Richard Siddins

{{Short description|Australian master mariner and lighthouse keeper}}

{{Infobox person

| image =

| caption =

| birth_date = 1770

| birth_place = County Louth, Ireland

| death_date = 2 July 1846

| death_place = New South Wales, Australia

| known_for = Siddins Point

| occupation = Ship captain, harbour pilot, lighthouse keeper

| nationality = British

| children =

| relatives =

| partner = Catherina Keenan (1804–1809), Eleanor Cooper (1809–?), Jane Powell (1816–1846)

}}

Richard Siddins (1770–1846) was an Australian Master Mariner, Harbour Pilot and Lighthouse Keeper.{{cite Australian Dictionary of Biography |last1=Parsons|first1=Vivienne|title=Siddins, Richard (1770–1846)|id2=siddins-richard-2661/text3573|accessdate=5 October 2017}}

Biography

File:Macquarie Lighthouse old and new removed lantern.jpg File:Marriage notice of Richard Siddins.jpg

Richard Siddins was born in 1770 in County Louth, Ireland and died on 2 July 1846 in New South Wales, Australia. He travelled extensively in his work as a merchant ship's master, merchant sailor, ship's pilot & lighthouse keeper.{{cite news|title=Arrival of Vessels at Port Jackson, and their Departures|url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/71247621/5987725|accessdate=16 November 2017|work=Australian Town and County Journal|date=3 January 1891|location=Sydney|pages=16–17}} He had three sons and ten daughters from three different wives.

He had been married to Catherine Keenan (1804) and Eleanor Cooper (1809) becoming the father of William Keenan and Rebecca Cooper.

On 24 April 1816 he married Jane Powell, daughter of Edward Powell, in the Church of St. Philip's, Sydney. At the time Siddins was 45, while Jane was 16, although in the Church register it had been written Siddins was 35, and Jane 22. They had eleven children: Anne Jane (b. 15/01/1818), Augusta Maria (b. 28/12/1820), Joseph Richard (b. 30/04/1823), Mary Elizabeth (b. 18/06/1825), Jane (b. 04/09/1827), Isabella (b. 06/12/1829), Thomas (b. 11/12/1831), Elizabeth (b. 24/02/1834), Ellen (b. 13/12/1837), Maria Augusta (b. 28/12/1839) and Sophia (b. 31/10/1842) Siddins.

At the end of 1807 he became master of the King George; later he was employed as captain of the Campbell Macquarie by the ship-owner Joseph Underwood. This vessel was a 248-ton full-rigged ship, built at Kolkata, India. It was the first known shipwreck on Macquarie Island, when sailors were marooned for four months during 1812 with the loss of four Indian crew members.{{cite journal|last1=Morgan|first1=Anne|title=First Known Wreck - Campbell Macquarie|journal=The Shipwreck Watch|year=1812|volume=2|pages=1–3|url=http://www.parks.tas.gov.au/fahan_mi_shipwrecks/journals/Shipwrecks/swcampbell2.pdf|accessdate=16 November 2017|series=The Sealer's Shanty|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180329224922/http://www.parks.tas.gov.au/fahan_mi_shipwrecks/journals/Shipwrecks/swcampbell2.pdf|archive-date=29 March 2018|url-status=dead}}{{cite web|title=Hunter Valley Settlers|url=https://www.jenwilletts.com/richard_siddons.htm|website=jenwillets.com|accessdate=16 November 2017|archive-date=10 November 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161110130922/http://jenwilletts.com/richard_siddons.htm|url-status=dead}}{{cite news|title=Ship news|url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/628563/6969|accessdate=16 November 2017|work=The Sydney Gazette; and New South Wales Advertiser|issue=462|publisher=Authority|date=31 October 1812|location=Sydney|pages=1–2}} In 1823 Richard applied for the position of harbour pilot in Sydney. The couple's son Joseph was born the following year. He became superintendent of the South Head Lighthouse (also called Macquarie Lighthouse) in 1832. In 1804 he arrived in Port Jackson aboard a British whaler. From 1804 to 1824 he had been on many voyages around the Pacific Ocean and Southern Oceans and north to the Indies, Kolkata and Canton, first as mate or captain and later as part-owner of his ship. Some details can be extrapolated from several books on his adventurous life and Australian maritime commerce.

