Trove Tuesday - Death Notice of William Pummeroy 1889

It is sometimes amazing just how much information can be included in the few lines of a death notice when you pull it apart.

The notice below was for the death of my great great grandfather William Pummeroy, who died 6 October 1889.  The notice was published in the Melbourne Leader on Saturday 12 October 1889 and The Age on Monday 7 October 1889.  Both are available through Trove.

These few lines tell me so much about William and his family.  Firstly, it gives me his address, providing a head start on researching the house history.  It names all his surviving children, the sons and unmarried daughter by their first names and his married daughters by their married names - which in turn helps me confirm the marriages of his daughters.  It notes that William is the grandfather of 53 (!!)  It then gives his age, allowing me to calculate his approximate year of birth - if he is aged 71 in 1889 then he was born around 1818.  Finally, the notice states he was a colonist of 41 years.  This not only tells me William was not born in Australia, it also tells me he arrived in the colony in about 1848, at the age of 30.

So much information in just a few short lines.