Sarah Hinshilwood (pre 1841) and David Heffernan (1834?)

Here’s a couple of characters straight out of a 19th century novel. On one side stands Sarah Hinshilwood, the epitome of virtuous (and industrious) Victorian womanhood, on the other her husband David Heffernan, a drunk, thief and seducer.¹ Heady stuff.

Yet David Heffernan could be an ancestor of whom to be proud: an ambitious and educated man who seized his opportunities where he could. Nor can Sarah Hinshilwood be reduced to passive victimhood: she had a profession and ran her own business. But this couple presents a mass of contradictions. Let’s see if they can be shaped into something resembling a coherent story.

Seeking Sarah

Sarah Hinshilwood’s precise origins are unknown. Her family name has a decidedly Scottish ring to it and its close cousin ‘Henshilwood’ is supposed to have come from a Lanarkshire village of that name, south west of Glasgow.² However the only birth I’ve located so far which could be a match is a Sarah Hill Hinshelwood, daughter of John and Mary, christened on 3 January 1821 at St Mary Whitechapel, Stepney (now part of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets).³

Even if that’s not the right Sarah we can be pretty certain ours was born into the working class somewhere in England around 1820.⁴ She received some education, being at least able to sign her name⁵ and entered the workforce young, as was the custom.

The first definite appearance of the woman who was to become my great great great grandmother was on her wedding day in 1841. While it’s unlikely she stepped straight off the boat and into the arms of her husband not one Sarah Hinshilwood, or similar, appears in the Van Diemen’s Land records or press between 1820 and 1841. There is one faintly possible match but in the absence of proof you can only read about it in the ‘Extras’.

David Heffernan, Child of Erin⁶

One Saturday in the winter of 1831-32 the young David Heffernan presented himself to an imposing building in St Stephen Green, Dublin.⁷ He had come to be examined in ‘the Latin and Greek classics’ in the hope of gaining entry to study at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.⁸ Unlike their London or Edinburgh peers, aspiring Irish surgeons were required to demonstrate a decent ‘liberal’ or general education even if surgeons were at the time considered socially and professionally inferior to physicians (those entitled to call themselves ‘Dr’).

On the day in question the young man’s knowledge of texts such as the ‘six books of the Aeneid of Virgil, the Satires and Epistles of Horace … and four books of Homer’s Iliad’ met the standard required by the College and he qualified to be registered as a pupil.⁹

It seems that David was unable to take up his place but getting as far as he did demonstrates a relatively high standard of education coupled with significant ambition. The problem may have been financial. It cost £11/7s/6d to be examined and registered as a pupil back in 1818.¹⁰ If David had also wanted to be indentured (apprenticed) to a surgeon, which was common but no longer compulsory, the cost would have run into hundreds of pounds.

The fact that David or his family had been prepared to meet the cost of the initial examination without him going on to enrol suggests a change in circumstances, material or otherwise. The blow must have been a heavy one and was perhaps what led him to choose emigration over the options open to him in Ireland.

It seems probable that David Heffernan the disappointed surgeon was the ‘Mr Hefferman’ who arrived in Hobart Town as a steerage passenger on the barque Cleopatra direct from Dublin in mid June 1834.¹¹ That makes two Dublin connections but as I have been unable to find a birth for him, or even a birth year, I can’t say whether he hailed from that city or elsewhere in Ireland.

Dr Lloyd of Collins Street

Henry Thomas Lewis Lloyd had arrived in Hobart Town from London in April 1832. He established his medical practice first in Liverpool Street then moved at the end of the year to 32 Collins Street, nearly opposite the Ship Inn.¹²

Dr Lloyd began advertising in March 1834 for ‘A Steady Man, as house servant, and who understands the management of a horse’.¹³ Either steadiness and horse sense were in short supply or Lloyd was especially choosy as the advertisement continued to run into early April. It seems that the position was still vacant when David Heffernan arrived in the colony in June and that this was his first employment.

Lloyd soon discovered that the talents and education of his recruit surpassed those of the average house servant. He put Heffernan’s knowledge of Latin to good use as his dispensing assistant, preparing medicines and no doubt keeping the doctor’s accounts and specialist inventories. If the duties of the next occupant of the position are anything to go by he may also have carried out minor procedures such as tooth extractions.¹⁴

Either the dual burden of the dispensary and household duties (Heffernan was later described, rather unkindly, as having been ‘stable and kitchen-boy to Dr. Lloyd’) proved too much or the young Irishman found that the medical field did not suit him after all.¹⁵ After five months or so David Heffernan informed Lloyd that he planned to move on as the doctor advertised in November 1834 for ‘A Clever, active, sober young man who is competent to manage the duties of a Surgery, and dispense Medicine’ although it was not until next March that he wrote the following reference for Heffernan on his departure.¹⁶

Hobart Town, March 20, 1835

I hereby certify that Mr David Heffernan was in my employ, in the capacity of dispensing assistant, about eight months, during which time I had an opportunity of observing his general conduct which was very satisfactory to me. I deem him fully competent to fill any such situation, and can confidently recommend him to any person wishing an honest, sober, and steady assistant.¹⁷

By then David Heffernan had his sights set on a new field: teaching.

Ridler’s School

In the Van Diemen’s Land of the 1830s there was no public (in the sense of government) school system and little in the way of regulation or oversight of those schools that did exist. This left the way clear for those running schools to set their own fees and curriculum in the hope of attracting enough pupils to make a decent living.

Henry Harford Ridler was one such educational entrepreneur. He was teaching by 1831 and in 1834 was conducting a school in Elizabeth Street ‘opposite … the Stowell Arms Inn’.¹⁸ As owner of 10 and 12 Brisbane Street, between Elizabeth and Argyle Streets, Ridler next turned no. 10 into a school for boys offering ‘spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic, and English grammer’ [sic].¹⁹ The school was around present day 34 Brisbane Street, one of the few buildings to have kept its low profile along that street front.²⁰

Ridler was doing well enough by 1836 to require the ‘assistance of his friend, THOMAS SQUIRE, who has had experience in the teaching of youth, and whose attention and preserverance [sic] have seldom been surpassed’.²¹ But another man, without Squire’s standing, had already been employed by Ridler to help with the running of the school:

H. H.RIDLER begs to return thanks to his friends for their support, and to inform them and the public, that in consequence of an increase in the number of his scholars, he has, in addition to the aid afforded by his present assistant, re-engaged the services of his friend Thomas Squire, the latter not proceeding to England as was anticipated. Brisbane-street, No. 10, April 13. 1837 ²² (my underlining).

