Sarah Maria AIKEN, daughter of Thomas AIKENS ( - ) and Julia DORAN ( - ), was born in 1831 in Newry, Co. Down, Ireland.^{1 2} She was baptised on 16 Sep 1831 in Newry, Down, Armagh, Ireland.² Her baptism appears to have been sponsored by a Mary Doran, most likely her maternal aunt. Sarah was a Needlewoman.^{3 4 5} She was Catholic.¹ She married William KNIGHT on 26 Dec 1857 in St. Augustine's Catholic Church, Balmain, Sydney. Marriage certificate 1070 / 33 copy 10/11/1980 - information on certificate from Church register 28/6.1916. Sarah died on 8 Jun 1916 in 96 Curtis Rd., Balmain North.¹ 1916/6175 Cardiac disease (aortic) Ref. letter 1 , Ref Letter 3, Buried with her daughter Elizabeth OBrien at Gore Hill cemetery. Sarah was buried on 9 Jun 1916 in Gore Hill cemetery, Roman Catholic section.¹ 1916/6175 Ref. letter 1 , Ref Letter 3, Buried with her daughter Elizabeth OBrien at Gore Hill cemetery, catholic section.

Sarah Maria Aiken (Aiken often spelled differently) was baptised in September 1831 according to “Ireland Roman Catholic baptisms” and so her birth year is likely to be 1831. A birthdate of 1834 is indicated on her death certificate, which was informed by son Edward, and from her headstone. Her age given on her emigration document in 1853 says she was 19, so there remains some question over her exact date of birth.

Her baptism was at Newry, Armagh, county Down., with parents Thomas Aiken and Julia Doran. We have no knowledge of her parents’ demise. However, she was raised with her sister Margaret (Bessy) as an orphan, in Ireland by the "Poor Clare's", an order of Roman Catholic Nuns, at Newry.

The Order moved to Newry from Dublin in 1830 : “by invitation, the Order moved north to Newry. The Minutes of the Newry Mendicity Association in the late 1830s note that care of orphans was given over to the good Sisters. It had been Dr Kelly, Bishop of Dromore who had written to the Poor Clares in their Harold’s Cross, Dublin headquarters, requesting help to deal with the widespread poverty, misery, and lack of educational facilities of his people. Prior to this, it had been exclusively a contemplative order. To the great benefit of many generations of Northern Catholics, the Sisters agreed to take academic training and pass on their skills and knowledge to their young charges”, reported the Newry Journal. “Within a year four hundred children were attending school, and by 1835 this number, augmented by many orphans, had risen to five hundred. Soon a workshop was added to teach older girls the skills of lace-making and embroidery, by which they might earn their living. By 1836 the Bishop was in a position to laud the Sisters on the examination successes of their young pupils”. According to ‘Newry Memoirs’ “An Inspector of the National Education Board reported on an examination of 500 pupils in 1852: “All the classes must be highly commended on their proficiency in reading, writing, arithmetic and geography. Their answering evinced a readiness and proficiency quite astonishing in persons so young.” Sisters of St. Clare.com states that “The history of the Poor Clares in Newry is one that placed a strong focus on the education of women, enabling them to take their role with confidence in society and the Church. In addition to the basic reason for their being, ie prayer and contemplation, the Sisters assumed the following Ministries: Teaching: Primary, Secondary, Grammar and Commercial Schools. Ministry to the Poor- they established a breakfast and dinner kitchen.” Given this strong educational focus and no doubt stern treatment (the Sisters in modern times promising reparations for past abuses, reported by the ‘Independent.ie’), Sarah seems to have developed into a person with resilience and determination.

Sarah emigrated (age stated as 19) with her sister ‘Bessy’ on the Ship "Bolton", which arrived in Sydney 23/6/1853 from Plymouth, England, via the Cape of Good Hope. They emigrated as orphans, and one pound each was paid towards their passages. They were listed on the ship’s manifest with other single young women, assisted immigrants.

