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From: "Perplexed" <>
Subject: Re: [AUS-GERMAN] Hunter Valley Germans some questions
Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 13:32:20 +1100
References: <200501212228.j0LMSEAX001139@mail.rootsweb.com>


Re the mailing:

My ggg grandparents (Heinrich Bouffier and Catherine(a) Web(b)er) came to
the Hunter on the Parland in 1849. Heinrich was a vine dresser so
presumably the family was sponsored for those skills. They came from an
area west of Wiesbaden and were Catholics. They established vineyards in
the HV eventually (1860s). The family was involved in wine making and
Martin is noted as having a vineyard on the north side of Wollombi Brook in
the 1860s. The Bouffier family was also involved in Macrobrunners. Look at

http://www.sunnycessnock.com/history.html para 9

http://amol.org.au/ which holds oral history tapes, including a couple about
the Bouffiers and wine making.

or the following quote from
http://www.cessnock.nsw.gov.au/Cessnock/index.asp?id=119
"A skilled German vigneron by the name of Martin Bouffier established a
vineyard with in Cessnock itself around the same time." This refers to the
1860s. Martin was actually born in the Hunter Valley.

Do a search for Macrobrunner Wines.

Re anglicisation of names, my gg grandparents (Martin Bouffier and Mary
Smith) kept the Bouffier name - didn't anglicise. Heinrich on his
naturalisation certificate becomes Henry though.

I really know almost nothing about the remainder of the family - there
appears to have somewhat of an enstrangement between my grandmother and her
father. She was one of 8 children and when her mother died her father
remarried within the year (understandably as a farmer with 5 children aged
12 or under). I believe my grandmother wasn't happy about the remarriage.
So I can't comment on what the remainder of the family may have felt or
known about their "German" heritage. Because of the estrangement I know so
little about my family history on that side that I'm visiting the Valley in
a few weeks to take photos of gravestones, listen to these tapes and
generally do more research.

Re "shame" or why the "Germans" in the HV lost that sense of identity I
offer the following thoughts about my family. I placed German in
parentheses because my mother knew her family on that side came from
Alscace-Lorraine. She described them as sometimes being French and
sometimes German, dependant on historical quirks of the period. This is
also reflected in Heinrich Bouffier's name. That they were of German or
French extraction was never a fact which was hidden.

I also understand that when the family arrived in 1849, the area they came
from west of Wiesbaden was not actually formally part of Germany and wasn't
until 1866. Some of the information I have refers to them as from Nassau.
If that is correct it may help to explain why some of the "German"
immigrants didn't identify themselves as German. They may already have been
a hybrid of French and German and one heritage didn't necessarily override
the other.

The other thing to consider is that, as in my grandparent's case, because
they were Catholic there were plenty of Irish and Scottish and other
families in the Hunter Valley who were also Catholic which enlarged the
groups available to marry into if they intended to remain Catholics. Within
one generation of arrival there were out marriages into other
cultural/ethnic groups which would have an impact, possibly dilute the
"Germanness" of the families.

As examples, Martin Bouffier married Mary Agnes Smith who was born in
Wollombi I understand and was not a "Schmidt". When she died, he married
Honora McGrane who I believe was the daughter of a convict and Australian
born, again not of German extraction. My grandmother Catherine Bouffier
married Daniel Galvin, an Irish Catholic background. Whose heritage becomes
more important to maintain in these cases? Certainly in the Bouffier line
there were marriages between what I would asssume are German families
(Bouffier/Ansoul).

Also, were those of Lutheran faith more likely to marry into "German"
families because they constituted most of the available Lutheran families
in the area? I'm afraid I don't know very much about cultural background of
Lutherans and whether they comprised mainly Germans who migrated to
Australia. If that was the case, then those groups would have more reason
to maintain the German culture but you've indicated in your mail below that
the majority of Germans who came to the HV were Catholics. To my mind that
opens up more "out marriage" possibilities for the majority of the group and
then more dilution of the concept of being German. Did this happen with
other waves of German migration to SA, Qld etc?

In addition, at that time the colony, and I htink especially NSW, was moving
towards a greater sense of "Australian" identity. Refer
http://www.nla.gov.au/ferg/lasie.html about the Ferguson Project. The
reference below is taken directly from that site today.

"The project will provide access to the published record of life and
activity of the period 1840-45, regarded by scholars as seminal in the
development of a colonial culture and an emerging sense of an Australian
identity in the colonies. This period, following the end of convict
transportation to New South Wales and preceding the influx of the gold-rush
migrations, heralded the introduction of representative government in 1842
and witnessed the early years of mass free migration to the Australian
colonies. It was a period marked by an upsurge in local publication in both
the older and newer centres of settlement to meet the demands of the
increased population and the commercial opportunities emerging in the
colonies. "

I think the first sentence outlines what I'm trying to get at. In the 1840s
there's a movement towards a more defineable Australian culture. It's
possible that people wanted to be part of that and may have chosen to move
away from "old" heritages, especially in NSW.

