William Rich, Crimean War Veteran

My great great grandfather William Rich was, according to his funeral notice, a Crimean War veteran.

Sydney Morning Herald, 27 April 1927, p11.

And according to the funeral notice under the one his family placed in the paper, he was also a member of the United Imperial Navy and Army Veterans' Association of NSW. What was that? I've never heard of it!

I did some research on Trove, and also in the Sydney Morning Herald archives (1955-1995). The first mention in the Sydney Morning Herald of the the United Imperial Navy and Army Veterans' Association of NSW was in 1908, and the last was in 1960.

From the research I have done, it appears that the organisation pre-dates today's Returned Services League (RSL), which was formed in 1917. The RSL is for those who served or are serving in the Australian Defence Forces, whereas The United Imperial Navy and Army Veterans' Association of NSW appears to have been for any British veteran who had seen service up to and including 1885. Members of the latter organisation had served in many different conflicts including in the Crimea, the Sudan, and India. I contacted the RSL and they confirmed that they are unrelated to the United Imperial Navy and Army Veterans' Association of NSW. It seems to me that the United Imperial Navy and Army Veterans' Association of NSW possibly just died out once all the old veterans had died.

A write-up of the Veterans Christmas Dinner of 1923 mentions William Rich; "Nine of those present were over 80 years of age, two of the oldest being Mr. William Rich, 89, who fought at the Crimea in 1854, and Mr. Charles Kidd, 80, who fought in the Indian mutiny three years later." (Sydney Morning Herald, 24 December 1923, p10). At a veterans gathering for Empire Day in 1926 "The Governor General was the principal speaker... [and] hailed as "comrade" the hardy old soldier, William Rich, who served in the Crimea, and is marching - if more feebly than of old - towards his centenary." (The Telegraph, 29 May 1926, p12.) At the Christmas dinner after William Rich died he was mentioned: "Since the last dinner their oldest member, William Rich, who had served in the Crimea, and almost reached 100 years, had died" (Sydney Morning Herald, 19 December 1927, p10).

From these articles we learn that William Rich was in the Army, not the Navy, as he is referred to as a soldier, not a sailor, and that he fought in the Crimea in 1854. One wonders why it was only 1854, as the British were still in the Crimea in 1855 - was he invalided out?

I also learnt in my research that William Rich lived at the Veterans' Home at La Perouse, on Bare Island. This explains why he did not live with his wife towards the end of his life - a question that I have wondered about for some time. 

The gravestone of William Rich, at Waverley Cemetery, Sydney.

A trip to Waverley Cemetery

I recently managed to get to Waverley Cemetery to see some graves there. Waverley is a cemetery with a lovely setting - it is situated on the cliffs at Bronte, in the eastern suburbs of Sydney. It overlooks the Pacific Ocean, so the "guests" there have a great view, if only they weren't so dead that they couldn't enjoy the scenery. There were two lots of graves I wanted to check out - the Rich graves and the Horsey graves.

I started off with the Rich graves. I asked at the office as I had no idea where they were. For a $15 fee (which I think is steep, considering some cemeteries don't charge at all for information, but I guess they have to pay for up-keep somehow) they gave me a whole lot of details about where the graves were, and also offered the family with the chance to take over the lease of the graves as there was still room available. For only about $1700 for a 25 year lease. Otherwise, they may be recycled at some stage in the future - which makes me glad that I photographed them while I had the chance!

The first photo shows the double grave for the assorted members of the Rich family buried there (Church of England, Section 15 Ordinary, graves 6206 and 6207), along with my little helper. The inscription that my little helper was sitting on said "Erected by Avice", Avice being one of William and Laurina's daughters.

The inscription on the headstone says:
"In Loving Memory of
Our dear parents William Rich, late Crimean War, died 25th April 1927, aged 95 years, and Laurina Rich, died 21st Jan 1929, aged 79 years.
Our dear sister Lily Rich, died 16th April 19112, aged 35 years.
Also our dear brother William Milton Rich, late 1st A.I.F., died 11th Aug 1950, aged 69 years."

On the lower section it says:
"Also Laurina Garrett, daughter of the above [William and Laurina], died 11th Nov 1962, aged 69 years."

