I have seen the Strettle name on many occasions in my historic research - Stratford Strettle was an Auctioneer and Stock and Station Agent and conducted thousands of sales. However, I came across these sad public announcements about the birth and death of Stratford's son and then the death of his wife, Annie, and I thought if anything summed up the precarious life of women where marriage was followed closely by childbirth and childbirth often by the death of the mother or the baby (and sadly in some of the poorer countries around the world today this still happens) then it was these two notices. So this prompted me to have a look at the Strettle family.
Ireland in 1835. (1) They had five children, all born in Cork. (2)
- William, born c.1838, who died at the age of 47 at the Gladys Park property on July 15, 1885. Birth date is approximate as it is taken from the death date, so I am not sure if William and Maria were twins or just born really close together.
- Maria, born c.1838, who died at the age of 27 in 1865. Maria married William Minifie on November 22, 1854 and died on January 4, 1865, after a long and painful illness at her home in Wellington Street, Collingwood. She had three daughters - Florence Kate (born 1857), Edith Eveline (1861) and Ellen (born and died 1864). Florence and Edith were listed as beneficiaries in the will of their grandfather, Abraham.
- Katherine (Kate) was born c.1840 and married William Summers Flint in January 1870, they had three sons - Arthur (1871), Walter, (1872) and Bertie (1875). Kate died in Claremont in Western Australia at the age of 70 on May 27, 1912.
- Ellen, born c.1841 and died at the family home, 2 Carlton Street, Carlton, aged 20 on December 8, 1861.
- Abraham Stratford, known as Stratford, born 1845 who died December 19, 1919 aged 74.
As noted in Stratford's 1919 obituary (see below), he was a colonist of 66 years, which means the family arrived about 1853. According to their daughter Maria's marriage notice (see below) the family had previously been in South Africa - Cape of Good Hope being the name of the area when it was a British Colony - but I have no information about their time there.
Abraham Strettle was stock agent, who was at one time in partnership with George Kirk (3), which was dissolved in 1865.
In December 1865, Abraham Strettle purchased 328 acres of Crown land in Lysterfield and in 1868
another 263 acres, which he named Sweet Hills, due to the lush pasture. (4) They were allotments 59 and 51, Parish of Narree Worran. He still owned both allotments when he died, as they are listed in his probate papers. The 591 acres were valued at £1626. Abraham also had land in Bourke Street - the Union Hotel, two adjoining shops and at rear - large corrugated iron cattle pens, piggeries etc valued at £9000. (5) His son, Stratford, took over the Sweet Hills property and planted out an orchard, but more of this later.
This interesting incident involving Abraham Strettle was reported in The Argus in 1871-
A disturbance at Mr. Abraham Strettle's sale-yard, in Bourke-street west, came under the notice of the magistrates at the District Court yesterday, when Strettle was summoned for assault by Richard Griffiths, who laid damages at £20. The defendant was selling pigs, of which there were two pens of nine each, one belonging to Griffiths and one to some one else, and Griffiths's was sold for 15.,
while the other only fetched 11s, Strettle's clerk made a mistake by which the prices were reversed, and Griffiths upon demanding the higher price was told to go to the office in order that the matter might be settled. He, however, waxed wroth, and abused and struck Strettle, who, in retaliation, gave him a thrashing. As it was shown that the violence was begun by the complainant, the case was dismissed. (6)
Mary Strettle died in Melbourne on November 14, 1864 at the age of 54 at the family home in Cotham Road, Kew. Abraham died at sea of consumption on March 25, 1876. He was on his way to New York and is buried at the Cypress Hills Cemetery in Brooklyn in New York. (7)
Back to Abraham Stratford Strettle, known as Stratford. Stratford married Annie Eliza Johnston on April 22, 1868 at St James Cathedral in Melbourne, by the Reverend T.C. Cole. (8) According to the marriage notice in The Argus, she was the third daughter of Waldron Johnston of Fairfield, Malvern. The notice didn't list her mother but she was Bridget McIntyre. Waldron was a hotel owner and had the Clarence Hotel in Collins Street and the Levithan Hotel in Collingwood, amongst others. (9)
Annie and Stratford had three children before the stillborn son who is listed in the announcement at the top of this post (10)
- Ethel Mary, born January 9 at the family home 35 Regent Street, Fitzroy and died January 29 in 1869.
- William Stratford, born December 17, 1870 at Drummond Street, Carlton. He married Florence Young on August 22, 1906 and had three children - Bruce Stratford (born and died 1909); Margaret Somerville, born October 15, 1910 and married Richard Caney in 1942; and Joan Elizabeth (1913-2003). William, a civil engineer with the Public Works Department, died in Perth on January 4, 1934.
- Stella Kate, born November 13, 1873, at Carlton. Stella married Herbert Powell (c.1870-1941) in Adelaide in December 6, 1894 and died November 9, 1900 in Melbourne at the age of 26. In the seven years between her marriage and her death she had three children - William Hamilton (1896-1936, died in South Africa); Keith (1898-1971) and Stella Kate born in 1900. Little Stella died July 16, 1902 and the death notice lists her as the adopted daughter of James and Alice Cuming, Jnr. Not unusual in those times for a baby to be adopted informally after the death of a parent, especially the mother.
- Unnamed son stillborn in July 1877 at Fernlea, Dudley Street, West Melbourne.
