Life's Race Well Run

By Jeff Hopkins

In this revised edition of the 1992 book, ‘Life’s Race Well Run’ the original concept of ‘A Diary of Discovery’ has been maintained and the book is published for the first time. However, with new information now coming to light, the author revisits and presents new stories and pictures illustrating his family’s genealogy.
There is a dynasty established by a Foundry owner and his eleven sons who were draftsmen, fitters and turners, machinists, mining engineers and a mercer. They spread worldwide searching for new challenges and in the service of their country. Two elusive grandfathers are eventually tracked down with their fascinating histories and stories revealed.
A never before heard of great, great, grandfather is discovered. His seven-year transportation sentence to Van Diemen’s Land extends to sixteen years’ incarceration at various locations. When he finally gains his ticket of leave and then is emancipated in 1849, he travels to the mainland where his sons and granddaughters link in with the genealogy outlined in the 1992 book. This leads to revelations of more ex-nuptial children and half-brothers that had never been previously known.
The exceptional women in the story are not neglected. Their perseverance and endurance is outlined. Aunts, grandmothers, and great grandmothers all have unique tales to tell. They had large families, and many had to face the pain of losing their children to illness, disease, and accidents.
Locations where the characters lived and died, religions, occupations, and service in wartime are detailed. The ships, from small sailing ships to luxury ocean liners, on which they travelled are described in detail.
Then there is the expanded bloodline genealogy that was never fully explored in the first book. While keeping much of the original material, these new stories open a whole new world of investigating a family history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Oct 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9781923065536

Jeff Hopkins

Jeff Hopkins (1950) is a retired schoolteacher. He lives in Walyalup, Western Australia. Walyalup which means 'lungs' is the Whadjuk name for Fremantle, and is part of the Noongar Nation. As the drama master at Hale School in Perth, he wrote ten original musical plays and produced and directed them at the school.In 1992, he researched and wrote a family history, 'Life's Race Well Run', and after retiring in 2006 he has written twenty novels, a memoir, and three 'faction' biographies.

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Copyright 2023 © Jeff Hopkins

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Disclaimer

This is a non-fiction work based on research over a period of thirty-one years. Where possible the information has been substantiated with Certified Certificates of Births, Deaths, and Marriages. It was assumed historical newspaper reports and documents were accurate. Every effort has been made to check relevant facts with members of the subsequent generations who are still alive. Any inaccuracies are accidental and unintentional. The author, their agents and publishers cannot be held responsible for any claim otherwise.

Life’s race well run,

Life’s work well done,

Life’s crown well won,

Now comes rest.

List of Photographs

1. Frederick Charles and Edith Bell Bousfield (nee Forbes).

2. From Left: William Francis Hopkins. His wife Amelia and their foster son Bill (Charles William Hopkins).

3. William Francis and Amelia Hopkins (nee Adams) gravesite.

4. Great grandmother Mary Elizabeth Bousfield (nee Robertson) (24th April 1852 – 15th April 1908).

5. Great grandfather John Monkhouse Bousfield (14th September 1849 – 1st September 1924).

6. Edith Bell Bousfield (nee Forbes) gravesite. (9th December 1880 – 23rd February 1944) Edith Bell lies in the Presbyterian Section HA of Karrakatta Cemetery and the grave number is 246.

7. Peter Forbes, great, great grandfather. (3rd March 1830 – 20th November 1916).

8. Edith Bell Forbes (1880–1944) studio portrait taken circa 1907.

9. Five Bousfield Brothers circa 1915. From left Cuthbert Henry ‘Bert’, Septimus, Gordon, Leo, and Thomas ‘Perc’ Percival.

10. Alfred John Hodgson Bousfield  (3rd March 1877 – 20th March 1937)

11. Frederick Charles and Edith Bell's Five Children.  From Left: Minnie Elizabeth Hopkins, Frederick John Bousfield, Edith Prosser, Vera Jean Moraday and Thelma May Willis, 13th March 1965.

12. Uncles. From Left: Frederick John Bousfield, Charles William ‘Bill’ Hopkins, Henry Bethall ‘Harry’ Prosser, Lesley Charles ‘Les’ Moraday and Albert Edward ‘Bert’ Willis.

