Laurence Stodart and Mary Ann Middleton
This couple appear on the Jan Squire - Family Tree - Stodart Descendents Page, where many relatives are listed, extending back several generations. They are also mentioned in the book "The Tweedie Family – a genealogy", which has a large amount of information on the Stodart family. However neither of these sources provide any information about the present couple after they left Scotland. I doubt if the two sources are independent of one another.
Jan Squire's web page tells us that the original compiler of the Stodart data was Miss Grizzel Gillespie Stodart, who conveyed her information to Mrs M. T. Rose, who probably added some extra material. Mrs Rose's work was apparently the basis for a document created in 1933 by one Arthur Smart and now in Jan Squire's possession.
Grizzel Gillespie Stodart was born on 4/4/1855, and Mrs M. T. Rose was born Mary Tweedie Stodart on 20/4/1873. I have no way of knowing whether their work was based solely on family records, or included deductions from parish register data. Note, however, that according to their work, the Laurence Stodart who married Mary Ann Middleton was a brother of Mary Rose's father's father, George Tweedie Stodart. Now I think that family supplied information about great uncles is likely to be accurate, and so I think it highly probable that "my" Laurence Stodart was indeed George Tweedie Stodart's brother. And surely also we can trust the information that Grizzel Stodart and Mary Rose supply concerning Laurence's parentage.
Laurence Stodart was born at Biggarshiels, in Biggar, Lanarkshire, on 19/5/1805; his parents were Thomas Stodart and Christian Tweedie. His father Thomas was born on 15/2/1770 in Walston parish, Lanarkshire, son of George Stodart and Jean Tweedie; his mother Christian was born on 29/5/1774 in Tweedsmuir, Peebles, daughter of Thomas Tweedie and Jean Brown. According to the Tweedie book, Christian died in 1806 and was buried in the Tweedsmuir parish churchyard. In 1809 Thomas married Ann Brown; the Tweedie book gives her full name as Anne Lawson Brown, and according to a web page entitled "The Pedigree of the Family of Tweedie-Stodart" she was the daughter of Laurence Brown of Edmonstone and his wife Anne Lawson. The Tweedie book says that Christian's mother Jean Brown was the daughter of James Brown of Edmonstone and his wife Bethea Scot.
I am inclined to guess that Anne Lawson Brown's father Laurence was a brother of Christian Tweedie's mother Jean. Although familysearch.org do not have a record of the birth of Anne Lawson Brown, they do have births of three children of Lawrence Brown and Anna Lawson: Lawrence, William and Bethea. It seems plausible that this Bethea was named after her father's mother.
Thomas' father, George Stodart (born 20/1/1731) was a brother of Robert Stodart, who made important contributions to the development of the grand piano, and founded the Stodart piano business. (Robert was baptized on 19/7/1748.)
Thomas died on 25/5/1820. This date is given in a "Trust Disposition and Settlement" document, which was registered in Edinburgh on 3/2/1821, along with an inventory of his estate. I have obtained copies of these documents.
The Trust Disposition and Settlement was signed by Thomas on 28/7/1815. The trustees named are Mrs Anne Brown or Stodart, Thomas' spouse, Laurence Tweedie Esquire of Oliver (who I believe was a brother of Thomas' previous spouse Christian), James Brown Esquire of Edmonstone (who I believe was a cousin of Christian and possibly also of Anne), Andrew Storie (Writer to the Signet), James Stodart (farmer at Covington Hillhead), John Stodart (farmer at Castland – this must mean Cartland) and David Stodart (farmer at Crosswood burn). I guess that these three farmer Stodarts were first cousins of Thomas, being sons of his uncles Adam, John and David respectively. Mentioned in the document are George, Thomas, James, Laurence and Jean, children of Thomas' first marriage, and Anne, only child of his second marriage. George was to get three thousand pounds, the others two thousand. There is also mention of a sum of one hundred pounds bequeathed to Thomas' daughter Jean by her grandmother, Mrs Jean Tweedie or Brown, widow of Thomas Tweedie.
The sum of the items appearing in the inventory is £17,986 18s 2d.
The Trust Disposition and Settlement document is rather tedious, and I am yet to study the details of it. But it appears that Thomas' wife and children were the only beneficiaries. Besides the sums explicitly set aside for his children, there was provision for an annuity for his wife, and instructions on how whatever was left was to be divided amongst his children.