In the book Richard Siddins of Port Jackson,Richard Siddins of Port Jackson, Edition 38 di Roebuck Society publication, Author Lyndon Rose, {{ISBN|0909434298}}, 9780909434298 Lyndon Rose describes the details of the journeys by the small band of sea hunters in the first years of Australia's international trade.

Siddins worked mainly for the Port Jackson merchants Lord, Kable and Underwood, ex-convicts who made their fortunes building Australia's export-import trade.

In it there are some illustrations about Siddins' journeys but the author could find no likeness of Richard Siddins.

In The Canberra Times Helen Brown, reviewing Lyndon Rose's book,{{cite news|last1=Brown|first1=Helen|title=Siddins, 'sea-hunter' of early Australia|url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/122477888?searchTerm=richard%20siddins&searchLimits=|accessdate=16 November 2017|work=The Canberra Times|issue=13|date=12 January 1985|page=4}} stated that there is no account of Siddins's life before he arrived in Port Jackson, {{blockquote|"...because no reliable information could be unearthed. So he remains a somewhat shadowy figure..."|Helen Brown, The Canberra Times}}

The book Letter from Charles R. Siddins to H.F. Norrie, 1857{{cite book|last1=Norrie|first1=Harold Francis|last2=Pickering|first2=George Ferris|last3=Siddins|first3=Charles R.|title=Letter from Charles R. Siddins to H.F. Norrie|date=1857|url=http://archival.sl.nsw.gov.au/Details/archive/110327728|accessdate=16 November 2017}} are letters that Siddin's grandson wrote to Harold F. Norrie. Norrie was a public servant who held several posts, including Secretary of the Sydney Harbour Trust, commissioner of the South Head Trust, and alderman of Vaucluse Council. The letters confirm that Captain Siddins built the Greenwich Pier (or Vaucluse Hotel) and after his death his son Joseph succeeded him as superintendent of the South Head lighthouse.

He was claimed as possibly the most important captain in the history of exploration from the book Log-Books and Journals with maps and illustrations by Ida Lee F.R.G.S and Hon. F.R.A.H.S. :{{blockquote|"...perhaps the greatest traveller of them all, who gave so much information concerning early Fiji, and delighted to hold mission services on board his ship in Sydney Harbour, and whom we find later in company with William Smith (mariner) and Robert Fildes in Blythe Bay, New South Shetland.

..."|Ida Lee}}

Voyages

File:Campbell Macquarie crew list.jpg

Richard Siddins was one of the earliest and best known merchant sea captains sailing out of Port Jackson.{{cite book|last1=Rose|first1=Lyndon|title=Richard Siddins of Port Jackson|date=1984|publisher=Roebuck Society|isbn=0909434026|url=http://deerubbinpress.com.au/index.php/richard-siddons-of-port-jackson.html|access-date=28 November 2017|archive-date=1 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171201051345/http://deerubbinpress.com.au/index.php/richard-siddons-of-port-jackson.html|url-status=dead}}

From 1804 to 1822 Siddins helped reap the vast harvest of seals and sandalwood on behalf of the Sydney traders. He took cargoes to China and India for them, and brought back Asian goods for the colonial stores. After many adventures in the Pacific and having survived the shipwreck of Macquarie Island, he became the Port Jackson pilot and later superintendent of the South Head Lighthouse.{{cite web|title=Richard Siddons of Port Jackson|url=http://deerubbinpress.com.au/index.php/richard-siddons-of-port-jackson.html|website=deerubbinpress.com.au|accessdate=30 November 2017|archive-date=1 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171201051345/http://deerubbinpress.com.au/index.php/richard-siddons-of-port-jackson.html|url-status=dead}}

Richard Siddins arrived in Australia, to New South Wales, in 1804 aboard the English whaler Alexander. For many years he took part in trading voyages to Kolkata and the islands of the South Seas. He was in Port Jackson in 1806 aboard the King George and at the end of 1807 he brought cargoes of sandalwood, seal oil and seal furs to Port Jackson.{{cite web|title=Richard Siddins|url=http://australianroyalty.net.au/individual.php?pid=I67057&ged=purnellmccord.ged|website=australianroyalty.net.au|accessdate=30 November 2017}} From 1809 to 1815 Siddins was in the Fiji Islands.{{cite book|title=Exploration and Exchange: A South Seas Anthology, 1680–1900|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=9780226468464|year=2000}}