13. Roseanna Hopkins Family.  From Left: Francis Graham Hopkins, Francis George, Hazel Dawn, Roseanna Hopkins (nee Stanton) and Constance.

14. Full cover of book ‘Surviving the Silence: The Benjamin Stanton Story 1819–1891’.

15. Charles William Hopkins (aged 16 years) Harrison Football Club 1924.

16. Minnie Elizabeth and Charles William’s Wedding 6th March 1943. From left: Albert Edward Willis, Charles William Hopkins, Minnie Elizabeth Hopkins (nee Bousfield), Reverend G.C. Tebbit,  and Vera Jean Bousfield.

17. Bill (located in the top left of this picture) serving in New Guinea.

18. The Hopkins Family Grave.

19. Close up of the plaques at the Hopkins' gravesite.

20. Kenneth William Hopkins (circa 1973) preparing to give his last lecture at the University of Western Australia.

21. Ken as Secretary of the Fremantle History Society (circa 2003).

22. Ken's memorial Plaque alongside his Mother and Father's.

23. The Author Jeff Hopkins.

Foreword

In 1992, thirty-one years ago, when I set out to do this genealogical study, I did not think it would be 2023 before it was finally nearing completion! In truth it is still not complete. Perhaps that is the nature of genealogy. There are mysteries unsolved and questions that still require answers as the reader will discover. However, it was necessary to bring the work to a conclusion without letting it drag on ad infinitum and never be published.

My motivation in beginning at all was simple. I thought if I knew a little more about my ancestors and their lives and longevity, or lack of it, I might be able to make a reasonable guess at my own life expectancy. That motivation was quickly forgotten as the fascinating world of genealogy opened up before me. As you will find out in the first part of the book, who, and why, I decided to research, required a lot of decisions. In the end I followed everyone who played a part in the story. Along the way I contacted, and was contacted, by many people through DNA analysis, and they added volumes to the second part of the book. One of those lines of investigation spawned a separate book, ‘Surviving the Silence: The Benjamin Stanton Story 1819 – 1891’ which detailed the life of one of my great, great, grandfathers.

When I came to this reworked edition in 2023 the major decision was whether I should include all the early work which was done from first principles with certificates, letters, and phone calls. There was no Ancestry.com or My Heritage.com in 1992 and my fumbling early steps led me down rabbit holes and into culs de sac which upon reflection seem so silly and naïve. In the end I decided to keep the early work in the reworked edition. I have tidied it up in places but decided to maintain the embarrassing false steps as cautionary tales.

The one thing that is missing from the original book are the extensive genealogical charts I drew up and presented for branches of the various families. These are superfluous to requirements these days as most families have their own family trees on Ancestry.com or My Heritage.com or both. These can be easily accessed and updated as families continue to expand.

I think the expanded stories and information in the second part of this reworked edition will provide some fascinating reading and a few surprises! I hope you enjoy it, and it might inspire someone, somewhere, to pick up the trails which went ‘cold’ on me.

Part One:

A Diary of Discovery

Chapter 1:

Making a Start

Where an amateur genealogist takes tentative steps into the wonderful world of family history.

Sunday, 19th April 1992

When I began my genealogical investigations, I didn’t even know how to spell the word. I certainly didn’t know where to begin! I had a vague idea of what a family tree should look like and copied the layout of the first draft of my ancestors from the front of a novel. The matters that became immediately clear were that I needed more knowledge on how to attempt the task, a method of going about it, a procedure, a direction, and that many people would have to have an input if the whole project was to be successful.

I began by writing to the Genealogical Society of Western Australia, and an organisation called ‘Genealogical Services’, for advice and I became familiar with the Registrar General’s rules and rates in Western Australia and then began securing addresses and telephone numbers for similar departments in other states, notably Victoria and Queensland, which I suspected, from little snippets of information I had gleaned over the years, would form important parts of the investigation in due course.

Then there had to be a point at which I could begin. I chose Charles William Hopkins, my father, as the starting point. It was a logical beginning. Charles William, at eighty-four years of age, was beginning to talk about his own death, and it became clear that if he died, without the knowledge he had stored in his head being recorded, then it may well be lost forever. Also, he lived with me, and our casual conversations often sparked off interesting lines of investigation that could have been pursued, but up until this time had not been.