I have not been able to locate a record of the marriage of Laurence's parents, but in the Disposition and Settlement document Thomas refers to the contract of marriage between him and Christian, dated 25/12/1798 and 26/12/1798. So presumably they were married on Christmas day 1798. The Disposition and Settlement also mentions the contract of marriage between Thomas and Anne dated 1/6/1809.
Thomas' eldest son, George Tweedie Stodart, became a Writer to the Signet, as did George's third son, who was also called George Tweedie Stodart. A History of the Society of Writers to her Majesty's Signet has the information that the elder George was born on 13/10/1799, was married on 4/6/1833 to Mary Wilson Paul, daughter of a Birmingham merchant named Alexander Paul, and died on 26/8/1869. His third son and apprentice was born on 18/1/1841 and died unmarried on 23/5/1882.
Thomas' second and third children, Thomas and Jane (or Jean), both married Aitchisons: Thomas married Robina Aitchison on 14/10/1828, and Jane married John Aitchison on 23/6/1826. Robina and John were both children of William Aitchison and Mary Russel Ker, Robina was born on 16/9/1808 and John was born on 26/7/1805. Thomas' third son, James, married Janet Liddell Steele on 28/6/1831, and his youngest daughter, Anne, married the Rev. William Campbell on 21/7/1841.
Laurence Stodart married Mary Ann Middleton on 1/7/1828 in Edinburgh. I presume that this Laurence Stodart was the one born in Biggar on 19/5/1805, because Grizzel Stodart and Mary Rose say so, and besides there is no other birth record that matches. Mary Ann was the daughter of John Middleton, a solicitor of London, but I have been unable to find out anything more about her ancestry. Whatever their ancestry, I am sure that this couple are my ancestors.
On p. 27 of the 31/10/1832 issue of Johnstone's Political Register and Monthly Chronicle of Public Events, Scottish Lists, &c. there is a list of Scottish bankrupts, and it includes Laurence Stodart, of Stodart and Martin, wholesale merchants, commission agents and brokers, of Leith. I think it highly likely that this was my Laurence Stodart, since the marriage register entry states that he was a merchant (as does the newspaper announcement shown above).
The births column of the 30/3/1833 issue of Johnstone's register (on p. 33) reports that Mrs L. Stodart, of Leith, gave birth to a daughter on 26/2/1833.
Laurence and Mary Stodart had three children:
- Thomas Stodart, who was born 2/4/1831 in South Leith, died 23/8/1884 at Kapunda.
- Mary Stodart, who was born 26/2/1833 in South Leith.
- John Benham Stodart, who was born 17/6/1836 in South Leith, died 6/3/1917 at Glen Osmond.
Laurence and Mary Stodart and family migrated to Australia, sailing on the Palmyra, which left Greenock on July 20th, 1839, and arrived at Port Adelaide on October 29th, 1839. (See the passenger list.) They settled at Nairne in 1839 "in the only two buildings there then – the shepherds' huts on the property of Matthew Smillie" (according to a family source).
It appears to me that compared with many other immigrants this family must have been relatively well off, despite Laurence having been bankrupt. The genealogy indicates that he had relatives who were prominent, and rich, and he was able to obtain cabin accommodation for his family on the voyage to Australia. No doubt the "shepherds' huts" were a temporary arrangement pending the building of a house. However, Laurence Stodart died shortly after his arrival in Nairne, probably in 1840.
After Laurence's death his widow Mary, with three children under 10, must have had a hard life. At her marriage in 1828, to a well-to-do young merchant, she must surely have anticipated something rather more comfortable.
Thomas and Mary
Thomas Stodart, eldest son of Laurence and Mary, married Charlotte Jane Hughes, daughter of George Robert and Charlotte Hughes. See the George Robert Hughes and Charlotte Prentice page for some information about the descendants of Thomas and Charlotte Stodart. Mary Stodart married William Frederick Hughes, brother of Charlotte Jane Hughes. This couple, great-great-grandparents of mine, are discussed on a separate page.
