Did Robert Sproule travel from either Jamaica or from Ireland in a sailing ship, go all the way to Australia in 1855, and then return all the way back to Ireland? This is the big question. Jane Thomas Sproule was married in Melbourne in January 1855, and her father was named as Robert Sproule, Planter, from Jamaica. Jane was married to James Ward in the house of Mr Sproule in Melbourne, Australia. Was this our Robert Sproule and was he actually there in Melbourne?
Timeline – when Robert is in Jamaica
So let’s look at
where Robert Sproule was during those years. We know that Robert is definitely
in Jamaica from at least 1829 to 1843. This is the timeline of what we know;
1829 Robert Sproule is in St George 28 June and registers one slave [1]
1836 Robert Sproule and Mary Ann Schouberg married in St George, 18 June 1836 [2]
1838 Robert registers Orange Vale, St George, Jamaica [3]
1839 Lieut. Robert Sproull is in the Militia, St George, Jamaica [4]
1843 – Robert’s son, Robert Sproule, is born in St George, 20 Nov 1842 [2]
So Robert Sproule is definitely in Jamaica in 1842 and now we
move to Ireland.
Timeline Robert in
Ireland 1845 - ?
We have in the 1st Strabane Presbyterian Baptism records, a second timeline, this time of Robert Sproule in Ireland.[5] We have
a list of five more of the children of Mary Ann Schouberg and Robert Sproule
with their dates of birth. The couple had a house in Bowling Green, Strabane, where
their cousins also lived at this time. This house eventually went to their son,
Andrew Schouberg Sproule, and when we look at the 1901 & 1911 Census for
that Bowling Green house, we find another child, his sister Jane Sproule.[6] That brings us to 6
children. The death of one more child,
Ann Jane, is recorded in the newspaper in 1851, making a total of 7 children;[7]
1845 Ireland, son James Sproule is born in Strabane on 5th April 1845
1847 Ireland, Andrew Schouberg Sproule is born in Strabane 20 July 1847
1849 Ireland, Samuel Angus Sproule born in Strabane 1 July 1849
1851 Ireland, Ann Jane Sproule born Strabane, Dec 1851, died 16 Apr 1853
1851 - Robert in the 1851 Jamaican Almanac as a magistrate, but is marked as ‘off island’
1854 Ireland daughter Margaret Matilda Sproule born in Strabane 9 Apr 1854
1857 Ireland daughter Marianne Sproule is born in Strabane 25 Oct 1856
1857 Jamaica Robert Sproule in St George is a magistrate in Jamaica, Jamaican Almanac
1860 Ireland - daughter Jane Sproule is born
1862 Ireland Robert Sproule dies in Mulvin, Tyrone, 24 May 1862 [8]
Now we have Robert's timeline, we know where he was at certain times. Can we fit in that trip to
Australia and back?
His daughter Marianne was born on 25 Oct 1857 in Strabane, so Robert
would have to be back for that child to be conceived. So we need him to be back in Ireland by Jan
1856. That means he has got a full year after the
wedding to return to Ireland, from Jan 1855 to Jan 1856.
It could be done – there is a window in Robert’s timeline, plenty of time to get from Ireland to
Australia, and back.
But … and here’s the
big ‘but’. Where was Jane Thomas Sproule? Where was the daughter? It is highly
unlikely that she was in Ireland. And if she were in Ireland, Robert could have married her off there, no need
to go to Australia at all.
If she were in Jamaica, Robert would have to travel to Jamaica, pick
Jane Thomas Sproule up, and somehow go on to Australia directly from Jamaica. But were there any ships to travel
on?
Were there Ships from Jamaica to Australia?
It has taken a bit of time to sort this question out. I could find no records of ships from Jamaica to Australia at all, and there was a good reason for that - there were none! None, that is, with the exception of just two. It was all sorted out in the end thanks to two ladies in Jamaican Genealogy Resources.[9] Narelle Maloney and Vilma Ruddock were able to point me at all records for shipping to Australia. However, it was Vilma who gave me that piece of gold that has all the answers that I needed. She gave me a fabulous article from the Jamaica Journal of 1976, written by Barry Higman, “Jamaicans in the Australian Gold Rush”. [10] The Australian 'Gold Rush' began in 1851 when gold was discovered in New South Wales and Victoria, and Melbourne was at the centre of it all.
