Morrison Family

1857

Joseph Beat Morrison (1830–1907), copy of an image from a collection of photographic portraits compiled by H. Hansen, Beechworth photographer in 1899. The Burke Museum, Beechworth kindly provided a copy of the image to the Morrison family in the 1990s. The image and a biographical note about Joseph Morrison are also reproduced in M. Rosalyn Shennan, A Biographical Dictionary of the Pioneers of the Ovens and Townsmen of Beechworth, Noble Park, Victoria, 1990, updated edition 2004.

Joseph Beat Morrison (1830–1907) was born in Dundee, Angus, Scotland on 6 March 1830 to David Morrison (1809–??), weaver[1], and Ann Beat (1805–1867).[2] Joseph was the second of the couple’s three children: Ann, Joseph, and Charles. By 1834 Ann Morrison (née Beat) had married William Ross, a Dundee yarn bleacher. What happened to David Morrison is still under investigation, however, he does not appear to have died before 1834, and may have left Scotland for England. In the 1841 Scotland Census (available on Scotlands People), Ann Ross (previously Morrison, née Beat), her daughter Anne 13, and sons Joseph 11, and Charles 9, all recorded as bearing the ‘Ross’ surname, were living in the household of William Ross 35, Linen Hand Loom Weaver, and Ann Ross 30, with half-siblings William Ross 7, Betty Ross 5, and Andrew Ross 2 months.[3] Jean Spence Ross had yet to be born.  

As a young man of 20, according to the in the 1851 Scotland Census, taken on 30 March 1851, (he had turned 21 on 6 March), Joseph Morrison was a member of the Smart household living at 15 Bell Street, Dundee, headed by Christina Smart, millworker, aged 30. Other people living in the household were Christina’s sisters Isabella, 29, Helen, 23 (both ‘at home’), her brother Peter 21, brass founder, Joseph Morrison 20 [21], millworker, ‘brother-in-law’, and her nephew William Seaton, aged 10. All members of the household were recorded as having been born in Dundee. This census record is very important as it is evidence that Joseph Beat Morrison was married in Scotland before he migrated to the colony of Victoria, Australia. Most members of the Morrison family in Australia were only aware that Joseph had had a partner, Catherine White, in Victoria before he married Johanna Ross in 1868.

Joseph Morrison’s marriage to Christina Smart’s sister, Helen, took place at Dundee on 1 March 1850, five days before his 20th birthday. At the time he was recorded as an ‘overseer.’[4] Joseph and Helen had a stillborn, premature daughter, who was buried unnamed, on 26 June 1850. The infant’s burial record also records her father Joseph Morrison of Bell Street, Dundee, as an ‘overseer at a power loom’. At which Dundee factory or factories Joseph Morrison worked at is still being researched. Further tragedy was to strike the couple a little over a year later. Helen Smart, then resident at Cowgate, Dundee, recorded as the ‘Wife of Joseph Morrison, Mill Overseer’ was to die, aged 24, of ‘dropsy’ on 26 July 1851.

Gold was discovered in the British colonies of New South Wales and Victoria, possibly as early as 1823, but the gold rushes did not begin until the 1850s–in Victoria in 1851. Many free Scots were among those who took the long, often very uncomfortable, journey south from Britain in search of their ‘fortunes’, and a better life. A Joseph Morrison, ‘farmer’, who would have been 30 years of age, is listed as an unassisted passenger on the Carrier Dove that arrived at Hobson’s Bay, Melbourne, Victoria from Liverpool, England on 2 November 1857. This is the only Joseph Morrison, of six males by that name, who arrived in Victoria unassisted between 1853 and 1863, whose age and country of origin appear to match our direct forebear’s. If this was our Joseph Morrison, his age is correct, but his ‘profession or calling’ would not have been ‘farmer’. However, Joseph might have aspired to take up land and farm after he arrived in the colony so his occupation as ’farmer’ was added to the passenger records. No Joseph Morrisons of the right age arrived as Assisted Passengers to Victoria in the 1850s or 1860s. There were other Morrisons living in Beechworth at the same time as our Joseph, even one with the same name, who was a watchmaker, but whether any of these Morrisons are related to our family has not yet been researched.

The American medium clipper, Carrier Dove, owned by Montell and Company, Maryland, was launched in 1855. This is the ship on which Joseph Morrison most likely sailed to the colony of Victoria in 1857. Image: Wikipedia.

What Joseph did on arrival in Melbourne is not known, although he tried mining at various goldfields before arriving at the town of Beechworth c. 1860, according to family records. By the early 1860s he was prospecting for gold on Spring Creek that runs through the town. Joseph had a partner called Catherine White (c. 1833–1867) for possibly a year or longer. Catherine White died at Spring Creek from gastritis on 15 December 1867. When Catherine was buried on 16 December 1867 in an unmarked grave at the Beechworth Cemetery, her name was recorded as ‘Catherine Morrison’, born in Scotland, father ‘Joseph White’.[5] Just who Catherine White was, is still unknown. One theory is, however, that she was Irish, not Scottish, as no records relating to her have been located so far in the Scotlands People database or other Scottish records. A Beechworth publican, Joseph White, an Irishman, who Joseph Morrison would most likely have known, kept an establishment called the Allied Arms Hotel, located on the corner of Short and High Streets, probably a short walk from Joseph’s place of abode. This Joseph White may have been a relative of Catherine White.

