Alexander Dick senior (Alexr) was my father's mother's grandfather. His son Alexander Dick Alex) migrated to Victoria in 1853. Alexr wrote a series of letters to his son from Busby with local news and gossip, until in 1856 he and the two younger sons also emigrated.
The letters from Alexander snr are still in my family, and were transcribed and indexed by my father in the 1990s. They mention many local people from Busby, several of whom also emigrated about that time, so it may be worth sharing the writings in case others are researching people from that area. I am currently scanning the transcriptions to make them easier to use.
Alexander jnr (Alex) first migrated to Geelong, Vict, where he joined the hunt for gold, then became involved in wholesale business ventures. He later moved to Melbourne where he was a respected businessman and was involved with Scots Church, The Old Colonists Association and various other organisations.
Alex (jnr) apparently wrote copious diaries which he later condensed into three (?) journals. According to my family lore, two of these journals were found under a house somewhere, and donated to the LaTrobe Library in Victoria. I have copies of these (books 2 and 3). They deal with his daily life, family and business dealings, and are an interesting insight into life in Melbourne in that era, so I have begun to transcribe portions of the journals for my own interest and to share with others.
My research into the family and my conversion of the letters and journals is an ongoing process, which I will share occasionally in this blog.
The Letters of Alexr Dick (snr) to his son Alex in Australia
These are the notes and family background written by my father in 1990 when he transcribed the letters:
THE LETTERS OF ALEXANDER DICK (1802 - 69)
Introductory Notes written by his great grandson
Ian Scales - 15 June 1992
These seventy-one letters were written by Alexander Dick to his eldest
son Alex in the Geelong and Ballarat districts of Victoria during the period
January 1, 1853 to October 5,1862 and as far as I have been able to ascertain all the letters he wrote arrived safely.
They were kept intact with their addressed envelopes in Alex's "old
mahogany chest with three locks" and upon his death in 1913 the chest and
contents passed into the possession of his widowed sister-in-law Isabella Dick,
possibly his closest surviving relative. Upon her death in 1923 it passed to her
youngest daughter, my mother Dorothy Scales, along with a family Bible and other memorabilia of that era. Upon her death in 1968 the
chest and its contents were passed on to me.
Alexander Dick, only son of William Dick and Anne
Robertson, was born in the Parish of Tibbermuir, Perthshire in March 1802.
According to his handwritten entries in the family Bible he married Isabella McLachlan in
July 1828. Their first three children died in infancy; then followed Alex (1834), John (1836) and William (1838), all surviving into their
seventies. In November 1840 Isabella died of peritonitis, at the age of thirty-eight.
In October 1852, Alex, then
18 sailed for Melbourne in the 'Sir William Molesworth', arriving in March 1853. Alexander and his two younger sons remained in
Busby near Glasgow, where he was fitfully employed in the textile printing
industry and the boys were apprenticed to the carpentry trade.
While the letters were undoubtedly written to Alex to acquaint him with
news from home and from the Continent and America - the United States did not
yet exist - they contain some interesting comment on news from the Colony
contained in newspapers and letters received from Alex - letters which have not
survived. Any letters Alexander wrote to his younger sore also have not survived.
A letter written to Alex
just prior to the family's emigration to Victoria aboard the 'Euphrates' in August 1856 contains a
passage that conveys much in a few words:
Yet,
when it comes across to me that my father’s and mother's people have lived 600
years in this country, I think it queer in me to leave it. It is but the spirit
of the times and the conveniences we have for travelling now. Why, the voyage to Southampton would have been
as great an undertaking to my
ancestors as the voyage to Australia is to me.
The last letter was written
aboard the 'Donald McKay’ on October 5, 1862 as the ship neared Port Phillip heads and Alexander
finally returned to Victoria. He went immediately to Smythesdale, some ten
miles south-west of Ballarat and lived there for about five years.
Alex was beginning to
prosper as a merchant and had married in September 1864. In October 1867
recently widowered, he removed to Melbourne with his father and bought a house
in Peel Street, Hotham, where Alexander died of a stroke on September 23, 1869
aged sixty-seven and was buried in the Melbourne Cemetery.
That both father and eldest
son were named just 'Alexander Dick' could lead to confusion and I have sought
to overcome this by referring to the father as 'Alexander' and to his son as 'Alex'. There were later
Alexander Dicks in the lineage but not during Alexander's lifetime.
I have endeavoured to
transcribe the seventy-one handwritten letters faithfully, including all his casual spelling variations.
The only editing was to delete unnecessary capitals and add punctuation to
clarify sentences and present the most likely context.
Appended to each transcription are the names of
people referred to in that letter. Some, especially those who emigrated to
Australia, could be of further interest and these have been collated and
referenced separately.
Alex was married and widowered three times and had a
son by his second wife, named Alick Hernon, who died unmarried a great many
years ago. Alex himself died in the Melbourne Hospital in November 1913, aged
seventy-nine, following a traffic accident and was buried in the St.Kilda Cemetery.
His brother John (my
grandfather) died at Prahran in
December 1906, aged seventy and was buried in
the St. Kilda Cemetery. He was
survived by his wife Isabella, four
sons and three daughters.
The youngest son William never married, but spent many years travelling
throughout Australia with mining interests. There is little available
documentary evidence concerning his later years but his signature dated 1909 in an autograph book indicates he was still alive
at seventy-one.
Some further notes
regarding people who Alexander frequently mentioned in his letter may prove
helpful:
Mary was his only sister. She and her
husband, Alexander Russell, who died in 1855 had two children, Annie and
Alexander, often named by Alexander as Aunty, Annie and the "Wee Black'.
Mary died in 1873 in Glasgow.
James Dick, born 1803, a successful
merchant in Glasgow, was a cousin of Alexander Dick.
The Moodies were old family
friends in Glasgow. One son, Wm. Moodie
continued to write to Alex for many years.
John Leckie - a family
friend who emigrated with his wife in the same ship, the Sir William
Molesworth, as Alex. He was distantly related to Alexander; one of his
ancestors being the older stepbrother of Mary Douglas, Alexander's paternal
grandmother.
Mrs.Maria Muir (Mrs.Moore),
born 1804, was well acquainted with Alex'r and his sons in Busby. She and her
husband James, a printer, had a number of children and lived close to Kittoch
Water, a small stream in Busby. James Muir probably died about 1850. While some
of the children remained in the U.K. others emigrated to Victoria. First to
arrive in 1853 was Matilda and her husband, James Murdoch, a baker and they
finally settled in Elaine, keeping a store (the building still stands). Samuel
probably arrived about the same time and became a farmer in Elaine. Then
followed Maria Muir in 1861 in the 'MorningLight' with Mary and the youngest
14 year old daughter Isabella, later to marry Alexander's son John in 1870 and
to become my maternal grandparents.
Maria Muir died at Elaine in 1893 at the age of eighty- nine.
David Alexander, a friend
of Alex's in Busby, had a brother George who was studying for the Presbyterian
Ministry. Late in 1922, my grandmother, Isabella Dick was enduring her final
illness. John Alexander, newly appointed minister to the Gardenvale Presbyterian
Church, recognising the name 'Kittoch' on her front gate, visited,
and discovered that their forebears had been well acquainted in Busby. It seems
probable that John Alexander whom I knew quite well personally and who had a
son named David, was a descendant of George Alexander.
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