The Family of James Sproule of Grennan and Ann Irwin/Irvine

Written by Jo McCoy 

Time to introduce myself as Jo McCoy from Melbourne - a big fan of Kate’s Sproule Genealogy blog and grateful recipient of hers and others’ research.

My husband Rowan’s great great grandfather was James Sproule (1810-1884) of Greenan and Wellington. James was the son of John Sproule (1785-1853) and Elizabeth Wallace and potentially the grandson of a Hugh Sproule and a Ms Houston. [1] [2] [3]

Jack Elder's tree showing James,
son of Hugh Sproule

It seems that based on the Sproule DNA Project research that Hugh may in turn have been the grandson of Cornet Andrew Spreull, but I’d love to get some YDNA evidence from James’ line to confirm that. Maybe there’s a distant male cousin with the right mutations.  Stick with me to the end of this story to see some surprising prospects for who we might ask to take the test!

James Sproule married Ann Irwin/Irvine, daughter of James Irwin and Isabelle Osborne on 13 June 1837 when he was about 26 and she 20.  Sadly, Ann died quite young in around 1853, leaving behind seven children aged between 3 and 13. [4]

James emigrated to Australia not long after, arriving in Melbourne on the Oliver Lang in September 1854, with his two eldest sons George 14 and James 12.  The five youngest children were left behind with family friends (more on that later) while James Snr established himself in the colonies.  It’s only recently come to light though that there was more than one brother at home in Greenan – thanks to some great pointers from fellow Sproule researcher in Australia – Robyn Ritchie.  According to our branch of the oral family history, James Snr’s plan had been to head to Yackandandah with is three sons in the Victorian goldfields, close to where many of his wife’s Irvine relatives had already established a home for themselves at Osborne’s Flat. Quite why there was no apparent knowledge of the other siblings is a mystery which is yet to be unravelled.

We now know that James’ older brother John Sproule had emigrated to Australia in 1841 and sponsored at least three of his siblings to arrive in New South Wales over the next four decades, but not James. Who knows why James chose to stick with the Irvine side of the family?

James’ younger children did eventually all make their way to Australia, but little is known about many of them or their relationship with their father. James Snr died in Wellington, New Zealand as a very wealthy businessman in 1884 but his executors were still advertising to try to find three of the children some four years later. 

Son David Robert and youngest daughter Margaret inherited the bulk of his considerable estate following provision for his second wife, Eleanor Hollywood (nee Jennet) whom he had married in New Zealand in 1868 and his stepdaughter Emma. It appears James Snr was unsure of the circumstances of many of his children in Australia and perhaps America at the time of his death. Please feel free to examine this line on my Tatchell Summons tree on Ancestry and let me know if you can add anything to the story or correct any errors.

It’s with James’ second son, named after his father, that the story comes ‘closer to home’ for our family.  James Jnr had been sent to be an overseer at Momalong – an Osborne family property in southern New South Wales when he turned 20 in around 1860.  This was soon after two of his younger siblings – Thomas and Ann Eliza, arrived in Melbourne. James Snr migrated to New Zealand in 1965.

While the Osbornes ultimately sold Momalong, James Jnr became the manager and was reportedly earning £500 a year, a small fortune, by the time of his marriage in 1875.  James’ English bride, Mary Brodie Smith, was a governess at a nearby property and 14 years his junior. Mary, known as Polly, was born in Lancashire but had migrated to Melbourne as a four-year-old and grew up in Ballarat.

James Jnr and Polly had six daughters and two sons all bearing the middle name St George. The Rev Henry Lucas St George had been the rector at the Dromore Presbyterian Church, a few miles from the farmlands at Greenan.  Apparently, James and some, perhaps all, of his siblings had been taken in by the St Georges after his mother died while James Snr was organising his travel to Australia.  The story goes that incorporating the St George name for each of his children 20 plus years later was James’ way of expressing how grateful he was for the kindness shown to him as a child.

James and Polly Sproule with their five eldest children
at Momalong in southern NSW in the late 1880s.

The growing family left Momalong and the pastoral life behind in 1892 and moved south to Melbourne – ostensibly for the children’s education, but there had been a terribly hot summer of bushfires the year before. They built a grand home in the suburb of Kew which was named Chatto after Polly’s mother’s family.  Some years earlier, James had also purchased significant acreage at Flinders on the Mornington Peninsula and it was there that the family enjoyed a country retreat named Palafia for many years to come.

James’ and Polly’s fifth daughter, Viva St George Sproule was my husband’s grandmother. One of Melbourne’s first female medical graduates of the early 1900s, she married Dr Walter Summons in 1909. His family lived near the Sproules in Kew and coincidentally also had property in Flinders.  We are lucky enough to now have our own holiday home there, named Little Chatto, originally owned by Viva’s sister Florrie.

It is to the descendants of Viva’s brother, the third James in this line, that we must look to for that YDNA evidence. James St George Sproule, known as Jim, was born at Chatto in Melbourne in October 1893, the last of James’ and Polly’s eight children. Like many young Australians of his generation, he joined the AIF when war broke out and found himself at Gallipoli and later on the Western Front. He was awarded an MC in 1917 for "behaving with great gallantry at the taking of Vimy Ridge."

