Alfred (The 1St) Brown (Convict)

  General Notes:

"Book" The Pragmatic Pioneer" "Page 308"

ALFRED BROWN at the age of seventeen years did not seem to have a very great life expectancy; he had been sentenced to be hanged by the Neck until he is dead. Alfred was the son of John and Hetty Brown and was born on 9th May 1802 in Dallington, Sussex, one of a family of eleven children. He had been charged with stealing from the person of James Crouch with force of arms, the sum of three Shillings, and was described as being five foot seven and a half inches tall, fair to pale complexion, dark flaxen hair and hazel eyes. His death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment and he arrived at Sydney Cove on the "Malabar" in 1819. The surgeon's log of the "Malabar" indicates that the prisoners were very well treated on the voyage, the youngest prisoners, who would have included Alfred, were separated from the hardened criminals and taught to read and write. He reported to the surgeon on 5th July with pains in the stomach. He was constipated and the surgeon prescribed some aperient pills, which seem to have had the desired effect, as he did not complain again.

Alfred was assigned to Samuel Mason a settler at Wilberforce, received his ticket of leave on 21st March 1827, and according to the 1828 census continued in the employ of Mason after his freedom was granted. In 1835 Alfred married Lucy Tindall the daughter of John Tindall and Lucy Cooper, at St. Peters Richmond. They produced eight children, Caroline in 1835; Lucy 1837; Mary Ann 1838; John 1840; Alfred (who married Matilda Gosper) in 1842;


"The Pragmatic Pioneers" "Page 309"

Elizabeth Sarah 1845; Sophia 1847; and Susannah in 1849. Where or how he acquired the necessary skills is not known, but Alfred spent most of his life as a carpenter and builder in the Hawkesbury district, although it would seem he combined this trade with that of farming to at least some degree. He is mentioned in the Windsor and Richmond Gazette in the column The Ups and Downs of an Old Richmondite thus: -

Alfred Brown, a carpenter lived in Lennox St for a while, in a weatherboard house with a cedar tree in front.

And

Alfred Brown was another old man about Kurrajong and a carpenter by trade. It was he who built the house where Mr Pitt lives, for old Mr John Town. He built another large place with stables and kitchen three miles this side of Mt Tomah for Thomas Sherwood; I put him over the punt occasionally. I know his son Ned, who lived on the Heights for a long while.

Alfred Brown died at North Richmond on 2nd May 1865 and was buried at St. Peters Richmond. His wife Lucy died in the Sydney Infirmary on 17th January1877 and was buried with her husband at Richmond.

  Noted events in his life were:

• Arrived on the Ship, 1819 on the “Malabar”, Sydney Cove, NSW Australia.

• Physical Description: Described as being five foot seven and a half inch.

Alfred married Lucy Tindall, daughter of John Tindall The First and Lucy Cooper, in 1835 in St Peters C of E, Richmond, NSW Australia. (Lucy Tindall was born on 17 May 1817 in Sydney, NSW Australia, died on 17 Jan 1877 in Sydney Infirmary, Sydney, NSW Australia and was buried in 1877 in St Peters C of E, Richmond, NSW Australia.)