Also buried in the grave is Laurina Garrett's husband Maurice, although there is no inscription bearing his name (though there is space for it next to his wife's details - clearly no one ever got around to it). He was buried there 23rd Aug 1956.

This photo is of the grave of Sarah Horsey, and members of her extended family - James and Selina Baker, Charles, Selina Grace and Harriett Eliza Baker, and Frederick and Maria Ruth Horsey. The details of these graves are Church of England, Section 2 Ordinary, Row 10, graves 235-238.

Selina Horsey was Sarah and Josiah Horsey's daughter. She was married to James Baker. James' brother Charles was married to Selina's sister (and Sarah and Josiah's daughter) Sarah Ann, and Selina Grace was their daughter, with Harriett Eliza being Charles' daughter from a previous marriage (his first wife died). Sarah Ann, Charles' wife is not buried in this grave as she remarried after the death of Charles, and so is presumably buried with her second husband elsewhere. Frederick Horsey is a son of Sarah and Josiah Horsey, and was married to Maria Ruth.

  

The inscription on this headstone is:
"In Loving Memory of Sarah Horsey, native of Somersetshire England, who died June 21 1880, aged 64 years.
In such mournful visitation
On this sweet assurance rest
Whatsoever the dispensation
God's decree is always best"

There is definitely space at the bottom of this headstone for details of further burials, but apparently there were none. Josiah, Sarah's husband, was buried in the Devonshire Street Cemetery, which closed in 1867, thus explaining why Sarah wasn't buried there with him. The Devonshire Street Cemetery was  resumed in 1901 to make way for the building of Central Station, but I've never been able to work out where Josiah's remains were moved to. Perhaps he was moved to Waverley and buried with Sarah, but the information never recorded on the headstone. If I was over that way again (it's a bit of drive from my place) with another spare $15 I could get them to look up the burial information for those graves, but as I had what seemed like most of the information at the time I didn't do it on this particular visit.

Not him

I recently was able to look at the Register of Seamen's Tickets 1845-1854 (LDS microfilm 1482525), which included the ticket (no. 56694) for one William Rich of Bridgwater, Somerset. I hoped it would answer the question of how my great great grandfather William Rich reached Australia.

Unfortunately, it didn't help me - my William Rich was born in about 1832. The William Rich of seamen's ticket 56694 was born in 1818 and first went to sea as an apprentice in 1835. Shame. So my William Rich must have swum here after all!

Sorting out the Rich family of Somerset

I've been working on the family of my great great grandfather, William Rich (abt 1832-1927), who apparently came from Somerset - I'm still trying to work out exactly where. I'm hoping that if I can track down his family it might shed some light on where it was that he was born. Sometimes you just have to gather together all your information and try and make some educated guesses. So here goes.

His parents, according to his death record from the NSW BDM (6651/1927), were William Rich and Elizabeth Milton. William Rich, the father, was listed as a farmer. We can verify some of this with the death record of his known sister (known through her funeral notice), Avice Bindon, as her parents were both William and Elizabeth as well (14845/1908).

I have not been able to find a marriage record for William Rich senior and Elizabeth Milton - perhaps they weren't officially married. At about the time they appear to have started producing children there is a conglomeration of Richs in the area of Nether Stowey and Over Stowey. The Miltons are mostly found further west, around St Decumans and Sampford Brett. Wherever William Rich senior came from (which may or may not have been over at Nether or Over Stowey), I think that after he "married" Elizabeth they lived near her family rather than his - in searching for their potential children I have not found any baptisms for other Rich families in the same parishes.

