Jane Bygrave 1829 - 1877

Owned by Liz Hardie
Last updated: Sept 07, 2021

Jane Bygrave (1829 - 1877)


Jane Bygrave was born May Day Hill Plantation, Manchester Co. Jamaica. She was a slave born to Plantation Owner and  Richard Bygrave Esq and -based on her marriage certificate to Thomas Walker her mother is - Sarah Thomas (nb this is erroneously recorded as Eliza Jane Ham on Janes death certificate). It is unknown her mother was a plantation slave or a mistress, but given there is no documentation of her birth, it is most likely she was born a slave. There is record in plantation baptismal records of the baptism of slave child -aged 1 - in 1826. However her emigration record put her birth around 1829, and her 1858 marriage puts her birth at 1835 and the 1862 birth putting her birth around 1833. Richard died in Dec 1825, so she has to have been born in August/September 1826 at the very latest. 

In 1833 the British Parliament passed a law to abolish slavery as of August 1, 1834, throughout the British Empire. Jane (being over 6 at the time) would not have been freed immediately, but rather - as with all Jamaican slaves over the age of 6 - bound (indentured) to their former owners' service, albeit with a guarantee of rights, until 1838 under what was called the Apprenticeship System. The freed population faced significant hardships which resulted in many plantation owners going broke and emigrating.

Little is known about the circumstances of Janes birth, (on her death certificate she is noted as Thomas's child but in Thomas's will she is identified as "the reputed daughter of my brother Richard", and this is confirmed by her marriage certificate to Thomas Walker and thru DNA testing. Jane's movements or situation in the years between her birth and 1851 are unknown, but it can be assumed she lived at May Day Hill Plantation under her uncle's care after her fathers death in 1829.

In Thomas's will of 1851 (actual date of death unknown) he left Jane household property (chest of drawers of her choice and the bedstead and bed furniture in his bedroom) and a financial settlement, subsequent to the sale of his remaining property. Due to the challenging economic situation in the colony (many coffee plantations were in foreclosure) it may have taken a while to dispose of these assets, but despite this there would have most likely been a reasonable nest egg remaining and it is likely these funds that she used to immigrate to Australia in early 1853.

The Glenntanner was a 610 ton ship built in Aberdeen, Scotland in 1842 and captained by Captain Benjamin Bruce. It had travelled from Amoy in China, arriving in British Guyana on 12 January 1853 with the first shipload of cheap chinese immigrant labour.

The Glentanner then departed from Jamaica on 10 April 1853 with 151 passengers on board including a significant number of "ruined planters and landowners". It travelled via Bermuda; Bahia, Brazil; and Algoa Bay, South Africa (22 Aug 1853). The journey and passengers attracted a lot of commentary in Australia in the lead up to her arrival.

FROM The Sydney Morning Herald - 18 Jul 1853

It will be remembered that on the first of January last, a number of passengers touched here in the John Robinson, from Jamaica, on their way to Melbourne, which they made in forty days from this. We hear another party, numbering nearly sixty, consisting of ruined planters and landowners, are shortly expected by the Glentanner, on their way to Australia.

Report states that the sugar crop there is expected to be under 35,000 hogsheads this year (it used to be 200,000), and most of the white portion of the population are emigrating from the Impending ruin.-Cape Monitor, 22nd May.

FROM The Courier (Hobart) - Monday 25 July 1853

EMIGRATION FROM JAMAICA TO AUSTRALIA - A letter to the Savannah Courier, dated Kingston, February 22nd says :
"The British shop Glentanner, 600 tons , will sail on the 5th of April for Australia, full of passengers, many of them highly respectable people, who leave us merely because they have nothing to do. Another vessel will follow her in a few months."

FROM The Sydney Morning Herald - 11 Oct 1853

THE GLENTANNER -- The Port Elizabeth Telegraph of 18th August, has the following in reference to this vessel, which arrived in Hobson's Bay early in the present week : -

" We almost omitted to mention last week the arrival ' of the Glentanner, with one of the most respectable body of settlers from Jamaica for Australia that ever visited our shores. Among them are persons of the first respectability, a gentleman of colour, formerly a member of Council in Jamaica, and several other people of wealth and standing in that Island, who purpose making Australia their future place of residence. There is something about the Colonial-British, which at once appeals to the eye and understanding, telling of habits of forethought and industry, not cramped by overwhelmlng toll, like that which crushes the aspirations of too many of the home raised. The passengers of the Glentanner are exactly of this description, and from the highest to the lowest there seems a chord of sympathy, which vibrates to the touch of self-respect. We anticipate that they will make excellent settlers In Australia, and our only regret is that so valuable a body should pass these shores."

