Hi folks:
This was originally posted on the Fife board, and I was advised to post on this one instead.
The McRitchie family were smallholders, ferrymen, boat owners, sailors and innkeepers in North Queensferry, Scotland, for over 200 yrs. Alexander McRitchie married Helen Walwood in 1687 but by 1901 only Alexander b. May 1842 was left. In 1821 James McRitchie married Janet Turnbull who died at the age of 36 after they had three daughters Christina, Margaret and Janet.
In January 1848 Christina and Margaret left for Australia. The State Library of Victoria has a letter written by Christina to her father giving a fascinating picture of the voyage.
"Dear Father, We are happy to inform you of our safe arrival in Melbourn(e) on May 16th. We had a good passage, a good Captain, a doctor and officers with temperate sailors. We intended keeping a journal but our part of the ship being so dark many day we could not see. Their was nothing of speaking about ... There was some children died but none of the old people died. It would have been a great deal worse if there had been but the children were never much minded."
The girls left N Queensferry on Jan 8 1848 and embarked on the barque William Stewart at Plymouth on January 25. There were 234 emigrants on the voyage which took 111 days. And we thought 22 hours on the Jumbo to New Zealand was hard going!!
Please can anyone suggest any way to trace Christina and Margaret McRitchie after they landed in Australia and took up servants' posts with a Mr and Mrs Brown? Christine appears twice in the Victoria online list of assisted immigrants but her name is misspelt as McRitchey, I can find no further mention using either spelling.