I had known for years that Charles William was a fostered boy. He was born Charles William Morgan and was taken in by the Hopkins family, eventually changing his name to Hopkins under licence. This line of investigation would open the true bloodline of my paternal family.

Now there was an immediate dilemma. The foster family of Hopkins could not be ignored. They had nurtured Charles William for a lot of his life, and he called his foster parents mum and dad and recognised his family as brothers and sisters. There would be a nature, birth and bloodline, versus nurture, the foster family situation. I decided to follow both. The foster family, Hopkins, had been my father’s life but his bloodline was the true genealogy. Having made this decision early, there was a threefold story to tell – a bloodline and a nurturing paternal line and a maternal line which looked more straightforward, at the outset.

A birth certificate for Charles William was ordered and a few well-placed telephone calls to Aunts, on the maternal side, plus some general knowledge got the ball rolling back to grandparents on what I intend to call the three lines of investigation:

1. The Paternal Bloodline – The Morgan and Stanton Families

2. The Foster Line – The Hopkins and Adams Families

3. The Maternal Bloodline – The Bousfield and Forbes Families

Early problems included a failure by surviving members of the families, to remember birthdays of the previous generation. These should always be recorded in a Family Register, Album, or Family Bible. The name of a person, their date of birth and the place it occurred, plus the names of both parents, including the mother’s maiden name are essential in tracking birth records through the various Registrar Generals’ Offices throughout Australia.

Photographs are precious! Again, a family album, regularly updated is essential, but they become useless if they are not named. Conscientious family chroniclers must get into the habit of noting the names of the people in the photograph, the date it was taken and the place it was shot. This can be an invaluable help and a thrill when you see a visual record of someone, long dead, who you have been thinking and talking about and believe you are coming to know. In the modern era a digital photographic record, well annotated with details, should not be too much of an effort to undertake.

To open the Bousfield investigation, I wrote to a relation, Bill Bousfield, in Victoria to try to clear up the immediate family of my grandfather, Frederick Charles Bousfield. This short and nuggetty man had already emerged as one of the characters of the investigation. With moustache and pipe and hat pushed back to expose his forehead, with the typical Bousfield receding hairline, he had an instant appeal, and it was clear he would develop as a figure of stature in all this. Already I had the feeling that he was no saint. In fact, my starting impression was of a well read, deep thinking, hard-working, skilful, but flawed man. The early anecdotes on Frederick Charles, which were all supplied by my father, Charles William, struck a chord. The five-pound notes, torn in half – half sent one week, half the next to his wife when he was away on mining engineering duties in the Western Australian goldfields and beyond. Then there were the dreams of atmospheric worlds, early atomic theory. The impetuous and strong-willed decisions when he felt he was being wronged in business arrangements. The comical interviews with his prospective sons-in-law on the verandah of his Malcolm Street home, usually after he had an elegant sufficiency of beer. Already I was looking forward to fleshing out the character I had never met. Part of this search is trying to find people you were denied.

By contrast, the elegant and almost saintly figure of Edith Bell Bousfield (nee Forbes), my grandmother seemed like a key to the tone of the next generation. In her way she appeared a figure of distance and awe, correct, demanding, strict, resourceful, but ultimately lonely and betrayed. I was tempted to say puritanical, but these are early days in the investigation.

1. Frederick Charles and Edith Bell Bousfield (nee Forbes).

The old-world pioneering spirit captured in the photos of William Francis Hopkins, and Amelia Hopkins (nee Adams), the foster grandparents, created the impression that there was going to be much to enjoy here. The anecdotes, again from Charles William, revealed drama and struggle. Hard working people, afraid of nothing, but kindly. They belong to a world that is now so far removed from all we know today, and yet I sit and write this on the property purchased in 1913 for £250 by William Francis Hopkins, he is so close and yet so far away. Amelia Hopkins (nee Adams) is a woman who inspires deep affection I look forward to knowing more about her.

