Rudd, Kevin - Sydney Morning Herald 31 July 2008
Title
Rudd, Kevin - Sydney Morning Herald 31 July 2008
Subject
Sydney Morning Herald 31 July 2008
Description
The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has been presented with a two-volume compendium on his family links to petty criminals, including an English street urchin sentenced to death for fleecing an eight-year-old of her dress and underwear in a toilet.
The volumes were given to Mr Rudd at Kirribilli House this morning by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who hailed the Prime Minister's geneology as "true Aussie pedigree".
The books tell the tale of Mary Wade, the Prime Minister's paternal fifth great-grandmother, who had survived the gritty London streets by sweeping streets and begging for food before getting into mischief with an older girl in 1788.
Together, they "coaxed an eight-year-old girl into a privy where they stripped her of her dress, petticoats, a linen tippet, and a cap and absconded", the books say.
Ms Wade was tried at the Old Bailey where she declared: "I was in a good mind to have chucked her down the necessary and I wish I had done so". The "necessary" is another term for "privy", an archaic word for toilet.
She was sentenced "to be hanged by the neck til she be dead" but, after months in a rat-infested prison, her sentence was commuted and she was sent to NSW as a convict, aged 12.
Another relative, Catherine Lahey, forged money. Mr Rudd's paternal fifth great-grandmother was convicted of forging coins because she could not pay one shilling and sixpence a week for rent. She arrived in Sydney in 1800.
Another ancestor, convict Thomas Rudd, became a founding father of Campbelltown. Two streets in the suburb are named after him: Thomas Street and Rudd Road.
Mr Rudd's other ancestors came to Australia as free settlers, living in Parramatta, Campbelltown, Wagga Wagga in NSW and eventually, spreading north to Queensland.
Church elder Terry Vinson, who gave Mr Rudd the books, said understanding one's family histories gave meaning to one's place in the present day.
"We regard today's presentation as our gift to the nation," he said.
The volumes were given to Mr Rudd at Kirribilli House this morning by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who hailed the Prime Minister's geneology as "true Aussie pedigree".
The books tell the tale of Mary Wade, the Prime Minister's paternal fifth great-grandmother, who had survived the gritty London streets by sweeping streets and begging for food before getting into mischief with an older girl in 1788.
Together, they "coaxed an eight-year-old girl into a privy where they stripped her of her dress, petticoats, a linen tippet, and a cap and absconded", the books say.
Ms Wade was tried at the Old Bailey where she declared: "I was in a good mind to have chucked her down the necessary and I wish I had done so". The "necessary" is another term for "privy", an archaic word for toilet.
She was sentenced "to be hanged by the neck til she be dead" but, after months in a rat-infested prison, her sentence was commuted and she was sent to NSW as a convict, aged 12.
Another relative, Catherine Lahey, forged money. Mr Rudd's paternal fifth great-grandmother was convicted of forging coins because she could not pay one shilling and sixpence a week for rent. She arrived in Sydney in 1800.
Another ancestor, convict Thomas Rudd, became a founding father of Campbelltown. Two streets in the suburb are named after him: Thomas Street and Rudd Road.
Mr Rudd's other ancestors came to Australia as free settlers, living in Parramatta, Campbelltown, Wagga Wagga in NSW and eventually, spreading north to Queensland.
Church elder Terry Vinson, who gave Mr Rudd the books, said understanding one's family histories gave meaning to one's place in the present day.
"We regard today's presentation as our gift to the nation," he said.
Contributor
Bob Stevens
Files
Collection
Citation
“Rudd, Kevin - Sydney Morning Herald 31 July 2008,” Mary Wade Family History Association Inc., accessed November 7, 2024, https://www.marywadefamily.org/items/show/143.