Hi everyone. First up, let me say thanks for all the resources listed on your site, several of them have been quite useful!
Now, I'm missing both ends of life for Miss Legass. This is what I know about her:
- living in Sutton Forest at time of marriage, age 24, married in the Anglican county chapel, county Camden, 1834.
- Marriage certificate states that she is free.
- No suitable birth certificates for Margarets with L surnames in 1809, 1810 or 1811 in NSW.
- No named passengers of that name prior to 1834 in the oz ships's index.
- Not on claim a convict site, possible substitute names are Legatt, Leggett, Lawless, Loveless.
- Traceable on the sands directory 1859 - 1866. They lived in Surry Hills during this time.
- Husband was John COFFEY (early spelling Coffee), he was in the Buff regiment and stayed on when they left Australia. He appears to have claimed land in Uringalla near Wingello in 1835 per a gazette notice.
- There are about 4 Margaret Coffeys marrying from 1861, when Mr Coffey died, to 1900. No Legasses.
I realize there may not be much more to find out, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on any further information I could get.
- Does 'free' on the Marriage cert indicate whether she was born free or a convict who was freed?
- Possible last names, this seems to be an obvious Anglicization. Perhaps most likely would be french Lagasse and variants? Someone else tells me that Legassick appears in the dictionary of British & Irish surnames. There was also a Lagace family established in Lower Canada, is this a possible connection?
- Any clues on whether she remarried or where she died, the family stayed in Sydney for the next generation, as far as I'm aware
