Edwin Colenso
Edwin, youngest son of Samuel May Colenso and
Mary Veale Thomas, arrived in Geelong on the Berkshire,
which docked at Point Henry at 10:00am
on the 3rd of October 1848. The Berkshire
had left Plymouth
on the 9th June
1848. His eldest brother William had immigrated to New Zealand in
1834, another brother disappeared to Canada around 1853. One of his
sisters, Jane Emily married a Napoleonic soldier, another married a saddler and
moved to Walsall Foreign. Cornwall was changing and many of its native population
were traveling to all corners of the British Empire.
Edwin was
recorded on the passenger list as “Edward Collins” a 24
year-old carpenter from Penzance.
I found this record after discovering from his obituary in the Geelong Advertiser
that he had arrived in Geelong
in October 1848. This narrowed the search down to three ships. Ironically
Collins was the name my grandmother chose to replace Colenso, when she changed
her name after being divorced by my grandfather.
Obituary
Geelong
Advertiser, July 1897.
THE
LATE MR EDWIN COLENSO
Hardly
a week passes without a vacancy occurring in the ranks of the old pioneers
who settled early in this part of the colony, and today we have to mention
the death of Mr Edwin Colenso, who died at his residence, Noble-street,
Chilwell, on the 30th ult. Mr Colenso arrived in the bay in October 1848,
and was among the first undertakers who opened business in this town. He
joined the mad rush to the diggings early in the fifties, and participated
in the Ballarat riots, taking sides with the late Hon. Peter Lalor at the
famous Eureka Stockade. He had the rather sensational experience when
returning to Geelong, having been "stuck-up" by bushrangers,
robbed of his hard earned gold, and was left in a perfectly nude state, by
them, lashed to a tree*. He was discovered by a settler shortly after, and
was released. He was employed at his trade in one workshop for 42 years,
having successively served Messrs W.B. King, J.W. Hudson, and W.B. King and
Sons, undertakers of Moorabool-street. Mr Colenso came from the Penzance
(Cornwall) family, several of whom have distinguished themselves in the
literacy and scientific world, notably the late Right Rev. John William
Colenso D.D., Lord Bishop of Natal, and celebrated arithmetician, and the
Rev William Colenso, the most eminent living authority on New Zealand
botany, and the first printer to set up the press in that Colony for the
Royal Missionary Society. Mr Edwin Colenso died at the age of 70 1/2 years.
* I think he probably argued with the bushranger to earn
this treatment.
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On the 5th January 1850,
Edwin married Eliza Borrill Cook, from Lincoln. They had 4
children, only two surviving infancy, before Eliza died on the 21st October 1858.
Their children were:
- Samuel Robert, born and died in
Geelong in
1852
- Samuel Robert, born in 1853 in Irish Town, died after a long and painful
illness on the 8th
October 1890. He never married.
- John, born 22 November 1853 in Irish Town, died in 1933 in Geelong, married
Sarah Ann Hopkins and had 11 children
- William, born 2 March 1856, died 14 March 1857
On the 12th February 1859
Edwin married Martha Austin, from Bristol.
They had 11 children.
- Edwin Austin, born 1860 Chilwell, died 21 Dec 1898 of Typhoid in Melbourne, married
Barbara Waixel 31 May 1882 in Fitzroy and had 9
children. He was bus driver when he married.
- William R,
born 15 August 1861
Geelong, died 26
December 1939. He had a son in Sydney in 1887, wife Helena
Hand (nee O’Brien) and had another family in Victoria, wife Margaret
Jackson with 7 children. The Sydney Branch of the family is most likely
descended from him.
- Mary Jane, born 1863 Chilwell, died 1865 Geelong.
- Emily Caroline, born 1865 Chilwell, died 7th December 1950, married Alfred Allan
Winstanley and had 12 children.
- Richard Alfred, born 1867 Geelong, died 23 August 1923 in South Yarra, married Grace
Ann Hodge 1891 and had two children.
- Thomas Henry, born 1870 Geelong, died 12 August 1950 in Deepdene. He married Elizabeth Gilchrist Bain in 1894
and had 4 sons and a daughter. After Elizabeth
died in 1940 he married Mabel Ellen Ash.
- Amelia Virginia, born 1872 in Geelong, died 1898 Benalla, married Robert Courtney Feltham
in 1890 and had three children.
- Joseph Austin, born 1874 in Geelong, immigrated
to New Zealand
in 1902 and died there in 1939. He married a fellow Victoria Emily Ince in
1902 in Dunedin,
settled in Oemaru and had three daughters.
- Benjamin, born and died in Geelong in 1876.
- Alfred George, born 1877 in Geelong, died in
1950. He married Maria Margaret Edith Ash in 1904 and had one daughter.
- Albert Ernest, born 1880 in Geelong, served with
the Scottish Horse and the Bushveldt Carbineers
in South Africa.
He married the sister of another Australian Soldier and settled in Durban, dying in
1954. He had a son and a daughter.
Most of the
Australian Colenso family is descended from Edwin, the majority still in Victoria, but some moved
to Queensland
and son William had his original family in Sydney.
Colenso Certificates