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William Paley Hammet (1824-1878) and his wife Emma Hannah (née Battersea, 1825-1860) married in Manchester Cathedral on 15th September 1849. William was the eldest son of nine children of Joseph Pope Hammet (1799-1860) and his wife Eliza Sophia Matilda (née Harvey, 1801-1879).
William and Hannah sailed from London (as unassisted migrants) on the "Ivanhoe" on 7th December 1854 with their three children Henry Paley (1850), Josephine Eliza (1852) and Jane Mary (1853) and William's young sister Louise Paley Hammet (1827-1914). A daughter Ivannia Atlantic (variously spelt) was born at sea and died at Chilwell (Geelong), aged 11 months.
They arrived at Hobson's Bay (off Melbourne) on 6th March 1855. After some time in Melbourne the family went to Geelong, where William briefly kept the Moolap turnpike before, possibly through a connection of friendship, he took over the managership of Mack's hotel. This, as his wife predicted, did not suit him and William was offered the position, which he accepted, of Stationmaster (Melbourne Station) of the Melbourne and Hobson's Bay Railway. (William had had some prior experience with the Great Southern & Western Railway in Ireland.) Governor LaTrobe turned the first sod in the building of this railway on 20th September, 1853. The line to Melbourne (from Hobson's Bay) was completed on 17th June, 1857 and was officially opened by the then Governor, Sir Henry Barkly on the 25th June, 1857. William resigned from this position upon having been appointed Traffic Manager at Geelong (for the Geelong & Melbourne Railway), and when this line reached Melbourne, was appointed General Superintendent of Melbourne Station (now Southern Cross Station).
In 1864 William left the railways to become a teacher, a position he held until his death.
Further children were born in Australia, Edwin Rupert (1856), Emma Matilda (1858), Frederick William (1859), Paley Edmund (1861), Herbert Sydney (1862 - my grandfather), Alfred Humphrey (1867) and Adelaide Louise (1869).
William died at Bolwarrah (near Ballarat), Victoria in 1878 and was buried in Ballarat. Emma died in Loch Street, Camberwell, Victoria in 1902 and was buried in Boroondara Cemetery Kew.
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