From subsequent events it seems the anonymous assistant was very likely to have been David Heffernan. He may even have joined Ridler in early 1835 straight from leaving Dr Lloyd’s household.

Schools started up and closed down with alarming frequency in Hobart Town and Ridler prudently kept other irons in the fire, including at 10 Brisbane Street where additional tenancies were advertised from time to time. A ‘convenient and respectable stuccoed Cottage’ fronted the street while the school presumably occupied the ‘new brick-building at the back, containing a good kitchen and long-room with three bedrooms and two atticks [sic] over’.²³ The attics would have been ideal for the ‘few boarders’ Ridler was ready to take at a hefty ₤26-30 per annum. By way of comparison he was offering to let ‘Three rooms & a kitchen’ at the same address for the equivalent of ₤26 per year.²⁴

HH Ridler decided to move onto other projects at the end of 1837. Ahead of a business trip to England he put the school, or at least its contents, ‘desks, forms etc’ up for sale at ‘very moderate’ terms.²⁵

Heffernan’s Academy

Asssuming he was Ridler’s so called ‘present assistant’ David Heffernan must have been in a quandary. Once the school closed he would be out of a job. But while presumably short of capital Assistant Schoolmaster Heffernan didn’t lack for confidence – he would buy out the boss!

Brisbane Street was a good location, just around the corner from one of the most reputable colonial schools, James Thomson’s Melville Street Hobart Town Academy, but it seems the premises themselves were not up to the measure of David Heffernan’s ambitions. Either that or Ridler was asking too much in rent.

Over July and August 1838 a blanket media campaign appeared in no less than four Hobart newspapers²⁶

REMOVAL OF HEFFERNAN'S Academy

HAVING completed the arrangements for conducting his Scholastic Establishment upon an enlarged scale, Mr. D. Heffernan begs most respectfully to notify to the parents and guardians of his numerous pupils, and to the public in general, that he has Removed his Academy for young gentlemen, from No. 10, Brisbane street (formerly known as Ridler's School), to those commodious premises situated at the corner of Murray and Brisbane streets, where he trusts, by a strict attention to the moral conduct, and to the intellectual acquirements of his scholars, to merit the continued confidence of his friends, and to receive an extension of public patronage.

64, Murray-street, July 12, 1838

If the venture did not succeed it would not be for want of publicity.

Hobart street numbers have changed significantly since then but from its corner position Heffernan’s Academy must have been located either on the site of K&D Warehouse carpark or that of the Hobart Animal Hospital.²⁷

Schools usually advertised for pupils at regular intervals and almost always at the beginning of each year but after the initial burst of PR Hobart Town’s newest ‘Scholastic Establishment’ disappeared from view. This strongly suggests that Heffernan’s Academy was not a success. The next educational activity advertised at 64 Murray Street was a Mrs Willis taking in female pupils at home in 1840.²⁸

79 Elizabeth Street

While things are looking doubtful for David Heffernan, let’s walk a block east along Brisbane Street to another address.

MRS. MORRIS takes this opportunity of informing her friends and the public, that she has opened that elegant and commodious house, No. 79, Elizabeth-street, as a respectable Board and Lodging House for Gentlemen; the house is well aired and the bedrooms large and comfortable. From her long experience in this line she flatters herself she will give general satisfaction.²⁹

In addition to two or three boarders Elizabeth Morris offered furnished rooms ‘with the use of a kitchen’ and later ‘Furnished Apartments for Families’ when the supply of gentlemen lodgers proved insufficient.³⁰

Her brick house was the property of a John Jackson whom I suspect to have been a relative.³¹ Its approximate location – roughly present day 161 Elizabeth Street, a door or two down from Hobart’s redoutable CWA shop – can be picked up from a contemporary map showing the grant to John Jackson and Hugh Addison.³²

While neither a gentleman nor a family, Sarah Hinshilwood was living at 79 Elizabeth Street by 1841. Whether as a tenant of John Jackson or subletting from Mrs Morris, Sarah was plying her trade as straw bonnet maker, one of those independent young women who had chosen self employment over the regular wages of domestic service.

In addition to being a lodging house 79 Elizabeth Street, like many other inner city properties then and now, was a veritable hive of microbusinesses. Many, though not all, were devoted to personal adornment in one way or another:

W. POTTER, Hair Dresser, Perfumer, and Ornamental Hair Manufacturer, HAVING just arrived from England, begs to inform the Ladies and Gentlemen of Hobart Town and its vicinity, that he has commenced the above business at No. 79, Elizabeth-street, and trusts by assiduity and attention to merit a share of their support. W. P. having been many years in the most fashionable establishments in London, and having had extensive practice in every department of the Business, feels confident those Ladies and Gentlemen who may honor him with their commands, will receive satisfaction. N.B. A fashionable assortment of ornamental Hair; hair, nail, and tooth Brushes; tortoiseshell, German ditto, and horn Combs, Perfumery, &c. Also, an extensive assortment of London Ladies and Children's Boots and Shoes, &c.³³

Having dealt with one’s requirements in ornamental hair and boots, a Miss Layton was on the spot at the same address to measure the discerning client for a frock or to show her ‘small but elegant assortment of Indian muslin dresses.’³⁴ Nothing could be more natural than to complement one’s new muslin with a fetching straw bonnet from the fair hands of Miss Hinshilwood conveniently at hand. Department stores eat your hearts out!

The other important characteristic of 79 Elizabeth Street was its proximity to 10 Brisbane Street. If David and Sarah’s paths had failed to cross while David was still at Ridler’s School his shortlived Academy in Murray Street was also within close proximity.

Marrying Up?

