuda with Rear Admiral Malcolm and 30 or 40 sail of transport, on board troops recently arrived from Southern France, to rendezvous in Chesapeake Bay with the "Tonnant" and the "Surprise". "The wind blowing from the east made it difficult for the "Royal Oak" to leave the anchorage. The Admiral resolved on the boldest thing ever attempted, to take the fleet out through the North East Passage, never done before save by one frigate

1814. The present Fort St. Catherine was built, from an earlier fort.
1814.  Thomas Tudor Tucker, born at Tucker House, St George’s, Bermuda and named for his uncle, the Treasurer of the USA, commanded HMS Cherub in an engagement off Valparaiso in the company with HMS Phoebe, when the USS Essex was captured.

1814. When it was announced that the seat of the Bermuda Government was to be transferred to Hamilton from St. George's, N. T. Butterfield (later, the Bank) moved to Front Street. 




The conditions in the West Indies were very bad, with malaria and yellow fever killing thousands, in fact between 1793 to 1796, when both Elias Durnford and Andrew Durnford died from yellow fever, there were 40,000 British soldiers who died in the West Indies.  Not a good environment for a family from England to live in.

His family must have been with him, because in December 1814, his eldest daughter Ann, married Lieutenant George Moss, another officer from the 8th West Indies Regiment., at St Michael's in Barbados.   George was made a Lieutenant on 16th November 1815  
 

Their first child Helen Hadley Moss was born 25th November 1815 in Martinique.  They returned to England, as Helen was christened 16 July 1816 in St John's in Leeds.




They left West Indies as he was transferred on 16th May 1816 to 2nd Royal Veteran's Battalion

2nd Royal Veteran Battalion was later disbanded.  He was transferred to 5th Royal Veteran Battalion.

Jersey

He was unwell, and on the recommendation of the Army Medics, he went to Jersey Islands 1816.

Henrietta was born on Jersey Islands, perhaps her date of birth is incorrect.

The island of Jersey is the largest of the Channel Islands. Although the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey are often referred to collectively as the Channel Islands, the "Channel Islands" are not a constitutional or political unit. Jersey has a separate relationship to the British Crown from the other Crown dependencies of Guernsey and the Isle of Man. It is not part of the United Kingdom,
and has an international identity separate from that of the UK but the United Kingdom is constitutionally responsible for the defence of Jersey.

Isle of Wight

Louisa and Maria state in their census records they were born on Isle of Wight.  If they were they had to have been born after 1816, and around the time he wrote a letter regarding his situation (below)

Isle of Wight is off the coast of Southampton, the long island in the top of the photo, ferry and hydrofoil travel regularly.


The Isle of Wight is roughly diamond-shaped and covers an area of 380 km2, nearly 150 sq.miles. Slightly more than half of the island, mainly in the west, is designated as the Isle of Wight Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The island has 258 km2 of farmland, 52 km2 of developed areas, and 57 miles of coastline. The landscape of the island is diverse, leading to its oft-quoted description of "England in Miniature". West Wight is predominantly rural, with dramatic coastlines dominated by the chalk downland ridge, running across the whole island and ending in the Needles stacks—perhaps the most photographed place on the Isle of Wight. The south western quarter is commonly referred to as the Back of the Wight because it has a unique social and historical background. The highest point on the island is St Boniface Down, at 241 metres (791 ft),which is a marilyn.

John Felton Hadley was born in Surrey.  The family may have been living in Surrey when he was with the 5th Royal Veteran Battalion.

London

Perhaps his 3 years of duty with the 2nd Veterans Battalion included time on both Jersey and the Isle of Wight.  He remained in the 2nd Veterans Battalion until 1st November 1819, then he was transferred to 5th Royal Veteran Battalion as Captain.  He retired on full pay 25th July 1821.

Their youngest son was born 1821 in Surrey.

