MILLER, Kenneth

ISBN 978-1-922452-65-8 PAPERBACK

They Came on Royal Saxon

The Ware Family Story

John Ware, with his wife, Maria, had four children in England. He decided that he would give himself and his young family a better life. In 1841, John and his eldest three young children, Jane, James and Mary emigrated to Australia.

THEY CAME ON, ROYAL SAXON.

This book, not only describes the life of the Ware family, but how the contributed to the development of Victoria and how Victorian history developed around them. In fact, the Wares arrived in Australia so early, that it was before Victoria was even known by that name.

Melbourne was then in its infancy, and the “country all around the wildest bush, the abode of the black fellow and kangaroo.” John Batman and John Fawkner had only arrived a few years before and they and other notable figures in the history of Victoria, make an appearance in this story.

The Wares soon moved to the Western Districts pastoral region. This was a dark period of time in Victorian history with numerous aboriginal incursions and massacres. The Wares lived in the middle of this terrifying time.

John and his second wife, Sarah Dede, were married as Melbourne was gripped by gold fever. They lived on at least three farms situated in prime positions between Melbourne and the Mount Alexander goldfields.

One son and six daughters of John’s reached adulthood. Each one of them has an interesting story full of joys and trials.

John and his family worked hard to prosper and the family expanded and settled in areas right across Australia. The many hundreds of Ware descendants owe a great debt of gratitude to this pioneering family.

The book is a tribute to John Ware and his family.

About the Author

Ken lives in the beautiful Mandurang valley, on the outskirts of Bendigo, with his wife, Barb. Their self-built house is mudbrick, on 1.5 hectares of land and is surrounded by trees and birds. Ken and Barb have two daughters who both have three children.

Ken commenced teaching in Broadmeadows in 1975. He is currently the senior mathematics teacher at Victory Christian College in Bendigo. When he was able to go part time a few years ago he commenced researching his family history. One day he decided that the best way to collate all of the various anecdotes and documents that he had collected was to write it in book form. Since then, documenting his and Barb’s family stories has become an obsession. As of 2021, however, he still teaches. He has tried to retire a number of times but finds that he also loves teaching, mathematics and students too much.

STEWART, Geoffrey

ISBN 978-1-922527-40-0
PAPERBACK

The Silent Moon

The untold true story of Frank the poet.

Born in 1811 Francis Macnamara a.k.a Frank the Poet was by birth a member of an old and noble Irish family is mattered little under English rule. Frank was falsely accused of a Terry Alt crime and transported to Sydney. If his early life was ill fated his ‘tour to hell’ was to leave him with the choice of losing his soul or to fight against all tyranny.

Frank takes up the fight which leads him to participate in Australia’s  first ever Gold Escort Robbery and the disappearance of the ship the Madagascar, with the help of the infamous American Pirate Bully Hayes.

This is the untold and true story of a great Irish/Australian anti-hero.

DINNING, Suzanne

ISBN 978-1-922452-59-7
PAPERBACK

Ancestral Legends of Mount Stuart Station

I clearly remember my Mother’s words as we sat on the verandah one afternoon. “If only somebody would come, just to have somebody to talk to.” She had put down the socks she was darning and was looking longingly down the dusty, winding road in front of her. I was a child at the time and I shared her longing for somebody to come to break the monotony and loneliness.

This is the story of the people who established Mount Stuart Station in 1880 on barren land near Tibooburra in northwestern NSW. Working tirelessly through times of drought and isolation, the Thomson family established a successful sheep station that remained in the same family for 126 years. – Sue Dinning

HAMPSEY, Seàn

ISBN 978-1-922452-13-9
PAPERBACK

Savage Beginnings

The Violent Birth of Australia

This story concerns the first couple of years of the first fleets departure from England to the newly discovered land of new south wales twelve thousand miles across the partly chartered waters of the most dangerous oceans of the world and the initial first years of settling into this vast and mysterious new land.

Intertwined into this adventurous expedition are the many interesting insights into the various characters who initiated the stepping stones of history. Giving us, who have followed, a window into the harshness and deprivation they had to endure. Two of the characters, Seamus Duffy and Mary Donaghue get thrown into this melting pot of characters. It follows the period in Ireland during and post ‘penal days’ when the English assert their gun-toting authority over the down-trodden Irish population, leading to the great famine of the mid 1700s, when the Irish population went from comfortably sustaining over eight million people to the decimated figure of around two and a half million fighting for existence through famine.

It covers the political and historical period when uprising was the catch-cry and savage repercussion was the inevitable outcome against such might of arms the english took to bear on the emaciated Irish and even their own kind.

