[Continuation of letter dated July 28, 1952...]


Thomas Lake Crommelin

I am sorry I cannot help you about the 'Russell' - the name crops up as a Christian name and this is often a clue in tracing back. You ask me about grandfather's (Thomas Lake C.) marriage to Harriet Ann Minard. They were a very handsome couple I have been told but he was much older than his wife. I have not obtained her dates yet, but I can remember when the letter came to my father bringing the news of her death. I have her photo - a jewelled net in her hair and her hands together beneath the lace frills of her silk gown. She had wonderful eyes - most unusual shape and expression, and I love to look at them with a reading glass. But her lips are too straight and narrow for my liking.

They lived in a fine old house and had quite a number of servants. The children were just called upon and played with at certain hours but they apparently loved her, although perhaps a little less than their old nurse whom they adored. Grandfather was very much liked. He gambled - very large sums went in that way and apparently he was persuaded to come out here to make a fresh beginning after his squandering. They travelled in a sailing ship in those days and therefore they were in close contact with others on board.

Grandfather had brought several servants with him and amongst them were his coachman and his very pretty daughter. Upon the voyage she became ill. Whether a child was born or not I do not know but my grandmother discovered the whole sorry story. When the ship arrived in Sydney she refused to leave it but returned to London with the two little girls (Annie & Laura). I don't think she took the four boys (perhaps two of them), or if she did, they came back again very shortly afterward and were sent to a boarding school. She obtained a divorce.

Afterwards my grandfather married the mother of his two illegitimate children - a son and a daughter. They went to live in a country town where grandfather had a position as 'Gold Commissioner'. One night he awoke to find his wife armed with a great knife - quite out of her mind! She died in an asylum many years afterwards. I believe her son became a solicitor who was well known and liked. He married an R.C. lady and had numerous children who all bear the name of Crommelin.

The daughter also married. I do not know the families, although I have met one or two of its members. It must have been a terrible experience for grandmother. She also married again - to the Master or Captain of the ship upon which she sailed away! However, they did not have any family when she died. Then he re-married his housekeeper who got away with all grandmother's most precious possessions!!

Now you have the whole story. You know Aunt Laura, but did you also know Aunt Annie? Of course she died many years ago and I only met Mary Davy and Harold Grey (my cousins) when I went 'home' in 1936. They were all very kind indeed to Father and to us when we were children. They sent us money and beautiful parcels of clothing until my father died in 1905. I think that was wonderful because, of course, they had never seen us, and Aunt Annie died some years before my Father...


Pearl Beach

It is now August 22nd and this letter has been long delayed. I am so busy I find it most difficult to do many of the things I should like to do. We have had more than 100 people here from the University since the last week in May, and we expect another group on Sept. 1st. There is so much to do and now I am slower. We have had floods and storms and were entirely isolated for some days as the roads were impassable - bridges and landslides, torrents of rain and big seas.

If you get a map of NSW and look just north of Sydney you will see the Hawkesbury River. It runs into Broken Bay. In the Bay there is a tiny island, Lion Island (from its resemblance to the crouching figure of a lion). The shore just opposite that island - at the northern side of the Hawkesbury River entrance - is the Warrah Sanctuary which is dedicated "for the promotion of study and the preservation of the native flora and fauna." It is one of the most beautiful parts of our land with the best native flowers and many native animals. Little Pearl Beach is a tiny village almost opposite Lion Island. Lying a mile from the sea is this "Crommelin Biological Station". I hope that someday it will prove of great help and benefit to our land and the purpose for which it has been devoted.

There is still so much to be done. The garden is full of weeds and the soil is being washed away. I have had sciatica and a strained elbow from the pruning and the damp cold weather, but have managed to transplant over 100 trees and shrubs since the rain. It has to be done before the wet weather which sometimes begins early in September.

