Derwentwater1864

*Name*		Age	County	Occupation
Cabin Passengers
Cox	Mr
Dakyns	Mr
Harper	Mr
Lawrence	Mr
Ross	Miss C
	Miss E
Monks	Mr
Williams	Arthur Cuthbert	22	Somersetshire
Steerage Passengers
McClatchie	Mrs
	Janet
	Margaret
McLelland	John
	Helen
Meddings	William

Arthur Cuthbert WILLIAMS: Arthur was born on October 12th 1842 at Bath in Somerset, the third youngest of thirteen children. His father, Lawrence Blount Williams, was a Commander in the Royal Navy. His six brothers were in the East India Co. Army, later part of the British Raj, and served in India, along with two brothers-in-law. However he followed his father, and joined the Indian Navy and served as Midshipman from April 1859 to August 1862 on nine ships. He spent 14 months on the Semiramis, on-station in the Persian Gulf dealing with pirates. He was discharged with full pension as medically unfit for service in March 1863. Arthur’s health was not good, so he came out to New Zealand, arriving two days after New Year 1864. (Family lore has it that he was not expected to live long; essentially sent out here to die. The Canterbury climate must have been kind as he was in his 84^th year when he died!). He was at Lake Coleridge, as a Cadet, working with Mr C Harper for several years. His day-to-day diary gives a good insight into the travails of farming in those times. Some years later he took up a small farm in partnership with Dr Hugh Knyvett By the late 1870’s he had moved to the Ellesmere district and was leasing his father-in-law’s, Edward James Lee, farm ‘Brooklands’. On April 26th 1881 he married Jane Pauline Harriet Lee at Southbridge. With his growing family he later moved down to the Faraday Island farm, on the Rakaia river, of some 1200 acres that had belonged to Jane’s father, Edward Lee. Arthur and Jane had 8 children: Rosa Pauline "Rose" born 27/ 2/ 1882, Lawrence Edward "Mike" born 8/ 10/1883, Cuthbert Leslie "Bert" born 30/12/1885, Reginald Bealey "Rex" born 1/12/1887, Edward James Lee "Ted" born 22/ 3/1889, Agnes Theodora "Theo" born 20/ 9/1890, Katharine Sydney "Kitty" born 6/ 2/1894 and Sydney Ethel born 27/ 2 1901. In May 1901, he made the last move in his farming career. He bought the lease of the homestead farm, 583 acres, in the recently settled, Lyalldale district in South Canterbury. This district arose from the Governments acquisition of the last 8000 acres of the Pareora Estate, part of it’s plan to make more land available for farming to a greater number of people. He called the farm ‘Charlcombe’, named after the little medieval village of the same name just north of Bath, and in sight of where he was born. He farmed there until 1920, when he and Jane retired to Timaru for a short time, before settling finally in Geraldine where Arthur died on January 21st 1927. His third son Rex carried on, and then in 1947, his grandson Charles bought ‘Charlcombe’. In 1986 his gr grandson John became the farming owner, and is still there! (With two daughters only, the family association with "Charlcombe’ appears likely to end when the present owner retires). If you have a connection with this family or would like to know more please contact Arthurs Great Grandson John C L Williams.