Atholie (Arentz) Gallagher

Ancestors

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I am unsure what information is of interest here. The infomation here is here-say from my mother - I know that the main facts are correct but some of the details may not.be.

I was born during WWII in Melbourne. My father had returned from service in the Middle East and was stationed nearby awaiting posting to New Guinea. My mother had come down from Sydney to be near him. About 6 weeks after my birth he was gravely injured during a training exercise when a faulty detonator caused a premature explosion, blowing the top of his left arm away. After he was stabilised in hospital in Victoria he was transferred to Concord Hospital in NSW where he spent approximately 18 months having rehabilitation for his injuries. Left handed, he had to learn to write with his right hand - a sample of his writing that I have from before the accident shows an easy to read, forward sloping script. After the accident this changed to a difficult to read backhand.

Discharged from the Army, he became a Fisheries Inspector and we moved from place to place with his job. My father had a large collection of German stamps, many from the post war years. These fascinated me and together with our family name, a contraction of Von Arentz, a noble name according to my mother, my interest in my ancestry was sparked when I was still a young child. My interest was so keen I studied German at High School - unfortunately when I at last got to Germany, I had forgotten most of it.

In the late 1970s I started to research our family tree. My mother was adamant that I should not pursue this, and she was not prepared to help me. When I discovered that her great grandfather was a convict, I understood where her resistance came from. Having a convict ancestor is a badge of pride to a genealogist in Australia, but a matter of great shame to many of the earlier generations.

My father was equally unhelpful - I don't know why. He eventually told me the Arentz family had come to the Shoalhaven from Germany and later to the goldfields. My father had been born in Tumut and no doubt the family ended up there because of gold. Needless to say, following my research, I found that plain Arentz was the family name, and there was no nobility in our line! Much of what my mother told me when I was a child about my father's family was not true - a case of wishful thinking. As I got further into my research I found that the story of noble ancestors was widespread amongst other extended family members and over the years I have been contacted by a number of people who were seeking verification of the story. It always makes me smile. A German genealogist told me that she had been employed to research the story but had found no evidence of it. She kindly gave me access to her material, and at some stage a Baron had been the godfather to one of the Arentz children. I think the story may have originated there.

I will leave this long story here to be continued at another time.