THE PECK & BOATWRIGHT FAMILIES

There are NINE members of the PECK family buried at St David's cemetery, plus ONE relative by the name of BOATWRIGHT. This is the biggest representation of any family buried there.

Sacred
to the
MEMORY OF
ROBERT PECK
WHO DEPARTED THIS LIFE
SEPTEMBER 13 – 1882
AGED 69 YEARS

He is gone, the one we loved so dear
To his eternal rest:
He is gone to Heaven we have no fear
To be for ever blest.

ROBERT PECK
The oldest actual grave in the cemetery is that of ROBERT PECK who died on 13 September 1882 at the age of 69. [Only the tombstones of the earlier Burgess, Douglass and Green burials are St David's, not the burials.]

His wife, HANNA PECK, died six years later on 23 December 1888 aged 70.

Sacred to the Memory of
HANNAH
Wife of Robert Peck
WHO DEPARTED THIS LIFE
DECEMBER 23 – 1888
AGED 70 YEARS

What though in lonely grief we sigh
For mother dear no longer nigh
Submission still would be wrought
Thy will be done.

ROBERT and HANNA PECK (nee BOTRIGHT) arrived at Sydney Town as free settlers on the Templar on 27 August 1844.

They were both born in Suffolk and married there in 1841. Hanna already had a son born out of wedlock called HENRY who was aged 6 when his parents left England for the colony of New South Wales. He had a sister, Mary Ann, aged two who died during the sea voyage. Another daughter, Mary, was born in 1844.

ROBERT and HANNA PECK appear to have moved straight to the Hawkesbury district, 50 km north west of Sydney Town, and lived in Richmond before obtaining land in Kurrajong Heights.

HENRY & MARY PECK
HENRY PECK, eldest son of ROBERT and HANNAH PECK, married MARY HURST, a local girl at North Richmond District's Registrar's Office in 1839. He was 24 and she 23.

MARY's father was a convict, SAMUEL HURST, and her mother, ELIZABETH BERWICK, the daughter of a convict.

Sacred
To the
Memory of
HENRY PECK
WHO DEPARTED
THIS LIFE
NOVEMBER 9 TH 1888
AGED 50 YEARS.
MY LOVING WIFE
MY LIFE IS PAST.
YOU FAITHFULLY LOVED
ME TO THE LAST.
WEEP NOT FOR ME
BUT PITY TAKE.
AND LOVE OUR CHILDREN
FOR MY SAKE.

Also MARY PECK
DIED 4TH JULY 1926
AGED 87 YEARS.

HENRY and MARY had 13 children, all of whom were present at their mother's funeral at St David's Kurrajong Heights, when she died on 4 July 1926 aged 87.
HENRY had died 38 years earlier at age 50, leaving his wife with a mortgage and more than a dozen children, the youngest aged 4.

Windsor and Richmond Gazette, Saturday 17 November 1888
Mr PECK, so well known in the districts of Richmond and Kurrajong, passed over to the great majority on Saturday last and was interred at Kurrajong on Sunday, the funeral service being performed by Rev. Dr. CAMERON.
Mr. PECK was during his lifetime highly respected wherever he was known, and his death will be deeply regretted not only by those who were intimately connected with him, but by the people of Kurrajong generally, whose interests he always studied.
A very large concourse of mourners paid the last tribute to his memory by attending his funeral.

There are five other members of the PECK family buried at St David's:
RICHARD EARNEST PECK - one of HENRY's sons, and his two wives, ALICE ELIZABETH POOLE and ELIZABETH EUNICE MYERS; as well as two adult children of HENRY PECK's eldest son, TED PECK - DORIS PECK and ALWYN PECK.

TED & JULIA PECK
TED PECK followed in his father’s footsteps as an entrepreneur and successful businessman. He married JULIA A LEIDICH, the daughter of the local postmaster at Kurrajong. Her father had been brought to the area by the Rev James CAMERON to be the overseer of Douglas Cottage.

TED and JULIA PECK had five children - Alwin, Henry J, Lena A, Doris Irene, and Frank C. Alwin and Doris, both of whom are buried at St David’s cemetery, came to tragic ends

DORIS who was engaged to be married died after an appendix operation at Windsor hospital.
ALWYN returned from the war and apparently unable to cope, shot himself in the head, leaving a widow and baby.

The grief of TED PECK over the loss of his beloved daughter, DORRIE, is evident in his sparing no expense in erecting a monument with a granite column over her grave.

GEORGE BOATWRIGHT
GEORGE was the older brother of HANNAH BOTWRIGHT, the mother of HENRY PECK, grandmother of TED PECK and great grandmother of DORRIE and ALWIN PECK. He was born in 1816, two years earlier than his sister, and in the same county of Suffolk, England. According to his Death Certificate, he shared the same parents, WILLIAM and LYDIA BOTWRIGHT. Hannah’s birth certificate does not name her father.