I am sorry you feel sensitive about that little part of your grandfather's romance. I do not think there is the slightest need to be. I feel the same way about the story I have just told you but I believe it is quite wrong. We cannot be responsible for our ancestors; every family in existence would probably show these defects in some part. Instead of keeping these secrets it would surely be better if children approaching 'years of discretion' were told the facts so that they might avoid the stumbling blocks in their own paths. I would always treat all such members of the family alike until I found their own character or personality made contact unwise. You remember Carlyle's words about 'stumbling blocks' - "The block of gravity which was an obstacle in the path of the weak becomes a stepping-stone in the path of the strong." Major Mangin would probably agree. We may find that he is quite closely related to us.

My father's brothers and sisters were:

I wonder where we get the 'Ebden'. 'Whiting' was (I have been told) the name of my mother's godfather: Bishop Whiting. My father had few possessions with family background - a small miniature of his grandfather, Charles Russell C., and a small black book (manuscript) copied out by hand and containing a rather extraordinary religious (Christian) belief. It disappeared, I'm sorry to say, perhaps because it only had a kind of oilcloth cover and may have been mistaken for an ordinary notebook. I cannot remember much about it but I think the name of Swedenborg was mentioned in it. I understand it was copied out by father's 'Uncle Henry' (Henry Blyth C. b.1808 - d.1883, unmarried), and it was a work on the Millenium.

'Aunt Maria' writing about the Dobbs family mentions Francis Dobbs. "He was called to the Bar and was highly talented." "In his later years he became extremely religious and wrote a book on the Millenium." "His eldest son Richard is settled in India and is married there and has a large family. Kate, another daughter, is also married there." So we see that there was a connection between the Dobbs family in India and this strange religious theory contained in the little black bound manuscript.

I must try to copy out this portion of 'Maria's' notes. They appear to be very confused about the dates; the changing names; and the fact that inheritance left to the Crommelins and their male heirs forever all went to the DelaCherois because Nicholas C. had left it to them and not to his own family (?).

I will roughly copy the documents obtained in Dublin Court of Arms for you to see particularly the descendents of Samuel Louis Crommelin who married (1st) Harriet Mangin. We will trace that down , leaving his second marriage to Gillot out for the moment. Their children were:

  • Samuel D.S.P.
  • Abraham (or Ebram) who married twice: Catherine Laurent, per will 1762 (no children); and per will 1768, Anne daughter of ... Carden D.S.P.

    Now I saw Abraham's will and noticed that the name 'Carden' seemed to have been written 'Arden' with a small 'a' (which was often done in those days) but a 'C' had been placed before it in quite different ink. It was all yellow and faded but the 'arden' was still fresh and black. Is it possible that the 'Arden' is where we find that name, and that Abraham had a son Charles? The dates given on my copy appear to be dates of the wills and not of the marriages. They do not agree with Scheffer who places the Gillot marriage first, and the Mangin second. It is most confusing that so many of the Christian names are exactly the same - both men and women!

    I do wish we could have known each other. Tell me more about yourself when you write. Have you many relatives? Are they interested in the family history? Is there any particular portion you think should be gone into, or do you think it is a waste of time? I sometimes feel it would be better to put in order the papers I have instead of wearily searching for the things I do not seem able to find. It is such a great distance from the records and many of those have probably been destroyed now. Thank you again for everything. I hope you are well and that you will be facing the coming winter in comfort. I would like you to see if Major Mangin could help us to trace that Lawrence picture, and you may be able to work out the 'Carden/Arden' puzzle by searching Genealogical Society libraries or Somerset House. I do not know if they allow people to look up records there. I think it is a most likely suggestion...


    Thomas Lake Crommelin
    as a young man...

