Thomas Hopkins burial record (General)

by jhopkins , Friday, January 15, 2010, 01:24 (5510 days ago) @ unknown

Thanks again Alan.

I have re-looked at the information you supplied in your first post, and notice that the only birth children left living with Thomas and Sarah in 1871 are John and Alfred. I know that Alfred subsequently emigrated to NZ, (I have confirmed at least three siblings and possibly four came to North Canterbury) and he was a storekeeper at Leithfield which is not far north of where his older brother William settled at Saltwater Creek.

I accidentally found Alfred's grave some years ago when my wife and I were looking for other family graves in the Leithfield Cemetery.

It looks as though John stayed on in the Forest but I need to check that. Your information may solve another puzzle for me. When my cousin started some of this research, she found a Kezia Hopkins and we could not account for her. It seems she was a daughter in law - John's wife. I do not know whether my cousin found her records here in NZ, or whether she was still in the Forest. If the former, that is another sibling who emigrated. The old people must have felt lost when their children left one by one.

Thanks for the other information in your most recent post. I had not come across the Hathaway name until now. It is interesting they arrived just three years after my ggparents, who also landed in Lyttelton, but went north to Saltwater Creek to take up land on the banks of the Ashley River. Our ancestors were not too far apart.

I used to live in Wgtn, and knew a Tony Isaac there - he was a TV director for the NZBC as it was then. It must have been about the late 1970's. I have a feeling his wife's name was Joan? Are they your bones?

Thanks again, John