David Heffernan was probably not shy about displaying his knowledge of Latin and Greek whenever the occasion presented and for a humble bonnetmaker his learning must have been quite dazzling. It wouldn’t be surprising if Sarah thought she was heading up the social scale when she married him in August 1841.³⁵ Little did she know.

The marriage register for these nuptials ‘according to the rites and ceremonies of the Independents’ [Congregational Church] describes David as schoolmaster and the marriage licence gives his address as Bathurst Street.³⁶ This tends to confirm the failure of the Murray Street school with David having either found a teaching position elsewhere or being in search of one.

Sarah is supposed to have been of full age on her wedding day although the census taker in the following January recorded her as still under 21. Her profession was not considered worthy of noting on the marriage record despite the fact the event took place where she lived and worked. Mrs-lodging-house-Morris was even one of the witnesses.

David Heffernan’s own business venture may have tanked but clearly he had high hopes for the earning capacity of his wife. The newlyweds lost no time in relocating to premises in keeping with David’s ambitions:

MRS. HEFFERNAN, STRAW BONNET MAKER,

IN returning her sincere thanks to the Ladies of Hobart Town and its vicinity for their kind patronage since her commencement in business, begs leave most respectfully to inform them that she has removed her Establishment, from No. 79, Elizabeth-street, to Collins-street, nearly opposite the "Ship Inn," and trusts by punctuality and attention to merit a continuance of their support.
N.B.-Three Apprentices wanted.
Nov. 26, 1841.

The range of goods for sale was also expanded. At the Collins Street address Sarah Heffernan advertised a stock of ‘Children’s Fancy Satin Trimmed Hats and Bonnets, of the newest fashion’ arrived by the Glenbervie from England.³⁷ The hand of her husband is evident in this new business strategy.

Straw Bonnets

In an age where no respectable female would dream of going outside ‘uncovered’, headwear was big business and a number of trades catered to this need, among them hatter, milliner and straw bonnet maker. All three were labour intensive but bonnet making required the least capital: ‘One guinea [21 shillings] is quite sufficient for the purchase of the machine and materials for employing two persons for several months.’³⁸

Most of the time was taken up in turning the raw material, straw, into a fine plait of 20 to 25 metres which was then coiled and sewn into the shape required. The straw had first to be softened and sometimes bleached with sulphur and after that it was a job for nimble fingers. Lots of them.

Straw plaiting was a specialty in a number of southern English counties, for example Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and Berkshire, where young girls attended ‘plait schools’ where ‘the owner of the school would educate the children he employed in the rudiments of reading and writing, instead of paying a wage for the straw plaiting they produced for the remainder of the day’.³⁹ There’s nothing to say Sarah attended such a school but it’s a possible explanation of how she learned to read and write.

It’s also a clue as to how the apparently unrelated skills of the Heffernan spouses could be put to use in a single business. Sarah could teach the apprentices to plait and sew while David could teach them their letters. And if that wasn’t enough, the nineteenth century apprentice normally lived with their master or mistress, and paid both for their board and for the privilege of being taught a trade. With a few paying apprentices under their roof the Heffernans had the means to purchase more stock to sell and the prospect of a thriving business before you can say ‘cash flow’!

Collins Street – Movin’ On Up

On paper the move from Elizabeth to Collins Street looked like a good one. The Ship Inn (later the Ship Hotel) was already well known when David worked across the road for Dr Lloyd in 1834. A hackney cab serving prosperous residential areas such as Sandy Bay and New Town left from there, as did the daily coach to New Norfolk.⁴⁰ The Inn itself included livery stables so there was no shortage of passing trade.

The Heffernans were renting premises built of brick and wood big enough for them, bonnet making and selling, and those vital apprentices.⁴¹ A similar property advertised for auction around this time was being let for £60 pa so their rent may have been of that order.⁴² To put that in very rough perspective, in Sydney at the time an employed bonnet maker could expect to be paid £14 pa plus their keep.⁴³

These apparent signs of prosperity may have prompted one Hobartian down on her luck to target Sarah’s establishment in a clumsy attempt at fraud just after Christmas 1841. Mary Ann Cox, claiming to be representing a well known Hobart lady, left Heffernan’s with a number of bonnets for her mistress to try. The goods got no further than the nearest pawnbrokers whose suspicions were aroused.

Holding her babe in arms, Cox was convicted the following month in the Supreme Court of stealing goods worth £3 from Heffernans’ shop and sentenced to six months imprisonment with hard labour.⁴⁴ Sarah Heffernan and an apprentice Hannah Armstrong both gave evidence against her.

Bonnet Wars

How TO PUT A LADY IN GOOD SPIRITS.

Take her to a milliner's shop and buy her a bonnet. The manageress of one of the most extensive establishments in London, in the course of her evidence the other day, in an action for breach of promise, declared, that "ladies are always in good spirits when they go to a milliner's to choose a bonnet." Here we have a valuable recipe, which may be of great use to those gentlemen whose ladies are troubled with ennui and the sullens. Like most applications for the health of "these delicate creatures," however, it is expensive. We believe the efficacy is not confined to bonnets. Ladies love to be purchasing, and we doubt not, if they were permitted to spend their day in shopping, their smiles would be perpetual.⁴⁵

If local demand was strong for straw bonnet therapy, supply was even stronger. In 1842, while Van Diemen’s Land was in economic recession, no less than six specialist bonnet making establishments were advertising their services in the Hobart Town press.⁴⁶ A bonnet could also be had from any milliner and from many local dressmakers. To make matters worse every drapery in town kept a stock of bonnets for sale, some of them ‘decidedly cheap’.⁴⁷

In this cut throat environment Sarah’s business needed to earn enough to pay rent, feed the apprentices (three in January 1842) and purchase stock and materials. There is no indication that David had found a teaching position so money was tight. One strategy was to advertise for more apprentices in February 1842, four of them this time.⁴⁸ At least that might bring in some cash in the short term, around £10 per head.

But Sarah Heffernan was not the only one looking to recruit. In March 1842 ‘Mme D’Avelyn and Daughter, Milliners, Dressmakers, &c &c.’ set up shop on her very doorstep in ‘Collins-street, nearly opposite the "Ship Inn"’.⁴⁹ It seemed that whatever Sarah did, this probably fake Madame would match it or go one better offering ‘Straw Bonnets, lined and trimmed, on the most reasonable terms’ and advertising for no less than six apprentices. It was all most vexing.

