Phelan and Atkin Family History

Readers of this blog might recall the story of Margaret Lawless' divorce from her husband Nicholas. This came just a decade after her father Patrick Kenny had his own trip to divorce court. In my previous post I wrote about Patrick's wife Catherine (Phelan) - but as mentioned there, she died in 1891 at just 40 years of age. It was Patrick's second marriage (to widow Elizabeth Green, nee Kelly) that went awry. While one could assert that Margaret Lawless came out of her divorce with her reputation enhanced, the same cannot be said for her father in 1896.  The case was covered so well in the newspapers of the day, that I will let you enjoy all the details straight from those involved...firstly from The Age, 28 August 1896: A REMARKABLE DIVORCE CASE. CHARGES AND COUNTER CHARGES. ALLEGATION OF CONSPIRACY. A HUSBAND'S ACTS OF CRUELTY. Some remarkable evidence was given in the divorce suit of Kenny v. Kenny and Quinn, which was heard by Mr. Justice a'Beckett in the Suprem...

When Sue (my sister) compiled our first family tree back in the 90s, she got as far back as our 2x great-grandparents (the generation that had emigrated to Australia). However, there was one detail left unclear - for the parents of Margaret Sheehan (formerly Lawless, nee Kenny), she had Patrick Kenny as the father but hadn't been able to prove the mother. Once I began my researching about ten years ago, with the benefit of online records I was able to determine that Margaret's mother was a woman named Catherine Phelan, born in Kilkenny about 1851. That's right, I have Phelan ancestors on both sides of the family tree! From a passing mention in an old newspaper article, I was also able to establish that Catherine had a brother Thomas in Victoria. From her marriage and death certificates I was able to make out that her father's name was Michael, but it was harder to interpret her mother's name from the handwriting. My best guess was that it read Mary Loony...this was ...

When researching family history, there's no doubt that it's great to make big discoveries, such as finding out you are related to Leigh Matthews 😏. But every now and then, as you add to your tree what you think is just another name in just another town, you do a little Google search and discover that he or she is actually a bit of a big deal in their community. And so it was when I was following one of the Davenport family branches recently, and came across a man named John Voss from Wahgunyah. While he might not have been a flying ace in World War Two, or become a ground-breaking surgeon, or even reached the AFL (though he did play footy!), he is one of those well-respected citizens who love their community, the type of person that deserves a shout-out every now and then.  But first, where does he fit in to my tree? In 1892, John and Elizabeth Davenport's youngest daughter, Louisa Mary (born in 1868, three years after my great-grandmother Florence), married William John A...

My 2x great-grandparents John Davenport and Elizabeth Froggatt both arrived in Australia at Adelaide in 1849, where they met and married before later travelling to Victoria during the gold rush. So it was interesting to discover that having ultimately made Melbourne their home, one of their children would return to South Australia, where his many descendants live today. These are not just in Adelaide - if you ever travel to the Yorke Peninsula, specifically the towns of Kadina, Maitland and Ardrossan, you might bump into some of them (or you can at least find several relatives buried in the cemeteries there!).    (Before I go on, I would like to add how great it is when you find a connection on Ancestry.com who has made plenty of photos of their ancestors available - once again, I have third cousin Lesley in Adelaide to thank for that. So it is nice to be able to do a post with plenty of images to break up the words!)   Edwin John Davenport, born 24 February 186...

Of the family lines I've researched, the Davenports stand out for their high representation in both World Wars. No fewer than 12 Davenports and their descendants signed up for the First World War, and 26 for the Second (including my own father of course!). Add in men who married into the family and these numbers rise to 18 and 45! Four of these brave men would lose their lives in WW1 and two in WW2. Unfortunately, these came from just two family branches. I have already written about three of those six: brothers Charles and Ken Cowan, and their nephew Ken Clark, descendants of Joseph Cowan and Florence Davenport. The second family which suffered loss was that of George and Emily Stone, of Mornington, the subject of my previous post. You might remember that they had a large brood of 13 children! Four of their seven sons would go on to fight in the First World War (Ted, Clive, Roy and Hugh), Clive and Roy never to return. A fifth son (Les) was signing up just as the conflict came to ...

In the last post I mentioned that two of John Davenport's daughters, Caroline and Emily married two brothers from the Stone family of Mornington, Henry and George. While Caroline and Henry ultimately moved back to Melbourne, George and Emily remained in Mornington, where they raised a huge family.  In the early 1880s, Emily Davenport found employment working as a nursemaid to the children of Rev. James Caldwell at 'Glenbank', where she caught the eye of George Stone, who worked there as a gardener. In 1883 they married and took up residence at Herbert Street, where George had purchased land the year before next to blocks purchased by the Rev. Caldwell, and built a two-roomed cottage. Herbert Street was separated from Mornington proper by Tanti Creek, so George built a bridge to make getting into town easier. Eventually the council replaced this with a new bridge, and signs today still mark it as 'Stone's Crossing'.                  ...

Now to possibly one of the biggest discoveries I have made researching my family history - certainly for a Hawthorn supporter - finding out that you are related to someone who many people believe was the greatest ever VFL/AFL player to have played the game!  You may remember in a previous post I wrote about John Davenport, and a visit I made to a 3rd cousin named Lesley in Adelaide. Well Lesley took me to meet an older relative of hers, maybe an aunt... I can't quite remember who it was but I do remember she was grumpy and her small dog attacked me as soon as I arrived, biting me on the shin! But I digress. It was during a conversation with this old woman where she informed me that we were related to Leigh Matthews! Once I got home I did the necessary research to establish that Leigh and I are indeed third cousins, ie. my great-grandmother Florence Cowan nee Davenport and Leigh's great-grandmother Caroline Stone nee Davenport were sisters (daughters of the aforementioned John D...