James Family
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Thomas James and Hannah Sampson married and had several children. Among them we know of Mary, Joanna, Thomas and then Jane. Janes letter to New Zealand to her niece Josephine appears later in the story. She mentions Joanna who died about 1903 Now Thomas married Selina first and they had possibly six or more children. There were possibly two older sons followed by Selina, Sabina, Hannah, Mary and the youngest son Richard known as Richie. Next Thomas married Mary Lawrie in approximately 1854 and there were 8 living children in that family. Josephine Treloar JAMES born April 10th 1855 John JAMES Dec 7th 1856 Richard JAMES Nov 6th 1858 William H JAMES June 24th 1860 Susan Ellen JAMES Mar 31st 1863 Samuel JAMES Oct 14th 1865 Beatrice JAMES Mar 8th 1867 Edith JAMES Aug 3rd 1871 There was also a set of twin girls but they died not long after birth.
Selina had a son who became a Methodist minister and there was a newspaper cutting giving him praise for gaining the top marks for all England in some examination. Susan was born at Goldsithney in 1863. She was a red head and was the most forward of all the children. She also had the most initiative. If she was in trouble for some misdemeanour, she always had the forethought to pick a bunch of wild flowers, to appease her mother. Early on other traits showed up which were proven true in later life Their mother said Susan would thrive where Josephine would starve. The family must have lived in various villages. Josephine talked about times when a shoal of herrings could be seen and the cry would go up "A seine, a seine". Josephine's home in 1873 at the time of her marriage was at Wheal Vor Breage and her brother Bill (William) claimed to have come from Redruth. Wheal vor Breage was one of the larger tin mines in the Breage area and there were several houses attached to the mines. It was not unusual for the miners to rent mine cottages. When Samuel was born he was registered as Joseph. The story goes that a friend of his mother's had named her baby Samuel and the name took her fancy so she made the change unofficially. The exchange in names was only discovered in later years when Samuel applied to join the railways and he was required to provide a birth certificate. This was the first time the family knew of the change. After Josephine left with her new husband to go to New Zealand, Thomas became sick with miner's disease and was reduced to making leather washers for pumps. He died of miner's disease at the age of 57 years. His wife, Mary, though terrified of the sea was determined to take her family to join her daughter in New Zealand. The passengers supplied their own furniture and food. Mary would mix the dry biscuits with water to make a crude pudding. The male children were in the single men's quarters and the girls were separated into the female quarters on board. The ship met heavy storms in the Bay of Biscay and was forced to return to Plymouth. They eventually got to South Australia where Mary had family and there they waited for sponsorship into New Zealand.
In Australia
The family went to Moonta (near Adelaide) where Cornish people were mining. The older boys were soon allowed into New Zealand but their mother, Susan, Beatrice, Edith and possibly Samuel had to wait to be sponsored. To the Australians the children appeared quaint because of their Cornish dialect. Bill went down the mines there but the other children where too small. Mary went out nursing and contracted influenza or diphtheria and was put in hospital. Because of the hospitals insistence that she take off her red flannel petticoat, she contracted pneumonia and died. Nobody from the hospital notified the family and it was a big shock when they went to visit her. One of the brothers came back to Australia from New Zealand and brought the family to Invercargil. In New Zealand
John James had married before they left England his wife refused to come to New Zealand so later on he went back to Cornwall and got a divorce. He married again in New Zealand to Agnes Fairmaid. The James brothers tried to keep strict watch over their sisters but Beatrice used to escape through the window. She met a sailor Henry Kelland 30 years old and at seventeen she married him. William (Bill) married Amelia (Amy) Challis. Amys father, George Challis started the Brethren Church in Invercargill and all the family were brought up as Brethren. George Challis was at one stage mayor of Avenal in the days when the city was divided into counties. Bill was a wagon driver who owned his own very successful carrying business which contracted to Wright Stephensons. His horses were kept in a paddock behind his home in King Street. The wedding took place at The Treloar farm at Awarua Plains and Bill and Amy had four children. Their eldest son, George married Dossie Carter whos parents were hotelkeepers, and their eldest daughter Gertrude married James Roby. It is their daughter Audrey Roby who has given the above paragraph of information. Richard married and one of his children Mary Alice visited and corresponded with her cousins. Richard had moved away, and the family believes that on a visit back, he took away the only photograph Josephine had of her mother to show his wife, promising to return. To Josephine's great grief it was never returned. Richard was unheard of for quite some time and it was only in the 1990's that it was found he had died in Tokannui Mental Hospital in 1937. He had been there from 1913. Samuel married Kate Smith whose father James Smith was a butcher in Invercargill. Susan married James (Jim) Hall and they had a farm at Awarua also. Edith married Thomas Eli Wood and they also had a farm not far from the Treloar Farm. Samuel became a very respected citizen in his community and the following obituary gives a good indication of the type of man he was: Samuel and Kate had four children. They were Clifford, Thomas, Eric and Gordon. Eric married Gladys Warburton in 1904 and they had two children Gwenda and Russell. Gwenda was to become a very good friend of Pearl Patterson (read about Pearl later in the Treloar chapters) and it was Gwenda and her husband Ken Wilden who were so supportive and helpful in our research in Invercargill.
Of Samuels four sons Clifford probably had the most colourful career. And his obituary gives a brief outline of his life.
While in the Solomon Islands Clifford and his wife Florence gave birth to Ivan who lives in Auckland today. Ivans birth was recorded in the Missionary news at the time:-
The church and missionary work was to play a big role in another James family member. Edith James married Thomas Eli Wood and one of their children, Maria (Myrie) was to spend a very memorable time in China with her husband and children. Her obituary follows with a very interesting story of their travels.
Credits: My special thanks to Gwenda (James) Wilden who gave me immense amounts of data on the family. Thanks also to Ivan James, who I have not met but who one day left an envelope full of James' newspaper clippings in my mailbox. Of Course none of this would have been possible if not for my cousin Pearl Patterson, who religiously wrote out her grandmother's (Josephine) stories. |
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