Tuesday, 2 September 2014

Christina Cleal

Christina Elizabeth was the third child of Emanuel and Johannah and was born on  26 September 1870 at Pindaroy near Inverell.  Johannah's mother was called Christiana, so I imagine that Christina was named for her maternal grandmother.

Emanuel and the children that were unmarried moved to Sydney around 1892, perhaps due to tough economic times in the country.  On 23 July 1897, Christina gave birth to an illegitimate son, Richard, in the Home of Hope, Newtown.  It is interesting to note that two of her sisters, Florence and Catherine, also gave birth to illegitimate babies in 1897. Christina married John Graham only three weeks after Richard's birth, so presumably he was the father, (in NSW before 1902 if the parents of a child were not married, the child was registered under the mother's name and the father was not recorded) but I'm not sure why they wouldn't have married before the birth to avoid the stigma of illegitimacy.  The only reason I can come up with is that John didn't turn 21 until May 1897 and maybe his parents wouldn't give permission to marry, and then something prevented marriage in the weeks before the birth. Sadly Richard died in January 1898, and was buried under the name Graham.

Christina and John went on to have two more sons John Robert (b. 1901) and Ernest Francis (b.1904).
John married Alice Dunn in 1926 in Sydney, and they had two children Ernest and Joan.  Joan married Charles Blizard in 1954, and Rohan Blizard, the professional golfer is her grandson.

John Graham died in 1947 in Sydney and Christina died in 1949 also in Sydney.