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THE SETTLER HANDBOOK by MD Nash
THE SETTLER PARTIES

RICHARDSON'S PARTY

No. 24 on the Colonial Department list, led by James Richardson, a corn dealer of Heartshead, Sheffield, Yorkshire.

Little information has been traced about this party. Richardson wrote to the Colonial Department in August 1819, proposing to organise a group of families to emigrate from Sheffield 'if they could have their passage free as from the badness of trade they have not in their power to pay'. This was followed a day later with a list of names, including Richardson himself and Charles and William Denton with their families, and eight single men,'all strong and healthy men able and willing to do their duty to themselves and the colony'. All eight dropped out, however, and permission had to be obtained for others to be substituted in their place before the reconstituted party was allowed to board the Stentor at Liverpool.

According to Special Commissioner William Hayward's notes, made when he investigated the settlers' claims to land in 1824, the party originally included seven servants, five employed by Richardson and two by William Denton. It is not clear how the party was organised and funded, or which of the 11 men for whom deposits were paid were under indentures and which free settlers.

The Stentor left Liverpool on 13 January 1820, reaching Table Bay on 19 April. Her charter expired at that port and the five settler parties on board were disembarked. The parties led by Griffith, Neave and White were transported overland to their locations at the Zonder End River and the north-country parties led by Richardson and George Smith were transshipped to HM Store Ship Weymouth, reaching Algoa Bay on 15 May. Richardson's party was located in Albany on the right bank of the George River.

LIST OF RICHARDSON'S PARTY

BRADSHAW, John 24. Cutler.
CLAYTON, George 29. Farmer. w Elizabeth 30.
CLAYTON, William 32. Farmer. w Judith 30. c John 7, Ann 5, Elizabeth 3.
DENTON, Charles 38. Labourer. w Hannah 39. c Ann 13.
DENTON, William 26. Labourer and army pensioner. w Mary 26. c William 1.
HULLEY, Richard 34. Farmer. w Ann 33. c Richard 9, Ann 6, Sarah 4, Francis 1.
KENNEDY, Jonathan 24. Farmer.
MOSLEY, Joshua 20. Cutler.
NOON, Richard 21. Farmer.
RICHARDSON, James 25. Corn dealer. w Sarah 29. c John 4, Emma 3.
SENIOR, Elizabeth 12, James 8 and Martha 8 (stepchildren of James Richardson).
WELCH, Luke 25. Farmer. w Mary 30.

*MOSLEY, George.

Main sources for party list
List of settlers under the direction of James Richardson (Cape Archives CO 6138/1,72). This agrees with the list of the party on board the Stentor on 25 December 1819 (Public Record Office, London, CO 48/45,680). According to E Morse Jones, the three older children in James Richardson's family (Elizabeth aged 12, and the 8-year-old twins James and Martha) were his wife's children by a former marriage, surnamed Senior.

*George Mosley, a stowaway on the Sir George Osborn, claimed to be a member of Richardson's party and attached himself to it after landing (Cape Archives 1/AY 8/71).