Between 1804 and 1820, 13 royal garrison battalions were raised, taking into service army pensioners and invalids. They were renamed Royal Veteran Battalions in 1804. These battalions worked in depots and stores doing mainly administration and support work, which enabled the more able-bodied soldiers to do the fighting. These veteran battalions were disbanded and re-formed right up until the 1820s.




In 1816 he wrote a letter to Capt John Piper.

John Piper (20 April 1773 – 8 June 1851) was a military officer, public servant and landowner in the colony of New South Wales.  He served at Norfolk Island, first going there in 1793, (due to his love affair) and again in 1804.  He was one of the better officers on Norfolk Island. 

(my husband's 6th g.grandparents and 5th great grandparents were both on Norfolk Island, one being a First Fleeter) 

Piper returned to Sydney in 1810, having avoided all the turmoil of the Rum Rebellion. He sailed for England in 1811, but resigned his commission and returned to Sydney in February 1814, as Naval Officer. 

In 1816 he married Mary Ann Shears, the daughter of two First Fleet convicts, who had already borne several children by him



The letter outlines his current position, he had ten children, his daughter had been married and was coming home with her husband and grandson, (the baby was a girl), his wife was having another child, and he was getting on in years, and had found Jersey!















Over the years, William tried to get passage back to Australia, in order to reclaim his land grants.

However, those land grants were taken back, along with hundreds of others in 1811, when the 102rd Battalion returned to England.  His son and grandson tried for years to get a resolution to the 100 acres granted to Sarah.

Before he left he apparently gave a power of attorney to the surgeon Charles Throsby, in order to get his funds.

Charles Throsby (1777 – 2 April 1828) was an Australian explorer, pioneer and parliamentarian. He opened up much new land beyond the Blue Mountains for colonial settlement. He was a grazier, and became a prominent member of New South Wales society.

Throsby was born in Glenfield near Leicester in England. He was engaged as a surgeon on the convict transport Coromandel carrying 136 male convicts from Portsmouth to Sydney. They departed Portsmouth 12 February 1802 and arrived in Sydney without calling in port on 13 June 1802, with no reported convict deaths under his care.

Soon afterwards he joined the medical staff of the Colony, and in October 1802 he was appointed a magistrate and acting-surgeon at Castle Hill. In August 1804 he was transferred to Newcastle, and in April 1805 was made superintendent there. Towards the end of 1808 he was given a grant of 500 acres (2 km²) at Cabramatta, and in the following year resigned his position at Newcastle.

In 1811 he was employed as agent by the colony's wealthiest landowner, Sir John Jamison, of Regentville.  He subsequently paid a visit to England      (He obviously avoided William!)   


In November 1824 Throsby was one of the 10 landholders and merchants submitted by Governor Brisbane to Earl Bathurst as suitable for appointment for a colonial council, and when the New South Wales Legislative Council was formed in December 1825, three of these were appointed, of whom Throsby was one. His standing in the community was very high and he was the owner of about 20,000 acres (8,100 ha) and large and valuable herds of cattle.

Unfortunately for him, about the year 1811 he had become security for the purchase of a vessel by a friend, Garnham Blaxcell, who had left the colony in 1817 and subsequently died. Proceedings were taken against Throsby which became drawn out, and eventually a verdict against him was obtained for £4000. His health had not been good for some time, and becoming depressed, on 2 April 1828 he committed suicide by shooting himself
 
One of Blaxcell's notes, on display at the Powerhouse Museum Sydney.


Garnham Blaxcell (1778-1817), merchant and trader, was baptized on 27 May 1778, the sixth son of John Blaxcell of Kelsale, near Saxmundham, Suffolk, England, and his wife Ann, née Groom. He joined the navy in May 1801 and served in H.M.S. Rattlesnake on the Cape of Good Hope Station, before he transferred to H.M.S. Buffalo, in which he arrived in Sydney as acting purser on 16 October 1802.

