Third Generation  

3. Ellen Penelope VALPY [35366] (William Henry², Richard¹) was born on 12 Feb 1827 in Cawnpore Uttar Pradesh India and died on 08 Sep 1904 at age 77.

General Notes: Ellen Valpy was born in Hummeripore (Hamirpur), India, on 12 February 1827, the second daughter of William Henry Valpy and his wife, Caroline Jeffreys. Ellen came from a talented family: there is evidence that her mother and her sisters Juliet and Catherine were accomplished artists, but Ellen seems to have been especially gifted. After her father's retirement from the East India Company she spent a year with her family travelling through Europe, receiving tuition from an Italian governess and drawing master. The influence of this early training is apparent in her later works.

In January 1849 the Valpys, with five of their six children, arrived on the Ajax in Otago, New Zealand. Valpy, with an income reckoned at £1,200 a year, was the richest man in the settlement. Mrs Valpy selected their suburban lot at the foot of the Caversham hill and a house named The Forbury was built there. It was at The Forbury on 15 January 1852 that Ellen Valpy
married her eldest cousin, Henry Jeffreys. Henry, as a member of the small Church of England community, was quickly enlisted by A. R. C. Strode, the resident magistrate, as a juror, a justice of the peace, and chairman of a committee designed to oppose Captain William Cargill's grip on the press.

Henry Jeffreys had property in New South Wales to which he decided to return after the death of Judge Valpy in September 1852. At this time Ellen Jeffreys was expecting their first child. A daughter, Caroline Emma, was born in January 1853, baptised in February and in March the Jeffreys family and a servant sailed for Sydney. Ellen and Henry stayed in Australia until 1860. In the interim several of their children were born and died. When Ellen returned to The Forbury in June 1860, she was accompanied by only one son, Henry Arthur. The following January another son, Edmond Francis, was born in Oamaru.

In 1863 Ellen Jeffreys was widowed. She continued to live in Oamaru near her mother and some sisters until 1873. In that year her son Henry was admitted to the Dunedin Lunatic Asylum suffering from a religious mania. Ellen Jeffreys moved with Edmond to Dunedin where Henry, a day patient, was able to visit his mother until his discharge from hospital in 1876. After Edmond died in 1887, Ellen Jeffreys's sole source of income was property to the value of £360 in Oamaru. To supplement her income she rented a studio in which to paint, intending to take pupils. Courage to advertise classes seems to have failed her and her only sales were to members of her and her sisters' families.

Ellen Jeffreys never joined the Otago Art Society or exhibited with it even though she was acquainted with its founder, William Mathew Hodgkins, and was friendly with many members. Her paintings survive in the Otago Early Settlers Museum and the Hocken Library. While she attempted oils of subjects such as Naples, most of her works are watercolours which depict local scenes: views of Dunedin from The Forbury, or houses in Caversham. Her paintings failed to capture a wide audience, her vision being of the ideal rather than the romantic. In the last decades of the nineteenth century fashionable artists strove to follow the example of William Turner. Those artists whose training was rooted in an earlier century were thought to be too natural and as a result their work was dismissed. It seems now that the paintings of Ellen Jeffreys have been undervalued; they are not merely of historical interest.

Ellen Jeffreys had evangelical beliefs which derived from her education and upbringing. She joined her sisters Arabella Valpy and Catherine Fulton in a variety of charitable schemes and movements including the Band of Hope Coffee Rooms, the Salvation Army and the Women's Christian Temperance Union. She died a Baptist at Mornington, on 8 September 1904.

Entwisle, Rosemary. 'Jeffreys, Ellen Penelope 1827 - 1904'. Dictionary of New Zealand
Biography, updated 7 July 2005
URL: http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/

• Immigration: 1848, New Zealand on board "Ajax".

Ellen married Henry JEFFREYS [35324] [MRIN: 13064], son of Henry JEFFREYS [35307] and Anna Maria HOBSON [35323], on 15 Jan 1852 in Christchurch Canterbury New Zealand. Henry was born on 05 Jul 1824 in India, was baptised on 05 Oct 1824 in Bombay Maharashtra India, and died in 1863 at age 39.