Elizabeth Street Revisited

A few months after Mme D’Avelyn’s encroachment on her territory a notice appeared in the Colonial Times advising Mrs Heffernan’s customers that she had ‘removed her establishment from Collins-street to No. 81, ELIZABETH-STREET, seven doors above Melville-street and facing Mr. Davis, pastrycook, where she trusts by unremitted attention to merit a continuance of their support’.⁵⁰

The new premises in Elizabeth Street were next door to Mrs Morris’ lodging house and had already hosted a succession of milliners and/or dressmakers including Sarah’s old neighbour Miss Layton and even Mme D’Avelyn.⁵¹

Having direct competition at uncomfortably close quarters could have prompted the Heffernans to move from Collins Street but the real explanation seems more prosaic. It is consistent with later events but as its source is a man who had no reason to be charitable towards David Heffernan it should be treated with a certain amount of caution. This version is that the Heffernans got so far behind with the rent at Collins Street, owing more than £20 to landlord Elisha Bailey, that they did a moonlight flit, presumably with stock in trade and apprentices in tow.

Thanks to the advertisement in the Colonial Times ladies in search of a bonnet knew where to find the Heffernans but so of course did their old landlord. It’s not hard to imagine Elisha Bailey installed across the street in the ‘Luncheon and Refreshment Room’ of pastrycook Davis tucking into one of his ‘Savoury Pies’ while waiting for David Heffernan to show his face.⁵²

Once Bailey inevitably caught up with him David came up with a plan. One of Sarah’s apprentices, Harriett Ramsay, just happened to have a father, also David, in the pawnbroking game. He should be good for a loan. Apart from the connection through Harriett, the two men probably knew each other through the Congregational Church. Further, Ramsay lived and worked in Murray Street not far from Heffernan’s shortlived school.

David Heffernan’s intuition was well founded and David Ramsay agreed to bail him out, possibly out of sympathy for Sarah. Following an intuition of his own Ramsay settled the debt directly with Elisha Bailey rather than putting cash in Heffernan’s hands. Ramsay was to help the couple twice more in the months that followed. In his professional capacity he lent money to David Heffernan against a pledge of his watch and some clothes, charging ‘not one farthing of interest’ and lent money direct to Sarah Heffernan who paid it back as promised.⁵³ If nothing else these loans helped ensure daughter Harriett, still in the Heffernan household, continued to be fed!

In Elizabeth Street the bonnetmaking business struggled to stay afloat and kept a low profile. There was no further advertising other than one attempt in September 1842 to drum up business (paid for with Ramsay’s cash?) directing customers to ‘commodious premises’ opposite Waits’, a long established drapery.⁵⁴

It is some comfort to report that Mme D’Avelyn must have also failed to make her fortune in Collins Street - perhaps the Ship Hotel’s customers were not the right demographic – and in March 1843 she too moved back to Elizabeth Street, although at least a decent distance away this time at no. 34.⁵⁵

1843 - Annus Horribilis

Around the time the Heffernans were getting hopelessly behind with the rent in Collins Street Sarah discovered she was pregnant.⁵⁶ The presumed happiness of the parents-to-be must have been tinged with worry about the impact of motherhood on Sarah’s capacity to continue to support them.

Sarah and David’s son was born at the end of January 1843 but the birth was never registered, perhaps because the child was premature, or sickly. Called Henry, his father’s second name, he died of convulsions on 2 February aged only three weeks, one tiny corpse among so many others at this period.⁵⁷ According to the details in the death certificate David had found work around this time as he describes himself not as schoolmaster but clerk.

If Henry’s death was not enough of a blow worse was to come.

On Friday 14 July 1843 Sarah Heffernan went to Hobart’s Royal Victorian Theatre to attend Signor Carandini’s benefit concert leaving her husband at home with Harriett Ramsay. The two had lived in close proximity since Harriett had arrived as a 12 year old apprentice. Now she was 14 and nearing the end of her training. David must have been in his early 30s.

The most detailed account of what happened next comes from a third party, Harriett’s father, writing over a year later.⁵⁸ Mr Ramsay claims that David Heffernan raped his daughter then threatened her and her family with violent retribution if she breathed a word of it, although he also refers to Heffernan as his daughter’s ‘base seducer’.

David Heffernan’s story was that Harriett ‘went after him repeatedly’ and while he stopped short of claiming the teenager had jumped him, he swore black and blue that Harriett had been a willing party to sexual intercourse.⁵⁹ It’s possible that the truth lay somewhere in between. Harriett may well have had a crush on her employer’s husband and have been flattered by the attentions of an older, charming man. Whether she was a freely consenting sexual partner is a more complex question.

While we’re on the subject of consent, what was the view in 1843 of an act that today would almost certainly attract a serious charge under the Criminal Code?⁶⁰ So far as I can establish, the position at English law would have applied in Van Diemen's Land. This was that a girl could legally consent to sexual intercourse provided she had reached the ripe old age of 12.⁶¹ So provided David Heffernan had not forced himself on the girl he was legally in the clear.

That still left some pretty hefty objections based on Heffernan’s status as Harriett’s quasi-employer, also in loco parentis and, let’s not forget, a married man. The Colonial Times even suggested that Harriett was only one of several ‘young and helpless girls to [have] fallen victim to his brutal lusts!’⁶² But that was later. In the meantime, what about Sarah?

Separation

If Sarah Heffernan did not immediately catch on to what her husband had been up to, she can’t have taken long to work it out. Everything suggests that she didn’t take it well. In mid August a rather subdued notice appeared in the press:

REMOVAL. Mrs. HEFFERNAN, STRAW BONNET MAKER, begs to acquaint her friends and the public generally, that she has REMOVED to Mrs. Williamson's, Liverpool-street, nearly opposite Watchorn's Emporium, where she carries on her business as usual, and solicits a continuation of their patronage.⁶³

The following month Harriett was bundled off back to her father and step mother when her apprenticeship expired as there was said to be no work for her, which is likely to have been not only convenient but true. The Mrs Williamson with whom Sarah had taken refuge was a well established ‘Straw Bonnet Manufacturer [with] Straw, Tuscan, and Leghorn Bonnets of the latest fashion always on sale, and cleaned and altered in the best possible manner to the latest style’ and may have been Sarah’s employer rather than simply landlady or colleague.⁶⁴

Sarah must have sent David packing while she was at it. He was said to be leading a precarious existence boarding ‘at Mr Hugall’s, the baker … in Murray-street … sleeping however at Mrs Buxton’s a little lower down in the same street’.⁶⁵ The relationship with Mrs Buxton was presumably one of finance, not amour, and one hopes for her sake she insisted on payment in advance. As the implacable Mr Ramsay later observed it was a mystery ‘[h]ow this polished rascal found means to exist.’⁶⁶

A Second Chance

The rupture between the Heffernans might have become permanent had not biology intervened. Sarah discovered she was expecting again, her second pregnancy as badly timed as the first. This, combined no doubt with the usual promises made by her wayward spouse, seems to have brought them back together some time before the birth of their daughter Mary Jane on 10 April 1844.⁶⁷

The omens were mildly positive this time. When Mary was baptised in May at the old Trinity Church on the corner of Campbell and Brisbane Streets her parents were recorded as living in Elizabeth Street and her father described as a schoolmaster. Even if the latter was a case of professional aspiration rather than an actual position (it’s not clear which) at least David was no longer drifting between Hugall's ‘Plain and Fancy Bread and Biscuit Baker’ and a cot at Mrs Buxton’s.⁶⁸

In the last months of her pregnancy Sarah had relocated her business to an address in Elizabeth Street – again. No risk of her sitting around waiting for her ankles swell with David back on the scene. Typically he had come up with a plausible reason for this latest move:

MRS HEFFERNAN, STRAW BONNET MAKER, BEGS most respectfully to inform her Friends and the Public in general, that she has removed her business from Mrs. Williamson's Premises, in Liverpool-street (where she has recently been compelled to prosecute it in consequence of her inability to obtain suitable premises) to No. 71 Elizabeth-street, two doors from Melville-street, where she solicits a continuance of that support which has hitherto been so liberally awarded her.

No. 71 Elizabeth-st, Feb. 8, 1844.

Equally typically this advertisement ran three times.⁶⁹

Just How Bad Can Things Get?

Whatever David Heffernan’s character flaws were, they certainly ran deep. Maybe he struggled manfully to overcome them, maybe he didn’t, but whatever promises he had made to Sarah, his failure to keep them would border on the spectacular. Harriett Ramsay’s father is again our source for that which follows so some may be exaggerated. However the detail is such (corroborated in some cases by other sources) that Ramsay’s account has the undeniable ring of truth. So let’s dive in to the month of June 1844.

On the 17th, a Monday, David Heffernan was drinking in Sharman’s Murray Street public house, The Birmingham Arms. This pub, close to Mrs Buxton’s, had been one of his locals and offered ample opportunities for bumping into Harriett whose family lived and worked opposite at 74 Murray Street. Reportedly ‘in a state of beastly drunkenness’ Heffernan foolishly ‘made free with some drink belonging to some soldiers who were there; for this he received what he richly deserved, a sound thrashing, which blackened both his eyes’.⁷⁰

It’s safe to assume that up until that moment he had been buying his grog with his wife’s hard earned business takings. Not surprisingly Sarah took serious exception to this and I imagine ordered him to pack his bags once again. The next day she fronted up in the local police office, perhaps with 2 month old Mary in her arms, to report her own husband for stealing. This must have required significant courage but unfortunately proved to be a waste of time as ‘of course, [the culprit] being her husband, the case was dismissed.’⁷¹ It would be nearly another forty years before a married woman would have the right to own property independently from her husband.⁷²

Sarah’s hard line did nevertheless have an effect, although perhaps not the one she expected. David had been secretly meeting with Harriett hatching a plot to drug her father and stepmother (she was supposed to slip a dose of laudanum into the supper beer fetched from The Birmingham Arms) to enable the pair to steal a box of valuables belonging to David Ramsay. For his part David Heffernan was making what he thought to be discreet inquiries down at the docks about shipping valuable items to Sydney under an assumed name.

Harriett was obviously infatuated with her lover but she was still an affectionate daughter and David failed to talk her round to the laudanum idea. But he needed to get out of Hobart Town, and fast. In the early hours of Wednesday 19 June, exactly a week after her fifteenth birthday, Harriett Ramsay and David Heffernan, with sundry valuables they had managed to liberate from the Ramsays, ran away to Launceston!⁷³

If Hobart Town was a small place, Launceston was even smaller and alerted by David Ramsay it did not take long for the police, in the person of a Constable Jones, to track down the pair. Harriett was restored to the bosom of her family and David allowed to go free as the Ramsays chose discretion for the sake of their child.

After these dramatic events David Heffernan left for Sydney as he had planned, although with neither Harriett nor any Ramsay valuables. He may have intended just to lie low for a time or to make the move a permanent one but not long afterwards he was back in Hobart Town, motivated ‘in point of honour’ (his words) to return.⁷⁴ It’s unclear at whom this unaccustomed honourableness was directed: his wife and baby daughter, the young girl he had seduced, or simply the recognition that consequences must be faced.

Ramsay vs Heffernan

You might expect David Heffernan to be chastened by the failure of his scheme and to focus on reconciling with his wife and child. Far from it. According to Mr Ramsay Heffernan’s behaviour became even more erratic and he took to overtly stalking and threatening the Ramsay family outside their house, on one occasion at least ‘dressed in a sailor's jacket, a straw hat, and white trowsers’.⁷⁵ Ramsay had finally had enough and started legal proceedings seeking an order requiring his daughter’s swain to cease his allegedly harrassing and threatening behaviour.

David Heffernan appeared in the Hobart Police Court before Magistrate John Price on 11 September. Ramsay had engaged prominent lawyer Edward MacDowell to prosecute while David Heffernan, broke no doubt, was self represented. While Magistrate Price did not find the mostly hearsay evidence compelling and dismissed the case this doesn’t mean Price necessarily believed Heffernan’s testimony, ‘the worthy Magistrate cautioning Heffernan as to his conduct for the future, telling him he would do well to mind what he was about’.⁷⁶

The reporting of the case brought the sorry tale of Harriett’s ‘ruin’ into the public domain for the first time. The Colonial Times enthusiastically took up the cudgels against Heffernan, seconded on one occasion by the Launceston Examiner.⁷⁷ Readers of the Times were tantalised with promises of further juicy revelations over the course of September and October 1844 and in the best journalistic traditions of the colony the editor offered this gratuitous advice to Sarah:

we should strongly recommend his wife to separate from him, when, we feel assured that the public will patronise and support her, knowing that their wives and daughters will not have to expose themselves, as they now must, to the risk of contamination, by coming into contact with her disgraced and disgraceful husband.⁷⁸

The whole sorry saga might have faded from public view if David Heffernan, stung by the Colonial Times’ injunction that he ‘ought to be hooted and hissed from the town’ had not placed an advertisement in a rival publication, The Omnibus, to put his side of the story.⁷⁹ His ‘defence’ was that he believed Harriett to be older than she was (17, not 14), that she had made all the running and, to top it all off, that the elopement plan had been encouraged and abetted by Harriett’s stepmother, Dinah Ramsay!⁸⁰

According to David Heffernan it had been Harriett, not him, who had been repeatedly ‘IN DISGUISE, between the hours of nine and ten, about my residence’. He also claims that after the police caught up with them in Launceston she had threatened to poison herself and had to be put under close supervision to ensure she did not put these threats into action.

The Colonial Times then took great pleasure in publishing three rebuttals penned by David Ramsay (at Ramsay's own expense of course) which supplied much of the detail I have drawn upon here. This minor publishing sensation lasted until mid November with the last word going to an interested onlooker, ‘FATHER OF A FAMILY Campbell-street’, whose letter to the editor poured scorn on David Heffernan’s attempts to defend his reputation.⁸¹

What Next?

Goodness knows how Sarah Heffernan ‘young and handsome, with a lovely baby at her breast’ got through the Spring of 1844 even with public sympathy very explicitly on her side.⁸² Almost incredibly she seems to have taken David back by the end of the year indicating either extraordinary powers of persuasion on his part or an unshakable belief in the virtues of the nuclear family on hers.

There’s no mystery though about why David went back to Sarah: during his absence in Sydney Harriett had found herself another man! There is a definite air of wounded vanity in his description of Harriett ‘romping with ... [the new beau] at her father’s door’.⁸³

It turns out Sarah and David’s reconciliation was just in time for the year to deliver its last nasty surprise.

On 9 December 1844 David Henry Heffernan was arrested and held in Her Majesty’s Gaol, Hobart Town, not for sexual misconduct or pub brawling as you might guess, but for debt. The details are sketchy but he is said to have owed a little over £22 to a Mr William White of Hobart. As usual David had an excuse ‘I did not know that when I signed the Bond for Mr Pattison that money had anything to do with it’.⁸⁴

The idea that a person could be imprisoned for debt is quite appalling but there was one rather nifty feature of the system. It seems that debtors were required to contribute towards the cost of their ‘accommodation’ while in gaol.⁸⁵ In many cases being locked up and thus deprived of employment would in itself have made it impossible for the debtor to pay for their keep (or indeed repay their debt). As a way out of this impasse, and presumably to discourage frivolous actions for debt, a debtor could apply to have their creditor ordered to pay the weekly maintenance charge, known as ‘groats’, if they could not afford it themselves.⁸⁶

It’s no surprise that David Heffernan petitioned from prison to have William White pay for his upkeep. In doing so he provided some details about Sarah’s business, which he describes as his: that he was running a shop in town, without apprentices but with one servant, that his profession was ‘Straw bonnet maker and Hat Cleaner and Presser’ and that the business would be virtually worthless if he were not there ‘to press bonnets for [his wife]’.⁸⁷ He added that he owed his landlord, a Mr Landsey [?], a week’s rent of 15 shillings.

Notice of the application was served on William White on 13 December 1844 at his usual address at Old Wharf.⁸⁸ White had not responded by the following day, a Saturday, when the application for maintenance was heard – and refused - by Chief Justice Pedder. By contrast, five days later the same judge granted a similar application from another of William White’s debtors, painter and glazier Samuel Hubbard.⁸⁹ This suggests Pedder was unimpressed by David Heffernan as a witness, His Honour no doubt recognising a rogue when he saw one.

When William White failed to pay the court-ordered seven shillings per week for Samuel Hubbard the latter was entitled to be released from prison. Unfortunately the file is silent as to what happened next in David Heffernan’s case so we don’t know how long he languished in gaol or indeed whether White ever got his money back.⁹⁰

The Many Occupations of David Heffernan

After all the excitement of 1844 we know relatively little about the rest of Sarah and David Heffernan’s life together.⁹¹ They managed to have two more children (more on them shortly) and it seems that Sarah continued to work at bonnet making, as there was a Mrs Heffernan working as a milliner in Liverpool Street in 1847.⁹²

As we have seen David’s professional life was infinitely more varied than that of his wife, encompassing house servant, drug dispensing, school teaching, clerking and hat pressing all within a decade. In 1843, while separated from Sarah and needing to earn a living, he had also applied to become a police officer. This was probably in October as a number of character references exist from that date.⁹³ Significantly these were provided before the Harriett Ramsay scandal became public.

The first of the referees was Robert Mather, a Hobart businessman and draper of impeccable reputation and Wesleyan-turned-Quaker. Mather states that he had known Heffernan ‘for several years’ as a ‘respectable, steady, deserving man’ but it is not clear in what context. Next came William Ford, a Superintendent of Public Works, who considered Heffernan ‘deserving of a place of trust’. Ford’s son had been taught by David Heffernan for a period of five years which must have amounted to almost the full duration of his teaching career.

The next to attest to a ‘steady’ character was S A Tegg. Samuel Augustus Tegg was an Elizabeth Street bookseller and stationer who would have known both Heffernans as neighbours and David perhaps even as a subscriber to his circulating library.⁹⁴ Tickets for Hobart Town theatres could also be procured from Tegg’s – including tickets for the fateful Carandini benefit concert in July 1843.

The final recommendation came from Hobart solicitor Washington McMinn. There are several ways the two men may have known each other. McMinn’s marriage in 1841 and that of Sarah and David are consecutive entries in the Hobart marriage registrations for the year.⁹⁵ While they wouldn’t have bumped into each other in the doorway (the two events were a month apart) the McMinns and the Heffernans were both married by the same Congregational Minister, Frederick Miller, so presumably they attended the same church. Further, both weddings were at Elizabeth Street addresses so the McMinns and the Heffernans lived not far apart. But there was a much more specific connection: the witnesses at McMinn’s wedding were none other than David and Dinah Ramsay! We can only assume that David Ramsay had not unburdened himself to McMinn on the subject of his wayward daughter as the reference describes David Heffernan as ‘an honest and respectable young man’.

Despite these glowing testimonials it seems that David Heffernan was rejected by the Van Diemen’s Land constabulary so the search for employment continued.⁹⁶

How he spent the intervening few years is a mystery but David Heffernan pops up rather unexpectedly in 1847 as a cooper.⁹⁷ Hobart Town undoubtedly had a call for coopers - a whaling port needs barrels made for oil as well as for ale – but the man who had wanted to be a surgeon had shown little taste for manual labour to date. At least three cooperages were operating in the mid 1840s, Brown’s at Old Wharf, Withers’ at New Wharf and Johnson’s in Campbell Street. There’s nothing to say David Heffernan worked at any of these but someone must have had to teach him the rudiments.

David Heffernan does not seem to have lasted long in this new trade either as by 1848 he was describing himself as a sailor!⁹⁸

The Children of Sarah and David Heffernan

It’s time to say something more about Sarah and David’s children. The first, Henry in 1843, died so young his birth was not even registered. The second, Mary Jane, was born in 1844, followed by a third, a son, in March 1847. The birth register does not name him but I believe him to be James Henry Heffernan.⁹⁹

James Henry’s birth could have been the start of better times for the Heffernans but they were not to enjoy them for long as four year old Mary Jane died sixteen months later. The death register describes Mary Jane’s father as schoolmaster, as it did at the time of her birth, but it seems unlikely this information, provided by a friend, James Jackson, reflected the actual state of affairs.¹⁰⁰ In fact it was around this time that David commenced his career at sea, perhaps one of the few open to a person of his habits and reputation (with all due respects to sailors).

Sarah was pregnant again when she lost Mary Jane and the birth of her fourth and last child, a son, on 18 December 1848 was hopefully some consolation.¹⁰¹ As with James Henry the child’s birth was registered without a given name. For some years I could only speculate that this last Heffernan was Charles Richard Heffernan from whom I am descended. It would have been just too bad to have found a colourful character like David Heffernan and then only ever be able to say that we might be related.

Then luck intervened. My great aunt Jean had ended up custodian of the ‘birthday book’ kept by Fanny Jones, Charles Richard Heffernan’s wife.¹⁰² Amongst all the other dates and names in Fanny’s book was an entry for 18 December: Charles Heffernan. In the absence of any other likely Charles Heffernan that’s good enough proof for me of his parentage.¹⁰³

The Apparent Demise of David Heffernan

The last trace of David Heffernan is from 31 December 1848 when Mary Porter named him as the father (albeit as Henry Heffernan) in registering the birth of the last of the Heffernan children.

After that date David/Henry simply disappears from view. His new life as sailor no doubt took him away from Hobart from time to time but it’s unlike him not to have been up to some mischief that would have made the papers, but no, not a peep. He doesn’t appear either in any lists of ship’s crews arriving or leaving the port.

Instead some time between December 1848 and March 1852 David Heffernan died. Or at least Sarah says that he did. His death is not registered in Van Diemen’s Land nor anywhere that I can find but Sarah was most definitely presenting herself as a widow by 1852. Perhaps he had drowned at sea or died unidentified in a pub brawl in another port, the possibilities are endless. An inglorious end for a life that began with so much promise.

A Fresh Start

It’s hard not to wonder if David’s demise came as something of a relief. Even if supporting two very young sons would be no bed of roses Sarah was used to earning a living. There is evidence that her business was operating, or operating again, in May 1851 when she employed convict Margaret McKenzie, followed shortly afterwards by teenager Esther Berwick. Both were signed for the maximum allowable term of 12 months for probationer convicts but Margaret, a dressmaker in her native Scotland, was paid £9 per annum against Esther’s £7.¹⁰⁴

In total ‘Sarah Heffernan, Melville St’ engaged no less than six convicts in the period May 1851 to July 1852, each of them for a period of 12 months.¹⁰⁵ Either they didn’t last the distance or Sarah had quite a business going, perhaps with the mysterious Mary Porter helping in the background.¹⁰⁶

Then in March 1852 Sarah, still only 32, decided to give marriage another chance. She seems to have had a real choice in the matter: she had engaged a convict just before the wedding and the last of the six a few months after it (still in her own name) suggesting a degree of financial independence. Moreover the groom, Sidney Barham,¹⁰⁷ was her junior by three or four years. Maybe it was love but part of the motivation is likely to have been providing a father for James now five and Charles three.

Sidney Barham was London born. He was a sailor and so could have been acquainted with David Heffernan but it seems likely that he had not been in Hobart Town long.¹⁰⁸ Both witnesses at the wedding, Lewis and Tamsin Carlisle Jones, came from the bride’s side – their own wedding had been at the same church, St David’s, Hobart, a month before, witnessed by one Mary Porter.¹⁰⁹

The Barhams’ circle of friends was small and close knit. The second witness at Lewis and Tamsin Jones’ wedding had been a young printer named John Wilks. Wilks’ brother Matthew, the owner and licensee of The Golden Cross public house, was Sarah and Sidney’s next door neighbour.¹¹⁰ Matthew Wilks’ land was on the southern corner of Murray and Melville Streets (on the left as you go up from the city centre) but it’s not clear whether the Barhams were living there or on the other side of Melville Street.¹¹¹ James Porter, carpenter, and perhaps the husband of the Mary Porter, was also living halfway up Murray Street.¹¹²

A Sailor’s Life

Hobart Town was a busy port in the 1850s. Sidney Barham could have found work without much difficulty and perhaps Sarah chose to cut back, or cease, her work as a bonnet maker. In 1854 Sidney had the command of the 105 ton schooner Henrietta trading between Hobart Town and Adelaide.¹¹³

The owner of the Henrietta, Arthur Forbes Young, also operated her and other vessels on the trade with Victoria. The building boom which accompanied the Victorian gold rush absorbed as much timber and raw materials as Van Diemen's Land merchants could supply and Young even had his own office in Flinders St, Melbourne.¹¹⁴

It is likely that Sidney Barham continued on interstate runs for Young or others during 1855. He then crops up in Marine Board records as Chief Mate of the barque Harriet Nathan in early 1856.¹¹⁵ Majority ownership of this ship, built in 1844 by Battery Point shipwrights Williamson for a whaling syndicate, was by then in the hands of emancipist Robert Logan.¹¹⁶

The Harriet Nathan sailed regularly between Hobart Town and Geelong with a crew of around ten under the command of owner Logan’s stepson, James Lloyd. Manufactured goods were sometimes carried, such as the 25 cases of jam which made the voyage in October 1856, but the cargoes were predominantly timber and farm produce - apples, potatoes, onions, oats and even honey.¹¹⁷ Geelong sent back little in return other than animal hides and the occasional passenger and more often the ship sailed home in ballast.

Sailing was still a risky occupation and things could go awry even in the relative safety of the Derwent.

The Harriet Nathan, barque, Lloyd master, from Geelong the 5th April, arrived, here yesterday. The master reports that, on Thursday, the 10th April, about 1.30 p.m. standing in towards Point Pearson on the starboard tack, a whale-boat running before the wind with sail, and two men in the boat, came in contact with the martingale, in consequence of which the boat was upset and stove. One of the men narrowly escaped being drowned. The boat was about a cable's length to windward of the barque. Sydney [sic] Barham, mate, says he hailed the boat, and told the men the barque was going about, and told them also to get out of the way. There was but little wind at the time, and the vessel came to very slowly. The barque had not swung the mainsail when the boat upset. Mr. Lucas, pilot (the report continues), came off to offer his assistance to get the boat. It then came on to blow very hard from the N.N.W. The barque came to with port bower with 45 fathoms of cable in 12 fathoms water, off Point Pearson.¹¹⁸

The round trip to Geelong took almost exactly a month so being a sailor’s wife was not without worry. While there was no way for Sidney and Sarah to keep in touch during that time she was not left entirely without news. Such was the importance of the shipping trade that reports from newly arrived vessels of the ships they had encountered were published in the local press. So when Sidney Barham left for Geelong on 14 March 1856, one week later his wife could know, by reading the Colonial Times, that he had made it as far as Schouten Island after five days sailing.¹¹⁹ Not exactly SMS but better than nothing.

Life Ashore

While we know quite a bit about Sidney Barham’s professional life down to the rations provided to the crew of the Harriet Nathan (peas and pork three days a week, beef on the other four days) we can only speculate on how Sarah was spending her time.¹²⁰ If she continued to make and sell bonnets she did it without advertising but Sidney may well have earned enough to keep his instant family without the need for his wife to work. He was paid £10 per voyage as Chief Mate and signed on for the Harriett Nathan at least five times in 1856. Fifty pounds in a year was a decent start.

Sarah had to manage the disruption of having a husband at home full time between voyages and then entirely absent for weeks on end. As life with David Heffernan had accustomed her to frequent upheavals it is likely that she found her new existence very tame by comparison but she may just have enjoyed being able to bring up her sons with little interference.

The only incident to disturb this tranquil existence occurred just after Sidney returned from a voyage to Geelong in early April 1856. In the middle of that month ticket of leave holder Hannah Anson was convicted of stealing a gold ring ‘the property of Mr Sydney Barham, Murray-street’.¹²¹ It could be that this was Sarah’s wedding ring, married women not being considered the legal owners of their own possessions. There is no detail about how Ms Anson managed to liberate the ring from its accustomed place but she paid dearly for it: 12 months added to her original sentence.

A Premature End

It seems terribly unfair that after all of her trials and tribulations Sarah Barham was not destined to see her boys grow up aided by a (hopefully) loving stepfather. Instead she died of ‘dropsy’ on 21 October 1857 aged only 36. ‘Dropsy’, in modern parlance oedema, can be associated with pregnancy so Sarah and Sidney may have been expecting a child but it is equally likely to have been provoked by heart, liver or kidney disease. Sidney may have been away at sea at the time as the death was reported by their friend Lewis Jones.¹²²

Sidney Barham thought highly enough of his wife to pay for a proper headstone and Sarah was buried in St David’s cemetery less than six years after marrying in its church. The headstone is one of those recovered in the 20th century and placed in the memorial wall in St David’s Park behind the Hobart Supreme Court building. While its inscription is showing signs of deterioration the stone itself is still clearly visible. It makes a dignified, if premature, full stop to Sarah Hinshilwood’s life.

Post Script: Sidney Barham

Sidney stayed on in Hobart for some years after Sarah’s death (he was still on the electoral roll in Murray Street in 1861-62) perhaps in part to ensure that his stepsons, James and Charles, were properly cared for. From some point though Sidney Barham seems to divide his time between Hobart and Sydney where remarried in 1859.¹²³ His new wife, Rachel, appears to have been the widow of Sidney’s older brother, James Barham. If that is so, Sidney acquired a swag of new stepchildren as part of the deal.¹²⁴ The couple may have spent the first few years of their marriage in Hobart but it seems more likely they lived in Sydney, while James and Charles Heffernan, still very young, stayed in Hobart.

Rachel and Sidney Barham lived in Grose Street Glebe from at least 1870 until Sidney’s death in 1889.¹²⁵

 

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