I have spent many hours tracing my family connections. If you have any  information that would help with these families please contact me. Would love  to have anything you may be able to supply like family stories, photo's etc. Birth dates may be baptism dates in some cases for the older generations  If  you find a mistake please notify me so that I can rectify it. My Parks Family originally came from Somerset, England  on the 'Morning Star' in  1860. Eliza's brother Samuel Hunt had arranged the purchase of a property for them .This property  was later named "Parkside". I was born at "Parkside' the fourth generation to have lived there.   Robert and Eliza Parks  were followed by Eliza's 
 mother,sisters and another brother later in 1870. Eliza and Robert went to Lancefield and  lived there till their deaths in 1906. Robert was a tailor in England,(although his father was  noted as Yoeman on Marriage Certificate) but went on the 
 land when he arrived in Australia. Eliza's brother Samuel Hunt was the first of my  families to arrive in Australia. He arrived in 1852 on the " Lady Evelin" He was very well known  in the Lancefield 
 Romsey district (Originally Five Mile Creek) where he owned and ran several Hotels.

My Beard Family came out to Australia in 1855 on the 'Indian Queen'. The ship  sailed from Liverpool England on 5th December 1854 and arrived in Australia  21st Jan 1855. The Beard Family originated in Bedfordshire England. Joshua William Beard and his family went to live in Geelong,then Ballarat,  Rochford and finally Lancefield. With the help of family members we have traced the family back to  Wootton in Bedfordshire.
 Joshua William Beard was a Miller, Baker,and Mealman in Bedfordshire and had  similar occupations in Australia.His father was also in these occupations.

My Hemphill family arrived from County Tyrone in 1850's with Johnston arriving  1859 on the 'Arabian'. Johnston settled at Rochford and lived there until his death. Johnston's brothers Robert and James also came out to Australia and  settled in Rochford,another brother Wallace went to the USA. Rebecca was  Johnston's wife, she  also came from Ireland on the 
 "Shalimar" with her brother Richard Kyle and sister Lily and brother-in-law.

My G.G.Grandparents, Parks, Beard, and Hemphill are all buried in the  Lancefield Cemetery. There are still members of all three families  living  in the Romsey- Lancefield area.

I have had help with my families from some of the people listed below Peter Rudmam,Adrian Webb(UK),Doreen Sampson                   Philip Sharpe,Robyn Pankiw,Janet Baldock
 Janet Boyd, Helen Mitchell, Mavis Parks 
 Gordon Beach, Gwlad McLachlan, Greg Parks  Chris Parks (UK) Mark Randall (UK) Bill  Jarvis (Can), Alice Ronnenkamp, Marian Broughton, Don Lloyd.Rosie Drysdale. I am sure there have been many others . My thanks to all these people who have  kindly added to my knowledge of the past.Special thanks to Don Lloyd for all his corrections and  family names etc that he has provided to me, 
 My family history has been given to me by many family members and as we all know these memories  are not 
 always accurate. Even with my own immediate family, Official records give my fathers birthdate as  21 June ,but his mother always said it was the 10th of June and I guess she should have been  correct, but his Uncle Fred was the registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages, so I guess he got  it 
 wrong.
 I would like to add some history of these families, why they came to Australia,  the trip out and what they found when they arrived etc.Any help would be appreciated.

I have some proof by way of certificates etc, but a lot has been given to me by  various family members both here in Australia, and from UK. A lot of birth dates  for the family in England are probably Baptism dates obtained from the IGI Any early photo,s letters etc would be most welcome. I have G.Grandmother  Eliza's photo Album, but do not know who most of these people are, as there  were no details on many of the photos.

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