The ‘Empire’ newspaper in Sydney reported about the arrival of the ‘Bolton’ ; “The extreme cleanliness of the various compartments of the vessel in occupation of the emigrants, as well as the healthy appearance of the latter, reflects the greatest credit on the surgeon superintendent, Dr. Roberts; and the many samples of needle-work displayed in the cabin show that their time has been fully employed.”

The assisted scheme for the women on the "Bolton" followed, the model of the earlier Earl Grey scheme. Four thousand two hundred famine orphans had arrived in Australia under the Earl Gray scheme between 1848 and 1850. “Behind the scheme to relieve Ireland of its crowded workhouses and ship needy orphans to the colonies was the politically progressive Earl, Henry George Grey, Secretary of State for the Colonies (1846–1852). His vision was twofold: youthful lives spared of misery and the ex-convict colonies enriched with hardy, humble, fertile females. The selection process was simple. The girls had to be young, single, obedient, healthy and free of smallpox."

Earl Grey had originally hoped that orphans would be drawn from pauper institutions operating throughout Britain, although for unknown reasons only adolescent, unmarried girls from Ireland were despatched. Transport and processing costs were shared between the English government and Irish Poor Law Unions. Just as important was support from the colonies to ensure secure and comfortable housing and efficient hiring facilities, once the girls were brought ashore.

Initially the scheme looked promising. Reporting to London in 1848, immigration agent Frances Merewether was optimistic that, ‘provided the Emigrants were of useful description … three ship loads, or about 700 Statute Adults … might be despatched to the Sydney District each month’. With minor alterations and expense, the spacious old prisoner barracks with its high-walled compound and outbuildings could offer ‘ample and most comfortable accommodation’ for the Irish orphans.

In Australia, decades of convict transportation had left the colonies with a serious shortage of women. Teenage girls were vital for raising families while female servants and workers were needed in aspiring colonial households. However, without supportive networks or family, the girls remained vulnerable and powerless to control their fate. Mostly uneducated, unworldly and unused to domestic service, the orphans relied on protective officials to negotiate their place in the labour market. And costing less to hire than more experienced servants they generally found work quickly.” (Sydney Living Museums)

“For all the prejudice, the colonists needed labour and they needed women, so work was found for the girls as domestic servants and as wives. There was probably not much difference between servitude and marriage in many cases but marriage offered at least a chance to 'get on' and so many of them married young. In a colony with too few women they contributed much as the mothers of this nation.” (Shirley Fitzgerald, City of Sydney historian)

The journey to Australia usually took months, and “Before they left Ireland each orphan girl was given a regulation kit of clothing, linen and utensils stored in a lockable box. The girls shared bunks in third-class quarters and mustered in small mess groups. Each shipment was overseen by a surgeon-superintendent and a matron, who guarded against contact with sailors and fellow passengers. After several months at sea, the immigrant ships were towed into Sydney Cove, unloading their passengers on the dock like so many human parcels. The orphan girls, strangers in a strange place, along with the motley assortment of unaccompanied women and mothers with children, were carted on drays or walked up Macquarie Street to the Immigration Depot at Hyde Park Barracks” as described by ‘Irish Orphan Girls at Hyde Park Barracks’.

"No relations in colony, could both read and write", was the description of both sisters as per the ship Bolton’s manifest. Sarah’s occupation was given as "needlewoman". On arrival in Sydney they were quartered at the Hyde Park Barracks at top end of Macquarie Street. Sarah's name is engraved on the obelisk to Irish famine orphans at the Barracks. The obelisk was opened in 2002. It aims to acknowledge & commemorate the large numbers of often young, single women who arrived in Australia & resided at the Barracks during its time as 'Immigrant Women's Depot & Asylum', 1848-1886.

