WILLIAM GRAY 24/06/1805 TO 04/06/1851 Second child born to John and Elizabeth GRAY Supposedly became Son-in-law and close friend to John Best when John returned from Norfolk Island and settled at Evan in the Windsor district.

JOHN BEST (c1754-1839)

John Best was sentenced with John Tasker at the Old Bailey on 29 October 1783 to seven years transportation for theft of a pair of saddle bags, clothing, shoe buckles and other items from the Cross Keys, Wood Street, London. Best was taken by a captain of patrols coming down Kingsland Road, the stolen goods found in handkerchiefs and pockets. Best said they were his own things being taken to be washed, but the owner's name was on them. Tasker said they had been bought at the Blue Boar, Rosemary Lane, from people who frequented the place and often sold such things.

Both men were delivered on 30 March 1784 from Newgate to the Mercury transport. Tasker did not escape after the convict mutiny on board, but Best was captured at Torbay on 13 April by Helena before reaching shore, and held overnight in a small boat moored beside Helena. He was sent to Exeter, Devon for committal to gaol on the 16th. He was among the 66 escapers who were not tried, but remanded to their former orders by the Special Commission on 24 May.

On 28 June, Best went with a group of Mercury convicts to the Dunkirk hulk, age given as 30, where he was "troublesome at times". He was discharged to Friendship on 11 March 1787. On the voyage Lieutenant Ralph Clark gave him a glass of rum in December because he appeared to be very cold. He said Best was aged 27, with no trade and born in Middlesex.

NORFOLK ISLAND GAOL

On 4 March 1790, his seven year term almost completed, Best was sent to Norfolk Island by Sirius. At 1 July 1791 he was supporting two persons, at this date sharing with Grace Mattocks (Maddocks, Lady Juliana, age given as 28 on embarkation in 1789). A sow that produced a litter of nine on 5 September. Of a one acre allotment in Sydney Town he had cleared 73 rods and by 30 November he was a settler with a lease of 12 acres on Lot No. 65.

In 1793 Best was elected a member of the Norfolk Island Settlers Society and listed as a "clerke". Of his 12 acres only six were ploughable, but in October 1793 he had all six in cultivation. By the end of 1796 he was employed as a general government overseer and victualled as such. By 1801 he had leased an additional 18 acres. holding 147 acres and on 12 October he was appointed superintendent. This position he held until early in 1805, when he had 20 acres in cultivation, ten more in waste land, and owned 17 swine. In this year he was recorded with a wife but no children; through all these years he sold grain and meat to public stores, signing his name for receipt of payment.

In the early years of evacuation from Norfolk Island for VDL, Best decided to remain on the island. In 1811 his health had given out, and in January he was certified as subject to weak sight (one eye almost useless for several years) and incapable of continuing his duties. In April with Rebecca Chippenham (Chipman, Neptune 1790) his "housekeeper" and a child named Mary Wheeler (c1808) he was ordered to Port Jackson for recovery. He was recorded on Norfolk Island in August 1812. In 1814 he was a landholder in the Windsor district, granted 470 acres at Evan on 24 January 1817 and married Rebecca on 16 June at Castlereagh.

Around St Marys, grants north of the Great Western Road were allocated to Governor King's wife by an obliging Governor Bligh, and in return, Governor King granted Bligh's daughter, Mary Putland, land near Werrington. Grants to King's children were made by their father. The Kings sponsored the building of the Church of St Mary Magdalene, and the church became the nucleus of a small village when Sir Maurice O'Connell, who had married Mary Putland, put 400 ha of his wife's land up for sale in 1842.

Also north of the highway was John Harris's Shane's Park, and Phillip Parker King, son of the Governor and distinguished naval captain, was granted an additional 600 hectares north of Penrith in 1837 by Governor Bourke, close to his family's Dunheved estate. The house Werrington was also the nucleus of a large estate, owned by the Lethbridge family, relatives by marriage to the Kings, until the 1970s. South of the road, Samuel Marsden established his fine merino flock at Mamre, and a fine garden and orchard was established around the house.

Closer to Penrith, William Neate Chapman was granted 525 ha in 1804, and Daniel Woodriffe 400 ha. Neither lived on their grants. South of the road, John Best was granted 190 ha; this later became the Hornseywood Estate, but at first it prevented expansion of the town. Simeon Lord (400 ha) and John Single (97 ha) also held land south of the road. Even in 1835 Penrith could not have been expected to expand northwards, as Sarah McHenry was granted 40 ha there by Governor Bourke. This was subdivided much later, in 1885, as the Lemon Grove Estate.