The following is a table of the potential children of William and Elizabeth Rich, mostly according to baptism records:

Name	Baptism date	Parish	Father	Father's occ	Mother	Abode
James Milton RICHE	26 Dec 1817	Stogumber	William	Yeoman	Elizabeth Ann	Stogumber
Mary Ann RICH	3 Feb 1820	Stogumber	William	Yeoman	Elizabeth Ann	Vexford
Eliza RICH	23 Jan 1821	Stogumber	William	Maltster	Elizabeth Ann	Watchet
Harriet RICH	23 Nov 1823	St Decumans	William	Maltster	Elizabeth	Watchet
Anna Maria RICH	23 Nov 1823	St Decumans	William	Maltster	Elizabeth	Watchet
Avice RICH	Abt 1828 - based on 1851 Census					St Decumans
Louisa RICH	28 Aug 1831	Crowcombe	William	Maltster	Elizabeth	Stogumber
Ann RICH	19 Jul 1836	Stogumber	William	Farmer	Elizabeth	Higher Vexford
Emma RICH	19 Jul 1836	Stogumber	William	Farmer	Elizabeth	Higher Vexford
William RICH	19 Jul 1836	Stogumber	William	Farmer	Elizabeth	Higher Vexford
Frederick RICH	7 Dec 1842	St Decumans	William	Baker	Elizabeth	London

I have looked at this information for a long time, trying to solve the mystery of whether this is two families - one with a father who is a yeoman/farmer, the other a maltster - or one where the father does all three (setting aside the final entry for "Frederick Rich"). It wasn't until I was working on the Milton branch of the family that I discovered that the second option was very likely to be true: Elizabeth Milton's sister Ellen Wood Milton married Jonathan Date, and in the baptism records of their children he was also noted variously as a yeoman, farmer and maltster (he was also a baker). Although it might be possible that there were two families of William and Elizabeth Rich, the likelihood of there being two families of Jonathan and Ellen Date, with their less common names, is much smaller. Also, the Dates lived and worked at Snailholt Farm, Watchet, and I think it is quite possible that William Rich worked with/for Jonathan whilst the Rich family were in Watchet. Snailholt Farm was quite a large farm, about 143 acres, and so the Dates would have had many workers. I can imagine that William may have worked for him.

I have not been able to find any electoral lists that cover the period in Somerset where William Rich senior's occupation is listed as a yeoman. But it would appear that he was farming somewhere around the Vexford, Stogumber area. Perhaps a change in fortune lead to him and his family moving to Watchet, to work as a maltster, possibly with his brother-in-law Jonathan Date at Snailholt Farm. A maltster made malt, usually from barley, and often the maltster farmed the barley first. Being a maltster at a farm suggests that they were also farming barley there. There was a brewery at Stogumber that the malt would have been produced for.

By about the early to mid 1830s the Rich family had moved on from Watchet, back to around Stogumber/Higher Vexford, to take up farming again. Barley? Who knows. Although I have not been able to locate William and Elizabeth Rich in the 1841 Census (or any census in fact!) living at Higher Vexford in 1841 were Benjamin, Sarah and John Milton, brother, sister and father of Elizabeth Rich. The 1841 Census also lists a 10 year old Louisa Rich (F.S. - farm servant/female servant?) living/staying with the Miltons in Higher Vexford. So I think it is safe to assume that William had been working with his in-laws in Higher Vexford. I don't know where the majority of the Rich family were during the 1841 Census. I don't actually know when either William or Elizabeth died. There is the possibility that the family moved to London for William to work as a baker, using skills he possibly picked up whilst working with his brother-in-law Jonathan Date. The 1851 Census has daughter Avice living with Benjamin and Sarah Milton in Vexford - where all the other living members of the Rich family were is anyone's guess. By 1857, when Avice was married in Lambeth, Surrey, William is listed as a farmer. He is not listed as deceased on the marriage record, but then I'm not sure if they would do that anyway.

And that's about as far as I can get with guessing what the Rich family were up to in Somerset. I can only assume that the William Rich who was baptised at Stogumber in 1836 with his sisters Emma and Ann was my great great grandfather, unless better information turns up!

William Rich - perhaps he didn't swim here...

I've never been able to work out how my great great grandfather William Rich (born abt 1832, Bridgewater, Somerset, UK; died 1927, Willoughby, NSW, Aust) got to Australia.

I knew from his death notice that he was a Crimean War veteran, and he presumably arrived in Australia after he had completed his war service. It is just about impossible to find Crimean War records, but today I found that there were a number of William Richs who served in the merchant navy, and some merchant navy ships did indeed serve in the Crimean War.

