The Stories from the Stones 23 - By Steve Lavender

'Stories from the Stones'
Please visit the Contents Page for this section where you will find other 'Stories from the Stones.' From the St John’s Church Burial Ground Project.

These same stories are also published on Penistone Archive Group's Facebook page, their Journal and in 'The Bridge' magazine issued by St John's church, Penistone. Many thanks to their tireless author, Mr Steve Lavender, for his worthy contributions to local history and this website. - JB.

Part 1 of the Mitchell trilogy (Stories 23, 24 and 25). See also Part 2 and Part 3.

A quick review of the burials at St John’s reveals that there are no fewer than 51 Mitchells buried there. As many of you are aware that in January of 2024 we relocated to Perth, Australia, where we started to become aware of a variety of unexpected links between the state capital and our market town of Penistone. More of that as this story develops.

We start back in 1723 with John and Mary Mitchell who are buried in our churchyard. In reality we could go back even further following the Mitchell (and Mitchel) family line but this is a good place to start. John was born on Boxing Day 1723 in Langsett, and one of their children Thomas was born in 1753. He married Ann (Shaw) and they moved to Deanhead Farm, Hunshelf, just outside Penistone.
Thomas and Ann had seven children, and this is where we start to find ourselves following an unexpected family development. In this regard – we will look at two of the children, brothers John born in 1788 and James 1801. First, let’s take a look at what happened to John. He married Lavinia Spooner in 1817 in Penistone and they had five children. One, William Spooner Mitchell married Elizabeth Ellison at St John’s in 1845, and they had eight children. (It’s easy to see how complicated family trees can get when there are so many lines to follow).

Their sixth child Albert born in 1857 married Mary Jane Mitchel (1st cousin) in 1877 and continued to live in Penistone. As might be expected, Albert and Mary had a large family of eight – the youngest of all was Frank. Frank married Doris Nutter and, with the birth of Geoffrey, we can bring this part of the story to a conclusion. Geoffrey was born in 1939 and in due course married Margaret Cartwright.

Now we will broaden our story a little – Margaret has two brothers, Martyn and David – well known in Penistone for amongst many things their contribution to the development of Penistone Footpath Runners and Athletics Club. Their grandfather was Herbert Cartwright who married Lucy Wilby. Lucy Wilby is my great grandfather’s wife’s sister (Harriett Wilby). This means that the Cartwrights, Lavenders, Wilbys and all associated families can share in the next stage of this story.

Being good friends with Martyn and David, when they found out about my plans to come to Perth they explained that there was a link between not only our families but also to the Mitchells in Perth and a high-ranking politician in Western Australia. This would lead to a chat with Margaret and Geoff who told me about the link to Sir James Mitchell.

So let’s go back to brothers John and James in the late 1700s – sons of Thomas and Ann Mitchell. We followed the line of John all the way to the current Mitchells and the Cartwright, Wilby and Lavender families. Now we will take a look at that of James Mitchell. James married Jane Bedford in Penistone in 1832. They had four children, one of whom was William Bedford Mitchell born in Penistone in 1833 and living back at Deanhead Farm. At some time in the 1850s William made the decision to travel to Australia. He eventually settled on an estate in Western Australia south of Perth. He married Caroline Morgan in 1865 in Busselton WA and they had 15 children. The eldest of these named James was born on 27th April 1866 at Paradise Farm, Dardanup, Western Australia around 200 km south of Perth.

James had a long and interesting life including being elected to the Parliament of WA for the Northam seat in 1905 (which he held for over 30 years). He married Clara Robinson Spencer, the daughter of the mayor of the nearby town of Bunbury. They had four children. In his professional life he rose through the ranks to ministerial office with a specific interest in agricultural programmes. To pick out the highlights of a long and illustrious life - he became Premier of Western Australia from 1919-24 and again from 1930-33.

During the Great Depression, Mitchell was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of WA and resided in Government House Perth. He was eventually appointed the state’s 20th Governor in 1948 and was in fact, Western Australia’s first Australian-born Governor. He retired from the post in 1951 and died shortly after on 26th July 1951 aged 85. He is buried at Perth’s main cemetery – Karrakatta following a state funeral.

So, we have traced the line from graves in St John’s Penistone to that of Sir James Mitchell in Karrakatta cemetery, Perth, linking families from Penistone’s rich history to the other side of the world. But the story does not end there. Sir James has a major Perth road named after him and called the Mitchell Freeway. There is also a Sir James Mitchell Park and the Sir James Mitchell National Park in the south-west of WA about 300km south of Perth. The rapier flowerfeather has been named by the botanist Charles Gardner – Verticordia Mitchelliana – in his honour. More unusual than these honours is that close to where I now live in a northern suburb of Perth is a Penistone Park, a Penistone Street, a Springvale Drive and a Springvale Park. Surely this is no coincidence and that at some time there has been a further honour reflecting this man’s heritage by including our town’s name to be associated with some of the most beautiful parks in this city.

I hope that you have been able to stick with my complicated link between the Pennine town of Penistone and the State capital of Perth through the family history of the Mitchells. It just goes to show that there is a story to be found in the most unexpected places.

To Sir James and the whole Mitchell family and their associated ancestry links – we will remember you.

With thanks to
St John’s Burial Ground Project,
Ancestry.com,
Wikipedia,
The Mitchell and Cartwright family.

Steve Lavender - Former Chair, Friends of St John’s Church 2023,
St John’s Burial Ground Project, Stories of the Stones Sept 2024.

Please note that Story 24 is an interesting continuation of the Mitchell story.