LIST 26 - MARRIAGES - ST MARYS SYDNEY

 
 
The Reverend John Joseph Terry arrived in the colony in 1820 aboard 
the "Janus". The first entry in the marriage register was dated 28th 
October 1819 with the notation "before leaving Ireland" whether 
Robert Moss and Elizabeth Bride came to the colony is yet to be 
determined. The second entry was dated the 16th June 1820 in Sydney. 
There were a further 14 entries for 1820.
 
The information recorded for each marriage is as follows:
 date
 groom 
 family name
 Christian name
 year and ship of arrival
 civil status at time of marriage
 age at marriage
  bride 
 family name
 Christian name
 year and ship of arrival
 civil status at time of marriage
 age at marriage
 officiating minister
  comments
 reference number
 
The marriages are listed in chronological order.
 
Three of the marriages are duplicates of marriages that occurred 
earlier in the decade in Protestant churches.
 
It should be pointed out that in the original register the only 
information recorded was; date, family name and Christian name of both 
bride and groom. Information in the register but not included 
here includes; the officiating minister, names of the witnesses to 
the marriage and who gave consent to the marriage (the father to 
colonial born brides and the governor to convicts). Interested 
readers are urged to consult the originals.
 
As explained above the age at marriage is a derived figure.
 
When the Rev Terry first landed in Sydney, there was of course no 
catholic church building and for the first few years the marriage 
register was in a real sense the parish. As he travelled around the 
colony he performed marriages and the register gives a type of travel 
guide to his movements for the first couple of years. 
 
The Comments column records these places of marriage.
 
The reference number would direct the reader to the entry in the 
original parish register. In this instance the numbers run from 001 
to 016. 
 
In circumstances not dissimilar to the baptismal register, two 
entries in the St Marys' Hobart Vand Diemens Land register, relate 
to marriages performed in Sydney by Rev Conolly.
 
To locate an entry on this list; firstly an alphabetical search on 
the name would be made on Lists 15 or 16 using code "SMS" from which 
the date of marriage would be retrieved, secondly using the 
appropriate date, the marriage would then be located on this list.

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