He quickly won favour with Governor Philip Gidley King who appointed him to several official positions (deputy-commissary, 6 May 1803; acting provost-marshal, 20 December 1804; secretary 1804-06) and in 1806 granted him 1125 acres (455 ha) at Granville, on the Dog Trap Road, known as the Drainwell estate, in addition to 100 acres (40 ha) he had received soon after his arrival.

However, Blaxcell was more interested in commerce than in farming. 'The grain delivered in by him [to the government store], must proceed from traffic only, he not growing a single grain', the deposed commissary, John Palmer, told William Bligh in February 1809, and he alleged other instances of favoured treatment to this partner of John Macarthur.

Blaxcell took an active part in the Bligh rebellion, and was one of the committee that examined the governor's papers after his arrest. During the interregnum he was appointed a magistrate and became the sole auctioneer of the colony. By this time he was one of Sydney's richest merchants, his extensive establishments including a farm at Petersham, a windmill at Pyrmont, a warehouse in George Street, and a 'fine house' in Sydney. At various times he owned several small trading vessels: the Hope, Halcyon, Northumberland, Cyclops, Favourite, Elizabeth and (with John Macarthur) Governor Macquarie.


In 1810 Governor Lachlan Macquarie gave him, with Alexander Riley and D'Arcy Wentworth, a contract to build a general hospital in Sydney, in return for the right to import 45,000 gallons (204,574 litres) of spirits over the next three years. The building, completed in 1816, was severely criticized for its defects and brought no great profit to the contractors. In 1815 Blaxcell proposed another grandiose scheme to form a chartered company to establish settlements and factories in New Zealand. Over-ambitious ventures, however, led to his undoing.

As early as 1809 unsuccessful speculation in trading had obliged him to assign his Drainwell estate to Surgeon Thomas Jamison. In 1810 he became further involved in debts to John Macarthur and other leading colonists, and by 1812 he was unable to meet liabilities for import duties. His finances steadily worsened, but for some years no action could be taken against him because the Civil Court did not sit during the dispute between the governor and Jeffery Hart Bent.

By 1817 Blaxcell's liabilities were said to be £6373, and his assets £5255; he had also defaulted to the government for £2385 in import duties. Finding that the Crown was preparing to recover these debts through the Supreme Court, on 9 April 1817 Blaxcell secretly left for England in the Kangaroo with the improper connivance of her commander, Lieutenant Charles Jeffreys.

Blaxcell's stated intention of recovering money owed to him in London was never realised, for he died at Batavia on 3 October 1817, his death hastened by drink.

Poor William, he had bad advice.

He did have two blocks of land assigned to him, one in Cabramatta, and one in Parramatta district.


LieutenantHhadley (102 nd. Regiment) 25/4/1809 100 acres  Parramatta district W. Paterson 29/1/1810
G. W. Evans 14/8/1809 140 acres Bankstown                 W. Paterson 29/1/1810
G. W. Evans 21/12/1809 519 acres Mulgrave Place         W. Paterson 29/1/1810
Thomas Hobby 14/12/1809 640 acres Mulgoa district W. Paterson 29/1/1810
S. Lord                  8/8/1809      1170 acres Evan district         W. Paterson 29/1/1810


Lieutenant Hadley (102 nd. Regiment) 25/4/1809 269 acres Cabramatta district W. Paterson
29/1/1810

Spare a thought for S. Lord, he lost 1170 acres, Thomas Hobby lost 640 acres and
 GW Evans lost 669 acres.  W Paterson was the Government Surveyor.


However on 16th November 1811, he put a notice into the Sydney Gazette advising that he was leaving the colony.

He left on the "Friends".  His fellow passengers included  family of my husband's  4th cousins, the Belbins.


There were of course other passengers on the homeward bound voyage of Friends, and they can be identified from the pages of the Sydney Gazette for the months of October and November 1811. Two of the earliest passages were notified 26 October for Mary Mercer and a brother William Robinson, a youth. Mary Bendall, Mr.J.C.Palmer and his wife Hannah, were mentioned as passengers on Friends, 2 November, when the ship had an expected departure date of 15 November.