In Sydney, 1811, Siddins was employed by ship owner Joseph Underwood as Captain of the Campbell Macquarie. In 1811 and in 1812 Siddins returned to India on the Campbell Macquarie and later in that year arrived in Port Jackson with prisoners and a cargo of spirits. Soon after he again set out on the Campbell Macquarie on a sealing voyage to the South seas. They called at Kangaroo Island and collected seal skins and salt, then headed for Macquarie Island. He and his crew ended up being shipwrecked in Hasselborough Bay on 11 June 1812, and at least four of the castaways died. Twelve of them were rescued by the Perseverance, a ship that had arrived at Macquarie Island to collect a gang of sealers in October 1812. Joseph Underwood sent the ship Elizabeth and Mary to the Island to rescue the remaining crew. When Siddins landed on Macquarie island in 1812, he met the Russian explorer Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen there.{{cite book|last1=Ellis|first1=Richard|title=The Empty Ocean|date=2013|publisher=Island Press|isbn=978-1597265997|page=172|edition=Herzien|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9fWQed5be58C|accessdate=24 November 2017}}

Richard Siddins returned to Sydney on 20 January with 1700 skins and rigging form the wreck of the Campbell Macquarie.{{cite book|title=Kangaroo island 1800–1836|publisher=University of California|isbn=0909434026}}

From 1814{{cite book|title=Richard Siddins|chapter-url=http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/siddins-richard-2661/text3573|via=adb.anu.edu.au|accessdate=30 November 2017|chapter=Siddins, Richard (1770–1846)|publisher=National Centre of Biography, Australian National University}}

Lyndon Rose, with his book Richard Siddins of Port Jackson, has set down his story as a tribute to his contribution to the trade out of Port Jackson in the early days of the Colony.{{cite book|title=Richard Siddons of Port Jackson|publisher=Roebuck Society|isbn=0909434026}}

Bibliography

There are at least three books about Richard Siddins’ life and adventures:

Letter from Charles R. Siddins to H.F. Norrie, undated, with newscutting, 1857
Richard Siddins of Port Jackson / by Lyndon Rose.{{cite book|title=Richard Siddons of Port Jackson|publisher=Roebuck Society|isbn=0909434026}}
Richard Siddins pocket book and letter, 1815-1878{{cite book|last1=Siddins|first1=Richard|last2=Wentworth|first2=Sarah|title=Richard Siddins pocket book and letter, 1815-1878|location=Vaucluse|url=http://archival.sl.nsw.gov.au/Details/archive/110361747|accessdate=24 November 2017}}

Letter from Charles R. Siddons concerning the career of his grandfather, Captain Richard Siddons, and his father Joseph Siddins. The letter states that Captain Siddins built the home which later became the Greenwich Pier or Vaucluse Hotel. His son Joseph succeeded him as superintendent of the South Head lighthouse. Also included is a newscutting of the poem 'The Wreck of the Dunbar' by George Ferris Pickering, which features the role of the dog of Joseph Siddins in the discovery of the shipwreck. The second one doesn't have the direct purpose to tell Siddins adventures but to describe how international trade was carried out in 1770 century. The last one is a pocket book, being an interleaved copy of the New South Wales pocket almanac for 1816 containing MS memoranda and tallies, and a set of letters that came from Sarah Wentworth to Mrs Siddins from Vaucluse, N.S.W., 6 February 1878.

Death

In 1832, he was compelled by ill health to exchange his situation as pilot with the superintendent of the South Head lighthouse. He died on 2 July 1846, aged 76.{{cite news|title=Funeral|url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/12888216?searchTerm=richard%20siddins%20death%201846&searchLimits=|accessdate=16 November 2017|work=The Sydney Morning Herald|date=4 July 1846|page=3}} His wife died on 9 February 1883, and was buried at Richmond cemetery and his son, Joseph Richard (1823–1891), became a pilot at South Head.

Curiosities

In his honour, Siddins Point, which projects into the middle of the head of Hero Bay on the north coast of Livingston Island in the South Shetland Islands was named for him by the United Kingdom Antarctic Place-Names Committee in 1958.{{cite book|last1=Hillary|first1=John Stewart; foreword by Edmund|title=Antarctica : an encyclopedia|date=1990|publisher=McFarland|location=Jefferson, N.C.|isbn=9780899504704|page=910|volume=2|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NAwtAAAAMAAJ&q=richard+siddons|accessdate=20 November 2017}} Up until 2011, the name was incorrectly spelled "Siddons Point".