During the mid 19th century as many Tin and Copper mines closed down in Cornwall the Cornish people migrated to all corners of the globe in search of employment in mines, infact there is a common saying in Cornwall that "a mine is a hole anywhere in the world with at least one Cornishman at the bottom of it!" It is estimated that 250,000 Cornish migrated abroad between 1861 and 1901.
My own great great grandfather Robert Stickland left Cornwall in the mid 1840's to work as a boilermaker and engineer in the industrial midlands of England, I was also interested to discover what happened to his siblings.
Through Ancestry.com I came in contact with a distant 'cousin' living in Australia who was also busy with her family tree and we discovered that she was descended from William Stickland the younger brother of Robert, who had emigrated to Australia in the mid 1850's, after arriving in Australia he married a Cornish girl and they had four daughters, his second daughter was given the name Grace Morsehead Stickland after my great,great,great grandmother, confirming the fact that we had the right William Stickland. My distant 'cousin' in Australia has also done a DNA test and I was pleased to discover her name among my DNA matches, confirming biologically our distant relationship.
One of Robert's sisters,Wilmot Stickland, married and travelled with her first husband to California during the time of the Gold Rush, their eldest child was born in California but after finding their fortune they returned to Cornwall, her story can be read in one of my previous blogs.
Robert's youngest brother Richard Arundel Stickland died at the age of 14 after a fall from the mast of a schooner in the port of Hayle. That left one brother unaccounted for, John Stickland who was born a year later than Robert in 1829. On the 1851 census aged 21 he is recorded as still living with his parents and his occupation is recorded as being a copper miner. In the summer of 1851 I found a record of a marriage between a John Stickland and Eliza Treglown but in 1862 Eliza was living in Norfolk and was married to someone else, her marriage certificate declared that she was a widow, so I assumed that John had died, though I couldn't find any record of his death.
Then my DNA test results came back, Ancestry 's results give you a list of possible relatives, people who share a small part of your DNA, recording how many segments, according to how close the relationship is.
Ancestry also shares a list of surnames which you have in common and places where your ancestors lived. One of my DNA matches shared the name Strickland and looking at his tree I saw that he had a John Strickland born around 1830 and living in Australia close to the area where William Stickland, Robert's brother lived. The only thing was that on this person's tree he had recorded that John was born in Australia and had a different father. After doing genealogical research for more than 40 years I know that family trees are not always correct, infact I have had mistakes in my own which I have discovered later after more research and after more information becomes available. I decided to check all the documents which were available about this John Stickland/Strickland and discovered the following facts that convinced me that this is my long lost John Stickland, brother of Robert.
First of all in August 1854 a John Stickland arrived in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, in October 1857 he was initiated as a Freemason in Beechworth, Victoria, his occupation was recorded as being a miner. In 1863 and in 1864 he fathered two daughters though he didn't actually marry their mother until 25 November 1864 (could this have been because he was still legally married to his first wife in England?)
On his marriage certificate he is also recorded as being a miner and as final proof I found a copy of his daughter Maria Strickland's birth certificate on which it records her father's birthplace as being Cornwall! Also an interesting fact is that the area around where some of John's children where born is often referred to as the Cornish settlement.
John had a total of 10 children and passed away in 1908 at the age of 78.
One of his sons, also named John, and also like his father and grandfather, a miner, fought during the First World War in Gallipoli. During one of the battles he was severally injured and was sent to England to recover. His vision was so impaired he was unable to return to active service, but during his stay in England he met and married his wife and resided for a short time in Dorset, very close to his ancestral home of Cornwall.
Without the help of the DNA test I probably never would have found out about John Stickland/Strickland (like my great great grandfather he added an 'R' to his name) and now I have found a lot more 'cousins' in Australia.
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