There is even a merchant navy listing for a William Rich, born in Bridgewater. His register ticket number was 56694. Unfortunately, I can only find a listing in the index for him, but there does not appear to be an actual record of his service available. So I may never know if it was him in the merchant navy, but it doesn't seem so far fetched to think that he may have been working on a ship when he came to Australia, and stayed.

Syphilis or congenital defects?

I was watching the Martin Freeman episode of Who Do You Think You Are UK recently. His great grandfather's third wife bore him 12 children, six of whom died in infancy. It turned out that most likely this high rate of infant mortality was due to syphilis. There were one or two children who were healthy, then six who died, then the remaining ones survived childhood. The sexual health expert interviewed for the program said that the most common reason for a block of children in one family to not survive was syphilis. Apparently after infection, over a period of four to six years, the first pregnancies would have resulted in miscarriage, the next few would likely have been stillborn, the next few would have failed to thrive (and lived or not), and then the next children would be healthy, after the syphilis infection had run its course. He also said that 100 years ago, the rate of infection with syphilis in the population was about 1 in 10, so therefore, most family historians were likely to find cases of syphilis somewhere in their ancestry. Today, syphilis is treated with antibiotics, so is no longer the large social problem that it once was.

I thought about families in my ancestry who might fit the bill, and the one that leaped out at me was the family produced by William Rich's first marriage. Of the nine known children, none survived childhood. Of course, there is the complicating factor in this case that William married his first cousin, and so therefore there could well have been congenital causes for many of the deaths. But I think it is worth considering that syphilis was a possibility as well, so I have put together all the relevant information I have:

Name	Date of birth, place	Date of death, place	Age at death	Listed cause of death
William H Rich	22 Jul 1861, Peel River, NSW, Aust	1862, Sydney, NSW, Aust	0-1 years	Unknown - death record not obtained
Frederick John Rich	1863, NZ	1863, Tuapeka, NZ	<1 year	Unknown - death record not obtained
Henry Bindon Rich	1865, NZ	5th Jul 1865, Tuapeka, NZ	6 months 5 days	Acute hydroceptiales (sic) - I think it should be hydrocephalus
Sydney Rich	1865, NZ	1866, Gabriel's Gully, NZ	0-1 year	Unknown - death record not obtained
Emma Matilda Rich	unknown	1868, NZ	unknown	Unknown - death record not obtained
Sampson Rich	unknown	before 1872	unknown	unknown - only known from death record of mother
Alfred Rich	1868, Hokitika, NZ	7 Dec 1872, Melbourne, Vic, Aust	4 years	Bronchitis and whooping cough
Cornelia Rich	1870, NZ	21 Nov 1872, Melbourne, Vic, Aust	2 years	Debility and marasmus
Avice Rich	10 Mar 1872, Melbourne, Vic, Aust	2 Jul 1872, Melbourne, Vic, Aust	3 months 22 days	Marasmus and apoplexy
PLUS their mother:
Mary Jane Rich née Bindon	8 Mar 1838, Crowcombe, Somerset, England	8 Apr 1872, Melbourne, Vic, Aust	34 years	Anaemia and diarrhoea

Looking at this information, I'm not sure if syphilis could be blamed for any of these deaths. I had wondered if the children's mother, Mary Jane, could have died of syphilis, and I was talking to a health professional about this and she said it was definitely possible to die from it, but it would be tertiary syphilis, and she was too young for that. That Henry died from acute hydrocephalus makes me think it was from a congenital cause, resulting from parents who were first cousins. It is so sad to think of Mary Jane and William having baby after baby and watching them all die. Such sorrow. I can only imagine Mary Jane thinking about the babies in her womb, time after time, wondering and worrying about what might be wrong with this next one.

Kissing Cousins

William Rich (c1832-1927) was my great great grandfather. I am descended from his daughter Christina (1889-1971), who was born to his second wife Lavinia Huxley (1847-1929). Previously, William was married to his first cousin Mary Jane Bindon (1838-1872). In Australia it is legal to marry your first cousin, though whether it is a good idea to have children is another thing, considering the limited gene pool. However, the genetic implications of having children with your first cousin were unknown in those days and so William and Mary Jane had a number of children. I'm not sure of the exact number as the records do not really agree with each other on the names. The one thing I do know is that none of the children survived childhood.