2. From Left: William Francis Hopkins. His wife Amelia and their foster son Bill (Charles William Hopkins).

Finally in this introduction, to the mysterious figure of Charles Morgan. Who was he? A bloodline grandfather, hidden from view for all of my life and most of my father’s. The anecdotes and hearsay have him as a soldier at the Barracks in Fremantle who had a brief encounter with a domestic servant at the Esplanade Hotel and starts a family line that is so strange and diverse. Where had he come from? What about his life? Did he die a shadowy death on the goldfields? The intrigue in this character alone will be one of the thrills of the investigation. Of the domestic servant, Roseanna Stanton, what are we about to uncover? Roseanna abandoned her child, Charles William, at two years and two months of age, saw him briefly at age nine, in an encounter we shall recall in detail later, and then married, of all people, a man called Hopkins. Francis Graham Hopkins, as it eventually turned out, was a nephew to my foster grandfather. Roseanna then had four more children. She is the bloodline grandmother, not quite so shadowy as Charles Morgan, but nonetheless an equally perplexing character.

So, the stage is set for the diary of discovery. I shall write it as it happens, and you the reader will share the discoveries, disap­pointments, frustrations, and wrong turns as they arise. Hopefully, there will also be some moments of pure joy. As your chronicler, I will, of course, always present my interpretation. It will be coloured by my background and my point of view. I am hoping you will share it and then present your own insights, which I anticipate will differ from mine quite strongly in some cases. The final story will be the sum of what we all feel or have known for many years but have never said or written down.

If this little volume does nothing more than encourage you to keep better records and name your photographs or tells you how to work on your own family in the same way, then it will have achieved something. Hopefully, it will prove an entertaining read.

Friday, 2nd June 2023

All the above was written in 1992 when I began my tentative steps into the wonderful world of genealogy. In 2021, twenty-nine years later an inquiry that came to me via Ancestry.com from David John Bailes in Adelaide has prompted a reworked edition of this book. We will get to what David Bailes asked and how the Stanton bloodline became a new fascination in due course. For the moment let us resume the ‘Diary of Discovery’ as it unfolded chronologically in 1992.

Chapter 2:

Contacts, Cemeteries, Speculations,

and Doubts

Where a cemetery proves to be a very valuable resource, but a lack of information leads to many questions, theories, and conjecture.

Tuesday, 21st April 1992

A writer should have a plan, an outline of where the whole work may go. In the introductory chapter mine was sketchy, somehow to trace the six family lines: the Adams, Bousfield, Forbes, Hopkins, Morgan, and Stanton connections. How will the written work be coherent then if it is written like a diary? Perhaps that is the more exciting structure, a journey of discovery, reporting the method and the manner as much as the material. I sense for the moment I have found my way ahead.

After the introduction and pondering the challenge, the first day of investigation began with a routine telephone call to the Queensland Registrar General’s Office and then a letter requesting Frederick Charles Bousfield’s death certificate. This was to fill in an important gap in knowledge between the Second World War and Frederick Charles’ presumed death in the Sunshine State circa 1970. All this was based on anecdotal and hearsay evidence, but it was a starting point. The letter was written and posted. Fees for certified copies of birth, death, and marriage certificates in Queensland at that time were $17. This is the cheapest in Australia.

A telephone conversation with Vera Jean Moraday (nee Bousfield) Frederick Charles and Edith Bell’s fourth child led me to telephone Margaret Bousfield in the Fremantle Menswear Store which has carried the family name for as long as I can remember. Margaret was Frank and Jean Bousfield’s daughter and a granddaughter of Thomas Percival Bousfield, who was often known in the family as ‘Perc’ or ‘Uncle Perc’ a brother to Frederick Charles. Margaret explained how it was her brother Maxwell who had studied the Bousfields’ genealogy. Maxwell is now resident in Cambermurra, New South Wales, so I wrote to him for help. The letter was posted and the work for the day appeared done. It was not to be the case!

While watering the garden it occurred to me that the Fremantle Cemetery would be a treasure trove of neglected information. I made a speculative telephone call to the Fremantle Cemetery Board and was given great help with surprising politeness.

Quickly, the foster family line of Hopkins revealed some of its secrets. William Francis Hopkins had died on the 26th of November 1935 aged eighty years. William Francis was buried in the same grave as Amelia, his wife, who had died on the 16th of August 1942 aged seventy-eight years. The grave is Anglican section A5 number 256, a plain stone border surrounds the grave and there is a double leaved book tombstone. William Francis is on the left and Amelia the right.

