Moses Hibbs

Story

Moses Hibbs, a young carpenter and Ann, his wife of three years boarded the “Agra” in

Southampton and sailed for Australia arriving in Geelong in May 1854. Their son was born in

Melbourne five months later. So the story goes, Moses went fishing one day and never returned.

Somehow, his wife managed to move to Sydney and marry again there.

However, in 1867, thirteen years later, we find Moses, now aged 40 and very much alive,

in Omeo. There he met Sarah Jane Nichols.

Sarah, a Londoner, had come to Australia in 1865 as a twenty-one year old, as companion

to a lady who hoped the climate in Australia would be better for her health. Unfortunately. the

woman died on the 3 1/2 month long voyage, so when Sarah arrived at Geelong, she found work

with a Mrs Evans in Warrnambool. Many people from that district moved to grazier settlements

near Omeo, and Sarah moved there with her employer.

Moses and Sarah married in Bruthen in 1868 despite the fact that there is no record of

divorce. They had six children, Emily, Arthur, Henry, Robert, Lillian and Herbert.

Unfortunately, Moses developed emphysema and prompted by his wife, made a will only days

before his death in 1880. Sarah was left with a house on 20 acres, 100 pounds from life insurance and

five children aged from eleven to two, with baby Herbert still a few months from arriving.

Two years later Sarah married Alfred Lucas, an acquaintance of her husband. Lucas was

born in Tuscany, Italy and had anglicised his name from Luca. A widower, he also had six

children who may have perhaps been a little older than Sarah’s. They then added to their brood

of twelve with young Rosabelle. Records show that in 1895 they ran the hotel in the mining town

Brookville, the licence held in Sarah’s name, as Alfred was not naturalised. In 1897, Alfred died

with Sarah encouraging him to make his will a few days before he died.

Widowed twice and in her fifties, Sarah had more deaths to cope with. In 1901, young

Rosabelle died in Melbourne aged only 14 and Sarah had to apply for special permission from

the licensing board to close her hotel on the day of her daughter’s funeral. The following year her

son Arthur died in a mining accident involving explosives. Sarah herself lived to 74.

Meanwhile, Emily Elizabeth, Sarah’s eldest daughter had married a handsome young

man Edward Renehan. He was the sixth of eleven children whose parents had emigrated from

Ireland in 1857, and he ran a string of racehorses. Six years later he died of a perforated intestine

at age 36, leaving his widow with four young children aged 10, 7, 3 and 1. How women managed

in the days before the widow’s pension, I don’t know. but Emily apparently did a good job. One

son died in his thirties, the other went to the Middle East and New Guinea with the Australian

troops during WW2. He never married and looked after his mother. Both daughters married.

The elder daughter Maude Mary Jane married a handsome young man, John Leonard,

whose father promised them a house. Perhaps the family history of mothers left with young

children helped her decide to marry a man with such prospects. Unlike her mother (who if not

widowed would probably have had more children) Maude only had two. So she covered all bases

for a safe and secure life. Unfortunately, her husband sold their house when they had to move to

be nearer doctors and hospitals when their younger daughter contracted polio. They never bought

again and lived in rented premises. Maude outlived her husband by several years.

These then were my maternal grandparents who helped shape who I am today.