    Going back to my grandfather, I am very glad to have that long letter you so carefully copied for me. Everybody loved grandfather. He seems to have been kind and thoughtful, and I expect the Riverina people did not know the sad story of my grandmother's life. I blame the stupid indulgence of the age which did not give young men of property a useful occupation in life. They were separated from their parents at such an early age to gain an education at a 'good school' (Harrow). There they were drawn into groups of gambling and drinking and extravagant companions. No doubt their parents had such a strenuous time building up our Empire they thought to spare their sons some of their own toil and hardship. It was a mistake! Few of them could resist the temptation, and most of them failed in one or another of the moral codes. It seems to have been all too common in those days and, indeed, at the present time in our own part of the world.

    The last time that my father saw his father was at the Union Club. Grandfather showed him a brass casket of Indian workmanship - either six or eight-sided. It had a secret opening - very complicated - and its mechanism was shown to my father only and told "It contains papers of great value to you boys after I'm gone but of no use to me now." Father was away in the country hundreds of miles when he received the news of grandfather's death. He rode a great distance to catch a train but when he got to Sydney the funeral was over. He went to the Union Club but only found a number of empty trunks in the basement. No casket was ever found. I have often wondered if it is stowed away in some bank vault.

    Now Evelyn Crommelin (the Evelyn we both know) told me a story of another brass casket which disappeared in India. When one of the Charles died he was alone with Indian servants who stole the casket because they thought it was made of gold. They broke it open and destroyed all the family documents it contained. Grandfather's will left all his possessions to his two youngest children. Everything had to be sold and divided. He does not mention his first wife or family - was it because he thought they were already provided for, perhaps by the casket's documents? He was very fond of his first family, I am sure. The estate was a very small one - a little over 2000 pounds - although that meant more in those days than at the present time. By dividing this between the other two children, I think he did the right thing. They must have been left without the care of parents...


    Clipper ship "Anglesey"
    Source:

    The family came out in the ship "Anglesey" in 1853 and the voyage took 82 days. Thomas Lake Crommelin paid the fare of 23 passengers - all old servants coming out to the colony - housemaids, cooks, farmers, grooms, etc. (I have just come across the above notes and will go on with them.) Grandmother returned to England with all children excepting Tom who had finished his college education, and James who was left at school at Parramatta for a while. (The other boys also came out after a short time but the girls remained with their mother.)

    It is strange that we have no record of Mark Anthony's marriage. Charles C., father of Charles Russell C., left two illegitimate children, William, who died Ghazapore 10 June 1804, and Charles b. 28 Dec. 1758. He became senior merchant in the Bengal C. service and died, Calcutta 17 Oct. 1788. I had a note somewhere about the happy visits which children spent with "'Uncle Tom' and his family" but I cannot find them. It seems to have been a happy household.


    Louis Crommelin and Anne Crommelin
    of Lisburn, Ireland

    I am sending you a copy of my bookplate, and a copy of the silhouettes of Louis (Linen) Crommelin and his wife Anne. The originals were in the ancient copper frames and they are apparently very ancient indeed. Evelyn de la Cherois C. lent them to me to be copied.

    The other copy of a miniature has not come out well and does not show the long curve of a big hat which had a plume or a fur round the crown - only the plume shows. There were two miniatures and the other was of William the Silent - a beautiful little colored picture but I only have one 'photo copy' of it. I wish we could identify the strange dark little man. He is perhaps an ancestor. I think I will put great grandmother Anne in a frame with her husband.


    Minard Fannie Crommelin,
    b. at Aston Station, Bombala, NSW, 29 June 1881.
    This photo taken in London, 1936, age 55

    I will send you an untouched photo of myself taken at the age of 55 when in London (1936). And now, dear Margaret, it is time for me to finish this long paper ramble! I hope I have not wearied you. The date is now August 31st and our number of visitors has risen to 120! The present group is rather noisy - first year students, and tomorrow one of the senior fellows is bringing his wife and three children, so my family is a growing one! Please write again soon, won't you?

    I hope you like the little photo of Broken Bay. It is the only one I have at the moment, but you will be able to see how beautiful the coast is and just now the wild flowers are lovely. How I wish you could see them! Your loving cousin, Minard