While recovering from injuries at various stages throughout the war, Jim had spent much of his time in Hertfordshire at the home of his mother’s Chatto cousins. Andrew Chatto (1840-1913) was the publisher of Chatto and Windus fame – his family circumstances provide lots of interest for genealogists to ponder over too. Look for him in the censuses from 1871-1891 for some eye-opening living arrangements.

As the photo below from 1901 shows, Jim’s older siblings had been visiting the Chattos in England for decades – well before the war.  

Hillside Hertfordshire 1901 - the Chatto home at Elstree. Standing L to R: Walter St G Sproule, Miss Patten and Mr White (neighbours), Andrew Chatto, Dorothy Chatto, Horace Brocklesby Seated: Helen Leyborn (Chatto), Katherine Chatto, Andrew Chatto Snr, Isabel Brocklesby (nee Chatto), May St G Sproule Front: Josephine Chatto (Fleming), Gladys Chatto (Sproule), Phyllis Brocklesby

In mid-1918, Jim married his second cousin Gladys Muriel Chatto, and soon afterwards brought her home to Australia and the family compound at Flinders. Gladys was unhappy though and pined for her old life back in England to where they returned in 1920. Their eldest son Thomas Chatto St George Sproule was born at Elstree in 1922.  This is the line where the YDNA takes an interesting journey.

Thomas went on to become an actor who used the stage name Tom Chatto. It would be fabulous if one of the Chatto boys from this family or their paternal male cousins would come forward for YDNA tests so that we can confirm the Sproule origins of this family and see whether their elusive ancestor, Hugh Sproule of Greenan was in fact a grandson of Cornet Andrew.

 

References:

[1] Death of John Sproule - "SPROULE. At Grannan, parish of Dromore, on the 11th inst., MR. JOHN SPROULE, in the 75th year of his age." Londondonderry Sentinel

[2]  Death record of James Sproule 1 Dec 1884, Ancestry.com. Australia, Death Index, 1787-1985 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

[3]John Sproule and Elizabeth Wallace are confirmed as being the parents of James Sproule through his death cert in Wellington, which reads, "District of Wellington,  1 Dec 1884 James Sproule, age 75 Gentleman, Father John Sproule, Mother Elizabeth Wallace, farmer,  buried 3 Dec 1884 Wellington, Religion Presbyterian,  19 years in Ireland Married 26 years before in Wellington to Anne Irvine, and 6 years to Eleanor Hollywood." Thanks to Robyn Ritchie for this.

[4] James Sproule and Anne Irwin were married on 13th June 1837  "Married James Sproul son of John Sproule and Elizabeth Sproule alias Wallace of Grannan Parish of Dromore to Anne Irwin daughter of James Irwin and Isabella Irwin alias Osborne of Letterbuoy Parish of Magheracross, Witnesses Robert Sproule and Charles Stevenson"  from PRONI Ref MIC/1P/247, thanks to Robert Williams, Ulster Ancestry

[5] Dromore Church Records births,  PRONI Film # MIC.1P/247 (PRONI = Public Records Office of Northern Ireland), transcribed by Kate Tammemagi

The children of James Sproule and Ann Irwin:

GEORGE SPROULE 12 Jul 1838 (baptism date) in Aughadara, Dromore, Co Tyrone, Ireland (Dromore Church Record). He died in 1895 in Prince Alfred Hospital, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

JAMES SPROULE  07 Mar 1840 (baptism date) in Ederney Hill, Dromore, Tyrone, Ireland (Dromore Church Record). He died on 17 Feb 1912 in Kew, Victoria, Australia. He married Mary Brodie (Polly) Smith on 22 Dec 1875 in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia. She was born on 05 Jun 1854 in Chorlton, Lancashire England. She died on 06 Feb 1936 in Flinders, Victoria, Australia.

ANN ELIZA SPROULE was born about 1844 in Grennan, Dromore, Tyrone, Ireland.

WALLACE SPROULE 02 Dec 1844 (baptism date) in Dromore, Parish of Dromore (Dromore Church Record). He died before 1884 in Momalong Station, New South Wales, Australia.

THOMAS SPROULE was baptised on 01 Aug 1847 in Dromore, Parish of Dromore.

ROBERT DAVID SPROULE was baptised 31 Oct 1849 in Dromore, Parish of Dromore. He died in 1880 in Honolulu County, Hawaii, USA.

MARGARET ISABELLA SPROULE was born on 06 Jun 1851 in Grennan, Dromore, Tyrone,  Ireland. She died on 12 Mar 1939 in Wellington, New Zealand. She married (1) CAPT THOMAS WILLIAM SMITH on 10 Dec 1877 in Napier, Hawke's Bay, New Zealand. He was born on 02 Dec 1848 in Auckland, New Zealand. He died on 08 Feb 1879 in Napier, Hawke's Bay, New Zealand. She married (3) MAX BOLLINGER in 1884 in New Zealand. He was born on 13 Sep 1848 in Zivil, Altenkirchen, Pfalz, Bavaria. He died on 14 Nov 1917 in Khandallah, Wellington, New Zealand.