50-Day Family History Blogging Challenge - Day 30

Fragments of Family History – The Family of William Stephens & Mary Newman Buckman – Mary Jane Stephens

Jennifer Jones from TRACKING DOWN THE FAMILY has initiated a 50-Day Family History Blogging Challenge. This is a big writing commitment, but I have decided to participate. I have decided my topic will be “Fragments of Family History”. I will write short posts of newspaper items or single stories connected to my family history. This may expand over the 50 days.

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Mary Jane Stephens

Mary Jane Stephens was born on 25 February 1848 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.¹ She was the eighth child and fifth daughter of William Stephens and Mary Newman Buckman. She was baptised on 2 April 1848 at St Lawrence Church of England, Sydney.²

Mary Jane's parents used the English naming pattern for most of their children and as the fifth daughter she should have been named after her father's oldest sister, her name was Jane! It was also his paternal grandmother's name. I assume her first name of Mary was for her two sister's, Mary Susan and Mary Theresa, who had died.

After losing six of their previous seven children, Mary Jane survived! She was 12 years younger than her only surviving sibling Mary Emma.

Mary Jane married George Thomas Hordern Braddock in 1866 in the district of St George, Sydney.³ Mary Jane and George had 11 children:

• Annie Emma Braddock 1866-1920

• George Henry H Braddock 1869-1951

• Rose Emily Kate Braddock 1871-1940

• Ada Lilian May Braddock 1873-1874

• William James Braddock 1875-1875

• Alice Lily May Braddock 1876-1936

• Maud Mary Braddock 1878-1939

• Minnie Edith Braddock 1881-1905

• Horace Stanley Spencer Braddock 1884-1964

• Herbert Hilton Prosper Braddock 1886-1938

• Harold Searle Collett Braddock 1890-1959⁴

It is lovely to note so many of her children with the names of her brothers and sisters; Emma, Edith, Mary, Spencer, Thomas (although probably named after his father), and George (most likely named after his father). Mary Jane had 11 children and only lost 2 as babies. She would have known about the loses her mother experienced and perhaps was apprehensive about losing children herself.

George Thomas Horden Braddock was a carpenter and joiner. George and Mary Jane lived in Newtown which was close to her parents in Marrickville. They later moved to other Sydney suburbs.

George died on 11 January 1920 at his residence Emoh-Ruo, Parramatta Road, Ryde and is buried in the Presbyterian Section of the Field of Mars Cemetery, Ryde.⁵ Emoh-Ruo was a popular name for houses in Australia in the early twentieth century being “Our Home” spelt backwards.

Mary Jane died on 15 February 1935 at a private hospital in Petersham.⁶ She was 87 years old. Mary Jane is buried with her husband.

Four children having lunch, Peder Severin Krøyer, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

1. New South Wales Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, NSW Government, Baptism Certificate of Mary Jane Stephens, daughter of William and Mary, Reference No. 409/1848.

2. "Australia, Births and Baptisms, 1792-1981", FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XTXN-R3P : Website accessed 11 July 2025.

3. New South Wales Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, NSW Government, Marriage Record of Mary J. Stephens and George Braddock, Reference No. 1219/1866.

4. New South Wales Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, NSW Government, Birth, Death and Marriage Records; Trove, National Library of Australia, https://trove.nla.gov.au/.

5. ‘Family Notices’, The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW: 1842-1954), 12 January 1920, p. 5.

6. ‘Family Notices’, The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW: 1842-1954), 18 February 1935, p. 8; Find a Grave, Memorial Search, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/search.