Historical Society - Hoskisson Family
Unfortunately, the markets had to be moved to the IGA hall this week something that hasn't happened for quite a while. Thank you to everyone for your co-operation - most of all the usual stall holders as well as the TRC stall with the Mayor and two councilors to talk to residents.
During the week we received a visit from Lorraine & Graham Turnbull. Lorraine was one of the key figures in the running of the Jane Ison Family Re union here 12 years ago. Cross, Crowley and Eaton were some of the families taking part and Lorraine and her committee are now hoping to arrange a similar reunion at Walcha because the Cross family is well represented there. We will let everyone know when there is a date as all branches should be represented.
Also, this week we have had a query about Hoskisson's Plains - one of our earliest settlements. The more modern name is Barraba Creek Station and even that name has almost died out with the sale of small blocks in the area.
John Hoskisson seems to have been the first to take up this land. He appears in J.F.Campbell's Squatting on Crown Lands in N.S.W. which lists those with licences in 1837 to depasture stock beyond the boundaries of the Colony.
The entry is Hoskisson, John, who lived at Cornwallis (Richmond/Windsor area) having 117 licences in the northern area of Brisbane at Banaba Plains. Later in the 1840 list we find John Hoskisson, (117) "Barraba" under Liverpool Plains. The 1840 list also gives the names of several other early settlers in the Barraba area. Reading through this little book we note that John Hoskisson had 76,800 acres on Manilla River while Armitage (Barraba Station) had 45 square miles also on the Manilla River - thus there was not much room for anyone else at that time.
John Hoskisson had a hard start to life. He was born in 1799, just a few weeks after his father was murdered by aborigines in the Windsor area. His mother, Sarah, was left to rear their three children and as was common in those days she remarried to a Mr. Upton in 1803 and young John was reared in Sydney by his Godfather. He worked hard taking horses to water at the Tank Stream and carting wood in a wheelbarrow; in fact, he was already looking forward. He returned to Windsor at an early age to take up farming and married Sarah Freebody at the age of 19 years. The young couple managed to accumulate a considerable amount of property, eventually purchasing the property "Clifton" in the 1840's. The young couple had 11 children, rearing 9 of them and setting them up with properties at Armidale, Windsor, Barraba and in Queensland.