Dawe, William

**Fast Facts**
Type of person	Individual
Date of birth	1814
Place of birth	Tamerton, Devon, England
Date of arrival	1840
Principal occupation	Quarryman, labourer, farmer.
Date of death	1850
Place of decease	Willunga, South Australia.

William Dawe was born on 23 March 1814 in Tamerton, Devon, England in 1814. Religion – Church of England. William was the son of Sampson Dawe (1792-1856) and Jenny Maddock (1789-1862). He was the cousin of Sampson Dawe (1813-1879) and Henry Dawe (1816-1849).

William married Mary Anne Gregory (1816–1889) on 30 Sept 1838 at East Stonehouse, Devon, England. William and Mary Anne had six children (five sons and a daughter):

William Henry (1839 –1924) m. Ann MacDiarmid (1841–1909),

Sampson (1841–1911) m. Frances Sarah Norman (1842-1921) on 29 June 1865, blacksmith

Joseph (1843–1881) m. Harriet Fenn on 06 July 1875, builder

John Maddock (1845–1860) unmarried

Mary Jane (1847–1910) m. Robert Eaton on 06 Nov 1864

Robert (1850–1926) m. Catherine Martin on 25 Dec 1872

William and Mary Anne Dawe, with their infant son William Henry and his cousin Sampson Dawe with his wife Jane Elizabeth and their infant daughter Elizabeth, left Gravesend on 5 March 1840 and arrived on 17 June 1840 on board the 453-ton barque Charles Kerr from London, Gravesend, and Deal to Port Adelaide.

In the 1840s Wiliam Dawe was employed as a laborer and quarrymen at the slate quarry run by his cousin Sampson Dawe and Thomas Polkinghorne. In August 1849 William gave evidence at a Supreme Court Trial involving trespass brought by Sampson Dawe and Thomas Polkinghorne against Thomas Williams who was found guilty and fined 40 shillings.

William Dawe, aged 36, died in an accident on 3 Nov 1850 at Willunga after the horse and cart that he was driving hit a stump and overturned. He was buried at St. Stephen’s Anglican Cemetery at Willunga..