The Glentanner finally arrived in Melbourne, VIC 27 Sep 1853. On the ships documentation Jane is noted as being 25. Janes potential financial status is reinforced by the fact that she is noted as travelling with a servant.

The Argus, Wednesday 28th September 1853

September 27.-Glentanner,Ship, 610 tons, C. S Chapman, from Jamaica 10th April, via Bermuda 9th May, Bahia 2nd July, and Algoa Bay 22nd August. Passengers-Mr. B. Henriques and lady, Mr. A Roxburgh, lady, child and servant, Mrs. Chapman and Servant, Mr. R, Thomson and lady, Mr. R. Gregory, lady, four children and servant, Mssrs Thomas Norton, S.Norton, E. G. Harrison, Mr. James Anderson, lady, child and servant, Mr. G. Himming, lady, child and servant, Mrs. Vick, Miss Bygrave and servant, Messrs McCorkell, F. R Griffith, G. D Baggett, Edward Davis, E. Lindsey, T. Rawlings, W. C Taylor, R. Thomas, Martin F. McMahon, M. Young, and one hundred and ten in the intermediate and steerage.

Capt. Chapman, agent.

Janes exact movements upon arrival in the colony are unknown, but within months of arriving she married Francis MacDowel in the Roman Catholic Church in Melbourne. Francis died sometime in early 1854 prior to the birth of their only child (we have been unable to find a marriage certificate for the couple or a death certificate for Francis) 

    • Francis MacDowell Davis Born 18 Aug 1854 Geelong, VIC; Christened 2 Oct 1854 St Mary's RC Geelong; Died Mar 11 1899 Casino, NSW

Francis Jnr was christened on October 2nd 1854 at St Mary's Roman Catholic Church, Geelong, the Witnesses were William McMasters and Elizabeth/Mirabell Jackson. Jane is noted at living at Newtown at the time. Mr McMaster contributed £15 to the construction of St Mary's church as noted in the Geelong Advertiser  on 5 April 1854.

Jane disappears from records for several years, and for a long time we were unable to find any information on the family between 1854 and 1877. In Sept 202 Jen Christianson - a fellow descendant - identified a potential marriage record for a Jane McDowell to a Thomas Walker, and this led to additional information which fills in some of those gaps

On June 28 1858 at the Wesleyan Chapel Geelong, Jane married Thomas Walker. Thomas was a mariner and cook who was born in 1821 in America to Peter Walker and Mary. Thomas was a widower whose previous wife had died in 1851. Thomas passed away on 10 April 1861 at the age of 40 from acute inflammatory rheumatism. His death certificate indcates that he had been in Victoria for about 7 years. He was buried on 11 April 1861 at the Wesleyan Cemetary Geelong. His will was read .. Jane and Thomas had no children.

We next find a reference to Jane on a birth registration in 1862. Based on this registration Jane marries a William James Walker in later 1861. William was born about 1821 in Buffalo, USA. We have been unable to find a marriage registration, however the birth certificate notes that William is publican and Janes is noted as Jane Walker - previously Walker, previously McDowell, previously Bygrave. At the time they were living in Ashby - a suburb of Geelong located in the area of Geelong West

We believe that it is this William James Walker (also recorded as William George Walker) who is later known as Thomas Davis but we don't know when he changed his name or why. In the "Tenterfield Shire and Beyond Death Records" Jane is noted as being 24 at the time of her marriage, but we assume this is her first marriage. 

William and Jane had 3 children (1 sons and 2 daughters):

We havent been able to find birth records for the male child or death records for either child. Some time after 1862 the family moved to Toowoomba in QLD where their daughter Louisa was born, before settling back in New South Wales at Bryans Gap 6 km from Tenterfield.

It is unclear when the family arrived in Bryans Gap, but there were living there in 1876 when Jane passed away on 3 Jan 1877. Her death certificate notes her religion as Church of England and her cause of death as an apoplexy that had on set on 30 December 1876. She is buried in the Church of England section in an unmarked grave and is noted as being 40 (although her age is likely closer to 48)