 Mr. Matthews, late of Mangalore, Mr John Grant, Sarah Porter, and finally William and Judith Kelly and family were added to the list on 9 November. The last of the passengers to be declared was Lieut. Hadley of the 102nd Regiment, who appeared in the same paper as the BELBINS, Sarah Porter and Mr. Matthews. The BELBINS therefore sailed to England as fellow passengers of the very vocal John Grant, who made things so difficult for both himself and Captain Piper, during his 2 1/2 year stay as a convict on Norfolk Island from June 1805 to January 1808.









Service History and Demographics, 1st Battalion 38th Regiment of Foot
1793: Ireland - Dublin; Belfast; flank companies to the West Indies
1794: Belfast; Bristol; March - to Low Countries; April - Ostend; Courtrai; Ypres; garrison of Ostend; Walheim; line of the River Waal; flank companies at capture of Martinique and Guadeloupe; Berville
1795: Buren; retreat to Bremen; to England; May - Norfolk; September - Chelmsford; Southampton; November - aboard ships for Barbados
1796: Hilsea; March - to West Indies; April - Barbados; Grenada; Morne QuaQua; Vigie
1797: February - capture of Trinidad; The Saintes
1798: The Saintes
1799: The Saintes
1800: The Saintes; June - to England; August - Chichester; October - Lichfield
1801: Recruiting in Lichfield; April - Liverpool; to Ireland; Newry
1802: Newry
1803: Newry; Dublin riots; Birr
1804: Birr
1805: Birr; Fermoy; Cork; August - to Cape of Good Hope
1806: Cape of Good Hope; Saldanha Bay; Cape Town; to South America; Maldonado
1807: Rio de la Plata; February - MONTEVIDEO; July - Buenos Aires; to Ireland; Fermoy
1808: Fermoy; Cork; July - to Portugal; Mondego Bay; ROLICA; VIMEIRO; into Spain with Moore
1809: Retreat to Corunna; CORUNNA; to England; March - Canterbury; July - Deal; to Walcheren; December - Shorncliffe
1810: January - Shorncliffe; April - Hythe; May - Shorncliffe; August - to Ireland; Fermoy
1811: Fermoy
1812: Fermoy; Cork; May - to Portugal; Lisbon; July - joined field Army; SALAMANCA; Madrid; seige of Burgos; retreat to Portugal
1813: Lamego; many fever detahs; May - advance into Spain; VITTORIA; SAN SEBASTIAN; NIVE
1814: Seige of Bayonne; Bordeaux; August - to Ireland; Cork
1815: Cork; June - to Flanders; advance into France; Paris; Army of Occupation.




His Military Records are held at the National Archives in Kew in London.

Name: William Hadley. Regiments: 37th Foot; 38th Foot; West Indies Regiment; 8th West...
This record has been digitised as part of the larger record 
Go to record 
Reference: WO 25/761/185 
Description: Name: William Hadley. Regiments: 37th Foot; 38th Foot; West Indies Regiment; 8th West Indies Regiment; Royal V Battalion. Dates of Service: 1802-1816. 
Note: Descriptions relating to individuals have been created using information from a nominal card index relating to Army Officers' service compiled in the 1980s, which is not comprehensive and may contain some errors 
Date: 1802-1816 
Held by: The National Archives, Kew 

Legal status: Public Record 
Language: English 




Andrew Durnford and Mary Hadley's youngest son was Montagu John Felton Durnford.











2 comments:

  1. Hi Kris,

    I came across your blog and was hoping you'd be willing to discuss this Hadley family. Please let me know how I can email you directly.

    Regards,

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Goodnes, I apologise for the delay in not seeing this but Google didn't let me know. jillett1800@gmail.com is the email address.

      Delete