James Crowl

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Portrait of James Crowl, A. Flegeltaub (photographer), Ballarat.
Kind permission Gael Phillips
Signature of James Crowl and others in a detail from the 1853 Bendigo Goldfields Petition
Bendigo Goldfields Petition, August 1853. State Library of Victoria (MS 12440

Background

James was born on Dartmoor, in Devon, to a Cornish father and a Devonish mother. He arrived in South Australia on the Harry Lorrequer in December 1849. Fifteen year old James Crowl was on board the vessel with his family. Richard his father aged 43 years, Mary A. His mother aged 37 and siblings, his older sister Elizabeth 16 years, William 14 years, Ann 12 years and Harriet 10 years.Five died on the voyage.[1]

After a couple of years they went to Victoria. James Crowl was one of the first diggers on the Forest Creek Chewton diggings.

A stonemason, he moved to Ballarat where he worked on many of the fine stone buildings for which Ballarat is known. He also assembled the plinth for the statue of Queen Victoria in Sturt Street. He had a brother John, who was also a stone mason who had a hotel at Talbot at one stage. John has no descendants, his wife died in childbirth and his only son did not have any children.

James Crowl died in Ballarat in 1909. James’s father, Richard, also emigrated to Victoria, and died there in 1852. He was also a stone cutter and stone mason. He worked in the stone quarries near Princetown on Dartmoor in Devon and James possibly learnt the stone masonry trade from him when the family were living on Dartmoor before migrating to Australia.

This James and John are not to be confused with the Crowle builders at Heathcote in the 19th century. James worked on the buildings at Mawollock station.[2]

Goldfields Involvement, 1853-1854

Signed the 1853 Bendigo Goldfields Petition. Agitation of the Victorian goldfields started with the Forest Creek Monster Meeting in 1851, but what became known as the Red Ribbon Movement was centred around the Bendigo goldfields in 1853. The Anti-Gold License Association was formed at Bendigo in June 1853, led by George Thomson, Dr D.G. Jones and 'Captain' Edward Browne. The association focused its attention on the 30 shillings monthly licence fee miners were required to pay to the government. They drew up a petition outlining digger grievances and called for a reduced licence fee, improved law and order, the right to vote and the right to buy land. The petition was signed by diggers at Bendigo, Ballarat, Castlemaine, McIvor (Heathcote), Mount Alexander (Harcourt) and other diggings. The 13 metre long petition was presented to Lieutenant-Governor Charles La Trobe in Melbourne on the 01 August 1853, but their call for a reduction in monthly licence fees and land reform for diggers was rejected. The diggers dissatisfaction erupted into the Red Ribbon Rebellion where agitators wore red ribbons on their hats symbolising their defiance of the law and prohibitive licence fees.

Post 1854 Experiences

See also

Bendigo Goldfields Petition

Ballarat Reform League Inc. Monuments Project

Further Reading

References

  1. https://bound-for-south-australia.collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/1849HarryLorrequer.htm
  2. Information supplied by Gael E. Phillips, Genealogy Victoria Australia FB page

External links

https://blogs.slv.vic.gov.au/family-matters/collections/did-you-ancestor-sign-the-bendigo-goldfields-petition/


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