Just under a year after Catherine’s death, on 12 December 1868, Joseph Morrison married Johanna Ross (1837–1899), a servant from the Scottish Highlands, at the Presbyterian Manse, Beechworth. Johanna Ross was born in the tiny settlement of Scouriemore, Eddrachillis, Sutherland, Scotland on 15 November 1837,[6] one of the 10 children of crofter/tailor George Ross (1799–1872) and Catherine (‘Kett’) McKenzie (c. 1809–1878), some of whose antecedents were from the Isle of Skye.

The Ross family of Scouriemore/Scourie were mainly crofters and fisherfolk who were able to avoid eviction by the Sutherland aristocracy, although some of them left Eddrachillis to train for other trades, find work, or to take up posts elsewhere. Johanna’s father, George Ross, for example, had become a master tailor at Inverness, possibly in the 1840s, before returning to Scourie to continue this trade. Some of Johanna’s siblings appear to have left the Scourie area to find work as servants or clerks. From the birth records of his children, it can be deduced that Johanna’s youngest brother, John Ross, was a lay preacher and teacher in Glasgow, the Isle of Lewis, and at South Knapdale, Argyll in the 1880s and 1890s.

Johanna who, unlike some of her older siblings was very literate, embarked from Liverpool, England on the White Star on 1 August 1866, arriving at Hobson’s Bay, Melbourne, Victoria on 12 October 1866.[7] Passenger records for the voyage list Johanna’s vocation as ‘GS’ or general servant and her faith as ‘Church of England’, although this is difficult to believe and must be a clerical mistake, as the people living in the Eddrachillis parish were Highland Scots who adhered to the various Presbyterian denominations, even after the ‘Disruption’ in 1843. Johanna, whose age was recorded as 25 and 27 in two separate record entries, was assigned as a servant to a Mrs Dunbar at Pentland Hills on 17 October 1866.[8] Despite a thorough search, nothing has confirmed this assignment, where it was at Pentland Hills, or how long Johanna was in Mrs. Dunbar’s employ. The position obviously did not last more than two years as Johanna Ross and Joseph Morrison were married at the Presbyterian Manse, Beechworth on 12 December 1868. Her occupation at the time of their marriage was given as ‘servant’.

When he first arrived at Spring Creek c. 1860, Joseph would have lived in a tent as so many goldminers did back then. Records held at Beechworth’s Burke Museum dating from early 1868 indicate that Joseph Morrison, miner, was domiciled at Spring Creek in a slab hut with an iron roof,[9] before being able to afford to build a house in High Street c. 1869. After giving up gold mining, Joseph Morrison ran the swimming pool at Lake Sambell and was a carter for a time. He also leased the local baths in the 1880s after a more permanent location had been found for them. For many years Joseph was a stalwart of the local Independent Order of Rechabites (IOR), Albion Tent No. 70. The IOR, that has operated in Australia for more than 170 years, is a friendly society devoted to educating people about the dangers of alcohol and drug abuse. In his later years, Joseph Morrison was the caretaker of the Beechworth Town Hall, Ford Street, built in 1859, now (2022) Beechworth’s Visitor Information Centre.

Johanna Morrison née Ross (1837–1899) holding one of her children c. 1870s. Morrison family collection

Joseph and Johanna were to produce five children, all born at Beechworth–teacher Charles Hugh Morrison (1869–1897), court reporter George Morrison (1872–1910), manager and commercial traveller John Morrison (1874–1936), Catherine Anne Morrison (1877–1882) and infants’ teacher Marion Ross Morrison (1881–1954). Only Charles and John were to have offspring, although Charles, George, John, and Marion all married. John Morrison was the only child of Joseph and Johanna Morrison who has living descendants (2022). A publication about this Morrison family of Beechworth is forthcoming.


[1] A Glossary on Scotlands People lists many 19th-century occupations and gives definitions for them: https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/glossary/B?page=1

[2] Scotlands People MORRISON, JOSEPH BEAT (Old Parish Registers Births 282/160/272 Dundee). Named after maternal grandfather; FamilySearch, Scotlands Births and Baptisms 1564–1950

[3] Scotlands People 1841 ROSS, WILLIAM (Census 282/ 67/ 23)

[4] In other records Joseph Morrison is described as a ‘power loom overseer’.

[5] VIC BDM Deaths 9844/1867, aged 33 or 34.

[6] Scotlands People 24/12/1837 ROSS, JOHAN (Old Parish Registers Births 049/20 57 Eddrachillis)

[7] The Australasian, Melbourne, ‘Shipping, Hobson’s Bay,’ Saturday 13 October 1866, p. 13

[8] Public Records Office of Victoria, Assisted passenger lists (1839–1871), passenger list for the White Star, arrived 12 October 1866.

[9] Burke Museum, Rate Books, April 1868: “[Entry No.] 709 Morrison, Joseph, Miner on government land 20′ x 12′ Slabs with iron roof. By 5 May 1869 this rateable dwelling at Spring Creek was described as: Morrison, Joseph [owner] on Govt land Prems 20′ x 12′ W.B. [weatherboard] Palings and Shingle Roof pounds 11.10.00s Ann. Value.” Rate Book for the Borough of Beechworth 18 February 1870, High Street: “[Entry No. 825, p. 64 Morrison, Joseph, Miner, Land and premises palings and shingle roof, Allt 12, Section 25a. This land was opposite the Botanic Gardens not far from Kars Street that does not run right through to High Street now. On 1 March 1872 Entry#2630 is for MORRISON, Joseph, Land 33 ps [perches?], Allt 12, Sect 25a. On 12 December 1873 Entry#841, Morrison, Joseph, Carter, W.B. House 20′ 12′ Land 33 ps, Sect 12, 25A. Paid to 13 December 1874.