UNCLAIMED LETTERS
Images courtesy of Pixabay
We take for granted the relative ease of communication that we have today...not so back in 1849. It's hard to imagine that in January alone there were hundreds of unclaimed letters... how many loved ones thought they were forgotten... or missed hearing family news, good or bad? Were there lost inheritances, unclaimed by the date required... were there newborns in the family, who were never acknowledged... were messages sent in the hope of having loved ones 'get home in time'...
Then again, I guess some deliberately avoided collecting mail. That way they could say that they knew nothing of whatever was being sent to them... convenient at times.
These lists are interesting in so many ways... not just for finding a long searched for name, then wondering howe to trace it to a discovery, but for the very vague addresses..not many street numbers, often no streets...
Some were sent to ships ..did Captain Alder of the brig "Julia Percy" ever get his mail I wonder. What about William Barnes, blacksmith... who was needing to contact him?
Maybe James Bradick, wheelwright of Glebe, never did get that order. Someone trying to contact E. Fanning, Esquire, music teacher, might never have found the right note...
Convicts had mail waiting, some with ticket of leave.. one man is listed as formerly of Dublin... there could have been quite a number that fitted that criteria.
In reality, even today, there is always quite a lot of undelivered mail for one reason and another. While researching, I have been able to trace my husband's great grandfather around NSW and Qld, but even that hasn't provided the answer as to where and when he died... I live in hope.
Do let us know in comments if you can claim, or hope to, any of the people listed here. Maybe someone else is searching for the same person... and can fill in some gaps for you, which is the whole reason that I create these posts...
New South Wales Government Gazette (Sydney, NSW : 1832 - 1900), Friday 9 February 1849 (No.21 National Library of Australia http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article230364437
