Details Page

Participant Info

First Name

Elizabeth (Bessy)

Surname

Fitzgibbon

Native Place

Kanturk, Cork

Age On Arrival

19

Parents

William & Judith (both dead)

Religion

Roman Catholic

Ship Name

Maria (Sydney 29 Jun 1850)

Details

Shipping: houseservant, reads only, no relatives in colony but sister Catherine was also on Maria. Immigration Correspondence 50/700 2 Sep 1850 to Moreton Bay with per Eagle with group of 15 orphans, including her sister, as Bessy Fitzgibbon; married James Petford, of Normandy Plains, in Ipswich RC in Jun 1852, witnesses Bartholomew Cullen & Catharine/Cathrine Manning, both of Ipswich. Bartholomew Cullen was also a witness at the marriage of Elizabeth's sister, Catherine, in Ipswich in Apr 1851. Catharine Manning is believed to be the Irish orphan (Thomas Arbuthnot, 1850) who married Ralph Cooper in the Ipswich Catholic Church in 1852; James and Elizabeth Petford, seem to have had 6 children; Elizabeth died 1 Jun 1899 aged 64; James Michael Petford returned in England before June 1866 and died in Worchester on 12 Mar 1899. See Ray Debnam's 'Fiesty Girls' for details of these two Fitzgibbon girls

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