Some relatives’ lives are defined by particular events. Generally this
occurred when they did things that were unexpected – especially for the
time. Ellen was one such woman.
Ellen was born on 10 October 1880 at Stoney Creek, about 40 kilometres south of Wellington, New
South Wales. She was the fourth child of
Agnes (nee Crowe) and Edmund William Freestone.
After her birth, the family relocated to Windsor near Sydney for a
number of years before moving to Orange and then returning to Stoney Creek, which was then known as Farnham. Stoney Creek / Farnham no longer exist. They serviced the gold mines that still dot the area, but are almost completely exhausted.
On 18 May 1898 seventeen year old Ellen married Francis Edward Hocking
at Farnham. Seventeen is
too young to get married! The marriage was not successful. Ellen appears to
have NOT been a person that just puts up with a bad situation. I’ll never
discover what Francis thought of her!
Fortunately the couple had no children together.
By mid 1902 Ellen was pregnant – just not
with Francis Hocking’s child.
In early September 1902, The Sydney Morning
Herald reported that Francis was seeking a “dissolution of his marriage” to
Ellen on the grounds of her misconduct with William Couldwell and Frederick
Hilton, who were both joined as co-respondents in the suit. It was noted that
Ellen, and the co-respondents did not appear at the hearing. Presumably because
of Ellen’s pregnancy, the final decree for the divorce was set for 3 months,
instead of the normal 12 months. This meant that the divorce was granted on 10
December 1902. Divorce was not common at that time, and was not easy to obtain
or looked upon favourably. Nor was it considered good form to be married to one
man and having a child to another. Presumably the judge decided to allow a
quick divorce in order to ‘right the wrong’! On the same day her divorce was
granted, Ellen married Frederick Warner Hilton, who was eighteen years old and
one of the co-respondents at her divorce hearing, at the Presbyterian Church at
31 Bent Street in Sydney. I wonder what her relationship was with William Couldwell…
Ellen and Frederick’s first child, Frederick Kenneth, was born three
weeks after their wedding, on 31 December 1902. A second son, Stanley Melville
was born in January 1905 in Hurstville, Sydney. In April 1906 Ellen visited her
parents, who still lived at Farnham. Young Stanley contracted pneumonia and,
despite seeing the local doctor, died on 28 April 1906. Stanley was buried on
30 April in Omigal Cemetery (this has now been renamed the Stuart Town
Cemetery). A third son Mervyn Leslie was born in Hurstville on 6 August 1907.
Sadly Ellen Elizabeth Hilton died on 17 June 1919 at her home at
Oxford Street, Mortdale. She was 38 and
the death certificate indicates that she died from toxaemia, which could have
been from pregnancy.
Fred and Merv had very fond memories of their mother. She was obviously quite a lively woman and
very likeable!
She was buried on 19 June at Woronora Cemetery, Sydney. She was the first of her ten siblings to die.
She also left behind 17 year old Frederick and 12 year old Mervyn – both of
whom missed her and perhaps never quite recovered.
[Relationship to SNR = Great-great grandmother]
No comments:
Post a Comment