Week 26 Middle
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| Giles Armitage Mason |
This may well be true, but there are at least six other
members of the family called Giles, most of them older than Alf, which suggests
that the name has another significance.
I set out to investigate who they all were.
The first Giles I can verify is Giles Armitage Mason
(1837 -1912) who was the eldest son of our 2 x great grandparents, Richard and
Jane (Armitage) Mason. Calling their
first born Giles would usually indicate that there was a parent or grandparent
of that name – Irish families generally followed that pattern of naming and
their first two girls were named for their mothers, Phoebe and Grace. However, Jane’s father was Richard Armitage,
Richard’s was Peter Mason and we know that one grandfather was William
Powell. No Giles has yet been found. The complexities of Protestant Irish records
of the period make it particularly difficult.
Giles Mason was only five when the family arrived in
Australia. There is little known about
him, but we know he married Mary Ann Sisley and they had two daughters. Judging from her obituary in “The Methodist”,
in 1922,* Mary Ann was a pious soul, so one wonders why she and Giles appear
not to have lived together for very long.
The obituary notes that she had lived in Moruya “excepting for a very
short interval” for most of her life.
Giles died in 1912 and the funeral was announced by his
sisters, Mrs Whitten (Charlotte) and Mrs Moss (Jane). He appears to have been living with Jane at
the time of his death.
In the next generation there are six men with the name
“Giles”
Jane and Richard’s eldest daughter Phoebe married Stephenson
Moore and they had 13 children together.
Their third son, born in 1862, was called Giles.
Giles Moore became a prosperous grazier in the Guyra
district of the New England Tablelands.
On his retirement and the sale of his property, “Valley Dale”, there was
a lengthy testimonial in the local newspapers. He recalled the shooting of the
bushranger, Thunderbolt at nearby Kentucky Creek, and also the days when the
“Mother of Ducks” Lagoon at Guyra covered a vast area and was teeming with
waterbirds.
Giles Moore was a well known and respected breeder of cattle
and horses – particularly draught horses – and a successful exhibitor of
Clydesdales. He married Caroline
McMullen in 1884 and they had five children.
After her death he married again, to Beatrice Palmer and had four more
children. His eldest son, Ernest, was
killed at Gallipoli in 1915.
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| Giles Moore |
In 1874, Grace Mason and her husband Alexander Bathgate
named their fifth son David Giles.
Born at Murrurundi, he spent most of his adult life at Quirindi, where
his aunts Eliza and Charlotte lived and there were many cousins. He married Anna “Nance” Smith and had two
sons. His carrying firm went bankrupt in
1901, but he appears afterwards to have led an exemplary life and was secretary
of the Presbyterian Church in Quirindi at the time of his death in 1920.
Another Giles of this generation was Giles Moss,
elder son of Jane (Mason) and her husband John Moss. The first of their ten children, this Giles
was born at Patrick’s Plains, near the original Australian home of his
grandparents and spent most of his life in this area. He married a local girl called Margaret
Dunne, and they had five children. Their
youngest daughter, Grace, served as a nurse in Palestine during WW11. The Singleton Argus published a
very interesting letter to her parents about her experiences there in 1940.*
Giles Talbot Moore was the son of Anne (Mason) and
William Moore, (who was a nephew to Stephenson Moore, their families having travelled to Australia together from Ireland)
Born in 1885, Giles was the sixth of their seven children and, like his
cousins Alfred Giles Whitten and Albert Whitten, he studied for the Methodist
ministry and was ordained in 1916. He
served throughout country NSW over many years.
He married in 1917 and had three children. He had a particular interest in welfare and
served with the church’s Social Services Department as their psychologist
towards the end of his career.
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| Giles Talbot Moore |
The sixth Giles in this generation was Alfred Giles
Whitten, my great uncle, about whom I have written before. His grandson Mark appears to be the only
one of any of the successive generations of
Whitten descendants who has inherited the name.
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| Mark Giles Whitten at the Giles Weather Station, 2019 |
*Mary Ann Mason’s obituary
4 Feb 1922 "The Methodist”
MARY ANN MASON (nee Sisley.)
Moruya Circuit lost one of its choicest souls recently
when Mary Ann Mason was called home. She was born in Sussex in the year 1842.
From her parents, Edward and Elizabeth Sisley, who were noted for their, piety,
she received a sound religious training. In 1855, after the death of her father,
she came with her mother and brother to Australia, in which country her uncle,
Mr. Jacob Luck, a noted figure in Moruya Methodism,, had already settled. The
family took up its abode in Kiora, near Moruya. Here Miss Sisley, at the age of
16, through the preaching of the late Rev. James Somerville, made - a full surrender
of her life to the Lord Jesus. About
this time she lost her brother, and, then mother and daughter moved to Moruya.
Here in 1869 Miss Sisley married Mr. Giles Mason, of Murrurundi, who pre deceased
her by nine years. Excepting for a very short interval Mrs. Mason passed the
remainder of a long life in Moruya. Every minister's family found in her a true
friend. Her conversion proved to be a deep and abiding work of grace, for her experience
proved that she was daily growing in grace and knowledge. Her life was a
separated one from all she deemed worldly, and one noticed in her a deep affection
for her church, so that her seat was only vacant when strong reasons prevented her
attendance. Towards the end she was called to suffer much through a dread malady.
Her faith only brightened under the test, for no cloud seemed to intervene between
her Lord and herself, and no expression of doubt as to her position as a child
of grace fell from her lips. Towards the close she longed for home, and on the day
of her triumphant entry she- said, 'I 'm so happy, ' asking for her favourite
hymn to be sung, My Faith Looks up to Thee.' She joined in the singing. Soon
aiterwards she fell on sleep, proving the words to be true,' 'These Christians
know how to die.' ' She leaves two daughters to mourn their loss. Appreciative letters were received from two
former ministers, Revs. J. H. Somerville and B. N. Hyde. — HJST.W.
*Singleton Argus 22 November 1940
JERRY'S PLAINS GIRL IN PALESTINE
LETTER FROM SISTER GRACE MOSS
Sister Grace Moss, with the Australian forces in
Palestine, in a letter to her parents, Mr and Mrs GilesMoss, of "Hill
Grove," Jerry's Plains, writes as follows:—
"I have just returned from a week's leave in
Jerusalem, which was delightful. I saw more tombs and churches than one could
imagine possible, and trod ground so historical of biblical times. At Bethlehem
the Church of the Nativity was visited. It was really beautiful. I went down into
the cave which was the manger. It is lighted with lamps, and is like a little
chapel. One morning a visit was paid to the Dead Sea. The distance is not so
far actually, and I was back at the hostel for lunch. Most of the country
passed through on the way was hilly and barren—not a sign of vegetation until
one came upon the town of Jericho, which was a patch of lovely green nestling
on the shores of the Dead Sea. The latter is not at all pleasant to bathe in,
though some of the girls did so.
With others, I
took a whole day and did the trip to Galilee. It was very beautiful, especially
when we arrived at the sea. Tiberius, the oldest city in the world, is situated
right on the shore The sea itself is the most glorious colour, and canoes and
sailing boats dotted here and there on the surface make a pretty sight.
"A stop was made at Nazareth on the return trip,
and I saw a church built over the workshop where St. Joseph and Our Lord were
supposed to have worked. Just a short distance from the city is the Garden of Gethsemane
and Mount of Olives. I walked the Via Dolorosa, or Way of the Cross, in the old
city, and the crucifix which I bought and am sending to you I got at the Church
Io Ecce Homo, which is built over the courtyard where Pontius Pilate condemned
Our Lord to death."
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