As well as being double brother-in-laws, Thomas Stodart and William Frederick Hughes were business partners. Their most notable joint venture was a flour mill in Nairne, to be discussed below. Their names are also linked in several items in The South Australian Advertiser that are concerned with matters apparently unrelated to the mill.
6/10/1858
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29/2/1860
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31/1/1861
27/4/1866
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The 1866 item shown above was part of an advertisement headed "Real Property Act Notices":
REAL PROPERTY ACT NOTICES. –WHEREAS the Persons named at foot hereof have each respectively for himself made application to have the Lands set forth and described before his name at foot hereof brought under the operation of "The Real Property Act:" Notice is hereby given that, unless caveat be lodged with the Registrar-General, by some person having estate or interest in the said Lands, on or before the expiration of the period herein below for each case specified, the said pieces of Land will be brought under the operation of the said Act as by law directed. Diagrams delineating these parcels of Land may be inspected at the Lands Titles Office, Adelaide, and in the offices of the several Corporations or District Councils in which the Lands are situated, or at the office of the Local Court nearest thereto:
According to the land title system introduced in 1858 by Robert Torrens (later Sir Robert Torrens), then Premier of South Australia, the state maintains a register of land holdings, by which it guarantees individuals title to parcels of land. Once a piece of land is on the register it can never be removed, and the register shows definitively who holds title to it. The purpose of the system is to make it easy to determine who really owns a piece of land. We can presumably deduce that William Frederick Hughes and Thomas Stodart were joint proprietors of Sections 3949, 3960 and 3961 of the Hundred of Onkaparinga.
Despite the fact that the 1866 advertisement above says "residence Mount Charles", it appears that Thomas and Charlotte Stodart moved from Mount Charles (near Woodside in the Adelaide Hills) to Tothills Creek (in the mid-north of the state) in 1863 or 1864, since their first child was born at Mount Charles on 15/2/1863 and their next two were born at Tothills Creek on 17/9/1864. But another Real Property Act notice seems to indicate that in 1867 Thomas was still the propietor of property in Nairne.
John
John Benham Stodart also moved from the Nairne/Woodside area to Tothills Creek in about 1863. But whether by bad luck or bad management, he proved to be unsuccessful as a farmer, and by 1867 he was insolvent. After this he apparently lived in or near Glen Osmond.
The Register, 20/7/1860
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The Register, 7/8/1863
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The
Register, 11/6/1867
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Walter Hillman, the farming partner of John Stodart mentioned in the newspaper report above, was born in or near Mount Barker on 8/2/1842, the son of John Hillman and his wife Johannah, née Palmer. (See Barry Leadbeater's South Australian Births page.) John Hillman was a carpenter from Cornwall, and one of the first residents of Nairne. The Hillman family, consisting of John, Johannah and children named James, Richard Thomas, Elizabeth Jane and John, arrived in South Australia in 1837, passengers on the barque Katherine Stewart Forbes. (See the passenger list.) The daughter Elizabeth Jane married John Prentice Hughes, brother of William Frederick Hughes, on 1/8/1855. Clearly John Hughes, the third member of the farming partnership mentioned in the newspaper report above, must have been John Prentice Hughes.
Some further information on John Prentice and Elizabeth Jane Hughes can be found on the George Robert Hughes and Charlotte Prentice page.
John Benham Stodart married Jessie Morrison McLean on 7/1/1862. They had the following children:
- Laurence Alexander Stodart (16/10/1862–17/8/1951), married Elizabeth Maria Lovick
on 21/2/1894, at Macclesfield.
They had the following children:
Edith Marjory (13/4/1895, Heathfield),
Alan Ernest (28/10/1896, Glen Osmond),
Nora Benham (17/3/1904, New Glenelg).
The Advertiser 8/2/1887
The Advertiser, 28/12/1916 - Margaret Anne Stodart (1/12/1863–9/5/1942), married Edwin Harlow Sutton on 23/12/1884 at Glen Osmond. They had the following children, all born at Nortons Summit: William Henry (11/3/1886), Jessie May (28/1/1888), Hilda Nulie (16/1/1890), Ada Muriel (8/11/1891), Jean (7/9/1896).
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Jessie Dale Stodart (3/1/1866–23/8/1963), married James Grylls Goldsack
on 26/7/1899 at Glen Osmond.
