Who was Great Aunt Susan?

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks (2020)

Week 3 | Long Line

In reflecting on this topic in its most literal sense (as in ‘a long line of butchers’), I was a bit stuck for options. We have a tradition of teaching going back four generations from my generation.  And there’s at least a few generations of cordwainers on another branch but I haven’t done enough research to write about those ancestors yet.  So I’m going to take an alternate interpretation of the topic and write about a long line of inquiry I undertook that ultimately paid dividends in identifying a mystery photo brickwall.

Some years ago (probably around 2003), my mother entrusted me with my maternal Granny’s photo album. Most of the photos were no longer in their mounts and there was no apparent order to where they nestled in between the leaves of the album.  I began a process of sorting, scanning and identifying.  The majority could be linked to my Granny’s family.  There were only two clearly linked to her husband (my Pop).  And there was this one that was a complete mystery.

The photo was badly deteriorated and I really wanted to know who this lady was and if she was significant enough in our family tree for me to invest in having the image restored.  The only clue on the photograph was the name and location of the photographer – H. W. Pell, Kadina.  Kadina is on the Yorke Peninsula in South Australia, originally a mining settlement of mainly Cornish immigrants employed in the copper mines.  My maternal line is almost exclusively Queensland-based (back to the point of immigration to Australia) so this posed an immediate conundrum. 

I was able to establish that H.W. Pell had a studio in Kadina between 1906-1915, giving me a date range for the photo.  At the time I started this inquiry, the Pells still operated a studio in Kadina but they indicated that they did not have any records old enough to assist with this query.  Mum thought the image was related to her father (my Pop) but had no basis for this ‘feeling’.

I started by sending a copy of the photo to all of Mum’s siblings and cousins which failed to net any information.

From that point, each time I made contact with a newly discovered cousin in any maternal branch of my family, I would send them a copy of the photo and ask if they recognized the subject.  Each time the response was an apologetic ‘no’.  Continued research connected me with a cousin on the Betts line in 2009 and together we found a connection in our Betts family line to Wallaroo, South Australia, which is very close to Kadina.   It was a clue.

Three years later, in 2012, I made contact with additional Betts family members in South Australia and duly emailed a scanned copy of the photo.  Within a day and a half I had a reply back to say ‘yes, that photo was in his collection of Betts image’.  Notations in his mother’s hand on the back indicated that it was “Great Aunt Susan, spinster sister of Thomas Betts—lived in Queensland”.  Hallelujah!  This mystery lady now had a name. And, not only that, I knew exactly who she was.  And included a digital copy of his version of the photo, which was in much better condition than the one in my possession.

Susan Betts was my Pop’s mother, Annie Davey’s, sister and, as noted by my contact’s mother, was a spinster.  As an unmarried woman it has been challenging to find sufficient information to build her story.  

Susan was born in 1849 in Brill, Buckinghamshire to parents Richard John DeVere and Tracey (nee Goodgame) Betts.  By the age of 12 years, in 1861, she was working as a nursemaid for her uncle and aunt Edward and Susan Hyde (nee Betts).  Edward was a cordwainer and the couple had three daughters ages 5, 4, and 1 year.

Like many of her seven siblings, she immigrated to Australia although. Based on her death certificate this was round 1891 but identifying when and where she arrived has not been established. She settled in Queensland and from 1903 she appears in electoral rolls living in the Lutwyche and Nundah areas, which was close to her sister Elizabeth, and the Beaudesert area, which was close to her brother John.  Her brother Mark was also living in Brisbane, while other siblings had settled in South Australia.  The portrait of her taken in Kadina suggests that she visited family in South Australia at least once. For a few years, she worked as a nurse.

In her later years, Susan was living at the Aged Christian Women’s Home in New Farm.  Susan died in the Salvation Army Home on Morgan Street, in May 1933 from heart disease and a throat infection at the age of 83 years.

Susan is buried in Lutwyche Cemetery (Brisbane, Queensland) in a grave shared with her sister Elizabeth.