James CHAMBERS II [19337]

  General Notes:

Biographical Index of South Australia database
Surname:CHAMBERS
Given Names:James
Parents:Jas. & Cath. nee REDIN
Life Information:Birth 7.5.1839 SA. Death 22.5.1893 Pt Elliot SA. Religion C/E.
Occupation:Farmer
Residence:Pt Elliot
Spouse(s):Emily
Children:With Emily: Emily (c1867-1961), Jas. (c1877-1919).
Rec Type:Main
SNcode:BISA1

  Research Notes:

The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1889 - 1931) Tue 16 Jan 1900 Page 6
AN OLD COLONIST'S STORY.
To the Editor.
Sir -I send you a line or two with reference to my arrival and landing at Holdfast Bay in June, 1839. We came by the ship Hooghly, and our landing was attended with considerable danger, for the long-boat in which the emigrants' goods were packed was overloaded, so that at every lurch of the boat she shipped water over the gunwale. I remember Captain Bailey warning the chief officer who had charge of the loading of the boat that she was being overloaded. The officer's reply was very characteristic. He said, "I will send them all to the devil, and go with them myself." He went with us, for he steered the captain's gig, which had the long-boat in tow. That boat was also as full of passengers as it could hold. There were some men on board the long-boat who were intently watching the action of the boat, and trying to prevent the water from coming over the side. The captain stood on the poop, watching, till we touched the shore, and immediately we did so the boat heeled over on her side, the consequence being that the whole of our goods were saturated with salt water. This was to us a great loss, for we were so liberally supplied with food on board that my father had saved a good amount of biscuit, oatmeal, and the like, which would have been of great value at the time, but which was afterwards only fit for pig's food. To save our belongings the men had to work the whole of that night, and in the meantime we youngsters had to be stowed away as best our parents could manage. My first night in the colony was passed in a stack of native grass that had been cut on Kangaroo Island, and brought over to the Glenelg Beach. It was almost my last night as well as the first, for all the sailors decamped directly the boat got ashore to a sly-grog shop just over the sandhills, and the chief officer, Leshaw, and the boatswain, after a vain attempt to induce them to return to duty, came back to the beach. The hay stack being in their line of travel, and they being three sheets in the wind, they rolled right on the spot where I was covered with the grass, and only for my good lungs attracting my father's attention it would have been the last of me, as considerable difficulty was experienced in pulling me from under the men, who were too senseless to move. Next day my father and a person named Anthony thought it best to remove us to Emigration-square, and on our way up I first saw the blacks, who were camped at or near the Black Forest. I am, &c.,
JOHN THORPE Kangrarilla. P.S.-The haystack of which I wrote belonged to Mr. James Chambers.

James married Emily [19340] [MRIN: 7110]. (Emily [19340] was born circa 1842 and died on 19 Jan 1918 in Port Elliot, South Australia.)