HELP!! me find great-grandfather John Robert Davis-emigrated to Australia 1800s

[sparrett]

Yes, that's the document I referred to Annbee.

I was in Beechworth only 2 weeks ago and there is still huge evidence of the goldmining days there. Very evident in the investment in public buildings.
A lovely town.

If Ernest grew up and learnt his Chinese language from an early childhood in the  Asian community there, I wonder whether he only started using the surname DAVIS when he left the district.

When is the first sighting of him away from the district?
Was it something mentioned in Melbourne?

Sue

[Annbee]

If this is the same John Davis who hopped on a boat with Johanna and the kids - I think they came over later than 1866 but I'll go have to check that again.

Katorama, yes they arrived 1868 from memory. Neale suggested perhaps a son John came out on an earlier ship and so I looked for other Davises in the Beechworth area prior to '68. The earliest mention of John Davis is 1866 when he applies for land. Sorry, I attached the briefer article in earlier post.

Here I am attaching the main link to Trove, a fabulous free library resource for Australia.

https://trove.nla.gov.au/

Enter the search term like this: "John Davis" +Tarrawingee +single (if on computer use side menu to whittle it down further by states & decades)

And this is the shortcut to the article: https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/198659284

Re. your family's oral history that John Robert Davis owned a pub (which in the mid to late 1800s in Australia can be taken to meaning you gained an alcohol license and served drinks in your front room of your two roomed cottage): it doesn't seem that the Beechworth John Davis who died in 1871 and was already ill in 1870 had a lot of time to set up a pub. But you could search in Trove to see if he was granted a liquor licence, it was often published. Perhaps you'll even find another John Davis somewhere else running a liquor establishment. 

[Annbee]

James R Davis who died so tragically young at 32:
"Sudden Death at Harrietville. — News has been received in Beechworth that Mr James Davis,  the well-known miner, and part proprietor of the Jackass Reef, at Harrietville, dropped dead in the public street in that township on Wednesday. No particulars of the sad occurrence are yet to hand."
(Trove see sparrett's link earlier)

In reading his wife's probate statement, a phrase leapt out at me, I haven't come across it before (and I must have read a hundred or more wills by now). James's wife states that "the deceased left... this deponent (the wife) and 2 children... who are his only next of kin entitled by law to share in his (the deceased's) property". It may be just be a careful lawyer - or it may be a smoking gun... IF James were a contender to be Ernest's father, it means James was 19ish if Ernest was born 1872 ish.

The term 'lawful children' was used at the time to denote legitimate births.

[Neale1961]

There are birth regos for James’ 2 “lawful” children. Denis in 1881 and Mary Jane  in 1884.

[Maiden Stone]

As has been mentioned by Neale, you should purchase the death certificate of the John DAVIS who died in 1871.

I'm doing that tonight!

Update - here it is

Place of birth Clare, Ireland.
Marriage column: Where married, at what age & to whom: Ireland, 21, Joannah Hogan.
Issue column: Issue in order of birth, their names & ages: John 27, James 22, Denis 19, Margret?

1st death at top of page was a Chinese miner who had also died in the hospital for the insane.   

[katorama]

I have been looking at the DAVIS family, particularly James and John who were the sons of John who died in the Asylum.

by 1887 yield from the Fiddley  Didd (whatever reef ) Harrietville was huge.   
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/198227507

There was a large income provided to the brothers through it.
James Davis of the FDD reef 1879
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/200194884

The news items about them list the mine's  frequent donations to the Beechworth Asylum.
Their father was only there for a matter of months before his death and seems to have arrived in a very bad state.  One wonders where he had been living till then.  There is a feeling that he was "not owned"

James died suddenly in 1885
 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/200578772

Intestate. And Notice of Claims outstanding in the estate to be sent to John
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/200577905

James Death notice.  Aged 32
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/6073900

A letter to the paper from John DAVIS states the mine sold to a man currently in England for an enormous price  by 1887
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/197452774



The probate file for James DAVIS and the will and Probate for brother John DAVIS who died in Melbourne can be viewed here
https://prov.vic.gov.au/explore-collection/explore-topic/wills-and-probates

There is never a mention of Ernest DAVIS.