William H Rich was their firstborn, and was born on July 22 1861 in Peel River, NSW. He died sometime in 1862 - I haven't gotten around to getting a transcript of his death certificate. Until the other day I had not found any concrete evidence of William and Mary Jane having any more children and assumed that they had not. I have wondered whether William H's short life span was just related to the type of illness which took many people's lives in those days before the advent of antibiotics, or whether there had been a congenital condition which had led to his death.

The other day a distant relative contacted me and pointed me in the direction of some children born to William and Mary Jane in Victoria, and further research revealed more, born in (surprisingly) New Zealand. I was completely unaware the family had spent time in New Zealand.

Other children believed to have been born to William and Mary Jane Rich:
Emma (born ?, died 1868 in New Zealand)
Sampson (born ? and died pre-1872)
Henry Bindon (born 1865, New Zealand - died 1865, New Zealand)
Sydney (born 1865, New Zealand - died 1866, New Zealand)
Alfred (born 1868, New Zealand - died 7 Dec 1872, Melbourne)
Cornelia (born 1870, New Zealand - died 21 Nov 1872, Melbourne)
Avice (1872, Melbourne - 2 Jul 1872, Melbourne)

Avice's death certificate says she was born in Hokitika, New Zealand. This is actually incorrect - there is a record of her birth in Victoria, however, as both her parents were not with her when she died it's not surprising that there was a mistake. However, it does suggest where the family were in New Zealand. William Rich was working on the gold fields at Peel River, NSW, before they went to NZ. Hokitika was settled in the 1860s after gold was found there. A huge number of Australians went there for the ensuing gold rush, apparently William Rich and his family included. Exactly when they arrived in NZ is unknown, but they returned to Australia, to Melbourne, in 1872. Had William made his fortune? Who knows.

The story of the children who died in Melbourne is terribly sad. Their mother Mary Jane died in Melbourne on 8 April 1872. William was left with three children, Alfred, aged 4, Cornelia, 1 3/4 and Avice, aged only 21 days old. William apparently was unable to care for the three of them, presumably because he needed to work, and fathers didn't do that sort of thing in those days anyway, so they were put into care. All three of them were sent to Industrial Schools, which were for the care of neglected children. Albert died in the industrial school on December 7, 1872 of bronchitis and whooping cough. Cornelia died November 21, 1872 of debility and marasmus (extreme malnutrition), and Avice on July 2, 1872 of marasmus and apoplexy. The industrial schools cannot have been happy places to live, especially considering the two girls died of extreme malnutrition. Were these children destined to die young anyway because of congenital conditions? We'll never know, because there was no knowledge of those things then, but it is a possibility, particularly in the case of Cornelia, who died of debility and marasmus.

It is interesting to note that from William's second marriage, to Lavinia Huxley (who was not a blood relation of his), of their eight children, none of them died in childhood.

William Rich in Waverley Cemetery

I had the chance to check the transcripts for Waverley Cemetery yesterday to find the record of William Rich's (abt 1832-1927) burial.

It turns out that the double grave he was in was reasonably crowded - he was buried with his wife Lavinia (née Huxley, surname Bennett from her first marriage before she married William, 1847-1929), their daughter Lily Rich (1877-1912), their son William Milton Rich (1881-1950), and their daughter Laurina Garrett née Rich (1883-1952).

One day I'll get there in person to have a look.

William Rich married his cousin

...at least I think so. I wrote about William Rich recently, and said I was going to send away for some transcripts of marriage and death records. They arrived today. And I learnt quite a few new things!

