Marriage - Charles Moore Stratton

Charles Moore Stratton and Bessie Boyce married in Penrith in 1904.  Bessie was the daughter of William Boyce and wife Elizabeth (nee Warren), while Charles was the son of James Stratton and Isabella (nee Malone) who are believed to be the older couple in the photograph at left.  The Stratton family were early residents of the Springwood area; James, a butcher, acquired land at Faulconbridge in 1869.  Today, Everton House (built by the Hon. John Meeks) and Faulconbridge Public School exist on the property. 



Pamela Smith
Ref: NSW Births, Deaths and Marriage Indexes
Blue Mountains City Council local studies collection image files.
The Making Of A Mountain Community: A Biographical Dictionary of the Springwood District, Springwood District. 

Marriage - Ethel Urquhart

Photographs are a wonderful resource of information and these portray the wedding day of Ethel Mary Isabel Urquhart, grand daughter of James Hunter Lawson -  and daughter of (the late) John Ferguson Urquhart of Aberdeenshire Scotland -  who married William Earl Blanchard Chadwick in 1914, in the Frazer Memorial Presbyterian Church Springwood. Chadwick was the son of Robert Chadwick of Glenbrook, while James Hunter Lawson, who gave his grand daughter away,  lived in the cottage Glen Lawson at Springwood. The ceremony was conducted by Rev. J. McKee assisted by Rev. Ernest Ferguson. 

The bride wore her grandmother's Limerick lace wedding veil over a gown of 'dull soft ivory satin' and Limerick lace with sprays of orange blossom. Chief bridesmaid was Miss Eileen Lawson who wore a shell-pink brocaded ninon and a mob cap.  The other bridesmaids were the Misses Lennox; Olga, Jean and Sheila Lawson, and Glennie Chadwick, who wore gold brooches and carried floral crooks the gift of the bridegroom.  William Chadwick, cousin of the groom was the best man.  The guests adjorned to Braemar after the ceremony where the wedding breakfast was served.  The newly married couple motored to the South Coast for their honeymoon.

Pamela Smith

Ref:

Blue Mountains City Council local studies collection image file.

Sydney Morning Herald 17th October, 1914, p. 8. 

Percy Stewart Dawson

An article in the Sydney Morning Herald dated 16th July, 1926, stated that 'Kit-Kat' the name of an old London club had been revived for the title of a cabaret to be held at Ambassadors, the Sydney night club and restaurant owned by the Dawson family.  The event was held to raise money for the Prevention of Cruelty to animals of which Mrs. Percy Dawson was president.  The remainder of the committee comprised of Miss Josephine Marks, Mrs. Harry Samuels, Mrs. Llewellyn Rees, Mrs. J.B. Quinlan and Miss Grace Jewell.  The ladies on the committee wore gold armbands to which had been attached black badges in the shape of a black cat and flowers, sweets and cigarettes were sold to boost their funds.

Percy was the son of David Stewart Dawson and Harriet (nee McNab). The Dawson family owned jewellery stores in England, most states of Australia and New Zealand, and various property interests, like The Spinney and Bon Accord guest house, in Springwood.  Both were located on Hawkesbury Road, Springwood.  The latter house burnt to the ground in  1937, but The Spinney still exists.

Ref:
Sydney Morning Herald, 16th July, 1926.
The Making Of A Mountain Community, A Biographical Dictionary about the Springwood area, Springwood Historians.
Blue Mountains City Council local studies collection & image files.

More On World War Two - Noel Dawson

Noel Dawson - Service No. N75360, was born in Springwood 12th December 1904 to Thomas Robert and Muriel Jane (nee Broughton) Dawson.  His older brother Kinglsey served in World War One.  The Dawson family owned the property 'Euchora' that the Hon. James Norton had originally owned. 

Today the property is the site of Buckland Retirement Village.

More On World War Two - Herbert Clay

Herbert Clay - Service No. N324122, was born in Springwood 16th October, 1892.  He was the son of James and Mary (nee Mitchell) Clay.  James had been head gardener for the Hon. Charles Moore but the family moved from the district in 1893.

