ALFRED WILLIAM THORGOOD (1882—1965)

A Big Man, a Big Heart

Alfred William Thorgood, known as William, came to the Shire looking for work at the age of eleven. He began by chopping trees for the families who had leased land from the Holt-Sutherland Land Company and were aiming to establish market gardens and farms. William was a hard worker, a big lad who wielded the axe all day and slept at night among the trees that he helped to fell. When members of the Towell family discovered he was not going home at night, they asked William to stay with them. Robert Towell had a property between Parraweena Road and The Boulevarde.¹

William’s father, George Thorgood, was a Londoner, born in 1849 and had emigrated from England before his marriage to Matilda Lydia Williams at the Homebush Congregational Church. Matilda was from Gunnedah in northern New South Wales and it was here that William was born. The birth of his younger brother, George Edward was registered at Canterbury.²

About 1894, George Thorgood took up a 99 year lease of 3 ¾ acres on Port hacking Road, Miranda. Its western most point was where four major roads of the area intersected. These roads, Port Hacking, The Boulevarde, Miranda and Kiora were nothing more that dirt tracks at this time and became known as the six-ways. The Towell’s farm fronted The Boulevarde and was a short distance through the bush to where George Thorgood’s market was established. Water was obtained from an underground stream which formed as it drained from high ground in Miranda, south of the Thorgood gardens. Large wells were dug to access the water in the stream. The lower part of the property where canna lilies flourished, tended to be marshy. On high ground a small vineyard was planted. Orchard trees were also planted.

When George and Matilda first moved to the Miranda leasehold, the property was cleared of some of the large timbers and most of the scrub. A weatherboard house with an iron roof was built with a large room in the centre which was used on occasions as a ‘dance hall’. It could have been a great social event for the area. Two bedrooms were built on the front of the house and a ‘lean to’ on the back of the kitchen area.

On the 21 January 1902 William Thorgood married Sarah Ann Towell at St Peters Church of England, Cooks River. Sarah was the daughter of Robert Towell and Elizabeth Martha nee Fretus. William and Sarah lived in the Punt house at Sylvania when their first child Joseph Robert was born in 1903.³ It was at Miranda that six more children were born, Frank Emanuel Leslie in 1905, William Edward in 1911, Harold Robert in 1915, Babe Elizabeth Matilda in 1918, Walter Samuel in1922 and Douglas Bernard in 1925. Electoral rolls of 1913 and 1917 show William and Sarah residing at The Boulevarde, Miranda. They may have been living with Sarah’s family on their property. At some time William built a ‘shed’ adjoining his parent’s cottage in Port Hacking Road and William with his young family lived there.

George Thorgood was 65 years old when he died on 14 October 1915 of heart failure at the Cottage Hospital, Kogarah. He made his will on his death bed and left the Miranda property to his wife Matilda. William and Sarah had four little boys at the time and they moved from the ‘shed’ into the cottage. The large central room was converted to a dining room and another bedroom. Matilda decided to live with Friedrich and Mary Geyer at Arncliffe. She probably knew the Geyers when they were living for a time in Parraweena Road, a short walk from the Thorgood’s farm.⁴ Friedrich was a policeman having been appointed to the Constabulary on 7 December 1903.⁵

 William worked long hours in the market garden and his sons were expected to help. When the boys weren’t attending Miranda School which was a 10 minute walk up the hill to the corner of Kiora Road and the Kingsway, they were working at home. A large variety of vegetables needed to be tended as well as orchard trees bearing stone fruit, apples and quinces. Any surplus produce not needed to feed the family was sold to the few local stores at Caringbah and Miranda. There was also a small flower garden. Pigs, sheep, cows, ducks and fowls were kept for domestic use. As the couple’s only daughter, Babe, was growing up and she was expected to help her mother with the domestic duties and also lend a hand in the garden at harvest time. Like her mother with the cousins, Babe attended Miranda School until she was 14. When she was 17, Babe had a job at Ford Sherrington, case makers, near Central Station. After three months it was decided she would be much better employed at home helping her mother.

The market garden was not the only source of income for the family. William also worked as a road ganger for the newly established Sutherland Shire Council when Tom Cole was the overseer. William remained with the Council for 45 years.  The boys grew into young men and also sought alternative employment, Frank, Bill and Harold all worked at the brickyards at St Peters and Joe drove a brewery truck for L M Edwards. Babe married Albert Browne (Alby) in 1939 and it was during the war years that Alby sought a discharge from the Army to return home and help with the gardens and orchard, after a lifetime of hard work William, now in his 60s, could use an extra pair of hands.

Matilda Thorgood would travel to Miranda from her home in Arncliffe, where she lived with the Geyers, to visit her family. William, Sarah and their seven children all lived in the three bedroom cottage, William’s brother George lived in the ‘shed’ vacated by William’s family. He remained a bachelor until his death in 1947. Matilda died in St George District Hospital at the age in 78 on 8 August 1938 and was buried in the Anglican section of Woronora cemetery.

William and Sarah lived on the Port Hacking Road property until he early 1960s when the leasehold was converted to freehold and subdivided into residential blocks. Their daughter Babe and husband Alby built a new home on one of these blocks after raising their own children in the much modernised original cottage. William and Sarah lived relatively long lives witnessing  many changes in the Shire, particularly along Port Hacking Road where rural vistas became a bank of suburban homes, the working horse and cart traffic became fast cars and lumbering truck transport. The six-ways intersection continued as a focal point for funnelling traffic to the corners of the Shire though today it has become five-ways with the closure of Miranda Road to through traffic. In 1952 Sarah Ann Thorgood died at St George Hospital, Kogarah and was cremated at Woronora Crematorium. William died in 1965 at the age of 83.

SUE HEWITT

First published in  Sutherland Shire, Some Early Residents, 2006, by Botany Bay Family History Society. Compiled by Maree McKinley and Sue Hewitt.   

 Click on the name ALFRED WILLIAM THORGOOD (1882-1965) at the heading of this story. You will be taken to the database entry for Alfred Thorgood and his family.

Endnotes:

1. Oral history: Babe And Alby Browne

2. Researched by Terry Browne

3. 1906 Electoral Roll, Illawarra Road Sylvania; Oral history: Babe and Alby Browne

4. 1903 Electoral Roll

5. SRNSW online Index to Police Registers