Yesterday evening I was yet again struggling to complete my Fisher Tree this time looking for one of William’s children the elusive Lucy Ellen and again asked on the ancestry group facebook group. They have have some mighty fine and fast searchers on there. I went to do my weekly shop and before I was even home I noticed that someone had found her marriage. Again a marriage in Ceylon so not easy to find in the ordinary records.
I knew of Lucy’s existance from two sources. Firstly I found her baptisms in the records at Nuwara Eliya. And secondly she was labelled as Lucy in the image above on Wikipedia which is from 1865 and taken in England. She was 17 in this picture. Their parents are back in Sri Lanka. In fact William Fisher went to Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) when he was a young man and lived for 35 years in Sri Lanka without ever returning. The photo is of seven living children. Also shown are the husband and two young Children of Alice Daniells nee Fisher, Lucy’s only sister. Their father William Fisher was to die the following year as did the two youngest children and a third Daniells child not pictured (all in Sri Lanka).
I imagine this photo was for the Daniells to take back to their parents. Lucy may well have gone back with them at that point. I think it was always hard to find good people to accompany the children for the long voyages across the seas so these were carefully planned affairs.
The wedding that turned up was a marriage record from the army. But armed with the surname I was soon able to track her down in the newspaper archives.
So my guess is that Lucy Ellen went back with the Daniells, then her father unexpectedly died falling off a horse. She would have been living with her mother and bother Albert supporting her. Then the three children died of cholera which must have been a second blow to the family.
Lucy got married at 21, four years after this photo to an older Irish army Officer from County Limerick – Denis Creagh. It was a good match because Denis was doing well in the Army. He had just been promoted to Paymaster. He came from a well thought of family in Ireland. As the newspaper announcements attest.
By 1890 they are back living in Ireland and various articles describle how Lieutenant Creagh and his wife partook of various activities related to the Kildare Hunt.
Here is an account of them at the Kildare Hunt Ball in 1890.
In 1894 it looks they boarded a ship for Nova Scotia. Perhaps to start a new adventure or perhaps it was to go with the army there. Later Lieutenant Creagh does seem to be still working for the army.
The passenger booking shows that they are in the smarter “Saloon” part of the boat. And Denis and Lucy Ellen are not travelling with any children. In fact I have not found any evidence that they had children at all.
Sadly Lucy Ellen died at sea on their journey to Halifax. She records show that she had sea sickness but that it was cirrohsis of the liver that killed her. She was 46 years old.
I found this sweet memorial to her in the newspaper. I get the sense that Leiutenant Colonel Creagh was devastated. I can find no record of a second marriage.
Looking at the family tree is interesting. So many of them died young. Lord Fisher (Jack) was the eldest by quite a significant amount but he outlived most of them by a considerable time.
We have
1. Four infants (Kate, Robert wilmot, Frederick Wiliiam and Catherine Emily that die before their fathers death in 1866
2. 1880 Philip dies at died in the ship Atalanta aged 22
3. 1883 Albert Bertram Arthur Fisher died in Batticola, Sri lanka aged 35
4. 1894 Lucy Ellen died at sea aged 46
Their poor mother died in 1895 aged 65 surely of grief aside from anything else. She was 75 and had been a widow on meagre means for 19 years. She had been predeceased by 8 of her 12 children. And was somewhat estranged from her eldest. I hope she had a good relationship with Alice and Frederick in her last years.
In 1901 my ancestor Francis or Frank Conrad committed suicde in Sri Lanka aged 51. I think it was to do with money worries which impacted alot of the families in Ceylon. Certainly the money his wife inherited was only a few hundred pounds. He was the only one of his immediate famiily left in Sri Lanka where he had lived all his life. That must have been strange in itself.
Alice died in 1915. John followed in 1920 and Frederick died in 1943.
In some of the biographies of Jack Fisher it describes how despite being a caring brother when his siblings were younger later in life he had little contact with them. The truth is that they were nearly all dead! He had fallen out with his sister Alice who had married a cousin. And the last sibling Frederick was a subordinate to him in the Navy He did have contact with him but perhaps it made it tricky.
I can imagine that much loss might not make you want to talk about your family a great deal. It is just too sad.
Here is the final trees for the famiily:
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