Medical - Diphtheria

Vaccination poster

On 28th July 1937 the Sydney Morning Herald carried an article headed DIPHTHERIA CAMPAIGN.  The tome stated that the campaign to combat the disease had begun in the Blue Mountains by the then Blue Mountains Shire Council.  In Springwood 180 children were treated and children at Blaxland and Glenbrook were next.

Diphtheria, a leading cause of death among children, was known as the "strangling Angel of Children" and affected children in epidemic proportions until intervention by vaccination. 

Ref: Sydney Morning Herald 28.7.1937      

Early Residents - Thomas Richard Smith

Thomas was born at Mt. Druitt c1843 to Thomas and Jane (nee Laimbeer) Smith. In 1867 he married Kezia (relative of Viv Colless) the daughter of George Colless and the couple are thought to have had two sons and two daughters named Thomas, Percy, Lillian Jane and Nina Matilda.

Thomas purchased a hotel at Woodside near Bathurst and farmed wheat in the area in approximately 1869.  Later he purchased the Royal Oak Hotel, moved to the Penrith area and purchased the toll on Nepean Bridge.

The lure of gold took him to the goldfields in 1872, and after losing money in speculative deals in Queensland, became a timber supplier at Colong.  In the 1880s he went into partnership with brother Sydney in an auctioneer and land agency firm known as T.R. & S. Smith.  The firm was also called Wills and Smith Bros.

Thomas was the MLA for the Nepean area during several periods 1887, 1895-8 and 1901-4.  He and his brother differed in their political ideals; while Thomas was a Protectionist Sydney followed the Free Trade party.

By 1890 Thomas had the lease of the Red Cow Hotel in Penrith and conducted a Penrith branch of his business.    The book written by Christine Stickley, called The Old Charm of Penrith, mentioned stained glass windows found in the Red Cow.  The windows had once graced the private chapel of Regentville the home of Sir John Jamison.  Thomas changed the wording on the windows to read "I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of T. Smith." The original wording said "into the house of the Lord."  According to Stickley, sandstone from Regentville was used in the construction of the Red Cow.  She suggested that Breaker Morant was a regular patron of the hotel prior to his departure for the Boer War.

Like many others, Thomas went bankrupt in the economic downturn of the 1890s but his debts were discharged by 1898.  The Smith family leased the cottage Elsinor , located on the main road, for six months during 1898.  In 1880 he had become the first secretary for the NSW Bowling Association.  He was also a Freemason and an alderman on Penrith Council 1889-90 and was said to have been a keen sportsman and cricketer.

In 1888 the Nepean Times newspaper announced that he was a general auctioneer and a house, land and estate agent in Penrith.  Around 1890 a prospectus for the Faulconbridge Freehold Estate Co. Ltd assured potential investors that surrounding estates were owned by such prestigious persons as Sir James Martin, Hon. Charles Moore and A. H. McCulloch.  Application could be made to T.R. Smith, Chapman and Smith for shares in the company.  The secretary of the company was Thomas J. Chapman who is thought to have been the brother of Michael Nason Chapman (one-time Mayor of Sydney).  

On a visit to Springwood in 1901 Thomas revealed to an assemblage at the Oriental Hotel that in 1861 he had taken up the option of the large parcel of land on which the hotel stood but found it impossible, despite every effort, to fulfil the grant conditions thus Frank Raymond jumped his claim.  Later he took up land at Valley Heights.  

It was Thomas, as the first subscriber, that launched the first of several attempts to erect a School of Arts in Springwood.  Brinsley Hall replaced Thomas in 1904 as the member for the Blue Mountains.  Thomas died in 1918.
Pamela Smith
Ref:
The Making of a Mountain Community: A Biographical Dictionary of  The Springwood District. 
Christine Stickley, The Old Charm of Penrith.
Image of T.R. Smith from image collection of Penrith City Library local studies collection.