Movement of People Like many rural communities during the Victorian period, Great Ellingham saw movement in the population. In 1836, several families left the village for a new life ‘on the other side of the world’. A few were ‘forced’ to embark on a journey to Van Diemen’s Land (later Tasmania) following a criminal conviction….
Author: Heather Etteridge
Ellis Clarke’s Successful Emigration from Rocklands to Tasmania
Ellis Clarke’s Railway Coffee Palace in Ulverstone, Tasmania. Ellis’s son Stephen and his wife Louisa are in the ‘buggy’. Courtesy of Kim O’Brien Death some 10,500 miles from his native home of Rocklands Ellis Clarke died in August 1903 at his home at the Railway Coffee Palace in Ulverstone, Tasmania. He was born in Rockland…
Charles & Jane Clarke – Sponsored Passage from Rocklands to Tasmania
By the time that Charles and Jane Clarke secured sponsorship for their emigration to Tasmania in 1855, they likely knew what to expect ‘on the other side of the world’. Charles’s eldest brother Robert and his wife and family had emigrated to South Australia the previous year. Although this was a time before the telephone…
From Rocklands to South Australia – the Clarke & Barham Families
Passenger Ship Bound for Australia The emigrant passenger ship the Joseph Rowan left Liverpool on the 21st March, 1854, with around 376 ‘government passengers’ bound for South Australia. The passage for these emigrants may well have been covered by one of the assisted-government schemes. The Australian colonial governments particularly wanted skilled labourers and single women….
James & Ann Clarke of Great Ellingham & Rocklands
I am always thrilled to hear from descendants of people who once lived in Great Ellingham. I am also grateful for additional information – particularly photographs of past villagers who once walked along the very same streets as we do today. This is the story of James and Ann Clarke who began their life together…
Six of One and Half a Dozen of the Other
Guilty of Assault The Diss Express of Friday, 4th August, 1905, reported on proceedings at the East Harling Magistrates Court. This included the case concerning a fracas between two women in Great Ellingham. Widow Elvina M Rushbrooke of Great Ellingham was charged with assaulting her neighbour Maud Halls on the 23rd July. Halls was charged…
Ted & Alice Lincoln of The Cock Inn, Stanton
It can be difficult to ‘fill in the gaps’ between the birth or baptism of our ancestor, their marriage (if indeed one took place), and their ultimate death. All these ‘rights of passage’ are almost certainly recorded in the parish registers, which can date from as early as the sixteenth century. However in relatively recent…
A Triumph for the People
Before parish councils were first established c.1894, the responsibility for the day to day administration of the parish fell to the rector and some of the more affluent landowners. The Norfolk News of the 26th April, 1873, published a report of a meeting attended by many discontented parishioners in Great Ellingham. A correspondent, who appears…
John Lincoln, son of Robert & Esther
I am always delighted to hear from descendants of people who once lived in Great Ellingham. An email from Andrea Hunter is no exception. Andrea kindly sent me a copy of her photograph, the subject of which is believed to be John Lincoln who was born in Great Ellingham in 1839. Andrea descends from John…
A Church with ‘No History’?
Great Ellingham Parish Church of St James 1935 Archaelogists’ Tour A report of an archaelogists’ tour published in the Yarmouth Independent on the 18th May, 1935, caught my eye. Amongst the three churches visited in the Wymondham District was St James’s at Great Ellingham. A comment made by Mr E J Tench FIBA particularly grabbed…