“To manage the orphan arrivals in Sydney, an immigrant depot was set up at Hyde Park Barracks. In its newly plastered and painted rooms were added rows of heavy iron beds, replacing the old convict hammock frames and tattered hammocks. In some areas, ceiling boards were fitted, eliminating drafts and creating comfortable sleeping wards. Downstairs offices were remodelled and furnished for immigration business. While the orphan scheme itself was short-lived - swept aside by popular protest - other programs of sponsored emigration, along with the discovery of gold, continued to lure hopeful travellers, reunite families and boost the colonial workforce for decades to come” observed ‘Irish Orphan Girls at Hyde Park Barracks’.

“It was from there that they were hired out and there was an agreement or indenture for up to three years, between one and three years, for them to go and work for someone within the colony”, noted Dr. Perry McIntyre – (“Irish immigrants from Australian records”)

The orphan girls were lodged at the Barracks. Scrutinised by immigration clerks, health officers and clergy, they shared sleeping quarters in the newly-appointed wards upstairs, before signing indentures for work in the ground floor hiring room. Elsewhere in the building, separate areas were appointed for regular shiploads of immigrant women. Immigration officials saw the Barracks as shelter for 'unaccompanied' females, along with the wives and children of convicts, 'sent out to their husbands or parents'.”

“From the first arrivals in 1848, and for years afterwards, the orphan girls confronted heated local hostility. In the background, moves towards colonial self-government had already kindled fears of a mobbish Irish majority, and Earl Grey’s support for the revival of convict transportation had won him few friends in the colony. Initial antipathy towards the orphans centred on their youth, incompetence, lowly workhouse origins and, most of all, their Irishness.”

The advertisement inserted by the Immigration Office in the Sydney Morning herald of 29 June 1853 for the hiring of single female immigrants from the “Bolton” at Hyde Park Barracks does not mention ‘Needle-workers” among the callings. The great majority are general house servants.

We have no information as to how Sarah lived from 1853 until her marriage to William Knight in 1857 (Her sister Bessy married in 1854). A List of returned letters returned to the Sydney GPO from the country in September 1856 has one for a Sarah Aikens in Hexham, NSW, near Newcastle. If it is our Sarah, then she would have had a work agreement to work at Hexham, perhaps as a housemaid for a certain period of time. She married William Knight in Balmain in 1857, and by 1865 4 children had been born.

After the death of her husband in 1865, she kept her family by making children’s clothing for Farmer & Co., as recounted by family reminiscences. Farmer & Co. were a drapery business established in 1839 which became a retail empire and social institution. Her sister-in-law Margaret Knight had married William Kempster in Sydney in December 1844. This couple probably took an interest in Sarah and her children after William's death in 1865. William Kempster had been a witness at the burial of Sarah's husband William. As well it has also been discovered that Sarah's grand-nephew William Gordon, age 3, was buried in or near the same burial plot in 1870 as her husband William. So the 2 sides of the family were probably close for some time.

Two years after husband William’s death we find Sarah trading as a grocer, at Adolphus St., Balmain, as per the Sands Alphabetical Directory of 1867. The Sands Directories then have her as a grocer at 92 Curtis St., in 1869, 1871, 1873, 1889 and 1901. She was obviously living next door to her daughter Elizabeth and son-in-law, Matthew O’Brien, who were listed at 90 Curtis Rd.in 1892. In 1890 her daughter Sarah, aged 20, was also still living with her. The 1901 census has her at 92 Curtis Rd, with 2 female occupants. She seems to have been living at that address up to and including 1905, when her son Edward, a blacksmith, was also at that address. In 1906 (aged 75), she was listed at No. 92, ‘domestic duties’ with son Edward. They lived there together until her death in 1916, according to Directories, censuses and Electoral Rolls. Curtis road and Short street seem to have been the areas where the family members lived, very near to one another. Sarah’s son William moved from 49 Curtis road in 1905 to “Glenore” in Rowntree street, still in close proximity to his mother.

Sarah died in 1916 at 98 Curtis Road, and her funeral moved from there to the Catholic section of Gore Hill Cemetery at St. Leonards on the north shore of Sydney Harbour. She was to be buried with her daughter Elizabeth O’Brien who had died in 1910. The Sydney Harbour Bridge had not yet been built, and so her hearse would have travelled on the Milsons Point horse ferry, a steam operated paddle punt, which was a vehicular ferry crossing to Blues Point, near to where the Sydney Harbour Bridge now stands.

