A couple of months ago, as I was scrolling through the catalogue of the SLNSW and guided more by a hunch than anything else, I decided to look at the two volumes of Greville’s Official Post Office directories, published in 1872 and 1876 and held by the Mitchell Library in Sydney.
Why? Well, I was hoping to find a record of Joseph Wilkes’ son in it.
I already knew that Jeremiah Wilkes had got himself into a spot of bother around that time, and I knew he was hauled before a court in Orange in NSW for that reason.
Young Jeremiah had stupidly, but unfortunately also illegally, performed a wedding service for a young love couple, without being qualified to do so.
This took place at the home of a Mrs Icely in a place called Goimbla, near Orange in NSW.
Would I be able to find a reference to Jerry and Mrs Icely in this post office directory?
I was also checking if I could find any references to two other men.
One was William or James Lynch, who was Joseph Wilkes’ nemesis; the other was Thomas Carew, the brother of Joseph Wilkes’ wife. I was curious to see if perhaps these men were still alive and living in NSW somewhere at the time. And I was also curious to see who still lived in the places where Wilkes had once lived and moved around.
So I went to the beautiful Mitchell Library to look at these directories. By mistake, but to my delight, I had been issued the hardcopy volumes, rather than the microfilm copies.
I always get excited when I can look at original material rather than microfilm or electronic records. Original records are just so much more real and they kind of take you back to the time the records were created.
Something that surprised me was just how well preserved the colours of the 1876 volume were – you’d never think these pages are 150 years old, right?
I initially only looked up and imaged the place names I had on my list. I couldn’t find anyone called Wilkes, Lynch, Carew or Icely.
But I couldn’t let it go. I had a feeling that I should go through the entire 1872 volume at least, place name by place name. So I literally turned page after page looking for these names in each listed location.
Needless to say, it was tedious. There were a few people called Lynch, but none were William or James, there were hardly any Wilkes, with or without an e, and even fewer Carews. But then, suddenly, I struck gold.
I saw the pretty unique name Icely, under the place name Murga. I couldn’t find a Wilkes in this volume under that place name, but when I checked the later volume from 1876, there were the Icelys again, and… Jeremiah Wilks, spelt without an e – but it could only be Joseph Wilkes’ son.
How exciting! I know, this is just a small piece of the puzzle, only a tiny bit of evidence confirming a person at a place and time, but it all helps paint the bigger picture.
