Joseph Law

Story

Joseph Law was born on 2.3.1841 at Church Lane, Mitcham, Surrey, England. His father, Michael, worked as a calico printer and his mother, Julia, died the following year.

At the age of eight Joseph emigrated to South Australia with his father, stepmother, brother Robert aged 9 and half sister Mary Ann l year. They sailed from Plymouth on 18.7.1849 aboard the ‘Duke of Wellington’. After seven weeks at sea tragedy befell the family when the baby, Mary Ann, died from diarrhoea, so it was a rather sad arrival at Port Adelaide on 8.11.1849.

It is not known what happened to Joseph’s father, stepmother and brother after arrival in Australia but as a lad of fifteen Joseph was living in a wood humpy out the back of Torrens Vale, near Yankalilla, working as a shepherd and came in contact with the bushranger Captain Starlight.

On 6.6.1859 at the age of eighteen, he married Mary Ann Brownlee who had arrived from Ireland in 1855. They settled on land at Torrens Vale and began mixed farming. Joseph also had over 3000 acres of bushland called ‘Callawonga’ where he ran sheep.

From 1895 he kept a diary and from this diary we know that in 1897 he sold 14 bales wool, 41 tins honey, 170 surplus sheep, 80 bags oats, 14 bags peas, 55 waggon loads wattle bark estimated at 220 tons, plus a cow, calf, 2 pigs and l hide.

The conditions of the time required a lot of physical effort to do all the work necessary so outside help was sometimes required.

On the ‘Callawonga’ property there was a hut and sheepyards and the men would stay for up to a week when inspecting sheep, mending boundary fences or clearing some of the lighter more open bush country with an axe. They worked during daylight hours and only returned to the hut for a meal and to sleep. For a bed they used either reeds cut from a nearby gully and piled on the dirt floor for a mattress or a bag thrown on the ground and dried sheepskins for rugs.

At shearing time extra men were required for mustering and shearing. It was rough and tough work in the saddle mustering on ‘Callawonga’ as the areas of dense scrub, rocky creeks and wide gullies covered with reeds up to six feet high made it hard to find and control the sheep who would stampede at the sound of horses and dogs. Daughters, Harriet and Mary Ann, sometimes assisted in driving the sheep along the 20 km of unfenced, narrow bush track from ‘Callawonga’ to the shearing shed at Torrens Vale.

Joseph was also Councillor for the Bald Hills Ward of the Yankalilla District Council. This entailed inspecting, estimating and letting contracts for road work to be done, then inspecting and measuring the finished job before certifying payment.

During the 1890’s Joseph bought about 15,000 acres of land at Bookabie on the far west coast of Eyre Peninsula and his son Robert settled there after his marriage. Daughter Agnes married Andrew Brook and also moved to Eyre Peninsula and farmed at Penong. The marriage of their youngest daughter Harriet to James William Hutchinson was held at home on 19.7.1898. James was a gun shearer with the blades and worked for the Law family at shearing and mustering times.

In January 1909 after fifty years of farming, Joseph and Mary Ann retired to the township of Yankalilla and their son Joe took over the management of the property and he greatly increased the holdings. Joe was born with only one arm but with his determination to overcome obstacles he did not let this unduly bother him. He could cut and bark wattles with an axe, catch a sheep and shear it with blade shears and handle a horse at a furious pace over the rough terrain of’ ‘Callawonga’ and is remembered as having helped a number of people financially when times were hard.

Mary Ann died on 24.12.1910 and was buried on Christmas Day in the Yankalilla Public Cemetery and Joseph passed away on 6.1.1921.

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