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Research in Other Countries => New Zealand => New Zealand Completed Requests => Topic started by: bourke-shaw on Sunday 29 June 14 12:08 BST (UK)
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Having scoured through everything I can think of, there seems no evidence of Martin & Sarah Bourke's arrival into Port Chalmers in 1873/4 (with several children), on the Otago, that I can find - apart from obituary notices. Can anyone help please?
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He may of came on his own into Christchurch then sent for his wife and family.
Name: Martin Bourke
Event Type: Immigration
Event Date: 29 Aug 1874
Event Place: Canterbury, New Zealand
Gender: Male
Age: 35
Nationality: Clare
Occupation: Farm Labourer
Birth Year (Estimated): 1839
Departure Date: 1874
Arrival Place: Canterbury
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Digital Folder Number: 004412832 , Image Number: 00026
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From 'The Otago Daily Times' dated 31.12.1874 there is a brief report about the 'Otago' which "arrived this afternoon from Melbourne, she sails tonight". Saloon passengers are named, "30 in steerage". She was then sailing to Dunedin.
http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz
Minniehaha.
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Thanks for that Minnie and Suzy - certainly your idea that Martin could have come separately sounds good, but it says he is single, and also a farm labourer, and in fact he was a school teacher and married with 5 children, so maybe this is a relative, and not our Martin?
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'The Otago Daily Times' dated 1.1.1875 reports the arrival of the 'Otago', ss, 64 tons, from Melbourne (Dec.23rd) via Bluff (Dec.30th). Again, just saloon passengers named...........
Minniehaha.
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From NZBound-Freepages-Ancestry.com (freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/)-
Full passenger list for the 'Otago' which arrived August 29th 1874*. However a quick scan did not find the Bourke family.
The arrival is briefly mentioned in the 'Otago Witness' dated 5.9.1874.
*The index shows the year incorrectly as 1875.
Minniehaha.
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It seems so strange to me, that they aren't mentioned, if everything else points to their arrival in 1874 on the "Otago". Why would this be? Do you think they would have travelled steerage and not be mentioned? But, according to Archives, NZ, they were not listed as "Assisted Immigrants", so they couldn't find them either!
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Yes, although not listed as "Assisted Immigrants" they would still most likely have travelled in steerage. The majority of people did. After a time with the arrival of so many immigrants, the newspapers no longer provided the names of all the passengers, preferring instead to list only those few not travelling in steerage. And the full lists in many instances have sadly not survived. :'(
Minniehaha.
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Hello...
Have you considered looking through the General Biographical card index [Bio 1] at Wellington Archives. Might be a mention. Might not :-)
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Just for the record, at the time there were two ships with the name of Otago sailing in NZ waters. One did the Melbourne-Dunedin route quite regularly and the other did the London-NZ route once a year-ish. The latter was the one that brought the migrants.
Regards
Beg
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Hello bourke-shaw
Happy to be able to tell you that the BOURKE family were indeed aboard the ship "Otago" which arrived at Dunedin on or about 8 August 1874.
Oddly ???? ... they are indexed under the (unusual) surname of HARTZ.
[I have some very scant notes on a BOURKE son who appears on the periphery of one of my families and so I know that his mother was Sarah KEELING (or KEALING) the wife of Martin BOURKE. ]
per "OTAGO" - arrived Dunedin 1874
HARTZ
- Martin - 35* years - occupation: Ploughman - Nationality: Limerick
- Sarah - 33 yrs
- Laurence - 13
- Fanny - 12
- Charles - 10
- William - 7
- Martin - 4
- Infant - 6 months
---------------------------------
Please see following post for some explanatory notes :
~ Lu
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ooops ... just having a few computer issues at the moment so will get back with some notes as soon as possible. ;)
~ Lu
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Although shown as a ploughman on the 'Otago' passenger list, a snippet in the 'Otago Witness', dated 19.12.1874, under the heading EDUCATION BOARD, states Mr.Martin Bourke "who brought excellent certificates from Ireland....appointed probationer at Manuka Creek".
And later from the same newspaper, dated 27.11.1875, an appointment at Beaconsfield. [Of special interest to me as I am working on a history of the area.]
Minniehaha.
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Further to Lu's reply 9# here is the passenger list
https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-267-11678-51611-78?cc=1609792
Cheers Janette
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Hi bourke-shaw
Notes:
As can be seen in my previous post > HARTZ family to Dunedin, per "Otago" 1874 > the ages (35 [born c. 1839] and 33 years [bc 1841]) given in the ship's manifest for Martin (HARTZ) and his wife Sarah, don't quite "stack up" with the approximate years of birth calculated at the deaths of Martin and Sarah BOURKE.
[NZ Deaths: 1916 - Martin BOURKE - 79 years - bc 1837 // 1924 - Sarah BOURKE - 90 years - bc 1834. ]
Whilst I'm fairly confident that the HARTZ family are indeed Martin and Sarah BOURKE and children, I'm undecided as to whether the use of the name HARTZ (for the purpose of emigration) was "deliberate" ?? On the ship's manifest the family are also indexed as "HARTZ - Martin - 8 " (= 8 family members), and the two older children who were transferred to the single men's and women's quarters, appear again under those listings as 'HARTZ - Laurence and Fanny". So not, I think, anything to do with a spelling error/ or mis-transcription, of the surname BOURKE.
The youngest "HARTZ" child, shown as "Infant - 6 months" is very possibly "Roger Harty BOURKE"*
born Tipperary, Ireland, on 1 October 1873 to Martin BOURKE and Serah [sic] KEELING.