There was great interest in this Gold Rush from Jamaican folk who were finding life very difficult at those times. The plantation ecomomy was collapsing and people who had been Overseers and Managers in the plantations were getting poor earnings or were jobless. In 1852 some gentlemen in Kinston saw an opportunity, and they chartered a ship to take these folk to Melbourne, the centre for the Gold Rush. Advertisements were placed throughout the island.
One ship sailed directly from Jamaica to Melbourne in September 1852, picking up passengers at
different stops in Jamaica, and then taking 5 months to reach Melbourne. A second ship sailed in April 1853 for Melbourne – and that is it. There were no more ships going directly from Jamaica to Australia either before this, or after this. There was no ship sailing to Australia in 1854 to take Robert and his daughter to Melbourne for a wedding.
So Robert Sproule definitely did not
travel to Australia from Jamaica in that window that we gave him to get there
and back in 1854. Could he have gone another route from Australia to Melbourne? Yes, it was possible
to go from Jamaica to New York and then to Australia – but that is so
complicated a trip for my Robert Sproule who was starting from Ireland,
that I don’t believe he would have done this.
What this means for me is that I now do not believe that the Mr Sproule in Melbourne was our Robert Sproule
from St George in Jamaica.
Indeed, being logical, why on earth would he do that? It
never made any sense that he would go all that way, and when I had found this large family in Strabane, it definitely made no sense.
Having eliminated that possibility, let’s look at the
alternatives.
The Alternatives
I still believe that Robert Sproule of Orange Vale and Mary
Ann Thomas are most likely the parents of Jane Thomas Sproule who was
married in Melbourne in 1855. So who was Mr Sproule in Melbourne?
1. The Imposter
One alternative that I looked at when I first learnt of Jane Thomas Sproule, was that 'Mr Sproule' in Melbourne could be a total imposter – a con man from Jamaica who had some reason to adopt the name and profile of Robert Sproule. I dismissed this at an early stage, and I still don’t believe it. James Ward and Jane Thomas Sproule gave their 3rd son the name Robert Sproule Ward. It gets very tortuous if you try to fit that fact into the ‘con man’ scenario, trust me!
2. A Paid Substitute
Was it possible that Robert Sproule had paid someone to take Jane Thomas Sproule to Australia, and to find a good husband for her? Yes, I believe this is possible. Jane was only 9 or 10 years old when Robert Sproule left Jamaica for Ireland. We don’t know anything about Jane. We don’t know where she was living in Jamaica and we don’t know who she was living with. Robert Sproule had maintained his interest in Jamaica, we know this from his registering as a magistrate in 1851 and 1857. It is very likely that he made some trips to Jamaica during those years, and he would have maintained contact with Jane.
Then comes the gold rush in Victoria in 1851 and the ships organised to go to Melbourne from Jamaica in 1852 and 1853. This is an opportunity for the family that Jane is living with to go to Melbourne and to seek their fortune. Perhaps Robert Sproule financed the trip for the family and provided finances to settle them into their life in Melbourne. So this family would go to Melbourne in 1852 or 1853, with Jane Thomas Sproule, who is by then 17 or 18. And Jane meets James Ward in Melbourne in 1854. That all sounds logical.
Except… Why would the person in Melbourne call himself ‘Mr Sproule’? Jane was married from the house of Mr Sproule in Melbourne. Why would the man in this family call himself ‘Mr Sproule’? If he had other children and a wife, they would have to all adopt the family name Sproule. Again, I have great difficulty making sense of that one.
3. The Paid Substitute is a Sproule
Could 'Mr Sproule' in Melbourne have been another Sproule? Yes, of course he could. I don't know of any document that said that 'Mr Sproule' was, in fact, Jane's father. My Australian informant just assumed that. He could have been another Sproule, he could even have been a Robert Sproule. I feel a bit like an Agatha Christie novel now. She was famous for leaving out a key clue, so that you really couldn’t really work out ‘who dun it'. I’ve left out a key clue - there is another Robert Sproule in Jamaica - but I honestly didn’t think he had anything to do with this story, and I didn’t want the story to drown in Robert Sproules once again!
