Arthur Swift Darby - Jan 1840
History Notes
Occasionally the name Darby appears in Barrabas’ history records but who knows who he was and what he did while living in our area.
Arthur Swift Darby arrived in Australia on 23rd January 1840. He travelled with his brother, Sydney Hudson Darby, Sydney’s wife, Mary Ann, and their four children – Edmund aged 6 years, Anna aged 5 years, Swift aged 3 years and Robert just one year old.
The Florintina was a barque of 425 tons and completed the journey to Sydney in five months. On arrival the party stayed in Sydney for a short time before travelling on to Cressfield, Scone in the Hunter. The family were left there while Sydney Darby and a friend travelled north to look for suitable land for sheep farming.
They took up “Tiengah” an 80,000 sheep station and called it Tiengah Run and the house “The Grove” was built in 1842. The story of the family at Tiengah can be found in the Tingha history book. Unfortunately, little is known about Arthur in the Tingha book, but the Bundarra book is a little more helpful.
Arthur took up a property named Winscombe near Bundarra in 1843 and probably lived there as he provided a security bond for the Postmaster at Bundarra.
As the years passed more people moved into the area. In the year 1884 the government introduced the Land Act, resuming about half of each grazing property and finding people to take over the resumed section. Arthur then rented his section of Winscombe to another grazier and finally sold it.
Referring to Arthur Witten’s diary we find entries from 1876, and it seems that he gradually cut his ties with Bundarra and bought land to the west of Barraba. He called his property Campo Santo and built the stone house which was there for many years. The Capel family built a new brick home almost adjoining the stone house and the two houses remained there until both were destroyed by a later owner.
With the use of Mr. Arthur Witten’s diary, I have found entries concerning Arthur Darby e.g. Mr. Goodwin went to see Mr. Darby in January 1876. Also, Henry Lockhart went to Darby’s for cattle in 1879.
In 1888 there were great fires burning on Darby’s land. There is also a note “Darby’s brother died at Tingah in 1884”. He is buried near the site of the old homestead. The Grove homestead is at the Inverell Museum.
Ten years after the passing of his brother, Arthur Swift Darby died at Campo Santo in July 1894 aged 58 years. Although he was said to be a bachelor, I think that there was mention of a widow at the time of his passing at home just after midnight in July 1894. He is buried in Barraba in the old Church of England section. Sadly, there is little evidence that he lived in the Barraba district for twenty years.
As I close the notes this week I must mention the passing of Nancy Baldwin – a member of our Society for many years up until the last couple and responsible for putting the cemetery records together and then printing a new edition every few years. A wonderful job and well-done Nancy.