Marriage: Love and Law exhibition catalogue - Flipbook - Page 51
37 Clerk of the Peace
Copy of the marriage
certificate issued to Patrick
Meehan and Amelia [sic]
Blake by James Fullerton,
13 June 1851
Paper
1851
NSW State Archives,
NRS 880 [9/6364]
38 Colonial Secretary
Nominal return of all
female prisoners confined
in H.M. Gaol Parramatta,
who have children
Paper
1852
NSW State Archives,
NRS 905 [4/3076] 52/3319
Emmeline’s parents, Thomas and Emma Blake, testified that they were
unaware that Patrick was known to their daughter Emmeline, let alone that
he had formed an attachment to her. Patrick was found guilty of abduction and
sentenced to three years hard labour. The Marys, also found guilty, were given
two years hard labour. Their infant children were incarcerated with them at
Parramatta Gaol (38). The offending trio’s family and other supporters urged
for the reduction of their ‘severe’ punishment. Mid-way through his prison
sentence, Patrick wrote to the Chief Justice asking for mercy. He admitted with
‘shame and repentance’ what he had done, and now understood the ‘great
magnitude’ of his actions which were ‘against the morals of society’ (39).
39 Patrick Meehan
Letter to Sir Alfred Stephen,
Chief Justice, requesting
early release, Parramatta
Gaol, 27 February 1853
Paper
1853
NSW State Archives,
NRS 906 [4/714.4] 53/2898
Was this case, as Emmeline herself believed, a story of true love between two
young people? Or, as Kiera Lindsey suggests, a conspiracy in which a naive
teenager was abducted and coerced into marriage so that her ‘husband’ might
benefit from her family’s wealth?
37
38
39
50
51