Thus, both Penrith and St Marys were hemmed in by large estates for most of the nineteenth century, with the earliest attempt at subdivision being made at St Marys in the forties. As in the Mulgoa Valley, however, small farms would not have prospered away from the alluvial soils. Penrith had to await the coming of the railways and the boom of the eighties for serious attention to be given to breaking up these large estates into smaller holdings.

In 1828 (age given as 71) Best was recorded as holding 470 acres, with 30 cleared, and owning three horses and 20 cattle. He employed two time expired convicts, and a ticket of leave man as labourers. Rebecca had died on 31 August 1819 at the age of 48: it does not appear that Mary Wheeler was the child of the couple, though in January 1828 (then married to William Gray) she claimed John Best as her father in an unsuccessful petition to Governor Ralph Darling pleading distressed circumstances when her husband was sentenced to transportation to a penal settlement. Best, she said, was suffering from "infirmities and old age". On 6 March 1839 Best died at Windsor, a pauper, and was buried next day at St Matthew's, Windsor, his age given as 82. He seems to have suffered a drastic reduction in circumstances, having lost the assistance of his son-in-law William Gray.

 
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Trial of John Best. ORIGINAL TEXT: (from the Trials of OLD BAILEY)

775. JOHN TASKER and JOHN BEST were indicted for burglariously and feloniously breaking and entering the dwelling house of John Hely, on the 9th of September last, about the hour of ten in the night, and feloniously stealing therein, one pair of leather saddle-bags, value 10 s. four linen shirts, value 30 s. one linen stock, value 6 d. five linen handkerchiefs, value 2 s. two pair of worsted stockings, value 2 s. a leather pocket-book, value 6 d. one pair of leather shoes, value 3 s. and one pair of men's silver shoe-buckles, value 10 s. the property of Samuel Coates.

JOHN HELY sworn.
I keep the Cross Keys in Wood-street, Mr. Samuel Coates came to my house in the coach, I was not at home then, I soon afterwards saw him, he always does come to my house; about eleven at night I was informed that one of the rooms had been broke open by some means, and that the saddle-bags were taken away; it was a bed-chamber up one pair of stairs; as soon as I was able to get an inventory of the things in the bags, I went up to Bow-street, I imagine the room was opened by a false key, there seemed to be a little bit of a purchase, there was some appearance of forcing the lock, as if a small chissel had been made use of; it is a spring as well as a lock, what they call a knob-lock; the next morning I went up to Bow-street between seven and eight, and had hand-bills printed, and soon after I received a message from Bow-street, to attend with Mr. Coates, we went there, and some things were produced which Mr. Coates swore to.

THOMAS LEWIS sworn.
I am chamberlain at this inn, I know the room where Mr. Coates's bags were put, I took the two pair of saddle-bags out of the room where Mr. Coates sat, and hung them across my shoulders, and put them into the room, I locked the door myself and brought the key down to the bar, and hung it up in its usual place, upon a book, No. 12.

Was the key there when you perceived the door had been broke open? - When Mr. Coates wanted to go to bed, I went to see for the key, and I found it where I left it, that was between ten and eleven; when we went up stairs the lock was open, shot back, but the door was shut.

What street does the room open to? - It opens to the gallery which goes round the yard. Court. Do the steps go out of the yard? - Yes, up into the gallery.

Court. Who took the prisoners? - Allen.

ALLEN sworn.
I took the prisoners that night in Kingsland-road, about two miles from this inn, I found on Best what is contained in this handkerchief, I was coming down Kingsland-road on my duty, I am one of the captains of the patrol, and I met the prisoners, I also took from Tasker what is contained in this handkerchief, two shirts, one stock, three handkerchiefs, and a pocketbook; these I took out of his pocket. (The things in the brown handkerchief deposed to.)

Court to Lewis. What time was it you received Mr. Coates's bags? - Between six and seven, when they came to the inn.

(The things in the red and white handkerchief deposed to.)

Allen. These I found on Tasker, the things just now deposed to in the brown handkerchief was in Best's pocket, the two prisoners were walking up the road together.

Court. In this red and white handkerchief, here are two shirts, three handkerchiefs, and two pair of stockings.

Jury to Prosecutor. Had these shirts any particular marks that you know them by? - Yes, there is my name on them.

Allen. The prisoners said the things were their own, they had been having them washed, or something to that purport; in the morning a printer's boy came to me with a handbill, and I then found that it answered to the property that I found on them.

PRISONER TASKER'S DEFENCE.

My Lord, me and Best were both together, we had been at Wapping, coming home we called at the sign of the Blue Boar in Rosemary-lane, where we bought these things; it is a house frequently used by people of this kind, who sell these goods, and we bought these things there.

Court to Allen. Did they say so to you? - My Lord, they said they were their own, and they had been to get them washed.

See original Prisoner Tasker. You asked what we had, and we told you it was our own property? - Allen. Yes.

Prisoner's Council to Allen. You do not know whether they said they were coming from the wash, or going to wash? - I cannot say, they said they were their own property.

Prisoners. We have no witnesses.

Court to Jury. A burglary must be committed in the night time, when there is not light enough to discern the face of a man; therefore it is punished so severely. If a man will take the advantage of night to commit a robbery in a dwelling-house, the law thinks proper to punish that always capitally. If a house is broke into, and things are taken away, or if the things are not taken away, if it is done with an intent to take things away, it is a burglary. Now this was on the 9th of September, and the prosecutor came to town between six and seven; there is not a doubt in the world but it is light at that time: the things, you observe, were not missed till eleven that night; therefore, whether they were taken in the night time or not it is impossible for us to say; but I suppose it is not light longer than eight, about the sixth of September. Nothing serves to ascertain the time when they were taken, but from the time when they were found; now that was about twenty minutes past eleven; then, you see, they had come two miles; and allowing them to be taken at twenty minutes after ten, it would be in the night - ten would have been in the night, nine would have been in the night; therefore that is a circumstance (though there is no positive evidence whether they were taken at night, or before dark) which makes it likely they were taken at night; and I cannot help saying, that one would hardly think that any body would go to break open the door of a room at a public inn, whilst it was day-light. As to the breaking, you will observe, Gentlemen, there must be an actual breaking, or a constructive breaking: it is not necessary that the door should be broke open, if it was upon the latch, and an outward door; the opening of it is in the law a breaking, because you have opened that door which the owner thought sufficiently fastened. If it is opened with a false key, picking the lock is as much a breaking as if the door had been broken all to pieces. Now it must be one or the other, because the key was in the same place where the man hung it up.

With respect to the goods found in the possession of the prisoners, if a man cannot give you a reasonable account to satisfy you that he came honestly by the goods in his possession, the law says he is the man that took them.

There seems to be no doubt in the world with respect to the single felony: how far it is burglary depends on the observation I made to you. If you doubt whether it was in the day-light, or at night, to be sure you will not take the lives of two men away if you have any doubt. You will consider the case, and, I dare say, give such a verdict, as in your consciences you think yourselves bound.

If the goods stolen in a dwelling-house are above the value of 40 s. that constitutes a capital offence; but, however, no particular value has been set upon these things.

JOHN TASKER, JOHN BEST,

GUILTY Of stealing to the value of 39s. but not of breaking and entering the dwelling-house. Transported for seven years.

Tried by the first London Jury before Mr. Justice NARES.

Return to William Gray

The Early Years ¦ Elizabeth Gray 1803 – 1836 ¦ William Gray 1805 – 1851 ¦ Jane Gray 1808 – 1880
John Gray Jr. 1810 ¦ Hannah Gray 1813 – 1856 ¦ Ann Louise Gray 1815 – 1874
Richard Gray 1817 – 1896

Letters from Elizabeth Killett Gray ¦ Trials ¦ Trips & Ships ¦ Letters from William J.B. Gray
Crest & Tartan ¦ Special Acknowledgements


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THE SECOND GENERATION

Rebecca Gray ¦ Elizabeth A. Gray ¦ Hannah Gray ¦ William John Best Gray
Mary Gray

THE THIRD GENERATION

William R. Gray ¦ Emily J. Gray ¦ Eliza A. Gray ¦ Mary E. Gray ¦ Henry Best Gray ¦ George C. Gray
Wallace J. Gray ¦ Edward Gray ¦ Joseph F. Gray ¦ Annie A. Gray ¦ Arthur Lytton Gray

THE FOURTH GENERATION

Noel Francis Gray ¦ Eric Gray ¦ Francis Gordon Gray ¦ Athol C. Gray

THE FIFTH GENERATION

Athol Wayne Gray ¦ Jennifer L. Gray ¦ Kerry Lytton Gray ¦ Eric G. Gray ¦ Gordon W. Gray
Alan J. Gray ¦ Neal J. Gray ¦ Ian Gray

THE SIXTH GENERATION

Brendon John Gray ¦ Allyson Joy Gray ¦ Rohan Paul Gray ¦ Guy B. Phillips ¦ Melinda Phillips
Susannah Phillips ¦ Shannon Gray ¦ Dylan J. Gray ¦ Rachael Lee Gray ¦ Elisha M. Gray ¦ Tehia L. Gray
Jason M. Gray

THE SEVENTH GENERATION

Dylan James Gray ¦ Ethan Kane Gray ¦ Riely Paul Gray ¦ Patrick B. Phillips ¦ Madaline Phillips


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