The Advertiser, 26/8/1907
The Advertiser, 18/9/1912 -
John Andrew Stodart (21/8/1867–23/8/1907) married Margaret Johnstone Robertson at Oakbank. They had the following children: Hugh Robertson (5/12/1894, Frewville), Roy Alexander (19/1/1897, Glen Osmond), Edgar Charles (15/1/1898, Glen Osmond), Jack McLean (11/8/1899, Glen Osmond), Bessie Roberta (16/11/1900, Gilbert Town), Gladys May (21/1/1902, North Adelaide), Myrtle (15/6/1903, North Adelaide), Lillian (12/2/1905, Somerton), Kenneth Gordon (28/1/1907, Glenelg).
The Advertiser, 9/4/1906Lillian Stodart visited the Hughes families (Fred and Nell and George and Sarah) at Laura some time about 1925, for some reason, since she signed my mother's birthday book.
- Mary Ann Stodart (8/4/1870–6/6/1942),
- Edwin Charles Stodart (9/3/1874–12/10/1908), married Caroline Jane Correll on 29/10/1901 at Parkside. They had at least one child: Jessie (1/2/1892, Parkside).
- George McLean Stodart (1/11/1876 – 3/5/1923), married Eleanor Iris Sadler on 13/3/1906, in Adelaide. They had the following children: Marian Winfred (7/8/1910, New Parkside), Laurence Harold (5/4/1912, Parkside), George Benham (13/11/1913, Eastwood).
It is quite possible, for every family, that there were other children I do not know about. For example, at the time of his enlistment in the AIF, George McLean Stodart had four children. In fact, Laurence Harold Stodart's service record names his next of kin as his sister, Iris Eleanor Stodart.
Searching for the surname Stodart at Mapping our Anzacs reveals that four of the Stodarts mentioned above served in the Great War: Hugh Robertson Stodart (enlisted 31/5/1915), Alan Ernest Stodart (enlisted 3/6/1915), George McLean Stodart (enlisted 27/9/1915), Edgar Charles Stodart (enlisted 15/5/1917). Digitized copies of their service records are available on-line.
Hugh Robertson Stodart was reported as killed in action, but it later transpired that he was captured, not killed.
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Laurence Harold Stodart served in the 2nd World War. He was a POW in Austria from June 1941 to June 1945, and appears in some photographs shown on Phil Cleary's Stalag 18A web pages.
John Benham Stodart died 6/3/1917 at Glen Osmond; Jessie Morrison Stodart died on 12/4/1925, at New Parkside.
The inn and the mill
In his memoirs – first published in the Mount Barker Courier, and now reprinted in a book A Miller's Tale: The memoirs of John Dunn of Mt Barker, edited by Anthony Stuart – John Dunn wrote:
When I first saw it there were only four persons settled in the town where Nairne now stands. They were my brother Charles, who was a blacksmith, a Cornish carpenter named Mr John Hillman, Mr John Disher (now father-in-law of Sir William Milne and Mr James Johnston J.P.) and a Scotch widow called Mrs Stoddart who kept a wayside public house where the District Hotel now stands.
John Dunn first saw Nairne in 1840, and so the above words indicate that Laurence was already dead at that time.
In an appendix to A Miller's Tale Anthony Stuart wrote as follows:
Despite John Dunn's reluctance to become a millowner in Nairne, his company was to work the former Albert mill, which was bought with considerable misgivings in 1864 for £1,500, for most of the remaining years of the nineteenth century. Still standing in the town's Junction Street, the mill was built in the late 1850s on land which had been granted to Nairne's founder, Matthew Smillie, on 4 March 1841. A Nairne resident named Laurence Stod(d)art had intended contracting with Smillie to buy the land in order to establish a public-house, but both parties died before the execution of the conveyance. Smillie's widow Elizabeth and son William conveyed the allotments concerned (46 and 47) to agents Alexander Elder and George Tinline in trust for sale on 2 August 1851.
A sale was subsequently made on 26 June 1852 to Thomas Stod(d)art, son of Laurence, who delayed five years before teaming up on 29 September 1857 with his brother-in-law Frederick Hughes, and successful farmer and former Kanmantoo miner, Thomas Reed, to construct a flourmill. Heavily mortgaged to Henry Ayers for the purpose, the three men completed the mill during 1858.
