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Eleanor Gott was born in Liverpool, England, on 26th October 1765.[1] She was baptised in St Peter's, Liverpool on 17 November 1765.[2] Her parents were John Gott and Ann Caughley. She was one of 7 children. Ellen's father was a shoe maker and Ellen had learned her father's trade and later taught it to her children. In March 1787 Ellen was sentenced at Liverpool to three months imprisonment in the Preston House of Correction for stealing a cloak and a gown.[3] In August 1789, Ellen was once more sentenced at the Lancaster, Liverpool Quarter Sessions, for the theft of various articles from her employer Charles Norris.[4] Eleanor was sentenced to 3 years transportation to Botany Bay and sent on the Neptune, one of the ships of the Second Fleet.[5] The Neptune would be known as the "Hell Ship."
Neptune |
The Neptune sailed from England on 19 January 1790.[6] There were 421 male and 78 female convicts on board. The convicts aboard the Neptune were treated harshly, the worst on any of the convict ships sent to Australia. The convicts that stole while on board, were flogged to death. Most convicts were kept chained below decks for the whole voyage. A large number of the convicts had scurvy and other diseases, and they received very little food. As the Neptune came in to the harbour at Port Jackson on 27th June 1790, bodies of the dead were being thrown over the side of the Neptune. 158 convicts died on the voyage, that was 31 percent of all convicts on board, and over 269 convicts were sick when they arrived in Australia.[7] There are a number of records that show how harshly the convicts on the Neptune were treated.[8]
Arrival of the Neptune Port Jackson on 28th June 1790 |
When they returned to England, the Master, Donald Traill, and Chief Mate, William Ellerington, were prosecuted for the murder of an unnamed convict, along with a seaman named Andrew Anderson and a cook named John Joseph. After a trial lasting three hours before Sir James Marriott in the Admiralty Court, the jury acquitted both men on all charges without troubling the Judge to sum up the evidence. There were no public prosecutions.
Ellen Gott arrived at Port Jackson on 27th June 1790. Not long after Ellen arrived in Australia, she met Joseph Wright, a convict from the First Fleet.[9] They were given permission to marry by Governor Arthur Phillip.[10] Joseph and Ellen were married on 13th December 1790, at St. Phillips Church, Sydney. The church register shows a signature by Ellen Gott, and Joseph Wright marked with a cross (X). Matilda Proud and Edward Field were the witness, and they both marked with a cross (X).[11] Ellen was 25 and Joseph was 23 at the time of their marriage. They lived in Sydney town until 1794.
St Phillips Church |
In 1794, Joseph Wight was now free by servitude.[12] He was given a grant of 30 acres of land, on the Hawkesbury River.[13] He was one of the first 22 settlers to receive land grants in the area. By this time, Joseph suffered ill health, most likely from the voyage to Australia, and the hard life of farming in the new colony. Joseph had no other option but to sell his farm. Joseph and Ellen moved to Prospect, where he found work on a farm. However Joseph did not stay in Prospect very long, before they moved back to Hawkesbury area, where they bought 25 acres of land, in the District of Pitt Town, known as "Boston Farm" from Owen Cavanaugh in 1800.[14]
The land Joseph bought was "low lying, and prone to flooding,"[15] and he lost his crops in 1806, then again in 1809. Joseph also continued to suffer ill heath, and he passed away at Pitt Town, on 30th August 1811. He was only 44 years old. Ellen now had 7 children to support. Although Joseph had left the deeds to his property to Ellen, it would not have been easy, raising 7 children on her own.
Eleanor, as Joseph's legally married wife, inherited the farm (now reduced to 15 acres) at Pitt Town and in February 1812 (before she remarried), she gave the land to her children, as a Deed of Gift recorded in the "Old Register" of assignments etc:
On 31st March, 1812, Eleanor married Daniel Buckridge, a convict who had arrived in 1792 on the Pitt.[16] They were married at St. Matthews Church of England, Windsor. They both marked the register with a cross. Witnesses were Robt Allen, Hannah Manley, Mathew Hughes.[17][18]
They lived at Ellen's farm in Pitt Town, and had no children together, but Daniel helped Joseph and Ellen's sons to receive trades, as Wheelwright, Blacksmith, Cooper and Shoemaker.
Daniel died on 18th June, 1834, and he is buried in the Pitt Town Cemetery. Ellen lived for another 9 years after Daniel died.[19]
Death: Ellen Buckridge died on 28th April, 1843. She is buried in the Pitt Town Cemetery, with her second husband Daniel.
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Categories: Neptune, Arrived 28 Jun 1790 | Port Jackson Penal Colony | Convicts from Liverpool, Lancashire to Australia | Pitt Town, New South Wales | Pitt Town Cemetery, Pitt Town, New South Wales | Nominated Profiles