1. William Rich was not from Devon, England, but instead from Bridgwater, Somerset. His marriage record for his marriage to Lavinia Bennett neé Huxley says he was from Bridgwater. His death record says Devonshire. Considering he wasn't present at the time his death was registered I'm inclined to believe he was from Bridgwater. Unless he lied at his wedding, but we have no reason to think he might have.
2. His mother's maiden name was Milton. Which is interesting, because the name of the house he lived in at Rose Bay was "Milton". And the maiden name of his first wife's mother (Susannah Maria Bindon) was Milton. Furthermore, Susannah had a lot of siblings, one of whom was named Elizabeth. Was this William Rich's mother? Evidence from the 1851 English Census suggests she was: William's sister, Avice, was staying with her uncle at the time of the census - Benjamin Milton, in St Decumans, Somerset. Susannah and Elizabeth had a brother Benjamin, and the birth dates for the brother and this Benjamin Milton match up. So it would seem that William Rich married his cousin Mary Jane Bindon.
3. William was listed as a gold miner on the marriage record, though his usual residence was recorded as Sydney. So he clearly was no longer working in Peel River. On the death certificate he was listed as a farmer. Where? None of the directory listings I have found for him list an occupation. Is that what he was doing at La Perouse when his wife Lavinia was in Bondi? There are market gardens in La Perouse that have been there for about 150 years...
4. The death certificate says that he was in NSW for 73 years. Considering he died aged 95 in 1927, this suggests he arrived in NSW in about 1854, when he was 22. Narrowing this down still doesn't help me work out how he got here - there's no records that I can find that match that.
5. The other thing I learnt is that William Rich was buried in Waverley Cemetery. Waverley Cemetery is the only major cemetery in Sydney that I can think of which does not have a deceased search function on its website. You have to go to the actual cemetery to find out whether the person in question is buried there, and where exactly. That William is buried there also gives me a clue why I've never been able to find his wife Lavinia's burial information either - probably because she is buried there as well. Considering she died in Katoomba it doesn't seem the first place to look for her, but for the fact I now know her husband was buried there.

So now I just need to try and sort out the confusing tangle of Riches, Miltons and Bindons. It may take a while!

Postcards from the war

My mother has two postcards which were passed on to her from her own mother. They were sent in 1916 to an unknown female relative, from her father, who was away at war in France.

From the details written on the cards we could tell it was a young girl because her father called her "girlie", but we knew it wasn't my grandmother because her father, Adolf Beringer, didn't go to war. We wondered if it was someone on my grandfather's side of the family - but looking at all the men in those families there was no one who seemed to fit. So we looked at ancestors in the Rich family - my grandmother's mother's family.

And we had a possible contenter: my grandmother's favourite cousin - Cousin Dorothy - her father went to war. In Dorothy's family there was her father, Harry Radley, her mother, Emma Radley nee Rich, Dorothy, and her brother Kenrick. So, with no sisters, it was quite likely that Dorothy might be her father's "girlie". One of the postcards was a birthday postcard, and it read "Wishing my dear little girlie many happy returns of 9/2/17". The only problem was that we didn't know Dorothy's date of birth - we only knew it was about 1913 - the NSW BDM birth records in the online search are only up until 1910 at the moment, and this was after that. Googling didn't come up with any birth dates either. I was looking up Harry Radley's service records at the National Archives of Australia when I discovered that Dorothy also had one. Although her actual service record is not yet available online the available information had her date of birth: 9 Feb 1913! So, quite by accident, I confirmed that the postcards were sent to my grandmother's favourite cousin, Dorothy Radley.

I suppose that the reason why my grandmother had them was that Dorothy never married and had no children, so there were no descendants of her own to pass such treasured belongings on to. To give them to your favourite cousin would be quite logical. I only vaguely remember Cousin Dorothy. I didn't meet her many times, but I remember she was a lovely kind lady.

Oh, by the way, the cards both have quite a bit of foxing on them. Are there any paper conservators out there who could tell me a good gentle way to clean them, without damaging them?

William Rich

William Rich was my great great grandfather. My mother and I have done a lot of digging on William Rich but there are still a lot of questions about his life.

He was born in somewhere (there's a possible contender in Sutcombe) in Devonshire, England(1) in about 1832 to William and Elizabeth Rich(2). He apparently had at least one sister, Avice(3). At some stage he came to Australia, by means unknown, though presumably he didn't swim! His sister Avice also came to Australia, with her husband Robert Bindon.