My thoughts about this - may be codswallop.

PS if anyone has information about the Bouffiers of the Hunter Valley, the
Smiths of Wollombi or the Galvins of Muswellbrook I would be most delighted
to hear about them.

Re Galvins - James and Mary (Connor)) arrived on the Lloyds in 1850.
Michael, born c 1842 in Ennis Co Clare, who came with them was my gg
grandfather. I think he was too old to have been James's son unless James
was having children when he was 16. James was 24 when he arrived, Mary was
29 so I'm assuming Michael was either Mary's child from a previous marriage
or possibly related in some other way to James. There was also a 12 year
old, Patrick Galvin who came out with them on the Lloyds - definitely not
James's son. Michael married Catherine Flanagan and their son, Daniel
married my grandmother, Catheirne Bouffier.

Smiths - I believe Mary Agnes Smith's parents were Patrick Smith and Mary?..
There is a Patrick Smith listed as a carrier in Greville's Cessnock
directory of the 1870s. Really interested in any information about this
family.

Cheers

Anne



----- Original Message -----
From: "Albert Grulke" <>
To: <>
Sent: Saturday, January 22, 2005 9:27 AM
Subject: [AUS-GERMAN] Hunter Valley Germans some questions


>I have spent half the night bashing the brain box trying to work this out.
>
> I am about half way through collating my gatherings on German migration to
> the Hunter valley in the 19th century and in particular the period
> 1840-1860.
>
> This was no minor movement of people. One document that I have says that
> in
> total 800 families migrated to the Hunter from Germany in that period. If
> that figure is accurate it would place the Hunter reception of German on a
> par with the Barossa valley. It may even exceed it. Of course we need to
> accept that a percentage of these migrants never left Sydney and some went
> further north to the Darling Downs and other parts. However my document
> says
> that that was only a small percentage of the 800 families. The rest
> settled
> between Maitland and Newcastle and Cessnock.
>
> About 53% were Roman Catholic. The rest were protestant and we can assume
> with confidence that more than 40% of the 47% protestant were Lutheran. So
> my first quandary:
>
> How come they never had a Lutheran pastor to serve their spiritual needs?
>
> In Queensland the government, the agents and the people themselves sought
> and received Lutheran pastors from Germany to serve their spiritual needs.
> Likewise for the Baptists and the Calvinists.
>
> How come that never happened in the Hunter?
>
> The thing that really tosses me is the way they changed their names. It
> seems that in more than one family the name was anglicised not by the next
> generation but by the migrant himself.
>
> Why, why, why?
>
> There was no war. This was more then 70 years before the First World War
> so
> why change his name?
>
> I can understand some slight changes for reason of spelling but to change
> the name entirely is beyond me. If there were only a few German families
> then I could understand it but here we have possibly 800 families.
>
> Then we find no record of German customs among these people or of their
> being passed on. In Queensland, Victoria and South Australia the customs
> were passed on even if they were modified to suit the new environment but
> in
> the Hunter it seems not one custom was passed on. It seems that not one
> custom was maintained once the ship left Hamburg.
>
> Why?
>
> Did the authorities prevent their maintaining their customs? Did the
> employers persecute them? Did the neighbours persecute them? Half the
> neighbours were German anyhow. Were they ashamed of their origin?
>
> Why did they just drop their customs?
>
> Where in the Hunter can you buy a good old German meat wurst made in
> traditional style?
>
> When they had completed their contract terms and ventured out to buy
> property they went into general farming.
>
> Why did they not continue with the vine growing and wine making?
>
> I find not one record of a German vine dresser becoming a wine producer
> under his own label.
>
> It seems that within two generation their German heritage had been
> forgotten. Emails and documents from descendants of these people who say
> they had no idea of their German ancestry until they began a genealogy
> project.
>
> Was there some reason of shame? What were they trying to avoid? Is that
> too
> harsh a question?
>
> I find it intriguing that the Hunter was the first major wine producer in
> this land yet by the turn of the century it was unknown as a wine area. In
> fact as I have it at this time the Hunter did not come to prominence as a
> wine producer until the 1970s yet it preceded the Barossa by about 20
> years.
>
> Why?
>
> These questions have really got to me and I would love to find some
> answers.
>
> Albert Grulke
>
>
>
>
>
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