Sarah Chandler

341

Maureen Withey on 9th April 2022

Colonial Secretary Index. CHANDLER, Sarah. Per "Friendship", 1818. 1818 Jan 14 On list of persons on board "Friendship" (Reel 6047; 4/1740 p.66) 1819 Feb 18 On list of prisoners sent to Newcastle per "Lady Nelson" (Reel 6006; 4/3499 p.325) 1822 Jul 22 Servant to Captain King; to be sent to Port Macquarie for seven years. On return of proceedings of the Bench of Magistrates, Parramatta (Fiche 3297; X643 p.21) 1822 Jul 30 On lists of prisoners transported to Port Macquarie per "Lady Nelson" (Reel 6019; 4/3864 pp.2, 364-5) --------------------------------------------------- List of Eleven prisoners transported to Port Macquarie on board H.M. C. Brig Lady Nelson, and their sentences, 30 July 1822. Sarah Chandler, convicted by the Bench at Parramatta, 23 July 1822, 7 years, per Friendship (2) Original conviction, Radnor Gt Sessions, April 1817, Life.

116

Tony Beale on 2nd November 2021

New South Wales, Australia, Colonial Secretary’s Papers, 1788-1856 Main Series of Letters Received, 1788-1826 - names of convicts with their characters during the voyage from London to New South Wales on the transport ship Friendship. pp 6597 to 6605 Quiet

105

Denis Pember on 4th October 2017

It would seem that Sarah may have been remarried in her old age. There is a marriage recorded in 1827. Name: Sarah Chandler Spouse Name: Dennis Morrow Marriage Date: 1827 Marriage Place: New South Wales Registration Place: Parramatta, New South Wales Registration Year: 1827 Volume Number: V Denis Morrow was a transported Irish convict, Transported in 1823 on "Archduke Charles". He would have been at least 62 when married and Sarah must have been about 54. Unfortunately these details are very difficult to verify since Sarah did not fill in everything on the 1828 census. Page 276.... [Ref M3214] Morrow, Denis, 64, TL, Archduke Charles, Tailor, Pitt Town. [Ref M3215] Morrow, Sarah, 55, GS (no further details). However, in appendix 1 there is a mention that her surname was also Chandler.

Sarah Chandler was the most celebrated of the 65 Radnorians, including 9 women, transported to Australia between 1788 and 1852. In 1814 Chandler was found guilty of altering three Kington Bank one pound notes and sentenced to death, Judge George Hardinge being unmoved by the fact that the 37 year old forger was pregnant and had seven children under the age of ten - Hardinge of course had also sentenced poor Mary Morgan to the gallows. Chandler's plight excited a good deal of sympathy in Radnorshire. She was described as "a very jolly good looking woman" and her husband Thomas Chandler of Dolley, Presteigne was said to have kept her short of money and to have treated her cruelly. The hangman was cheated however when Chandler's brothers managed to effect her escape from Presteigne jail in August 1814, she was not recaptured until she was discovered in Birmingham more than two years later. Petitions on Sarah's behalf were subsequently received from many leading citizens, including the High Sheriff and the owners of the Kington Bank. Hardinge's recommendation that she should nonetheless hang was overturned and in 1817 she sailed for New South Wales to commence a life sentence. All this is well known, but an article in the Northern Star of 1845 provides some further interesting information on Sarah Chandler's background. It seems that Sarah was a member of a notorious family from Bugeildy called Bowen. A family whom the Star claimed lived mainly by plunder and were a terror to the neighbourhood. The article was prompted by the fact that five members of the clan languished at that time in Presteigne jail for various offences. The exact relationships are a little confused but seem to include Sarah's brothers Francis and William and William's son William Bowen Jones held for theft, Francis' son Francis jnr and his wife Ann were also being held for transportation for sheep stealing. A few months before Sarah's son Richard Chandler and her 16 year old nephew Morgan Bowen had been transported for shearing a flock of sheep and selling the fleeces in Newtown. Another of Sarah's sons, Peter, had already been transported in 1824. I don't know what happened to Sarah in Australia. Her brother Francis died in Melbourne in 1853, his wife surviving until 1876. Young Morgan the shearer lived on until 1902.