A Genealogy and History of Our Family
© Copyright 2009-2023
Bronwyn Gorman
Welcome to our family history site. It is a work in progress, however I hope that it will become a rich source of linked information that recreates the history of our families as they emerged from the mists of time.
The main genealogical lines so far are Dent, Burgar, Foulis, Clark and Siviour. There is a link to the Scott family and some Cholmeley, Tyacke, Gorman details.
This page contains links to historical events which coincide with family movements, or which outline the context in which a family lived. At present these include:
The South Australia Company
Emigration (Shipping Lists)
This page contains a list of surnames so far documented for this family. Eventually there will be a cross-referenced link to other pages relating to:
Family genealogy
Origins of surnames
Places of origin.
So far this page links to local maps with some customised labelling of places of interest or ancient/medieval regions and towns of origin. These currently include:
Westray, Papa Westray and Mainland in the Orkney Islands
Dent and the Yorkshire Dales
Aquitaine and the medieval regions of Agenais and Astarac, and the ancient town of Agen.
Other regions of interest are:
Dumfries and Galloway
The Borders
Norfolk
Devon
Cornwall
Family Members of Note (Dent-Burgar line)
On Sunday the 3rd of December 1860, Agen Dent saved the 8 crew members of the "Flying Fish" when it broke loose from its moorings during a violent storm. He was 20 years old a the time, and became known as "The Hero of Port Elliot" or "The Hero of the Flying Fish". He accomplished this feat by tying a schnapper line around his waist (probably to a leather belt) and swimming it out to the ship which had been blown on to the rocks off Commodore Point.
This was not the first time he had saved lives. According to his obituary in The Advertiser, 11 October, 1919, p. 9, Agen pulled two girls from the waters at Port Elliot in 1852, at the age of 12.
Agen Dent later became a grazier at Mt. Benson, halfway between Robe and Kingston SE in South Australia.
George Burgar and Stewart Foulis
Agen married Margaret Burgar, second daughter of George Burgar and Stewart Foulis of Papa Westray in the Orkney Islands. Margaret's mother, Stewart did not migrate to South Australia as she passed away sometime not long after the 1841 Census. We have not yet located a record of her death, or a burial place although she must be buried on Papa Westray or Westray in Orkney. George remarried and then migrated to South Australia.
Migrated to South Australia on the "Orleana" * in 1840. WOK Dent worked as a labourer, engineer and general dealer in the early colony. His UK origins are still uncertain but he was probably born in Mancetter, Warwickshire to William Owen Dent and Ann Kitchin. We are still tracing the origins of the Dent family prior to this, but currently the most promising of a number of possibilities is the Dent family of Glascote, Tamworth, Warwickshire.
*Originally I had the 'John' as the correct ship, as transcribed to the online passenger lists. However, some years back a group of us gathered evidence that persuaded us that this is a transcription error, and William and Ellenor immigrated with Ellenor's brother Joseph Beasley on the 'Orleana'. They have sequential application numbers, and the number of children listed for William and Ellenor matches the 1841 Census. A cross check with:
Richard Ellis, 'The Barque "JOHN" A Voyage to the Land of Hope Gravesend to Adelaide 1839/1840 '
will show that the only Dent on the 'John' was the ship's doctor, who returned to England. Sarah and Nathaniel are also transcription errors. There are no records of either child with these parents. Sarah was someone else's child and Nathaniel was a middle name of William jr.
Maryann Naomi Dent
Maryann Dent was the second daughter of Thomas Agen Dent and Margaret Elizabeth Burgar. After the death of her husband Robert Buck (1916) and her parents (1919 and 1920) she sold her property in Mt Benson and moved, with her 4 children, back to the family home town of Port Elliot where she purchased a house and set up a midwifery hospital. I have not yet located the house or obtained any documented history of this, however it is a part of my mother's oral history (Maryann's grand daughter). Maryann died in Marion, Adelaide in 1940.
Mary Kathleen Annie Buck
Mary Buck is notable for her endurance of a life of unmitigated hardship beyond the death of her father when she was 10 years old. Mary won a scholarship to attend Victor Harbour HIgh School, however she was not permitted to go as she was needed to help out with the midwifery practice. Her life was a series of tragedies from here on. A single parent at the age of 17 in an unforgiving society and then married to a shearer who was soon unemployed and providing for the family through rabbit trapping. Norman Richard Jubilee Clark fathered 11 more children under these circumstances. She is a model of resilience in her determination to provide her children with a sound set of manners and values, and a fundamental education. She fed them well, disciplined them well and sustained a healthy sense of humour despite everything. She died of a cerebral haemorrhage at the age of 65.
Shirley Edith Clark
Shirley was a child of the Great Depression and her teen years were lived through WWII. She left school at 14 and began employment as a cleaning maid in a Victor Harbour guest house. In this way she paid for piano lessons for two years, the owners of the guest house allowing her to use their piano for practice. She later moved to Adelaide and worked in a rubber factory and then as a tailor's assistant. Finally she became a qualified nursing sister. She then married a farmer from the Midnorth and ran a poultry farm to subsidise the farm income and pay a double mortgage and private school education for 3 of her children. She played the organ in the local church and became a lay preacher, frequently running the entire service herself and travelling throughout the Rocky River Parish from Wirrabera to Port Broughton and Red Hill. She ran a book club and book stall through the church, bringing uplifting and educational literature to all ages and needs throughout the parish. She also drove the school bus for a period of time, was primary school secretary, and on the local Institute Ladies Guild. And unofficially provided an informal telephone counselling service to many people across the isolated parish and region.