The brother-in-law referred to must be William Frederick Hughes, since Thomas Stodart had no other brother-in-law named Frederick Hughes. And it makes sense, since William Frederick Hughes was a builder and stone mason before he became a farmer.
The book goes on to say that the rights to the property were transferred to John Toll on 30/11/1859, and after his death in 1864 his widow Charlotte and mortgagee Henry Ayers transferred the property to John Dunn.
Evidently the venture was not successful for Thomas Stodart, William Frederick Hughes and Thomas Reed. In 1859 Thomas Reed, miller of Nairne, was declared insolvent, a fate which Thomas Stodart and William Frederick Hughes somehow managed to avoid.
An online biography of John Dunn is available, courtesy of the Australian Dictionary of Biography.
Anthony Stuart's words quoted above suggest that Laurence was still alive in March 1841, but it seems to me that the 1841 date is incorrect, since Matthew Smillie had purchased his land at Nairne in 1839. The passage also suggests that Laurence Stodart and Matthew Smillie died at roughly the same time, but in fact the death of Matthew Smillie occurred in 1847. Perhaps Smillie's negotiations were not with Laurence Stodart but with Mrs Laurence Stodart, and took place in 1847.
According to the Manning Index the following appeared in The Observer on 19/12/1885, page 36:
Mrs Stodart begs leave to return thanks to her friends and the public for the ample patronage she has experienced since she built and established an inn and store at the village of Nairne... As the population of the village and neighbourhood is rapidly increasing, she has started a bullock dray to communicate with Adelaide once a fortnight, or oftener if required, which may be heard of at Mr Campbell's (late Campbell and Grieve) Hindley Street... Parties from Adelaide... will find the village well worth visiting as it is situated in one of the finest and most beautiful locations... It is a good stage from Mr Crafer's house in the Tiers and an easy day's ride from town... The nearest and the most direct road is by the village of Hhandorff [sic] and Glenfoy [sic], the residence of Allan Mcfarlane Esq. A medical man is situated in the neighbourhood and several builders and carpenters, a blacksmith and a butcher are in the village. A shoemaker is much wanted...
In fact this advertisement appeared in 1840 (see below), although I suppose that it may have been reprinted in 1885 as part of some historical feature. The advertisement borrowed some of the words of an earlier notice, also shown below, which was published in the Register in late 1839 and early 1840, advertising the proposed new township that was later named Nairne.
South Australian Register, 21/12/1839
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South Australian Register, 26/9/1840
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Perhaps the developers' advertisement above caught the attention of Laurence and Mary Ann shortly after their arrival, and persuaded them to establish an inn at Nairne. However, since Laurence Stodart and Matthew Smillie, Nairne's founder, were both from Leith, they may have had some previous connections in Scotland, and perhaps it had been agreed, even before the developers' advertisement appeared, that Laurence would open an inn in the new township.
Allan M'Farlane, Esq., mentioned in Mrs Stodart's advertisement, had arrived in South Australia on the same day as Laurence and Mary Ann, though he came on the Superb rather than the Palmyra. He was a son-in-law of John Horne of Stirkoke; there is some information about his wife's family on the William and Elizabeth Campbell page.
The book Mountain upon the Plain: A history of Mount Barker and its surroundings, by Bob Schmidt, says this:
In 1841 an attempt to establish a regular carrying business was made by Mrs Sturdeck, a widow who kept an inn at Nairne. Her teams were the first which came over the hills and formed the one means of obtaining supplies from Adelaide. Two men started on Monday with six or eight bullocks and a dray, carrying their blankets and provisions with them, and if they completed the return trip by the end of the week, their load intact, they were well satisfied.
Mrs Stodart's inn was known as the Nairne Arms. She operated it until 1845, when James Shakes became the licensee. Mrs Stodart died in 1847.
