What happened to my great great grandfather?
Ann Coles wants to discover what happened to her Australian ancestor following a family tragedy
QI would like find out what happened to my great great grandfather, William Rolfe, who married Ruth Birkley in Eastern Hill, Melbourne, in 1853.
Ruth had travelled to Australia on the Tippoo Saib from Liverpool, arriving Port Philip Bay in September 1852.
Baptised 24 March 1830 at Wallsend, Northumberland, her parents were Thomas and Isabella Birkley. By the 1851 census she is cook to the Hay family in Newcastle. Why did she move to Australia?
Her daughter, Elizabeth Rolfe, was born 13 October 1854 in East Melbourne and baptised 14 January 1855 at St Peter’s. Isabella (my great grandmother) was born on 10 March 1857 at Sandy Creek, Victoria. I could not find a baptism record.
Sadly, Ruth died in 1857 having hung herself “in a fit of insanity”.
Isabella was brought back to England by William Broughton and his wife Ann in 1862 and she was raised as ‘Broughton’, only reverting to ‘Rolfe’ on her marriage in 1902. Ann was a witness at the inquest, having discovered the two girls in the tent with the body of their dead mother. I do not know what happened to Elizabeth until her marriage to Alfred Ratcliffe in 1874 in New South Wales.
I traced a William Rolfe son of William and Elizabeth Rolfe, of James Street, born 13 June 1827, baptised 24 December 1827 in Marylebone. There is also lots of information regarding another William Rolfe, convicted of larceny at the County Criminal Court in 1843 and transported for ten years to Van Dieman’s Land. One document shows his place of birth as Marylebone. Court records show him as a basket maker, but one of the transportation records shows him as a whitesmith. Victoria Coastal Passenger lists record a William Rolfe, digger, departing Launceston on 27 April 1852 for Melbourne while another shows a William Rolfe arriving in Melbourne on 28 March 1853 from Sydney.
How can I find out which William Rolfe is the right one? Ann Coles
AFirstly, with respect to Ruth Birkley, we cannot know her reason for moving to Australia in 1852. The Australian colonies had a need for female migrants and newspapers often advertised reduced fares or free passage for single women. Or Ruth may have responded to news of gold finds in Victoria in 1851.
A report of Ruth Rolfe’s death can be found in The Age, 8 October 1857, though the surname is wrongly recorded as Raffle. So, what became of William Rolfe and Elizabeth? The most likely outcome is that he remarried. Indeed, the Victorian BMD index shows two possible marriages in 1858: Rolfe, William to Hines, Margaret, 1858/3030 and Rolfe, William to Williams, Lucy Lyon, 1858/2676. An uncertified image can be purchased from online.justice. vic.gov.au/bdm/indexsearch. doj. William and Lucy had three children between 1859- 64. Further lines of research will depend on your findings. A William Rolfe, age 49 died in Victoria in 1877. Could this be your William?
Searches of newspapers using Trove ( trove.nla.gov.au) and the Victorian Government Gazettes ( gazette.vic.gov.au) may help. Was the William Rolfe granted a license in 1859 for the Serpentine Inn your ancestor and/or the man at Sandridge (Bendigo) who was robbed of a purse in 1862?
There may not have been a resident minister in Sandy Creek in 1857, so it is not surprising that you have not found a baptism for Isabella. More information at home.vicnet.net.au/~tarnagul.
Regarding the identity of William Rolfe. All details available to me correspond with your findings that he is the son of William and Elizabeth, baptised 24 December 1827 at St Mary-le-bone, convicted of theft on 11 December 1843 and transported to Tasmania, arriving on 15 November 1844. His grant of conditional pardon was registered 28 May 1852, having been applied for in early 1851. His conduct record says he was a “troublesome prisoner”. He was employed by James Baker of Pattersons Plains in October 1849 for a year, pay £10. All Tasmanian records can be found online at www.linc.tas.gov.au. Other records can be found on Ancestry as part of the Australian Convict Collection. The “PB Launceston” found on the copy of the 1846 Muster at HO10/38, shows that William was held in the prisoners barracks there.
The two passenger records you found for William Rolfe are not mutually exclusive. Even though there is no record of departure from Melbourne for Sydney in 1852-53, William could have made that journey either by sea or overland. Sylvia C M Murphy