Details Page

Participant Info

First Name

Ellen

Surname

Fitzgerald

Native Place

Dungarvan, Waterford

Age On Arrival

18

Parents

James Fitzgerald & Ann Carey

Religion

Roman Catholic

Ship Name

Eliza Caroline (Melbourne 1850

Details

shipping: house servant, cannot read or write; parents: James Fitzgerald & Ann Carey; empl. Mrs Anne May, Malop St., Geelong, ₤8, 6 months; married 1) Henry Biggs or Applegate in Geelong 1851; 7 children; husband stabbed to death in 1864; married 2) John King 1868, Ballarat, the same day and same church, the Primitive Methodist Church, as her daughter Elizabeth married Charles McGuinness; daughter Annie wrote a book during WWII about her mother Ellen's hard life. See 'Barefoot & Pregnant?' vol 2 pp.128-31. Henry went 'bust' & Ellen & Annie lived on the bank of the Lerderderg at the foot of Mt Wilson, in a paling & bark hut with an earthen floor covered with Kangaroo skins. Annie grew up God-fearing & hard-working on a diet of goat's milk, eggs & senna tea. Ellen died in Healesville in 1897.

Story