Just when you think you know!

From Kincumber Parish Map. Toorigal was both 115 and 57.

The last few weeks, I have been digging through land grant, title and sales documents after learning to use the Historical Records system for NSW. I started out trying to find when William Ward's property 'Toorigal' left the Ward family, but I found out that there was a lot about William Ward's land that we did not know!

The landmark family history prepared by Joan Taylor in the mid 1980s correctly identified four key land holdings that William and Catherine ward owned:

• Williams original grant of 150 acres at Killcare.
• The Toorigal property, supposedly 100 acres, purchased from HG Watson about 1855.
• A grant of 100 acres bought in 1855 near Avoca - purchased for the timber.
• A block of about three acres in the Kincumber village.

While checking something else this week, I discovered that we had greatly underestimated William and Catherine's land holding. When you read Catherine's will carefully, the Avoca land is described as '260 acres'! I since found where William bought the two blocks to the north of his grant, These total 210 acres, so allowing for William's initial 100 acres, I still have to acount for some other transactions (sales?)

Next I was checking out what happened to Toorigal, which Catherine's will split between her sons, Ephraim and John. I found that Ephraim had sold his half-share back to John in 1910, but it was 80 acres, not 50! Checking the description of the land carefully, it is clear that Toorigal was 160 acres, not the 100 acres we thought. If you check the Parish maps, HG Watson had two grants, one being the Toorigal 100 acres, but the adjoining 60 acres was also granted to Watson, so they must have been sold as a single property. I have yet to find the proof of the sale, but there is no doubt that this was the case. Watson sold then re-purchased the property as one entity before it came into William's possession.

Now that solves another little mystery as to exactly how Manasseh Ward met his wife Madeline. Now that we know Toorigal included Watson's 80-acres, Robert Henderson's grant was the bordering farm! So When Madeline was staying with her brother at Kincumber, the Ward property was right next door and she probably had to drive through it to get to her brother's house.