[If you don’t see a navigation bar on the left then click here]
It was a good time to leave Jamaica. But where to go? My mother says that the men of the family went off looking for a good place to emigrate to. She says that Nova Scotia was one of the places they looked at but didn't like. They ended up in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Pat Wyatt says that the ship that took them to Australia left from New York. A distant family member (William Handasyde) came to Australia via New Zealand.
Gilbert Handasyde came to Melbourne in advance of the main party, arriving here in 1853 on the ship John Robinson. He was certainly in Jamaica in 1850, being godfather to Emily Handasyde Hall.
Australia was a good choice. The gold rush was on. A few years earlier the '49ers had descended on California looking for gold. The most profitable goldfields were just opening up in Victoria in 1853. And even if few miners got extremely rich on the proceeds, it led to a booming economy.
Who came? Here's the list from the web:
Public Record Office
- Victoria's Archives
Index
to Inward Overseas Passengers from Foreign Ports 1852 - 1859
Arrival
date: DEC 1854 . . . Ship: FLYING SCUD
. . . Port: F . . . Fiche: 028 . . . Page: 003
HALL . . . Given name: ANNIE . . . Age: 16
HALL . . . Given name: D MISS . . . Age: 16
HALL . . . Given name: E MISS . . . Age: 7
HALL . . . Given name: FRANCES . . . Age: 45
HALL . . . Given name: G MISS . . . Age: 12
HALL . . . Given name: LIZZIE . . . Age: 18
HALL . . . Given name: N B MR . . . Age: 50
HALL . . . Given name: N B MRS . . . Age: 40
PATTERSON . . . Given name: ---- MR . . . Age: 25
PATTERSON . . . Given name: ---- MRS . . . Age: 45
PATTERSON . . . Given name: D MISS . . . Age: 20
PATTERSON . . . Given name: D MR . . . Age: 16
PATTERSON . . . Given name: GEO MR . . . Age: 50
PATTERSON . . . Given name: GEO MR . . . Age: 12
PATTERSON . . . Given name: J MISS . . . Age: 12
PATTERSON . . . Given name: JNO MR . . . Age: 20
PATTERSON . . . Given name: R MISS . . . Age: 7
Arrival
date: FEB 1853 . . . Ship: JOHN
ROBINSON . . . Port: F . . .
Fiche: 006 . . . Page: 001
HANDYSIDE . . . Given name: A MR . . . Age: 36
HANDYSIDE . . . Given name: G MR . . . Age: 40
Here's my interpretation of the list (please excuse my prejudice for using the single 't'):
Mr G Handyside (Age 40) = Gilbert Handasyde b. 15 Jan 1823
Mr A Handyside (Age 36) = Alexander Handasyde b. 15 Jun 1829
Mr Geo Patterson (Age 50) = George Paterson b. 15 Feb 1801
Mrs Patterson (Age 45) = Allegonda Ann Hall / Paterson b. 20 Jun 1807
Mr Patterson (Age 25) - not related
Mr Jno Patterson (Age 20) - not related
Miss D Patterson (Age 20) = Dora Letitia Paterson b. 8 Oct 1834
Mr D Patterson (Age 16) = Duncan Colthirst Paterson b. 16 Aug 1837
Miss J Patterson (Age 12) = Jessie Briscoe Paterson b. 11 Feb 1842
Mr Geo Patterson (Age 12) = George Macfadyen Paterson b. 14 Sep 1845
Miss R Patterson (Age 7) = Robina Jackson Paterson b. 29 Jan 1848
Mr N B Hall (Age 50) = William Bryan Hall b. 4 Dec 1802
Frances Hall (Age 45) - not related
Mrs N B Hall (Age 40) = Dorothy Rawleigh Hall b. 7 May 1810
Lizzie Hall (Age 18) - not related
Annie Hall (Age 16) - not related
Miss D Hall (Age 16) = Dora Mignot Hall b. 11 Nov 1838
Miss G Hall (Age 12) = Georgina Paterson Hall b. 3 Mar 1841
Miss E Hall (Age 7) = Emily Handasyde Hall b. 9 Feb 1850
The names above marked 'not related' may be related, but if so I don't know where they fit in the family tree (I haven't looked very hard, for example the Pattersons may be children of George’s brother William). Pat Wyatt also records the names of family friends who came out on the Flying Scud, see her book for details. The Halls and Patersons listed above account for all the children of William Bryan Hall and all the children of George Paterson with one exception; the eldest daughter of George Paterson, Euphemia Frances Gilroy Paterson / Astwood, stayed in Jamaica with her brand new husband William George Astwood. They married on 23 Mar 1853, close to the departure time for the Flying Scud. It was the letters that flowed back and forth between the Astwoods and the other Paterson descendants that kept the Jamaica - Australia link alive.
So the family arrived in Melbourne in Feb 1853 and Dec 1854. Pat Wyatt has already painted a picture of the conditions in Melbourne when they arrived, but doesn't say much about the Victorian gold rush of the time. Quality information on the Victorian gold rush is surprisingly difficult to obtain. Here's an extremely brief outline.
· The 1836 census gives Melbourne a population of 177
· In 1842, Melbourne had a population of 10,000.
· In 1851, Victoria became a separate colony.
· Gold was discovered near Ballarat in 1851.
· By December 1851, there were 20,000 diggers in Ballarat.
· In 1852, 300 ships from all over the world berthed in Port Phillip, Victoria; this increased Victoria's population from 77,000 to 170,000 in one year.
· By June 1852, Bendigo had a population of 40,000.
· By the early 1860s, the Victorian gold rushes had virtually ended.
· In 1861, Melbourne was the largest city in Australia and Australia had a population of 1.15 million.
There were at least three significant differences between the Australian gold rush and the Californian one that preceded it:
· California was hard to get to, requiring a long overland journey, or hazardous routes via Panama or Cape Horn. Australian goldfields were easier to get to.
· California was seen as a lawless place, but Australia had a working British legal system.
· In California, the gold came out of the ground in gold dust. In Australia, gold could be picked up in large nuggets.