Second Dead Man's Penny returned to family members! This one was found buried in a local garden.

The Ryde District Historical Society was absolutely delighted to be involved in the returning of a second Dead Man’s Penny to the descendants of the family it was originally issued to.

Recently, we were contacted by a local Denistone resident who had found the ‘penny’ about ½ metre below the ground when digging in his garden. He in turn contacted us at the Ryde District Historical Society hoping that the family could be traced and the ‘penny’  a memorial plaque or commemorative medallion, as they were officially known, be returned to them.

Frank Uther's Memorial Plaque, showing scratches incurred when dug up in a Denistone backyard.

The name on the penny was Frank Uther. Unfortunately for us, Frank was not on our list of Ryde service people, but with only one man named Frank Uther serving in World War One AIF, the Society members and especially Kim, with her extensive experience and resources was not only able to identify him, but make contact with his family. This was made possible by using the public family trees on Ancestry.com. All those people who had included Frank Uther in their trees were contacted and his closest family was found.

The ‘penny’ was returned to Frank Uther’s second cousin, Erica, the only one still surviving of 77 cousins.

Kim, Erica holding Frank's penny and Ben from Ancestry.com

The practice of burying a Dead Man’s Penny, as they were commonly known, is not unheard of but how it ended up in the back yard of a Denistone home is still a bit of a puzzle.

The story of the penny's return was featured on Sydney’s Channel 9, 6pm news on Friday 17 October 2014, and will also be used by Ancestry.com.

Last year the Society and Ryde Library Services were able to reunite the penny for Oscar Henry Nelson, found in a Northern NSW garage sale, with descendants of his family – (see earlier blog stories for details).

 

Project Update — September 2013

My apologies for the lack of blog updates in recent months, but a bereavement and a birth in my family, has kept me distracted from updating the blog.

Yes – the Ryde goes to War Project is still progressing – our latest update:

In our database we currently have 2,075 names of Service people with a connection to the Ryde district. These have been collected from various Honour rolls, War memorials, embarkations rolls, local newspapers, etc. Most just list a family name with an initial or two. When these rolls, memorials and reports were created a hundred years ago, the Ryde community would have known exactly who they were honouring, but today many are unknown or forgotten. We want to identify these men and the few women and at the least find their full names and service numbers and their connection to the district. Many on our list were born in the area, educated or worked in the area; others are proving harder to find the connection for.

So far we have been able to identify,

 with full names and service numbers, 1,349.  

726 are still to be identified.

304 of them never returned home, and we currently have photos of 105 of their headstones or memorials.

We have also made contact with the families of 78 service people from our list

 and have found photos of 114 of them.

The number of Nurses, Sisters, or Matrons found on our list is currently at 11or 12 (depending if Nurse N. Hall, turns out to be the same person as Nurse Marion Hall...

What our team has been up to……

• In August we got together to discuss our project with many of our team of researchers. We have more than 20 working on the project including one joining us when possible from Victoria! Each has been focusing on a specific letter and working on their group of surnames; some have completed their groups and we are starting to collate the data, while others are still hunting!
• We also have representatives on the Ryde Anzac Centenary Committee Ryde Council’s WWI Centenary taskforce and are working with them to ensure the data we collect will be accessible into the future.
• We had planned a transcription and photographing day at one of our local cemeteries, Field of Mars, in June, but it was rained out.  The sun shone on our July date and we were able to tackle various sections to hunt out any headstones that included war service information or memorials. A few of our team are following up on this and more details will follow.

Remembering 'the mothers of Ryde' who lost their boys in WWI

This Mother's Day we think of all the mothers, grandmothers, wives, aunts and sisters who lost their boys during the battles of World War I.

Many would have expressed the same sentiment as Elizabeth Nelson, (mother of Henry Oscar Nelson, of previous posts) when she wrote to the Army in March 1917, following the information that her son, Henry had been reported missing since the action at Fromelles in July 1916.

“Our poor lad may be suffering from an injury to the head or shell shock, and may have forgotten who he is.  We all have the feeling that he is not dead.”

Sadly, a few days later she received a letter from the Red Cross confirming that Henry had died.

Elizabeth Nelson was not alone, many mothers across the district and the country were receiving the same news. Another, the mother of  Arthur Ernest Tipp, currently being research by our project....

It was the 5^th May 1918, when a Court of Enquiry declared that Arthur Ernest Tipp, No. 5099, 20^th Battalion, the only son of William and Alice Tipp of Ryde, previously listed as missing, had been killed in action in Belgium on the 9 October 1917. [Arthur’s story will appear soon].

And more pictures from Kim Phillips' travels ....

where she recently visited the memorial at  V.C.CORNER, FROMELLES and left a poppy beside Henry Oscar Nelson's name.

 

V.C.CORNER, FROMELLES
Photo: Kim Phillips,  May 2013

 

Photo: Kim Phillips,  May 2013

Our Anzac family – the Nelson Brothers of Ryde, NSW and Wellington, NZ

Their story as researched by the RGTW team

In the previous blog post we have heard the wonderful story of the return of Henry Oscar Nelson’s Dead Man’s penny to members of his family.  In preparation for that event we did some research on who the Nelson family were, and where they came from and discovered them to be an ANZAC family!