Though one speculates that Ernest was apparently well-educated (the finances of this family would make such a thing possible I suppose ), BUT school subjects did not include Chinese  language or Japanese language at that time.

Possibly Latin and French would be on a school curriculum.
Sue

Thank you for this - it's all great information. 

It looks as if the Davis family was fairly prosperous - John Sr was a farmer, had come over from Ireland a year or two before he had to be institutionalized ("brain fever" was a generic term used for several specific disorders that we know as viral encephalitis, meningitis etc) .  It also indicated some sort of emotional upset or triggering event. So it's hard to put together what led him to be institutionalized.

He may have come over to Australia to get settled and purchase land, so that he had a plan for his family coming over to an area that was probably a lot like the American West/gold rush days.
There were programs for British people to come over while given land rights which I can look into later. 

The essential component missing here is a link to Ernest.  We have never been able to figure that piece out.  He may have been adopted into the family as an orphan, or illegitimate, or the son of a servant/farm worker taken in by the family.  He may have had a falling out with them, or perhaps they gave him a little money to go out on his own.  There are records of an Ernest Davis in newspapers who got into trouble for stealing a pig, drunkeness, other random things.

Some records have an Ernest Davis in the Melbourne area.  There is also a John Robert Davis in that area, who was a shoemaker, had a shop, and went bankrupt.  There is no record of a direct tie to Ernest, other than there are newspaper clips with each of them being in the same general area at roughly the same time.  This Ernest then seems to head north, and has a couple of jobs in the Townsville/Cairns area, then shows up as a shopkeeper in Innisfail.  Again, no direct tie to John Robert but has some consistency with what we know.  He may have gone to college or a secondary school in that area and learned some languages.

[katorama]

As has been mentioned by Neale, you should purchase the death certificate of the John DAVIS who died in 1871.

I'm doing that tonight!

Update - here it is

Place of birth Clare, Ireland.
Marriage column: Where married, at what age & to whom: Ireland, 21, Joannah Hogan.
Issue column: Issue in order of birth, their names & ages: John 27, James 22, Denis 19, Margret?

1st death at top of page was a Chinese miner who had also died in the hospital for the insane.   

So this ticks off the boxes of a father named John who was born in Ireland who had a son named James who lived in the Beechworth area.

[katorama]

Yes, that's the document I referred to Annbee.

I was in Beechworth only 2 weeks ago and there is still huge evidence of the goldmining days there. Very evident in the investment in public buildings.
A lovely town.

If Ernest grew up and learnt his Chinese language from an early childhood in the  Asian community there, I wonder whether he only started using the surname DAVIS when he left the district.

When is the first sighting of him away from the district?
Was it something mentioned in Melbourne?

Sue

Yes - the name "Ernest Davis" doesn't begin to show up in newspapers, etc until the 1880's - there are random reports of theft, as a witness to an accident - things like there.  The first notable report I have seen shows him in Queensland as a victim of an accident in a slaughter house.

My father used to entertain us with a story about his father working in a slaughterhouse.  We were at that age where kids love blood and guts so he'd tell us a rather graphic story about it.  He would be admonished by my stepmother for talking about these things to children and at the dinner table.

[katorama]

Of course we have no idea if this Davis family is anyway related, but Ernest’s father could quite easily have been either son - John or James.

More speculation:- Since Ernest knew Chinese and Japanese well enough to be an interpreter, it is possible he grew up speaking these languages. Even though he may not have known his mother and his father died when he was young, perhaps he was taken in & raised by relatives in the Asian community in the Beechworth area. There is obviously a link to the Chinese shop owner in Innisfail.

DNA might be an avenue to pursue.

We have DNA from my brother (Ernest's grandson), myself, and my nephew.  We also have a test from one of my male cousins.  I believe it's paternal haplotype 0-M188;

It means that the all male line goes back thousands of years to a man who was O-M188, most probably in Taiwan, or at least that's how it was explained to me.

For some reason, most of the DNA relatives (third cousins or fourth cousins mostly) come up as sharing male haplotype with my mother's side of the family.  There is one who shares DNA with my father's side.  My nephew is trying to contact him to see what might be there.

There was a lot of turmoil in China contributing to conditions - wars between France and Japan and the fall of the Qing dynasty.  There was also an economic depression in Australia.