Early Lord Howe Marriages

Can A Sea Captain Perform

Marriages

Early Lord Howe Marriages Suggest That He Can

Apt Ain Brett Hilder, Of The

“Muliamasent us the following interesting notes. Anyone who knows

anything of marriages by sea cap

tains can contact him through the “PIM” or at his Sydney address, 195

Edinburgh Road, Castlecrag.

LORD HOWE ISLAND had been visited by passing ships and whalers since 1788, but the first settlement was made by a party from New Zealand in 1833 or ’34. The island became a porr of refreshment for weary whalers, where they could obtain fresh vegetables, and yet the population had, by 1850, reached the total of only 16.

These were members of the three families of Andrews, Wright and Mosely.

The latter had a romantic story of their arrival, and it is still current on the island. Allen Isaac Mosely was a navi gating officer of a whaling schooner, and he fell in love with a young Irish nurse

when his ship called at Sydney. He hid her in a packing case when the ship sailed, but when the captain discovered the woman aboard, he swore to set her ashore at the first island they sighted.

This turned out to be Lord Hows and Johanna Moran was, indeed, put ashore there, about the year - 1843. After the voyage was over, Mosely took passage in the vessel “Jane” and landed at Lord Howe to claim his sweetheart. They were married by the resident proprietor of the island, Captain Owen Poole, a retired military officer of the Bombay Establish ment.

No government officials were appointed to the island until 1881, and the registrar in the year 1892 persuaded the Moselys that they were not legally married, and proceeded to marry them officially at his office on June 3, 1892, when Mosely was 84, and the bride 55.

In 1855 or 1865, Captain Stevens arrived to settle on the island, from his ship the “Will o’ the Wisp,” and one of his men was a half-caste negro, the son of a slave from Philadelphia. The man’s name was Perry Johnson, and he took a trip to Sydney, where he picked up a Cape negress named Sarah Rachel Michel, who had arrived as a servant to a French family.

Johnson brought her back to the island to bear him company, and they were married by Captain Field, who was master of the island ketch “Sylph,” in which he was lost in 1873.

In 1913, the island had an SDA pastor, S. Butz, who warned the Johnsons that they were living in sin, and that they could not enter heaven unless they were married in the sight of God. He married them at their own home, the groom being 86 and his bride 95!

Neither of those couples left any de scendants, and they died on the island where their tombstones may be seen. The marriage Registers do not mention their early marriages, but describe them as bachelors and spinsters, so there is no proof that the legendary marriages by the captains ever took place, nor any details of the dates they occurred.

WHILE the above two cases do not con form with the romantic rule of be ing married aboard a ship by the Captain, they are extensions of the same idea, and I expect that many similar in stances occurred among other islands of the Pacific. If any reader knows of any I should be much obliged to hear what ever details are known or discoverable, particularly in regard to any certificate of marriage or of registration.

Marriages by Captains, as such, have never been legal, as far as we can discover, and yet there appears to be such a strong and widespread belief in this function that there may yet be some historical justification for it.

None of my Captain friends have known of actual cases of people being so married, but only this year I had a request from an intending passenger from Norfolk Island to perform the ceremony; he was one of the numerous Quintals, and as the prospective bride was not in sight I could not be tempted to gain notoriety. There were at least three clergymen on the island, in any case, and therefore no im mediate need for action on my part.

Eight new Anglican missionaries have gone, or are going, to stations in New Guinea this year. They are; The Rev.

A. H. and Mrs., Hatters, Dr. Blanche Biggs, Miss Elsie Manley, Sister Mervyn Griffith, Sister Nancy Elliot, Miss Nancy White, and Mr. Lyle Young.