The Nairne Arms, and the Stodarts, are mentioned in the proceedings of a court case reported in The Register on 21/6/1853. Richard Dixon Hawkins was suing Emma Gillett, widow of Hawkins' deceased brother-in-law. Hawkins testified that Mr and Mrs Gillett had arrived in the colony in 1849, at which time Hawkins "was keeping the Nairne Arms, Nairne, which he held under Mr. Shakes. Agreed with Gillett to let him the inn, with the stock-in-trade and furniture, and gave him long credit, as he had no other means of paying. Gillett carried on the business till his death. The lease of the house had four years and a half to run; there were also the stock-in-trade, furniture, and 60 acres of land. The agreed price for the whole was £523." After Gillett's death "the business was carried on by his wife, and the furniture remained in the house. She subsequently removed to the District Hotel, Nairne, and took the furniture with her. The Nairne Arms was now occupied as a private house, and she received the rent." Mrs Gillett testified that she "had offered the Nairne Arms to Mr. Shakes and Mr. Hawkins, but neither would take it back. Was hardly letting it for so much rent as she paid."
So the Nairne Arms was effectively superseded by the District Hotel. It also appears from Hawkins' evidence that the Nairne Arms may have still belonged to Thomas Stodart. We also learn that Matthew Smillie was executor of Mrs Stodart's estate. However, he would not have done much executing, since he died about five weeks after Mrs Stodart.
The Register 21/6/1853
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The following death notice appeared in The Register on Saturday 13th February 1847: "On Sunday last, Mary Ann, widow of the late Mr Lawrence Stoddart." Thus Mary Ann died on 7/2/1847. Presumably the 15 year old Thomas Stodart had to take on the role of head of the Stodart household, and the 13 year old Mary the role of housekeeper, when their mother died. I suppose that Thomas was not able to legally complete the purchase of allotments 46 and 47 until after his 21st birthday, on 2/4/1852.
My guess is that the land comprising lots 46 and 47 was split into two pieces when the Albert Mill was built, with Thomas Stodart retaining title to the part containing the former Nairne Arms, and the part containing the mill passing first to John Toll and then to John Dunn.
The Register 13/2/1847
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In the Mount Barker Library I found a pamphlet entitled Interim Mt Barker and Nairne Townships Heritage Register (draft, March 1997), prepared by Fiona Gardiner. Here is what it had to say about the "District Hotel":
The District Hotel was originally built in c. 1840 by Thomas Stoddart and named the "Nairne Arms". Mrs Stoddart's original hotel stood at the rear of Joseph Ryder's block of shops where one of its brick walls is built into his building and may still be seen today. The "Nairne Arms" or new hotel or both may have existed in the same area as that where the District Hotel was built and licensed in 1851. On Thomas Stoddart's death it was run by his widow Mary Stoddart who also conducted the first carrying service to Adelaide.
The "Nairne Arms" was first registered to Mary Ann(e) Stoddart on 11/6/1840. She retained the licence until 1845 when the property was transferred to James Shakes.
Of course we should read "Laurence" where it says "Thomas".
Although this line of Stodarts have consistently spelled their name with only one "d", others seem to experience an irresistible impulse to insert a second. I wonder how the name was spelled on the inn licence, and whether or not "Ann" had an "e"!
Given that Mary Ann, not Laurence, was registered as the licensee of the hotel in June 1840, I am inclined to believe that Laurence had already died by then.
The Nairne Heritage Register also mentions Stoddart's house, 45 - 51 North Road Nairne:
Constructed of freestone rubble with roughly shaped stone surrounds to openings. The exterior appears to be original with retention of scalloped vallance picket fence and half paned easement windows. The house is two-storey at the rear and has a central staircase.
The home of Mrs Stoddart. Mrs Stoddart was the caretaker of the Nairne Inn from 1840. It is believed that the house was built in 1847 or 1840 after the sale of the inn to James Shakes in 1847.
I have faithfully reproduced the words in the booklet, but I suppose they meant "1847 or 1848". Nevertheless, I think the house would probably have been built earlier than this. It seems unlikely to me that Thomas would have organized the construction of a new house as a first priority after his mother's death. If the inn was actually sold in 1845, as the article on the District Hotel says, Mary could have organized the building of the house then after selling the inn. It may be that the inn building was also the family home up to 1845, so that a new house was necessary when the inn was sold. However, a 1930's newspaper report of an interview with Andrew Smillie Hughes, a grandson of Laurence and Mary Stodart, quotes Mr Hughes as saying that Laurence Stodart commenced building a residence for his family on arriving in Nairne, but died before it was completed. So the building of this house may have commenced in 1839.