Notes from mc2 - John Pendergast & Jane Williams

JOHN PENDERGAST (also recorded as Pendergass, Pendergrafs or Prendergast) was tried at Dublin in March 1799. He was transported on the Minerva which sailed from Cork, Ireland on 24 August 1799 and arrived at Port Jackson on 11 January 1800. John was born in Ireland in 1769 and died in Windsor, New South Wales, on 27 January 1833. At his trial his occupation was listed as a labourer. JANE WILLIAMS arrived in Sydney aboard the Nile on 14 December 1801. She had been tried in Gloucester on 12 January 1801. Jane was born in 1776 and died in Windsor in December 1838. A record of the marriage between John Pendergast and Jane Williams has not been located. By 1808 John Pendergast had acquired a farm at Upper Half Moon Reach on the Hawkesbury River. Prior to this he had rented 30 acres at Mulgrave Place. Despite floods farming on the Hawkesbury was a successful venture with crops including wheat and maize and land used for grazing cattle and pigs. John Pendergast was a Catholic and was actively involved with the establishment of the Catholic church in New South Wales. He donated land for the building of a school but the land may have been used instead for a chapel which was later washed away in the 1867 floods. A small Catholic cemetery was located on his land. (John Pendergast and Upper Half Moon Reach) The children of John and Jane were: James 1803 -1863 Thomas 1805-1862 Sarah 1806 - 1873 William 1808 - 1850 Bridget 1810 - 1885 Charlotte born 1810 Records show that John Pendergast also had a son, John 1800 - 1867 who was a farmer at Campbelltown. Their son, WILLIAM PENDERGAST married SARAH HOLLAND A John Pendergast was listed as a landowner in the Campbelltown area and a street in Minto was named after an early landholder, John Pendergast. The Pendergast family donated a block of land on the corner of Campbelltown Road and Redfern Road to the Catholic Church.