General Notes: Henry went to New South Wales . He also Visited New Zealand where he met his cousin Ellen Penelope Valpy whom he married

Children from this marriage were:

   9 F    i. Caroline Emma JEFFREYS [35380] was born in Jan 1853 in Otago Province New Zealand.

   10 M    ii. Henry JEFFREYS [35381] was born in Australia.

   11 M    iii. Edmond JEFFREYS [35382] was born in Jan 1861 in Oamaru Otago New Zealand and died in 1887 at age 26.

4. Caroline Arabella VALPY [35367] (William Henry², Richard¹) was born on 26 Feb 1828 in Cawnpore Uttar Pradesh India and died in 1852 at age 24.

• Immigration: 1848, New Zealand on board "Ajax".

Caroline married Dr. Henry Egerton HENSLEY [35372] [MRIN: 13061].

Children from this marriage were:

   12 M    i. Harry HENSLEY [44318] .

   13 M    ii. Egerton HENSLEY [44319] .

   14 F    iii. Arabella HENSLEY [44320] .

   15 F    iv. Ellen HENSLEY [44321] .

5. Catherine Henrietta Elliot VALPY [35368] (William Henry², Richard¹) was born on 29 Dec 1829 in New Zealand and died on 06 May 1919 at age 89.

General Notes: Catherine Henrietta Elliot Valpy was born on 19 December 1829, the third daughter of William Henry Valpy of the East India Company and his wife, Caroline Jeffreys. There is some confusion about her birthplace: it may have been Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, or Reading, Berkshire. She was educated mostly in England, by an uncle, the Reverend Peter French. At this time she was also influenced by another uncle, the Reverend Charles Jeffreys, who had strong evangelical beliefs. Her formal education was supplemented during 1845 and 1846 when the Valpy family toured Europe. The young Catherine's impressions of Italy were chronicled in painstaking detail in the earliest of her surviving diaries.

In January 1849 the Valpys, with five of their six children, arrived at Otago on the Ajax. On 22 September 1852 Catherine Valpy married James Fulton, at a joint wedding with her sister Juliet Valpy and William Mackworth. The ceremony took place at her parents' home, The Forbury, Dunedin. James Fulton held land in West Taieri, called initially Ravensbourne, and later Ravenscliffe, to distinguish it from the West Harbour suburb of Dunedin. Except for brief sojourns elsewhere, Catherine Fulton lived there for the rest of her life.

On arrival in Dunedin Catherine Fulton had been a member of the most prominent family of Anglicans in the Otago community. The ease with which she took her place in Presbyterian Dunedin may be explained by her familiarity with evangelical views. Not long after her marriage she and James Fulton joined the Presbyterian ministers' sustentation fund at West Taieri, where they took leading places in the congregation. Weekly church services were held for many years in their house, and Catherine Fulton started and taught a weekly Sunday school and Bible class which continued to meet under her guidance for nearly 70 years. She was also baptised at the Hanover Street Baptist Church in 1868. The baptism did not change her religious adherence, but she experienced a state of grace.

Throughout her marriage Catherine Fulton kept daily diaries in which she attempted to record dispassionately the fine detail of her daily life. The surviving diaries, which cover the years from 1857 to 1919, reveal the trials and successes of pioneering life. From them we learn that the bread often did not rise; that Dolla Richmond was a most 'aesthetic young lady & Isa Blackett also too-too'; and that household help was occasionally insolent. Catherine Fulton records her involvement in numerous organisations. She also describes the talents of her sisters and brother and their families, her husband and her eight children.

While facility with pencil or paintbrush was common to many members of her family, Catherine Fulton was best known for her musical talent and taste. She regularly played whatever instrument was available at the local church services, and the story of how her piano came to grief in the Taieri River before reaching its new home is recorded in her autobiography as well as by her brother-in-law, F. C. Fulton, one of the party responsible for its loss.

Catherine Fulton's beliefs led her to become involved in various social, political and religious movements. She organised and chaired the Tract Depot for a number of years, and started the Band of Hope Coffee Rooms which she helped run with her sisters Ellen Jeffreys and Arabella Valpy. She was a constant attender at Dorcas and mothers' meetings, and was deeply concerned for the moral and social welfare of the young people in the Otago Benevolent Institution and the Otago Industrial School, which she and her husband supported.

In May 1885 Catherine Fulton helped found the Dunedin branch of the Women's Christian Temperance Union and was its first president. She was the dominion president from 1889 to 1892, when she resigned because a constitutional amendment with which she agreed was not passed. The amendment stated that members of the WCTU could be eligible for election as officers only if they accepted the biblical doctrine of the Atonement.

