THE ENGLISH Years

The "Manwaring" name can be traced back through history to the time of William the Conqueror when he invaded England in 1066. In the following centuries the family name spread throughout England and by the 16th Century the name could be found in villages and towns throughout England but concentrated mainly in Kent and surrounding Counties.

County Kent in south-eastern England is known as the garden of England because of its beautiful countryside. It is especially known for the blossoms of its many orchards in the springtime and for its hop fields. Kent is bordered by the estuary of the River Thames on the north,  Sussex on the south, the Strait of Dover on the east and London and Surrey on the west.

The ancestry of our family can be traced back to the small town of Cranbrook, known as the capital of the Kentish Weald. Cranbrook has a  past going back  to the early Middle  Ages when it  was the  centre for iron - smelting. The  name   Cranbrook is derived from Cran meaning crane or heron and Broc meaning a stream or marshy place. The town was granted a market charter  in 1290.

County Kent was abundant with rich pastoral land with orchards and hop field covering the countryside. Because of this the main work for the working class in Cranbrook and surrounding areas was that of Agricultural Labourer or Farmhand and it was in this occupation that our Manwaring ancestors were involved.

William Manwaring was born at Cranbrook on the 8th March  1808, the second son of William Manwaring and  Jane  Bradford.  Sarah  Manwaring, nee Judge, was born at Cranbrook on the 13th March 1807, the second daughter of  Thomas Judge and Sarah Biggs.

Between 1850 and 1860 nearly half a million people emigrated from the British Isles to Australia. If you asked each individual why he or she made such an enormous decision to pick up their roots, leave their home, family and friends and travel such a long journey to a new land, the majority would probably answer "the want of a better life."

England, at this time, was experiencing bad unemployment and poverty due mainly to rapidly increasing population coupled with the effects of the industrial revolution which was seeing more and more predominately labour - intensive jobs being carried out by machinery in both industrial and agricultural occupations.

In direct contrast to this, a rapidly growing country across the sea, was calling out for skilled and unskilled labour. Although during the height of the gold rush, carpenters, masons and wheelwrights were in great demand, most generally shepherds, stock - keepers, sheepshearers, farm labourers and female servants were the occupations which were most in demand.

Although many thousands emigrated to Australia in the 1850's solely in search of gold, many more thousands came to escape unemployment, poverty and helplessness, and to discover hope and prosperity in a new country.

Because of these hard times for the working people of England in the 1850's, William and his family decided to start a new life in a new land and emigrated to Australia on board the Anna Maria arriving in Australia on 25th June 1857.

The Manwaring Family came to Australia to grow hops for the Tooth Company for beer brewing. This is a story told to me, by, not one, but a number of people and because of this cannot be easily discounted. No direct evidence could be found in the Tooth records at the Archives of Business and Labour or any other source and no entry can be found in the Immigration deposit Journals that shows that Tooths brought the Manwarings to Australia to substantiate this story but a number of coincidences should be noted -