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Duke of Richmond 1844

|Duke of Richmond| 1844| Year Index|


Abbington, Charles (alias HANLON) - Convict

My great great grandfather was transported on this ship in 1844 having been sentanced in county mayo on the 27th July 1843 to 15 years for robbery with violence. At the time of his transportation he was the only bread winner for his family of which his mother was a widower and there were 4 other children ,so his mother would not have had a bread winner in the family after his transportation. charles was tried and sentenced under the name Charles Abbington / alias Hanlon , after his arrival in Tasmania he spent time at Premaydena, which is near Port Arthur and then time at Ellandale , Ross, Hamilton , the Cascades , and differant prisoner barracks. He eventually married Martha Pridden, whilst they were both still convicts and they eventually had about 11 children. Charles served almost the full 15 years of his sentence before being given his Ticket of Leave. He lived all the rest of his life in Ellandale and bought up his family there. Charles' descendants also raised their families in Ellandale , consistently marrying into the Ransley family , that is to say their were multiple marriages between members of the Ransley and the Hanlon families over many years as both families were quite large with a lot of brothers and daughters on each side . my great great grand father and mother and 1 of their boys, Charles junior who married Elizabeth Ransley are buried side by side in Ellandale's St Colemans catholic church, close to the front door and they may well be St Colemans first burial.

This entry for Charles Abbington was submitted by convict Stockade member tassiebob

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James Gray was one of the Duke of Richmond’s 111 all male passengers when it sailed from Dublin September 21, 1843. All landed safely in Hobart 103 days later on January 2, 1844.
At first blush, James Gray, born in 1820 in Ballbay, County Monaghan would seem to have been an unlikely candidate to bear the stigma of being a transported convict. He had been a twenty-two year old law student at the time of his July 15, 1843 trial for subornation of perjury. Loyalty to his father had, however, in the end outweighed any regard for ethical conduct.
His father, Sam Gray, was an intolerant Orangeman, loan shark, cheat, and ruffian who in many ways “ran” the town of Ballybay. Frequently in scrapes with the law, Sam was in custody for allegedly having shot at another when James arranged for an affidavit to be falsely sworn as to the state of his father’s health. The hope had been that this would tip the balance in favour of his father being admitted to bail. Once found out by authorities and tried, James was sentenced to one month in prison followed by transportation for seven years.
Meticulously kept convict registers describe James as a five feet, seven and one half inches tall brown whiskered twenty-two year old first offender. His conduct while a prisoner is noted as exemplary. He received his ticket-of-leave in 1847. The next year, as was then required, he sought and received permission to marry Mary Newton, a “free woman”, on April 29, 1848. In 1853 he received his own Certificate of Freedom.
James went on to become a model citizen becoming a civil servant and eventually a member of the Tasmanian parliament. He served West Hobart from 1872 to 1877 and Sorell from 1882 to 1889. An ardent Irishman who named his home Ulster Lodge, he, it is written, was noted for his eloquence, habitual anti-government stance, and devotion to causes of the underprivileged. James died in office on January 21, 1889 and is buried in Cornelian Bay Cemetery.
James had one child only, Isabel Grant Gray, to whom he left his entire estate. This daughter never married and died December 7, 1934 in Hobart. Her religiously intolerant paternal grandfather would have been aghast to know that his granddaughter had converted to Catholicism, for a time had served as a nun, and left her entire estate to Catholic causes.

James had a first cousin, Florinda Gray, who immigrated to Canada about 1880. Despite the tenuous family relationship my children have with James Gray (first cousin four times removed), a snippet of convict heritage is still theirs to claim.

This entry submitted by
David Arntfield
London, Ontario Canada

Sources:
Oral Tradition Passed on by Florinda Gray
At The Ford of the Birches by Peadar Murnane
The National Archives of Ireland Ireland-Australia Database
Archives Office of Tasmania
The Parliament of Tasmania from 1856 Online Site
Australian Dictionary of Biography

Created by tassiebob97 points . Last Modification: Wednesday 07 of December, 2011 00:50:00 EST by ozgenie49905 points .

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