Rookwood Cemetery Discoveries

  We are coming to the end of 2024, and this blog is one of reflection upon all the blogs that have been published under “ Rookwood Cemetery Discoveries”. This year I have highlighted many people who gave their lives for others; those that turned their lives around and benefitted others; many tragic unfortunate deaths and of course those that went off the deep end and shocked us all! The most popular blog this year was the one devoted to Euphemia Bridges Bowes . Mother of eleven children, wife of a Wesleyan minister performing all the duties associated with her role as well as establishing the First Woman’s Christian Temperance Union and other organisations. She worked constantly until she died - at the age of 85! A woman we should all be proud of who until a few months ago had fallen through the cracks of time. Another woman that caught your eye was Ada Hannah Coffill, a woman who completed the full funeral parlour experience as being the first Australian born woman to receiv...

 Melbourne Cup was to be the theme of my Rookwood blog this week, but I received a call for help via a Facebook message from the person who set up a group I have joined - Australian Headstone Images - regarding clarification. The name on the headstone in Rookwood came up with another alias and she wanted to know who this person actually was, so I decided to have a quick look. Well, what a find this man turned out to be. I've always maintained that Rookwood is full of wonderful people, many of whom lie under unassuming standard issue headstones - this man is one of them. WILLIAM "FIGHTING BILL SPARKES" PARKES William was born in April 1818 at the Cooks River in an area known at the time as Parkes Run. He was one of 12 children born to John Parkes and his wife Margaret Southern, both convicts. John had been granted 50 acres of land in October 1831 and the land was known with several versions of the name Parkes until it was renamed Earlwood which it is known by today. ...