Catherine Fulton was also an ardent advocate of women's suffrage and in 1891 records her and her friends' bitter disappointment when John Hall's Female Suffrage Bill was lost in the Legislative Council by two votes. She expressed her exasperation with Henry Fish, a Dunedin MHR, whose opposition to the bill was, in her words, 'outrageous and insulting'. She was also infuriated with Walter Carncross, MHR for Taieri, who introduced what she called a 'mischievous' amendment. He moved that women should be eligible to be members of the House of Representatives. As he had intended, the motion enraged members of the Legislative Council and the bill was defeated. Two years later in November 1893 when Catherine Fulton voted for the first time, Carncross did not get her vote, nor that of the many women she drove to the Outram polling station on election day.

Catherine Fulton's political sympathies were echoed by her husband, who, as a prominent politician, supported women's suffrage and the temperance cause. Her unmarried daughter, Caroline Fulton, was also a tireless worker for temperance, women's franchise and evangelical church organisations. After James Fulton died in 1891, Catherine Fulton managed the stud farm at Ravenscliffe, and continued to pursue her many interests until her own death on 6 May 1919.

Entwisle, Rosemary. 'Fulton, Catherine Henrietta Elliot 1829 - 1919'. Dictionary of New Zealand
Biography, updated 7 July 2005
URL: http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/

Catherine married James FULTON [35440] [MRIN: 13078] on 22 Sep 1852 in New Zealand. James was born in 1830 and died on 20 Nov 1891 at age 61.

• Immigration: 1848, New Zealand aboard the "Ajax".

Children from this marriage were:

+ 16 M    i. Arthur Robert William FULTON [35441] was born on 03 Oct 1853 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died on 26 Jul 1889 in Wellington Wellington New Zealand at age 35.

+ 17 M    ii. James Edward FULTON [35442] was born on 11 Dec 1854 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died on 06 Dec 1928 in Wellington Wellington New Zealand at age 73.

   18 M    iii. Francis John FULTON [35444] was born on 04 Apr 1856 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died on 02 Feb 1874 in Dunedin Otago New Zealand at age 17.

   19 F    iv. Caroline Arabella FULTON [35443] was born on 04 Mar 1858 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand.

+ 20 M    v. Herbert Valpy FULTON [35445] was born on 04 Dec 1861 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died in 1927 at age 66.

+ 21 F    vi. Catherine Juliet FULTON [35446] was born on 23 Sep 1862 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand.

+ 22 M    vii. Robert Valpy FULTON [35447] was born on 19 Jan 1865 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died on 01 May 1924 in Dunedin Otago New Zealand at age 59.

+ 23 F    viii. Mabel Violet FULTON [35448] was born on 04 Dec 1866 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died in 1958 at age 92.

6. William Henry VALPY [35369] (William Henry², Richard¹) was born on 08 Jan 1832 in Calcutta Bengal India, was baptised on 18 Jan 1832, and died on 01 Jan 1911 in Oamaru Otago New Zealand at age 78.

William married Penelope Caroline EVERY [35451] [MRIN: 13081], daughter of Simon Frederick EVERY [35362] and Mary BRUTTON [35453], on 01 May 1858 in New Zealand. Penelope died on 25 Jul 1892.

• Immigration: 1857, New Zealand on board "John Masterman".

Children from this marriage were:

   24 M    i. Percival VALPY [35452] .

Percival married Mary SHORT [35460] [MRIN: 13082].

+ 25 M    ii. William Henry VALPY [35456] was born on 15 Mar 1859.

   26 M    iii. Ernest Every VALPY [35457] was born on 20 Mar 1860.

+ 27 F    iv. Evelyn Penelope VALPY [35458] was born on 18 Nov 1862 and died on 07 Feb 1938 at age 75.

   28 M    v. Leonard VALPY [35363] was born on 02 Feb 1872 in Dunedin Otago New Zealand and died on 23 Aug 1951 at age 79.

+ 29 M    vi. Frederick Fulton VALPY [35455] was born on 16 Nov 1873 in West Taieri Otago New Zealand and died on 09 Jun 1963 at age 89.

+ 30 F    vii. Alice Mary VALPY [35454] was born on 14 Mar 1877 in Dunedin Otago New Zealand and died on 25 Sep 1964 at age 87.

+ 31 F    viii. Irene Lucy Gray VALPY [35459] was born on 06 Nov 1880 and died in 1970 at age 90.