Two of the six Nelsons listed on our Ryde goes to war database are brothers, Frederick Andrew Nelson (Service No. 727) & Henry Oscar Nelson (Service No. 728 ), both were born in Wellington, New Zealand.

Martin Nelson of Sweden, married Elizabeth McCracken of Ireland, in New Zealand in 1887.  They had seven children, all born in New Zealand: Charles Leonard, born in 1888 ; Alfred William, born 1889 and died in 1890 in New Zealand; Frederick Andrew, born 1891 ; Emily Jane, born in 1894; Henry Oscar, born in 1896 ; Agnes Maria, born in 1899 ; Maurits, stillborn in 1904.

Frederick Andrew Nelson
Service No. 727
 30th Battalion
 

The 1911 New Zealand Electoral Rolls record a Martin Nelson as living in Mount Pleasant, Mitchelltown and he was a Labourer.  The eldest son, Charles Leonard is also listed as living in Mount Pleasant.



 Henry Oscar Nelson
Service No. 728
30th Battalion
KIA Fromelles
20 July 1916

By 1915, the Sydney Sands Directory lists, Martin Nelson as residing in Parkes St, Ryde, on the south side between the Masonic Hall and Joseph Parry. This is the address given by Frederick and Henry, when they enlist in the Australian Imperial Force, in July 1915. With consecutive service numbers, the brothers both join C Company of the 30th Battalion, and depart Australia in November 1915. Tragically (as we have already heard in previous blogs), Henry is to be killed in action at Fromelles on 20 July 1916.

Only nine months after that the family is to receive another cruel blow when Martin fell from a tram near Pyrmont Bridge and died in Sydney Hospital.  He is buried in the Presbyterian section of Field of Mars Cemetery, Ryde.  His death certificate shows that he died on 10 April 1917, he was 60 years old, and died from accidental injuries.  His father was Svan Nelson, Pilot, and his mother was Anne Ivanson.  His place of birth is shown as Warberg in Sweden and he had been 3 years in NSW.  The informant was his eldest son, Charles, of Parkes St, Ryde.

 

Fortunately Frederick returned home safely from the war having married Beatrice Owen in England in 1918.  They settled in Bowden Street, Ryde, in a house they named “Amiens” where they lived, according to the Sands Directories, until at least 1933.  They moved to Victoria Rd, Drummoyne in the1930s and by 1943 they moved to Balmain, until Frederick’s death in 1969.

Elizabeth Nelson died on 8th July 1934 at her residence in 22 Belmore St, Ryde. Her death certificate shows she was 70 years old and her parents were John Charles McCracken, school teacher, and Margaret Henderson.  Her place of birth is shown as Dublin, that she lived in Wellington, NZ for 31 years and 20 years in NSW. The informant was her son, Frederick, of 61 Bowden St, Ryde.  She is buried beside her husband, Martin, at Field of Mars Cemetery.

Frederick Andrew Nelson is listed on the Ryde Town Hall Honour Rolls and St Anne's Anglican Church, while Henry Oscar Nelson is listed among the names of the dead in the Ryde Civic Centre Memorial Book and also on the St Anne's Anglican Church.

 

World War I Honour Roll of St. Anne's Anglican Church, Ryde

More photos from last week's Dead Man's Penny handover

Ryde District Historical Society's President Janice Eastment, MC for the afternoon

The Wallumetta Room
 at City of Ryde Library
was the venue for our handover of Henry Oscar Nelson's Memorial plaque
on Saturday 16 March 2013.


Judy & Phil Display The Weekly Times story

A local newspaper, The Weekly Times reported the event in both the week prior

 and the following week

    http://www.weeklytimes.com.au/

 

 

 

 

We were also very pleased to welcome Chanel 10 reporter, Mazoe Ford and cameraman who joined us for the afternoon.

Chanel 10 aired Mazoe Ford's coverage of the event during the 5pm news on Monday18 March 2013 under the title "Lost and found'!

Margaret, Richard, Angela, Kim, Judy, & Janice with Ryde City Mayor, Ivan Petch

 

We were also very grateful to Judy for bringing along family photos, medals & memorabilia

 for both Henry Oscar Nelson and his brother Frederick Andrew Nelson

and allowing us to make a photographic record of them

 for our project.

Project Up-date October 2012:

We currently have 20 helpers working on different letters of the alphabet to identifying the combined list of names we have collected from various Honour rolls, war memorials, embarkations rolls, local newspapers, etc.  that have been found to have a connection to the Ryde district before or during World War I.

The current total number of names is 1842 Service people ; and so far we have been able to identify with full names and service numbers 1044  ; with 798  still to be identified.

 

The number who didn't come home is currently 341 and we have photos of 107 of their headstones or memorials.

 

We have also made contact with the families of 38 service people from our list and have found photos for 125 of them.

The number of Nurses, Sisters, or Matrons found on our list is currently at 8.  

Relatives Info form

If your Ryde ancestors went to WWI & you would like to print this form to mail in
 - rignt-click and select : print picture - otherwise email us the deatils.