Inquests and My Family History

Inquests form an important part of my family history research. Since I first started researching my family history, and realised that it was possible to access inquest files, inquests have been a special interest of mine. Inquests can be accessed through state archive centers and usually they were reported in local newspapers. Quite often the newspaper report will be an exact transcript of the inquest,but often the entire transcript of the index is reported.

As yet, the inquests in my family were all held in Victoria, so I’m quite familiar with the Public Records Office of Victoria (PROV). I love the entire process of viewing these records. When researching an ancestor, one of the first things I would always do, is check the Victorian Inquest Index. On finding my ancestor’s name there, I would then order the record, to be viewed at PROV in Melbourne. Well, that was the process up until recent years. The inquest records have now been digitised and are available online, making it possible to view them more quickly and online. A trip to PROV for me was a two hour drive and so it wasn’t possible to go just any old time. I love that I can now view these records from home.

There have been a few interesting inquests in my family history. Below, are just two examples.

Ellen BOYLE was the daughter of Patrick BOYLE, my second great grand uncle. Her life was taken by her husband in 1871, when she was aged 18, and a mother of two, including her new born baby, of only a few weeks old. The big surprise of this inquest was that after being hit in the head with an axe, no cause of death was able to be given. The postmortem was delayed, and occurred three days after her death, The resultant condition of the body at the time of the post-mortem, made it difficult to ascertain a cause of death. A very gory desciption of the state of the body was discussed in great detail at the inquest. What I really loved about this inquest was that my great grandmother, Mary CALNAN was a witness. Reading her statement, I was able to get a better knowledge of the way she spoke, and I really did feel that I could hear her voice in my head.

Joseph Henry Jones, my 2x great grandfather, for many years was my brickwall. I had tracked his life from his birth in Hobart, and to Victoria, after his marriage, and the birth of his first child, Thomas James JONES. After a few years in Victoria, and the birth of another six children, he became elusive, and I was unable to discover his death certificate. Another family researcher gave me information that Joseph’s eldest son died in a mining accident in a remote area of Victoria. As usual I chased up the inquest file, expecting only to find interesting information about the death of Thomas. To my surprise, I found that his father ,Joseph, was present when he died, and was the main witness at the inquest. Finally I had found my missing great grandfather and was able to read his words as recorded in his statement. I then knew the area where he was living and was able to find his death certificate after many many years of searching.

I’ll never forget the file that I received from a very early inquest. Immediately, it was obvious that the paperwork hadn’t ever been handled, since being filed away in the archives, at the time of the inquest. As I opened the very stiff and crackly paper, particles of brown ‘stuff’ fell out. The subject of the inquest had left a suicide note where the particles had been hidden, which, as the archivist told me, was dried blood.

The above are just a few examples of interesting information that can be found in inquests. Each of the inquests that I have seen for my family, have interesting and unexpected information. Viewing the inquest files of family members who died suddenly, or in institutions, can give a better understanding of our ancestors and the lives that they lived. I believe they can help us better understand our ancestors. Many also contain statements from family members and friends.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve been occasionally publishing posts about the inquests in my family. There are still more to go but below are the links to those published so far.

Alexander McQueen

Ellen Chute Part 1 and Part 2

Baby Jones

Joseph Lowe Jones

Thomas James Jones

The Murder of Ellen Chute

William Stroud Dale

Thomas Love

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