Cant find a black sheep

The prompt for this week was “black sheep”. I don’t have any known black sheep in the family, and no ancestors I know of were sheep farmers. I just can’t find any. I had to be creative. I looked up breeds of sheep and found the Lincoln sheep. I therefore decided to write about an ancestor from Lincolnshire, my ggg grandmother, Sarah Cant. See what I did there? 😉

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Sarah was born in early 1835 to parents, Richard and Elizabeth Cant/Caunt, the middle child of a possible 11 children. She was baptised on 12 April 1835 at the Osbournby Parish Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul¹.  The baptism records note that the family were living in Osbournby, and that her father was a labourer.

The family were captured on the 1841 Census as living at Osbournby². On that Census, she is recorded as living with her parents, her brother William and sister Alice. If this is the correct record, this means that either the other siblings I found belong to a different Richard and Elizabeth, or that those three siblings passed away in their childhood before 1841.

The 1851 Census is a little trickier as I can’t seem to find a Sarah Cant who fits the bill. There is, however a Jane Cant who was a lodger in Grantham³ which could be her if she was going by her middle name at the time.

Sarah married John Drage in March 1861 at Saint Martin’s Church in Ancaster⁴. That same year, she was recorded on the Census as being a kitchen maid and John a servant for the Palmer family in Ancaster.

Sarah and her husband John in front with their sons William and Charles behind them.  Courtesy of Ridgey101 on Ancestry.com

John and Sarah had three children – William Henry Drage, Mary Ann Drage and Isaac Drage – before setting sail to Australia on the Racehorse in 1866. While on board, Sarah gave birth to my great great grandmother, Martha Ann Drage. The journey took 79 days in total and was said to be an excellent journey⁵.

Once they arrived in Australia, they settled in the Carcour and Cowra areas in NSW⁶ and had a further seven children, her last born when she was 45: Charles Drage, Wright Drage, Andrew Drage, Emily Drage, Rosetta Ellen Drage, Arthur Edward Drage and (possibly) Sarah Drage.

For about seven years, the family moved to Victoria⁷ where they may have lived at Walwa⁸, right near the NSW/Victoria border and at Springvale⁹, in Melbourne.

By 1913, it seems the couple had moved back to NSW and were living on Hoskins Street, Temora¹⁰. It’s unknown where they lived for the next 15 years, but what we do know is that by 1928 when John passed away, they had moved some 160 km south to Holbrook, NSW¹¹.

In 1930, Sarah appeared on the electoral roll as living at Fairview, Holbrook with her son, William Henry and his wife Mary Ann¹². A Google search suggests that Fairview, at least now, is a sheep station¹³. I was unable to determine whether it was a sheep station back then, but it’s probably fair to say that it’s likely it was a farm of some description.

The following year, at the ripe old age of 95 or 96, Sarah passed away⁷. She was buried in Holbrook Cemetery with her husband¹⁴. Two years later, her son Charles was also buried there.

Are you a descendant of Sarah with more information about her life or photos you’d like to share on my blog? If so, I’d love to hear from you. Please email me at lookingforwardlookingback@outlook.com.au.

Courtesy of cblambie on Billion Graves

Sources

1. Free Registrations UK
2. Class: HO107; Piece: 621; Book: 6; Civil Parish: Osbournby; County: Lincolnshire; Enumeration District: 5; Folio: 8; Page: 9; Line: 24; GSU roll: 438758
3. Class: HO107; Piece: 2103; Folio: 160; Page: 20; GSU roll: 87732
4. Ancestry.com. England, Select Marriages, 1538–1973 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.
5. EMIGRATION. (1866, September 29). The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 – 1954), p. 4. Retrieved June 30, 2018, from National Library of Australia
6. Based on the location recorded for the birth of these children.
7. Qld BDM Record of Death: 1931/20364
8. Ancestry.com. Australia, Electoral Rolls, 1903-1980 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Electoral roll of 1903
9. Ancestry.com. Australia, Electoral Rolls, 1903-1980 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Electoral roll of 1909
10. Ancestry.com. Australia, Electoral Rolls, 1903-1980 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Electoral roll of 1913
11. Qld BDM Record of Death: 1928/22653
12. Ancestry.com. Australia, Electoral Rolls, 1903-1980 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Electoral roll of 1930
13. New England genetics make sheep so fine at Holbrook and Holbrook Landcare Network (page 4)
14. Find a Grave