The Other One
In the plantation of Spring Bank in 1837, there is another Robert Sproule living with his wife Ann. He appears in only one record, and that is the birth of their son, Robert Wynter Sproule, born on 5 Mar 1837. [3]
 |
| Birth Record of Robert Wynter Sproule, Familysearch.org |
This other Robert, we’ll call him Robert2, is living in Spring Bank in St Thomas in the East, which is owned by James Sproule of Stokes Hall and Mellmount. Normally I would say that Robert2 must be related to both James Sproule of Stokes Hall and to Robert in St George, but I do not know who he is. He is not a member of their extended Sproule clan - there are plenty of Roberts there but they all are accounted for. So this Robert2 in Spring Bank is either 1) a relative I don't know, or 2) a Sproule from another Tyrone Sproule family, or 3) he is another slave-born child of James Sproule who was not baptised.
There are no other records at all of this Robert2 in Jamaica,
either before 1837 or after 1837. There is no record of a marriage to Ann. If
we assume that her name is likely to be Ann Wynter, since the son was called Robert Wynter Sproule, then
that marriage had to have taken place in Jamaica – there are no Wynters in Tyrone.
Could Robert2 have been the father of Jane Thomas Sproule? The
only baptism of a Jane who fit our profile anywhere
in the area was a Jane Thomas, who was born in 1835 in Lowlayton. Lowlayton is
in the parish of St George. Robert2 was in Spring Bank in the parish St Thomas
in the East. I don’t believe he was the father of Jane Thomas Sproule. Robert
of Orange Vale, St. George is far more likely.
James Sproule of Stokes Hall and Mellmount had died in 1840
and Robert2, as his relative in Spring Bank, would then have been without his support. We don’t know where Robert2 is living in 1850, he could be in Ireland or
he could be in Jamaica. Either way, he may well have welcomed the opportunity
to make that trip to the gold rush in Australia in 1852 or 1853, with Jane
Thomas Sproule.
Conclusion
I am still convinced that Jane Thomas Sproule was
the daughter of Robert Sproule of Orange Vale and Mary Ann Thomas who married James Ward in Melbourne in 1855.
I honestly do not believe that Robert Sproule of Orange Vale
travelled to Australia. I do not believe that ‘Mr Sproule’ who had the house
where the Melbourne wedding took place, was, in fact Robert Sproule who was living in Strabane in Ireland at that time.
I believe it highly likely that ‘Mr Sproule’ in Melbourne
was another Sproule. It is possible that he was the Robert2 Sproule, who was in
Spring Bank. It is also possible that he was another Sproule, either from home or one who already lived in Australia.
Previous Posts in this Story
[1] Jamaica Almanac 1829, in Jamaican Family Search
[2] Jamaica, Church of England parish register transcripts; 1664-1880, Familysearch.org
[3] Jamaica Almanac 1838 Jamaican Family Search
[4] Jamaica Almanac 1839 Jamaican Family
[5] 1st Strabane Presbyterian Baptisms 1840-1851 and 1851 to 1863 transcribed by Jim Crabtree in https://www.cotyroneireland.com
[6] 1901 and 1911 Census in the National Archives of Ireland
[7] From an entry on 1 Apr 1851 in Londonderry Sentinel: "From teething, at Strabane, on the 26th ult., Ann Jane, daughter of Robert Sproule, Esq., late of Jamaica, aged 16 months.
[8] From the Londonderry Sentinel of 30 May 1862, “May 24, at Mulvin, Strabane, Robert Sproule, Esq., late of Jamaica, West Indies.”
[9] The timing of this trip is based on the Ainformation in the Immigration Museum of Australia
[10] Thank you ladies from Facebook Group, Jamaican Genealogy Resources, especially to their expert there, Vilma Ruddock
[11] “Jamaicans in the Australian Gold Rush” by Barry Higman,
Jamaica Journal, 1976, published in Kingston, by the Institute of Jamaica
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