3. William Francis and Amelia Hopkins (nee Adams) gravesite.

The touching epitaph for William Francis reads:

‘LIFE’S RACE WELL RUN; NOW COMES REST’

Amelia’s is simply:

‘AT REST’

The full quotation is:

‘Life’s race well run,

Life’s work well done,

Life’s crown well won,

Now comes rest.’

The quatrain was presented by Dr. Edward Hazen Parker, in ‘Funeral Ode on President Garfield’. James Abram Garfield (November the 19th 1831 – September the 19th 1881) was the twentieth President of the United States serving from March to September 1881. Garfield was shot by an assassin four months into his presidency and died two months later. The quatrain was claimed for him by his brother in ‘Notes and Queries’, May 25th, 1901, p. 406. However, it was earlier claimed by Mrs. John Mills, for John Mills of Manchester, 1878. The quatrain appears in the ‘Life of John Mills’ with an account of its origin.

While at the Fremantle Cemetery I investigated the graves of Lewis Williams who married Sarah Adams, Amelia Hopkins’ elder sister, who had lived in Gold Street, South Fremantle. Sarah Williams (nee Adams) is reputed to have been the first white woman to visit Carnarvon and Dirk Hartog Island after sailing there on Lewis Williams’ boat. I was interested in this grave because the caring daughter, Sarah, had had her mother’s and father’s bones exhumed from the Skinner Street Cemetery (Vale Park) in Fremantle when it was to be redeveloped. It is now the playing fields for John Curtin College of the Arts. Sarah had them reburied alongside her husband’s grave when he died in 1917. The journey to this site would be a revelation. Located in Anglican Section AA of Fremantle Cemetery, the graves are side by side at Numbers 23 and 24. First Lewis Williams, which is incorrectly spelt Louis on the gravestone.

In Loving Memory of My Dear Husband

Louis Williams

who died on the 20th of May 1917

Aged sixty-eight years

‘Someday we hope to meet him,

Someday we know not when,

We’ll clasp his hand in a better land,

And never part again.’

And in the same grave.

And also…

Sarah

Loving wife of the above who died on March 10th, 1930

Aged seventy-six years

‘Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes,

Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies,

Heaven’s morning breaks and earth’s vain shadows flee

In life, in death, oh Lord. Abide with me!’

My father Charles William had an early memory of attending Sarah Williams funeral. He recalled the singing of the hymn ‘Abide With Me’. I remembered this and had it played at his funeral, and that of my elder brother Kenneth William many years later.

Then, as if spanning a generation in history in the four-foot width of a single grave, there were the Adams parents. The stone read:

In Loving Memory of Mary Ann Adams

died 25th of December 1898

Aged sixty-eight years

John Adams

Died 25th July 1905

Aged seventy-six years

and the simple epitaph is:

‘AT REST’

The years had fallen away. John Adams had been born in the first year of the colony of Western Australia, 1829. Mary Ann, his wife, the very next year, 1830. Colin Hopkins, the journalist son of William Alfred Hopkins, grandson of Lewis ‘Lou’ Hopkins, foster brother to Charles William, and great grandson of William Francis and Amelia Hopkins and great, great grandson of John and Mary Ann Adams had said in a eulogy at his father’s funeral in December 1990 that a William Adams had arrived in Western Australia in the first year of the colony aboard the sailing ship, ‘Rockingham’, these facts are yet to be checked.

Finally, while at the Fremantle Cemetery a punt, a guess, a stab in the dark. What about the Stanton line? Was Roseanna Stanton who married Francis Graham Hopkins buried in Fremantle? At the Fremantle Cemetery Board Office your first location inquiry is free, after that it’s $2 a shot. I played!

‘Could you locate the grave of Roseanna Hopkins (nee Stanton) and Francis Graham Hopkins?’

After two false starts, a match, and a mystery. Yes, there was a Rose Hopkins, but her full name listed in the Cemetery Board’s records was Rose Hannah Hopkins. This was to present a conundrum. What was this woman’s true name? The information provided upon her death would have been supplied by her husband and perhaps he believed her name was Rose Hannah. However on her birth certificate she was Roseanna. I made the decision to call her by the name she was given at birth.

Roseanna had died on the 6th of March 1929 aged