[* Roger Harty BOURKE died in New Zealand, aged 1 year, on 14 November 1874: His namesake brother, (indexed as "Roger Patrick BURKE, Parents Martin & Sarah) was born (NZ) on 16 November 1875. PapersPast has an obituary for the 2nd Roger Harty BOURKE - "Auckland Star" - 15 December 1934. ]
See continuation of "Notes" > next post >>
~ Lu
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Notes: HARTZ / BOURKE ... continued :
It was a relatively common ploy (especially with older men) to "tweak" their ages on emigration applications in order to meet the criteria set / or to be favoured by, the various authorities in NZ who were selecting immigrants. Likewise occupations were often changed in order to gain selection for subsidised immigration. Quite usually though, immigrant men who'd had all or part of their fares paid, were "bonded" to the occupation under which they'd been selected, for a period of time.
Edited to add: Just considering the surname "HARTZ" (which doesn't sound at all Irish :D ) ... and the christian name "HARTY", given to two of the BOURKE children ???
They're rather similar aren't they ?
So there exists the possibility that a "change of surname" (from BOURKE) might have been deliberate ? Maybe it was that the occupation of "schoolteacher" didn't qualify under the immigration scheme of the day ? A "ploughman" say, or a "general labourer" would be more readily accepted. [And it wouldn't be too difficult to revert to the BOURKE surname once in NZ. ]
??? ;D
~ Lu
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I noticed that there are a number of BOURKE family trees published on the ancestry.com website.
None of them (from what I could see) appear to have picked up the details of the child named as Fanny (HARTZ) or BOURKE ... born c. 1863. [None though have shown immigration details for Martin BOURKE and his family. ]
Fanny, may or may not be, the Fanny BOURKE who married in 1892 to a Henry BUTTERICK (indexed as BUTTRICK). ? This lady was a school mistress at Wakanui school, North Canterbury, from 1889 to 1892. (Given the occupation, she may be the daughter of Martin and Sarah BOURKE ?)
Fanny BUTTERICK (death indexed as Frances BUTTERICK) aged 40 years, died in 1905. Her obituary appears in the "Ashburton Guardian" - 28 January 1905 - page 3. [She is buried at Ashburton cemetery ... but it seems somewhat odd that she shares a plot with a Sarah B. COOPER and that plot was purchased by an Edward B. COOPER in 1899 ??? Can't see any family connection ?? ]
* Which particular line of the BOURKE family are you following ?
~ Lu
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:)I am so, so impressed with the amazing information that you have all provided me with; thank you soooo much!
No wonder, as a newbie to this, I wasn't able to find out anything - the name HARTZ makes it really difficult (but sense in the way that you have explained it to me) - HARTY, is, I believe, Martin's mother's family name - Peggy Harty. I would be really interested in your ideas as to why they felt they needed to change their name.
And the way you have explained the deceptive "ploughman" occupation makes good (if somewhat dishonest!!) sense.
Thank you Janette, for the passenger list, which I have now photocopied.
Where is Beaconsfield, Minnehaha? It would be interesting to know how long Martin taught there.
Re Fanny Bourke, Lu, I understand that she was named Frances - is Fanny an alternate name for Frances? And, yes, she did marry Henry Butterick of Wakanui. That does seem an interesting quirk to have her buried with Sarah Cooper - there must surely be some connection there?
Lu - to answer your last question - Martin Bourke and Sarah Keeling are my great grandparents - so it is their line that I seem to be following with great interest.
Once again, I can't thank you all enough for sharing your time and energy and enthusiasm with me - its wonderful!
Pam :) :) :)
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Hi Pam,
Beaconsfield was about 20 kms north of Dunedin. Taking in the last of the rise of the Kilmog Hill, continuing along what is now State Highway 1 for about 1 to 2 kms. Maybe around the turn of the 20th century Beaconsfield amalgamated with Merton which abuted it.
As far as I am aware, the school was always at Merton and was never known as Beaconsfield school.
Mr. Bourke would have been one of the first to teach at the school.
Minniehaha.
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Hi Pam
There is a photo available online of Martin BOURKE (and also one of his son Martin jnr.) together with a short biography for each. It appears in the Cyclopedia of New Zealand (Canterbury Provincial District) under the heading of West Melton available at the NZETC website.
http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/
[or google "NZETC + Martin Bourke" ... which returns Farmers / NZETC and gives a direct link to Martin BOURKE article. ]
~ Lu
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Hi again Pam
Will need to do a little further digging in order to answer (or attempt to answer ;)), some of your questions.
* Yes, Fanny is a diminutive of the girls' name, Frances.
I can see that Fanny (Frances) BUTTERICK was widowed at the time of her early death, aged 40 years. I'm just a bit puzzled that she wasn't buried with her husband who had died only a few years previously ? The Sarah COOPER she shares a plot with was aged about 86 when she died in 1899 ? Will endeavour to investigate this further if you're interested.
* Can you clarify please, which of Martin and Sarah's children was your grandparent ?? (It may be that there is further information available. )
~ Lu
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Thank you so much, for all the help that you have given me - it is fantastic.
I am following Martin and Sarah Bourke's third child, second son, Charles, who is my grandfather. Although the rest of the family hold great interest to me too; I would love to find some cousins!
Re Frances/Fanny Butterick's grave; I have been down to the Ashburton Cemetery to check it out, and find that Frances is buried with her husband, Henry, as one would expect, and not with the Coopers; they are in the next door grave. Clearly, the cemetery records have it incorrectly - so I will let them know.
Cheers, Pam