Margaret HENRY (McSeveny)

Story

Margaret HENRY (nee McSeveny)

Margaret McSeveny or McSavany was born 25-12-1807, the second of three known children of William McSeveny and Adams nee Ewart. ‘Adams’ was a female family name used frequently in the Ewart family. It became ‘Ademia’ in later members of the Henry family. Margaret\’s mother died when she was a small child and her father remarried shortly after.

Margaret married John Henry in 1824 and they lived in Kirkoswald, Ayrshire, Scotland for about thirteen years, where they had seven children. Margaret was pregnant with an eighth child when the family left Greenock on board the ‘William Rodger’ on 12-5-1838 bound for Australia. Margaret\’s occupation was given as ‘dressmaker’. She kept busy on the voyage with knitting and sewing activities and by helping her older children to learn to read. They were able to spend time on deck during the day until after the ship rounded the Cape of Good Hope. However they then struck gale force winds and rain and had to be confined below decks. The cramped, overcrowded conditions soon became unbearable and many people became sick. The ship had to be quarantined at the Quarantine Station at Spring Cove when the ship reached Sydney and Typhus Fever was discovered. Margaret must have been desperately worried about her family as sixteen people had died on the voyage and another forty-five died while the ship was in quarantine. The Henry family was one of the few lucky families who did not lose a member. There was some joy when Margaret and John\’s son Isaac was born on 16-12-1838. A few weeks later the passengers were discharged and Isaac was christened at St Andrew\’s Scots Church on 15-2-1839.

The family then went to Jamberoo, near Kiama, NSW. At first they lived in a house owned by Captain Collins who owned the Woodstock Mill at Jamberoo. Later John operated a sawmill and had a tenant\’s lease on ‘Riversdale’, the James Robb property. At Jamberoo Margaret gave birth to five more children. When the youngest was less than one year old, John died. Two of the older girls had married by this time but Margaret still had a large family to support.

On 14-10-1851 she married again. Her second husband was Andrew McClelland. Andrew had arrived in Australia in 1843 along with his parents and two brothers. The family had a clearing lease on ‘Riversdale’ up until about 1850. After Andrew\’s marriage to Margaret he took over the tenant\’s lease which had been in John Henry\’s name. Robert and Sarah McClelland, Andrew\’s parents, lived with them there and later on the Eureka Estate near the Minnamurra River. It was while they were living on the Eureka Estate that Margaret suffered two further tragedies. Two of her sons died suddenly in 1859 within a few weeks of each other. Bryce fell dead from his horse on Mt Terry on 29th May and William was drowned in the Minnamurra River on 2nd July. Bryce died from the rupture of something in the brain. A family story says he was struck by lightning. William died when a boat from which he was fishing was overturned by a freak wave.

Gold was discovered in the Nerriga area between Braidwood and Nowra and several families from the Jamberoo, Kiama and Shoalhaven areas decided to try their luck. In the early 1860s Margaret, Andrew and the younger Henry children joined them. There is no record of any big discoveries of gold by the family. They eventually had a farm about seven miles east of Nerriga village on the road to Nowra. Margaret acted as midwife at the births of several of her grandchildren and no doubt at other births in the district. There were no children from her second marriage.

Margaret died 29-10-1873 at Nerriga, NSW and was buried on the Rolfe family property there. Her youngest daughter was married to Edward Richard Rolfe. Andrew lived the last years of his life with Agnes and Edward Rolfe. He died 18-5-1892 also in Nerriga.

Shirley Jurmann

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