A Family story says that there was a 'Robbie' Aiken, whether in Ireland or Australia is unsure but no evidence has been found. Her grand-daughter Elsie May Knight reported that Sarah said that she was a poor relative of the 'Guinness Stout' family, a story which might explain why her father was listed as a “brewer” on her death certificate (informant her son Edward).

Sarah died intestate and 235 pounds was declared as the value of her estate^{3,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33}.

William KNIGHT was born in 1827 in Liverpool, England. He was baptised on 25 Mar 1827 in St. Nicholas, Liverpool, England.^{12 34} He was a drayman, storeman. He was Protestant. He died on 15 Jul 1865 in 13 Domain Terrace, off Macquarie St., Sydney.^{35 36} Reg. No. 1865/781. William was buried on 19 Jul 1865 in old Camperdown cemetery behind St. , Stephens Anglican Church.^{37 38 39 24 40 41} Headstone located by RHETT KNIGHT in May 1998 in above cemetery, south-west wall, near end. Viewed again in Dec. 1999. Headstone is 22nd. stone in from corner of s-w wall. Burial of Joseph Munford in same grave. SAG transcriptions has age 36, No.

Update April 2025

Through modern DNA matching it has come to light that William Knight (b. 1827) had a marriage, children, was engaged in criminal activity and was jailed before migrating, marrying an Irish orphan and continuing the Knight line in Australia. Consequently there exist half-cousins in the UK ,New Zealand and Australia who only now have knowledge of each other.

This information draws attention to some of the speculation below about William's early life in Sydney, between being discharged from prison in Portsmouth, England in April 1855 and his marriage in Sydney in December 1857.

We will leave it to the interested reader to research the union of William Knight and Sarah Valleley (b 1826), their criminal activities and the progress of their offspring by whatever means they like, e.g .Ancestry, My Heritage, Wikitree, Familysearch, etc. As a foretaste we have included on the home page an article about their involvement in house robberies in 1850.

William was born in 1827, the son of a Liverpool mariner who lived very close to the Liverpool docks. According to family sources William emigrated in the 1850's becoming the first male of the Knight family in Australia.

There is no verifiable trace of his immigration to Australia, including within a list of "ship's deserters", although a William Knight did desert from the ship "King William" in 1852 . As well in 1852 a William Knight, 5 feet 5 inches high with brown hair and grey eyes, about 19 years old, deserted from the ship"HMS Pandora".

There is no mention of William in the NSW Immigration Deposit Journals 1853-1900 and so perhaps he may have come out as a fare-paying passenger (unlike his sister Margaret who was an assisted immigrant), or as ship's crew. It is also quite possible that the record has not survived.

It seems that after coming to Australia William lived close for a while to his sister Margaret, who had arrived in 1842. In 1848 a William Knight is listed at 955 Windmill Street and in 1861-63 at 141 Phillip Street, both close addresses to the Kempsters. Margaret had married William Kempster in 1844. A compilation of early family names from the Sydney Assessment Rolls, indicating relevant addresses, has been made - including William Knight, indicating his quite poor accommodation.

He married Sarah Aiken in 1857 and by 1863 Sands Alphabetical Directory lists William at 13 Domain Terrace, and the same address in 1865.

William's early working life in Sydney seems to have been varied. His occupation was given as "Storekeeper" at his daughter's Elizabeth's marriage in 1883. Sands Directory has a "William Knight, Stores, Wynyard Lane, Sydney", 1861. In 1863 Sands notes him as a storeman living at Domain Terrace. By 1865 he was employed by Messrs. Watkins & Leigh as a drayman, that is a carter using a dray pulled by horses.

He died very suddenly the day after his second son's birth. Details of the enquiry at the Coroners Office have not survived. The coroners inquest index recorded death by "natural causes".This was echoed in a newspaper report about the inquest indicating death by "natural causes", suffering "from chest affections for some time previously". The Camperdown Cemetery Burial Butts describe his death as from "Disease of the Heart".

