John Donovan b 1776

 Not only a horse thief, and a convict, but a bigamist as well!

I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall when Elizabeth (Mahoney) Donovan and her daughter arrived in Australia on the 14th May 1826  and found that her Irish husband John, transported as a convict, had married another convict in Sydney!

I think that Elizabeth must have been a feisty Irish woman, and a force to be reckoned with!

Inquest into the death of Elizabeth (Mahoney) Donovan.

Elizabeth Mahoney

Born in Cork, Ireland in 1791, Elizabeth was a free settler who came to Australia aboard the Lady Rowena in 1826,  I wish I had known her.  She must have been quite a woman, after arriving with her daughter, Mary Ann aged 5,  and finding that her husband had married another woman, a convict named  Mary McElver, John Donovan appears to immediately be living with Elizabeth.

She immediately petitions the Govenor in 1826 for her husband John to be assigned to her, The family lived in Castle Hill for a time, having another 6 children, all catholic.  By 1834 the family is living at Mangrove Creek, where they seemed to have stayed.

Elizabeth met a terrible death by drowning in 1891, by which time she was 100 years of age.  Drowning was not unusual in the area in those days, the newspaper reports many deaths by drowning, particularly during floods.



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Marriage of Thomas Atkins and Anne Drennan (b1820)

Thomas Atkins and Anne Drennan were married on 14th April, 1836 at St Andrews Presbyterian Church, Kent Street, Sydney, NSW, AUS.

Ann Drennan was the daughter of William Drennan, a convict from Ireland, and Frances McAllister.  William Drennan was convicted of  Horse Stealing in Somerset Assizes Court on 8th September,  1821 and sentenced to death, later commuted to transportation.  He was transported to Australia aboard the Eliza in 1822.  William Drennan received a pardon in 1843, so he served 21 years as a convict.

It is not known when his wife and daughter Ann came to the colony, but Anne was born on 5th July, 1820 in Liverpool, Lancashire, according to the Gosford Pioneer Register (1788 - 1900).  As neither Anne nor her mother appear in the 1828 census, it is possible she arrived in Australia after this time.  She married Thomas Atkins when she was just 15 years of age, and he was 36 years old.

They had  7 children in total, but one died possibly in childbirth.

In  April 1848 this appeared  in the Sydney Morning Herald:

It appears that Thomas and Anne were going through some problems, but sorted them out as they had another 3 children after 1848.

Mangrove Creek & Thomas Atkins Landholdings