Learning more about Catherine Lucy Darcy–part 2

Catherine Lucy Darcy’s death certificate* gave her father’s name as Edward Flower Darcy. With no other information to go on I had entered the name into my database, but it had lead me no-where.

James Bennett and Catherine’s marriage certificate gave me the correct name for her father, also his occupation, and a name for her mother.

Her parents were:

Richard Darcy, chemist and Lucy Flower.

Having the rights names makes all the difference! I started looking into readily accessible sources for Dublin, Catherine’s place of birth. I found:

• A marriage licence index entry for Richard Darcy and Lucy Flower in 1822 (the marriage licences themselves no longer exist).
• A few directory entries for Richard Darcy, chemist or druggist, at 103 Thomas Street in the early 1820s.
• A baptism transcript for Catherine Lucy Darcy, daughter of Richard and Lucy of Thomas street, in 1823.
• A baptism transcript for Catherine’s sister, Elisabeth, in 1824.
• Newspaper articles mentioning Richard Darcy’s insolvency, and sale of his premises at 103 Thomas street in 1826.

The easily accessible sources having dried up, I then started wondering about Catherine. The mention of Liverpool on her daughter’s birth certificate had me wondering. Her husband, James Bennett, was the informant. Surely he would know whether his wife was English or Irish? It occurred to me that perhaps she had been born in Dublin, but spent substantial time in Liverpool before eventually emigrating to Australia.

I searched the 1841 UK census and found an entry for Richard Darcy, chemist, living in Liverpool. In the same household was a new name, Bridget Darcy, and Elizabeth Darcy. No Catherine, but the ages for Richard and Elizabeth matched my expectations. Bridget was too old to be Richard’s daughter and too young to be Elizabeth’s mother. Was she a new wife?

It wasn’t too hard to find a marriage record for Richard Darcy and Bridget Connor in 1833. Richard was a widower. Although I haven’t yet found her in any records, it appears that Catherine had probably moved to England before the age to 10.

I couldn’t find Richard in the 1851 census. I did find a Bridget Darcy of the right age listed as a visitor in Liverpool, with a Catherine Connor also visiting the same household.

My current theory is that Richard died some time between 1841 and 1851. I have ordered the most promising death certificate for a Richard Darcy who died during that period and now I’m waiting for the mail, hoping that the informant will be a name I recognise.


* Details of sources mentioned in this post are available on request.

Learning more about Catherine Lucy Darcy – part 1

After a piece of luck finding James Bennett’s death record (a long missing puzzle piece!) I was inspired to look more closely at his wife, Catherine Lucy Darcy.

This is the information I had about Catherine’s origins:

• According to Catherine’s death certificate, her father was a man by the name of Edward Flower Darcy.
• Catherine’s date of birth varied between documents from the late 1820s to the early 1830s.
• Her place of birth was usually given as Dublin, Ireland but appeared on (at least) one of her children’s birth certificates as Liverpool in England.
• Catherine seemed to have married James Bennett in 1853. Their place of marriage was either Collingwood, Victoria, or Uxbridge in England. However, no marriage certificate for this couple had been found by myself or any of the researchers I have communicated with.
• A woman born in Ireland named Catherine Lucy Darcy arrived in Australia on board the Kent in April of 1853, with a number of other young female emigrants who were mostly from England. 

Some of the information above is not correct.

I decided to have another try at finding the marriage certificate. The historical indexes on the Victorian Births Deaths and marriages website have recently become free to search. They have an excellent search interface. Lots of fields available, searches on first name variants, no restriction on how they can be combined, and wildcard options. Wonderful.

After trying various searches, this entry had me interested:

Groom:	James Bennett	Yes!
Bride:	Catherine Davey	Davey could be a mistranscription of Darcy – Maybe?
Year:	1884	Expected c1853. Far too late, surely?

The year was far too late and I didn’t want to waste $24 if it wasn’t the right couple. Before jumping in, I tried to eliminate “James Bennett and Catherine Davey” as being the same people as my ancestors. If they had children, or if there was a death index entry for Catherine Bennett (nee Davey) then they were probably different people and I would save my money. I found no evidence that “James Bennett and Catherine Davey” existed.

I bought the certificate. It was the right couple!

So what did I learn? I’ll get to that next…

Missing Friends–Trove Tuesday

It turns out that I’m not the only one searching for my Ancestor, Catherine Lucy Darcy (married James Bennett). Look what I found in the “Missing Friends” section of The Australasian.

Advertising. (1894, June 9). The Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), p. 1. Retrieved September 11, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article138594818

Unfortunately, I found this article 120 years too late. We could have helped each other. I could have told them where she was, and they could have told me more about where she came from.

In 1894 Catherine was still living in Avoca. She’d had three more children born after 1858. All six of her children survived to adulthood and had families of their own. By 1894 Catherine had a large number of grandchildren. She died in 1896.

I would love to pinpoint Catherine’s time and place of birth, and find out her mother’s name. Catherine’s mother is the most elusive of my 3 x great grandparents!

I have wondered what the trigger for this “Missing Friends” ad was. Did one of Catherine’s parents fall ill or die? It would have put her parents at a ripe old age, but it’s within possibility. Perhaps a sibling wanting to find her? Or perhaps really just a friend hoping to get in touch again.

I tried searching Trove for the post office box number given and found a few wanted listings, both before and after the date of the “Missing Friends” article. There’s a bit of a theme running through them…

Advertising. (1892, September 3). Evening News (Sydney, NSW : 1869 - 1931), p. 3. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article112595594

Advertising. (1896, March 17). The Sydney Morning Herald(NSW : 1842 - 1954), p. 1. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article14041631

Advertising. (1897, November 27). Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners' Advocate (NSW : 1876 - 1954) , p. 3. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article136275006

I get the impression it’s a personal post office box, not a business one. I think that maybe just maybe they might have liked boats. Messing about with pleasure skiffs sounds to me like a pursuit of the wealthy.

There’s a name – A.G.Wood. Is H.A.S. a person’s initials, or some sort of acronym? The dates are too early for the electoral rolls, and I don’t fancy digging through directories searching out all the A.G.Woods at this stage. They could well have posted the “Missing Friends” advertisement on behalf of someone else. Maybe one day I’ll look into it further, when I don’t have dozens of other more promising leads all over my family tree to follow!