The Family Detective

One thing you find as you search your family tree is that the more you look the more you find. Now that may seem like I'm stating the bleeding obvious but a few years ago I thought I'd hit a dead end looking for information on the residences of the early Cotters in Australia. But as the internet opens up even more you realise that places like "Taylors Creek" have about 15 different names!! Names for the first settlers properties (eg Wallah) and then as those properties grow or are divided then a creek may be named after the families (eg Taylor) and then an area grows up with that name (Eg Taylors Creek) but as time wears on the area is divided again possibly due to political or clerical reasons and then you find Taylors Creek is now Reids Flat or Rugby. Even the creeks had more than one name. So finding a few old maps and comparing the changes has given me more scope to look for information on the dwelling places of Michael Cotter (convict). I've opened this p...

On the evening of 19th March 1857 a travelling hawker set up camp beside a creek near Michael Cotter's hut. Michael Cotter worked as a shepherd and caretaker of Mrs Gibson's Taylor Creek property near Wallah Wallah and was still away from the hut at the time. At home was his wife and children. While sitting on a log, the hawker, Mr Thomas Kerr was approached by three men with blackened faces one who drew a double barrelled shotgun and another who drew a double barrelled pistol on him. Kerr was forced into the hut with the family while his dray was emptied of it's money till and a number of expensive items of clothing and cutlery. He was told to stay in the hut for half an hour and not raise the alarm to give the bushrangers time to escape, but it was then that Michael Cotter and a companion arrived home where they too were forced into the hut with the threat that they would "blow (his) brains out" should he look at them closely. In the morning Cotter helped ...

Indent descriptions used to create a "Mugsheet" of Michael Cotter on his arrival to NSW. My Third Great Grandfather Michael Cotter was yet another convict in my family tree. He was transported to Australia in 1831 for stealing a sheep. He was assigned to Mr Gibson from “ Tirranna” Goulburn Plains where he worked as a servant. During his time there he met Catherine, the daughter of fellow convict Patrick Dodd. After receiving his Ticket of Leave in 1836 he was granted permission to marry Catherine which they did on the 11th October that year. In 1851 Michael and Catherine had been married 14 years and had seven children. They had left Goulburn and were living near Wheeo a farming hamlet where the “Ashfield Tavern” had had a history of bushranger guests including Frank Gardiner and his gang. The population of the area was small but made up mainly of Irish immigrants. On St Patrick’s Day Catherine, Michael and his friend   John Carroll went to the “Ashfield Taver...