The first we hear of William in Australia is when he married Mary Jane Bindon on 19 April 1860 at the Scots Church, Sydney(1). William was noted in the marriage notice as a goldminer from Peel River (near Tamworth). On July 22 1861 Mary Jane gave birth to a son, William H Rich, at their residence at Dernon Point, Peel River diggings(4). William jnr died in Sydney the following year(5). It would appear that the marriage produced no more children. Mary Jane died, aged 34, in 1872 in Victoria(6). Why was Mary Jane in Victoria? Was William with her? When did they leave Peel River? I have not been able to find Mary Jane's death record in the Victorian BDM index (which I find quite irritating to use at the best of times), otherwise I might have more information on this. Perhaps there were more children born to Mary Jane and William in Victoria, but I can't find any records regarding that either, possibly because there may not be any!

William Rich next appears in the public record in 1875 in Sydney, when he married widow Lavinia Bennett (neé Huxley, grand daughter of Thomas Huxley)(7). Lavinia seemed quite flexible with her name and she was also known as Laurina, Lawina, Laura, and possibly other names as well. William and Lavinia had eight children: Lily (1877-1912(8)), Avice (1879-1973(9)), William Milton (1881-1950(10)), Laurine (1883-1952(11)), Emma (1885-1958(12)), Florence (1887-1977(13)), Christina (1889-1971(14)) and Ethel Louisa (1891-1971(15)).

In 1908 when William's sister Avice Bindon (neé Rich) died, they were living at "Mount View", 82 Gordon St, Paddington(16). They were still there when their daughter Lily died in 1912(17).For some reason in 1915 William and Lavinia seemed to be living in separate locations, as shown by their son William Milton Rich's military service records - William snr was listed as living at La Perouse, whilst Lavinia's address is 7 Jackaman St, Bondi. The Sands Directory for 1916 gives William's address as 9 Jackaman St, Bondi - is this next door to his wife, or is she with him?(18). By 1922 William was listed as living at "Milton", O'Sullivan Rd, Rose Bay, where he appeared to live until soon before his death(18). He died on April 25 1927 at his daughter Avice's house in Willoughby, but the death notice states he was late of Milton, O'Sullivan Rd, Rose Bay(19) - perhaps Avice nursed him in his ill-health until his death. Lavinia died two years after William in 1929 in Katoomba(20).

William Rich's death notice also says that he was a Crimean veteran(19). Unfortunately I am unable to access British Crimean war records without either visiting the British National Archives in England or paying someone to research it for me. I guess that he must have come out to Australia soon after the war was over.

The most mysterious thing about William is what he did for a crust. The only occupation I have for him was as a goldminer in Peel River. I have not found any directory listings (or anything else) which list any occupation for him. Did he find a fortune in gold and live off that for the rest of his life?

I think I probably need to order a transcript of William's marriage record to Lavinia, and also his death record. That might shed a bit more light on him.

1. Marriage notice in Sydney Morning Herald (SMH), 21 Apr 1860.
2. NSW BDM death record 6651/1927.
3. Funeral notice for Avice Rich Bindon, SMH, 18 Nov 1908.
4. Birth notice, SMH, 3 Aug 1861.
5. NSW BDM death record 307/1862.
6. Australia Death Index (Ancestry.com.au).
7. NSW BDM marriage record 344/1875, Lavinia listed as "Lawina".
8. NSW BDM birth record 3508/1877, listed as "Lilly". Interestingly there is no father recorded.
9. NSW BDM birth record 779/1879, listed as "Avis".
10. NSW BDM birth record 3953/1881.
11. NSW BDM birth record 8741/1883.
12. NSW BDM birth record 10431/1885.
13. NSW BDM birth record 9422/1887.
14. NSW BDM birth record 5147/1889.
15. NSW BDM birth record 38803/1891.
16. Funeral notice for Avice Bindon, SMH, 18 Nov 1908.
17. Funeral notice for Lily Rich, SMH, 17 Apr 1912.
18. Sands Directory (Ancestry.com.au).
19. Death notice for William Rich, SMH, 27 Apr 1927.
20. Death notice for Lavinia Rich, SMH, 21 Jan 1929, Lavinia is listed as "Laurina".