Throughout the story shines the glow of hope from a defiant and unbeaten people who will never forsake their faith in a god whose image, though faded with oppression, is nevertheless seared into and onto the minds and hearts of a nation destined to leave their indelible mark on the history of the new world. An embryonic nation, whose time has not yet come, but who, in future annals will influence generations yet to come.

ISBN 978-1-922803-58-0
PAPERBACK

The Pub with No Beer and I

If you’re looking for a story of adventure and mis-adventure. Then look no further.

Sean Hampsey’s latest foray into titillating our sense of Daring -Do under the guise of, not so much, “a walk in the park”, but rather, “a ride in the dark”.

Takes us, (the reader) into a potpourri of adventurous affairs that has us teetering on the edge of our saddle’s, tangling with venomous snakes, ‘orinary’ wild horses, and wicked wenches, who only wish to devour us, midst their beguilement. In an attempt to steal from us our virgin worth. Shame on them! And shame on Sean, for putting us in that perilous position of decision. ‘Will I? or Won’t I?’ That is the question?

This follows on from his previous attempts to corrupt our sponge-like innocent, inquiring, minds. In his other works, My Brother Sean, The Spanish Connection, The Maori Conflict, Savage Beginnings, A month in the Life of A Sexually Active Irish Octogenarian, Journal of Destiny, Sum of the Women in My Life and A further nine months in the life of a Celibate Octogenarian. Watch out!

There is no end to this man’s evil intent to not only steal our hearts to his Irish/Australian Wit, but to steal our very souls and have us as devotees of his story-telling for life. Don’t trust him! If you value your virgin mind.

– Reputable reviewer, who wishes to remain anonymous for family safety reasons, currently secure in safe housing. (But who knows?)

sean hampsey author

About the Author

SEAN HAMPSEY is an Irish-Australian playwright, poet and accomplished singer/ songwriter (winner of the “Best New Country Song” at the Red-Gum Music Festival, Swan Hill Victoria – with another three of his songs winning awards). He has also appeared at the Tamworth Music Festival.

His published titles include The Spanish Connection, My Brother Seán, The Maori Conflict, A Month in the Life of a Sexually Active Irish Octogenarian, Journal of Destiny, Sum of the Women in My Life and A further nine months in the life of a Celibate Octogenarian.

HARRADINE, Lee

ISBN 978-1-922452-38-2 PAPERBACK

Flags, Spoons & Knives

The first book on this famous club since 1986, Flags, Spoons and Knives is a unique look at the West Adelaide Football Club, celebrating its rich history and its wonderful players.

Get behind the scenes of the Neil Kerley sacking, what happened when Tony Modra first arrived at Richmond Oval, who was West’s most famous player, which household name nearly coached us in the 70’s, how was the 2015 premiership won, and the facts behind the famous events of a great club.

SLEE, Max

ISBN 978-1-922452-72-6
PAPERBACK

 

Canowie Station

In 2021 Old Canowie celebrates the 175th Anniversary of its foundation in 1846. This historic homestead, mid-way between Hallett and Jamestown in South Australia’s Mid North, is a remnant of the former Canowie station and Canowie Pastoral Company.
The Company was one of the earliest corporate pastoralists. Most such enterprises are owned by just one family, but the surnames of Canowie station owners and managers reads like a Who’s Who of the leading South Australian pastoralists of the provincial era.

Although the once-renowned Canowie estate has long since been subdivided into highly-productive grain farms, and its famed merino stud now operates elsewhere, for half a century the Company ran one of the most influential and prosperous sheep stud enterprises in Australia.

The genetic strength of the magnificent Canowie sheep evolved into a large framed combing wool merino, known generically as the ‘South Australian strain’. At the 1911 Royal Adelaide Show, Canowie stud rams scooped the prize pool in every category, which was a record.

By 1903 over 2,000 swagmen per year received their customary two meals and a bed at Canowie. By 1905 it was the largest private freehold landholder in South Australia.

With some shareholders having returned to England, land reformers complained that it was the third largest absentee landholder in the State, the largest being the South Australian Company. But, having sought and achieved immunity from the land reformers, the Canowie Pastoral Company was unexpectedly liquidated at the height of its prosperity.

A series of lucrative auctions of Canowie land commenced in 1909, culminating with the homestead and stud in 1925. That of 1910 was the largest single auction of freehold land ever held in South Australia to that time.

Exhaustive research now reveals the fascinating history of Canowie’s exciting frontier origins, its expansion into prosperous corporate pastoralism, and then voluntary liquidation at the peak of its success, leaving a remarkable legacy to the Australian wool industry.