He died at his address, 13 Domain Terrace, Sydney city. See the image of 1886 for a map. Domain Terrace was on the original site for the State Library of N.S.W.

The grave headstone was rediscovered by Rhett Knight 23.3.98 at St. Stephen's Camperdown cemetery in Newtown.

Newspaper notices include:

"17.7.1865: Funeral. The friends of Mr. William Kempster are respectfully invited to attend the funeral of his deceased brother-in-law, Mr. William Knight, to move from his late residence, 13 Domain Terrace, this (Monday) afternoon at 3 o'clock."

"Loyal United Brothers Lodge No. 3592, IOOF, M.U. - The officers and brothersof the above lodge, together with visiting officers and brothers, are respectfully invited to attend the funeral of our late brother William Knight to take place this day (Monday) 17th. instant. Brethren to meet at the hall, at 2 p.m.. By order. James McMenemy, N.G. William H Baker, Secretary." The involvement of Manchester Unity lodge may have helped the family, even with providing the headstone for the grave.

Witnesses at the burial were brothers-in-law William Kempster and CuthbertMcLachlan.

As the Sydney Morning Herald put it, reporting the Inquest, "Knight has left 4 children but scantily provided for".

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A Joseph Munford was buried in same grave 13 years later. The headstone inscription, below William Knight's reads:

"ALSO TO THE MEMORY OF

Joseph Munford

who departed this life 4th April 1878

Aged 52 years"

No relationship has been established between Joseph Munford and William Knight. They were the same age. As Cornelius Munford (who had his older brother Joseph buried in William's grave in 1878) was also a ship's deserter 2 months earlier than the aforementioned William Knight, possible "ship's deserter", it may not be a coincidence that William and Joseph's only connection was in their burial together.

Details about Munford are:

[NSW Pioneers Index - Deaths:

Jos. Munford

d. 1878

Fa. Adam

Mo. Sarah nee Castles

Sydney

Registration Number 677/1878.]

According to the international Genealogy Index Joseph was christened on 15/11/1826 at St. Mary Whitechapel, Stepney, London to Adam and Sarah. His mother Sarah Munford was a fishmonger, and she and her 8 children, including Joseph and Cornelius were located at Whitechapel on the 1841 UK census.

Joseph was unmarried and came to NSW in about 1848. He resided in Castlereagh St., with his younger brother Cornelius.

Newspaper notices of the death and burial in 1878 include:

"Munford, April 4th., at his residence, 241 Castlereagh St., Joseph Munford, aged 52 years."

Funeral Notices:

"The friends of Mr. Cornelius Munford are invited to attend the funeral of his deceased brother, Joseph. To move from his residence, No. 241 Castlereagh St. on Saturday the 6th. instant at 2.30 to Camperdown cemetery. Thomas, undertaker, 141 York St."

The Burial Butt for his burial indicates that his calling was "Gentleman", that he died of "cerebral disease", and that he was to be buried in the same grave as 13185, (William Knight).

It has also been discovered that William's wife Sarah's grand nephew William Gordon, age 3, was buried in or near the same burial plot in 1870. There is no reference to this on the headstone. It seems that multiple burials in the same grave were not uncommon. According to Society of Australian Genealogists "after 1867, the creation of new grave plots was prohibited and burials were only permitted by license from the Chief Secretary." And "From 1867 to 1900 there were a further 2,183 burials at Camperdown Cemetery into already existing plots and family graves." The Burial Butts for William George Gordon indicates that he had died of bronchitis and was to be buried next to William Knight's grave, that his father was a drayman, and that his address at death was 243 Castlereagh St., next door perhaps to where Joseph Munford lived 8 years later^{10,12,24,35,42,43,44,45,46,47,48,49,50,51,52,53,54,55,56}.

William KNIGHT and Sarah Maria AIKEN had the following children: