Many years ago, my uncle told me about a distant relative who had drowned in Sydney Harbour and he asked me to find out more. At that point I didn’t know about any family in Australia or how I would find out about them, so I filed this information away for a future date. About 15 or so years later I wanted to do some professional development about Trove, Australia’s digital heritage platform. Here was a great opportunity to research this story. I typed ‘Boyce drown Sydney Harbour’ into the search-box, and this is what I discovered.
In 1876 my 4x great uncle Frederick Boyce, his wife Hannah and their 3 teenage sons relocated from Lowestoft in Suffolk to South Australia. He was a plumber, painter and glazier (the family trade) and I’m not sure what would have prompted the move. Was there a demand for plumbers in down under? The family settled in the Adelaide area and the sons all married. In the mid-1880s James, the eldest son, moved his family to Sydney. He and his wife Eliza had 8 children, but he died aged only 40 in 1897.
Evening News, Sydney, 1st January 1900. Via Trove
By Christmas 1899 their eldest daughter, Elizabeth Beatrice, or Lizzie, was 18 years old and engaged to Albert ‘Bertie’ Boaz, with the wedding planned for early January 1900. It was not to be. On Boxing Day the couple, with a group of friends went sailing on Sydney Harbour. They hired a sailing boat, the Splendora, and sailed out from Rushcutters Bay around 11am. The party did include some fairly experienced sailors, however there was a stiff breeze and to try to avoid it, it was decided to change course near Clark Island. This movement was carried out with heavy seas breaking over the boat which caused it to capsize. Two passengers, May Moon and Johanna Collins were never seen again. A witness saw Bertie in the water supporting his fiancée. He called out for help, but none could be rendered, and they weren’t seen again. Another boat rescued the rest of the group. All four bodies were recovered by the first day of the New Year. This wasn’t the only tragedy on the harbour that day. Four other lives were lost when a skiff capsized, also near Clark Island.
An inquest was held on 2nd January. The boat was not overloaded and was in the hands of a competent sailor; a verdict of accidental drowning was reached. That same day the funeral of Lizzie and Bertie was held jointly. They were buried together at Rookwood Cemetery, and their relatives placed in memoriam notices in the newspaper for at least 15 years following their deaths. I imagine the Boyce and Boaz families had been close before this tragedy, and they remained close. In 1903 Lizzie’s brother Walter Victor married Bertie’s sister Frances Maria.
I’ve never been to Sydney but I would like one day to go and visit the resting place of my 2nd cousin 3 times removed and her fiancé. There is a lot of coverage of the two boating disasters of Boxing Day 1899 in newspapers on Trove, which provide more details of what happened. Other information comes from sources in my Ancestry family tree.
27 Dec 1899 – CAPSIZE OF THE SPLENDORA. – Trove
30 Dec 1899 – TERRIBLE BOATING ACCIDENTS. – Trove
01 Jan 1900 – THE BOATING DISASTERS. – Trove
02 Jan 1900 – THE SPLENDORA DISASTER. – Trove
Very interesting. This expands the info that my brother Allan had found some years ago.