Cuttle Family Page
The Estersnow Parish Church stands midst the headstones near the Cavetown Lakes, south of Boyle in County Roscommon. My great-great grandparents John Cuttle and Ann Ekins were married in the church in 1852, shortly after the potato famine. All of their children were baptised in the church, including, in 1855, my great grandmother Annie Marie Cuttle. In 1876, the two older sons left for New Zealand as assisted emigrants. They were followed, in 1877, by the parents and four of the remaining five children.
(Photograph Cut-est-008, Russell Hudson, 1993).
Introduction
The ivy-clad limestone walls of the Estersnow Parish Church rise above the gravestones near Cavetown Lakes, 5 km south of Boyle in County Roscommon. In the early to mid 1800s, prior to the Irish potato famine of the late 1840s, my great-great-great grandparents, John Cuttle and Mary Purdue, farmed an 18-acre leasehold in the nearby Townland of Knockroe. Each of their nine children was baptised in the Estersnow Church between 1819 and 1838. At least two of the children were married in the church: Jane Cuttle (born ~1822) married Benjamin Rea in 1848 and they emigrated to the United States, where they became successful farmers in the state of Illinois; John Cuttle (1824-1886) married Anne Ekins (~1826-1901) in 1852, and they remained as farmers in the district, raising a family of seven children, all of whom were baptised in the church between 1853 and 1870.
In 1876, the two older sons left for New Zealand as assisted emigrants. They were followed in 1877 by the parents and four of the remaining five children. During the voyage, my great grandmother Annie Marie Cuttle (1854-1931) met another Irish emigrant, William Douglas (~1855-1914) of Londonderry. The couple married in Dunedin in 1878 and, following the birth of their two children, David (~1880-1921) and Elizabeth Annie (1882-1943), the family moved to Australia, first to NSW and then, during the 1890s, to Western Australia.
In 1899, the family moved to Burbanks, south of Coolgardie in the Eastern Goldfields of W.A., where Elizabeth Annie Douglas, who trained as a teacher in Geraldton, had been appointed to the Burbanks School. She was married in 1905 to William George Clarke, metallurgist on the Burbanks Main Lode Gold Mine. My mother, Joyce Elizabeth Clarke//Hudson (1909-1984) was the second of their four children, all born at Burbanks. The Clarke family moved to Kalgoorlie in about 1915.
More of the Story
I am still working on converting the data I have collected on the Douglas and Cuttle Families to web pages. As the work is completed, it will be posted to this web site. Please pay me a return visit.