Annie Strettle, who died on July 12, 1877 did not leave a will, but her probate papers said she left an estate of £15,570 (11) - that was a lot of money in those days, but even all that money could not protect her from the dangers of child birth.
On April 17, 1878 Stratford married Jessie Powell the daughter of William Hamilton Powell. (12) Stella's husband, Herbert, was also the son of William Hamilton Powell so it appears that Stella married her step-mother's brother. There was one child from the marriage of Stratford to Jessie, and that was Hamilton Stratford Strettle, born December 8, 1887. Hamilton was listed as a motor mechanic when he enlisted in the A.I.F on April 21, 1916. While he was overseas he married Leonie Pickman in Belgium in October 1919 and his occupation then was listed as 'Island trader' - what ever that is, but it sounds romantic. Hamilton Returned to Australia February 1920 and he and Leonie had three daughters. In 1931, Hamilton, Leonie and Jessie were living on Point Nepean Road at Rye and he was back to being a motor engineer, clearly no call for the occupation 'Island trader' in Port Phillip Bay. Hamilton also served in the Army for a short time during World War Two. Jessie died May 8, 1932 at the age of 73; Hamilton died July 19, 1960, Leonie in 1974. (13)
Stratford Strettle was, as I said before, an Auctioneer and Stock & Station Agent. If you put his name into Trove you get over 9,000 results, so naturally we wont be listing all his business dealings here, but here are just a few of his advertisements of some of his many activities that took place all over Victoria and further afield.
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In May 1893 Stratford Strettle sold his company to Powell and Armstrong, who continued the company under his name.
In 1882 Stratford Strettle purchased Ravenhurst, a property of 396 acres on Berwick-Clyde Road at Cranbourne, although the address was often listed as Berwick. He soon acquired another 316 adjoining acres and renamed the property Gladys Park. His brother William also lived on the property and he who accidentally shot himself dead at the house on July 15, 1885. William was described as a gentleman of independent means, who had behaved normally at dinner that evening and whilst socialising with guests at the house. After they retired to bed, a single gun-shot was heard and when found Mr. Strettle was in a comatose state, and his case was manifestly hopeless. He, however, lingered on for 17 hours, and died at half-past 10 o'clock on Wednesday night. A report of the Inquest noted that the witnesses all concurred in the opinion that the act was not a suicidal one, and conjectured that he had staggered against the wall where the revolver was hung, and in trying to replace it on the nail accidentally discharged it. The jury found that the deceased died from a gunshot wound in the head, which was accidentally inflicted by the deceased himself with a revolver. (14) A clearing sale was held at Gladys Park on December 2, 1886 due to Stratford Strettle deciding to lease out the property and he eventually sold it in 1904. (15)
It wasn't the only clearing sale held by Stratford Strettle in December 1886. At the start of that year he had leased the mansion Ballyreen in Brighton Road, St Kilda (also called Elsternwick) but decided to move at the end of the year when he sold all his superior and well-kept furniture and horses and carriages (16).
His obituary noted that he lost money in the 1890s collapse of the land boom and as it appears that he didn't leave a will, I have no information as to how much he was worth when he died, but you could assume that he was 'comfortable' if he could afford to own a few trotting horses. But as with the death of his first wife, Annie, being well off did not protect you from family tragedy. If you put his family deaths into a time line then it shows how much death touched his family which would sadly have been fairly typical of the time - 1861 - sister Ellen died; 1864 - mother Mary died; 1865 - sister Maria died; 1869 - daughter Ethel died; 1876 - father Abraham died; 1877 - son stillborn; 1877 wife Annie died; 1885 - brother William died; 1900 - daughter Stella Kate died; 1902 - granddaughter Stella died; 1909 - grandson Bruce died.
(1) Ireland, Casey Collection Indexes, 1545-1960, on Ancestry.com
(2) Birth dates sometimes taken from age at time of death; Indexes to the Victorian Births, Deaths and Marriages. Maria - marriage notice The Age, November 25, 1854, see here; death notice The Age, January 6, 1865, see here; Katherine - marriage notice The Herald, January 27, 1870, see here; death notice Perth Western Mail, June 1, 1912, see here; Ellen - death notice The Argus, December 9, 1861, see here.
(5) Abraham Strettle's Probate documents Public Records Office of Victoria VPRS 28/P0002, 17/664 https://prov.vic.gov.au/archive/57E1D583-F1EA-11E9-AE98-01631E37CF84?image=5
(10) Indexes to the Victorian Births, Deaths and Marriages. Ethel Mary - birth notice The Argus, January 13, 1869, see here and death notice The Herald, January 30, 1869, see here. William Stratford - birth notice The Argus December 21, 1870, see here; report of marriage The Australasian, September 1, 1906, see here; short obituary Perth Daily Mail January 5, 1934, see here. Stella Kate - birth notice - The Australasian, November 22, 1873, see here; Marriage - https://www.genealogysa.org.au/; Death notice Footscray Independent, November 10, 1900 see here; Little Stella's death notice Footscray Independent, July 19, 1902, see here. More on James Cuming here https://kooweerupswamphistory.blogspot.com/2021/05/rythdale-origin-of-name.html
(12) The Argus, May 1, 1878, see here.
This is an expanded version of a post which I originally wrote and researched in 2018 for my work blog, Casey Cardinia Links to Our Past
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