From Poplar to New South Wales and back: Stephen Hannibal – Convict, Seaman and Servant

.By John D Ellis

Stephen Hannibal was born in Poplar, Middlesex on the 22^nd of October 1814.^[1]For Stephen Hannibal see: The National Archives (TNA) PCOM2 Piece 202. www.oldbaileyonline.org convictrecords.com.au Australia Convict Ships 1786-1849. Office Copies Of Printed Indents 1831-1842 (Nrs … Continue reading He was baptised at All Saints Church, Poplar on the 14^th of July 1816 and his parents were John (a “Gent.” – either a Gentleman or a Gentleman’s servant) and Mary Hannibal of Blackwall.^[2]London, England, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813-1923. London Metropolitan Archives (LMA). ancestry.co.uk His sister, Amelia Hannibal. was born in Poplar, Middlesex on the 3^rd of November 1816. She was baptised at All Saints Church, Poplar on the 25^th of July 1817 and her parents were John (a servant) and Mary Hannibal of Poplar.^[3]London, England, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813-1923. London Metropolitan Archives (LMA). ancestry.co.uk

Later in life, Stephen Hannibal was to be variously described as “a man of colour” and “copper coloured” which suggests that one of his parents was Black and that both he and Amelia were of ‘mixed heritage’. His father, John Hannibal was probably Black, with ‘Hannibal’ being the kind of pseudo-classical name given to enslaved men of African origin. There had been other ‘Hannibals’ in London, although any relationship between them and the Hannibal family of Poplar is unlikely: John Hannibal, “a negro” aged 16 years, had been baptised at St Mary Magdalene, Bermondsey on the 1^st of January 1721.^[4]London, England, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813-1923. London Metropolitan Archives (LMA). ancestry.co.uk This reference was provided by Audrey Dewjee. John James Hannibal, 33 days of age, son of Christian Hannibal “(a Black)” labourer and Mary his wife of Drury’s Rents had been baptised at St John of Wapping, Tower Hamlets on the 30^th of May 1725.^[5]London, England, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813-1923. London Metropolitan Archives (LMA). ancestry.co.uk

As a nineteen year-old, Stephen Hannibell (as Hannibal was rendered) was admitted to Newgate Gaol on the 13^th of November 1833, charged alongside George Preston (a White man aged 21 years and born in Kensington) with breaking and entering into the dwelling of Mrs Sophia Savage of No.2 Holland Park Terrace and stealing numerous goods. Stephen Hannibal had previously been employed by Sophia Savage. On admittance to Newgate he was 5 feet 11” tall a “man of colour” and a labourer by occupation. John Hannibal and George Preston were tried at the Old Bailey on the 3^rd of December 1833. The transcript of the trial is reproduced below with only minor corrections:

Stephen Hannibell and George Preston: Indicted for feloniously breaking and entering the dwelling-house of Sophia Savage, on the 12^th of November, at St. Mary Abbotts, Kensington, and stealing: 3 counterpanes, value 30s. 1 reticule, value 40s. 2 waistcoats, value 10s. 4 yards of silk, value 7s. 1 shirt, value 2s. 4 forks, value 4s. 1 handkerchief, value 6d. 1 skirt of a gown, value 3s. 1 pair of breeches, value 3s.

Sarah Cottle: I am servant to Mrs Maxwell, of Lyndon Grove, Kensington. I know Mrs Sophia Savage. Her house is No. 2 Holland Park Terrace, in the parish of Kensington. She sleeps at Mrs Maxwell’s. I have been in the habit of going to Mrs Savage’s house from eight o’clock in the morning until four o’clock in the afternoon, to act as a servant there. I have lived at Mrs Maxwell’s twelve months and Hannibell has been in the habit of going backwards and forwards with messages for her. He was employed in moving for her from Berners Street to Holland Park Terrace, to Mrs Savage’s, about twelve months ago. He has cleaned knives at Mrs Savage’s. He was employed there last, about six weeks ago. He asked me once if anybody slept in the house, and I told him there was a policeman. I cannot say whether that was the last time he was employed there or before. I cannot say when it was. I do not recollect his asking me that more than once, on the 12^th of November. I was at the house. I fastened and bolted all the doors and windows and left at four o’clock in the afternoon. I left nobody in it. Nobody slept there at that time. I locked the outer door and went away. The policeman came round at two o’clock and in consequence of his information, I went to the house at two o’clock on Wednesday morning. I found two policemen in the house. I found the flap of the coal cellar up. It was fixed down in the earth when I was there the day before. I found the drawing room windows opened. I had left those windows safe. One flag stone round the cellar grating had been lifted up. There is a grating in the middle of the stone. It was large enough to admit a person to go down it. I went upstairs to the first-floor bedroom, and missed a counterpane, and two counterpanes from the next room. I went upstairs and found a trunk broken open, and missed the skirt of a merino dress, and a reticule, two waistcoats, a piece of figured silk, a shawl, and a pair of small clothes. Mistress had opened her trunk in my presence, on the 12^th of November, and I saw them. She took the things out and I put them in again. The trunk was locked; it was left safe. I have seen these things since at Marylebone Station House. I missed some forks next morning, the 14^th of November, from a drawer in the china closet. I did not examine the drawer until then. They were there on the 12^th of November. Mrs Sophia Savage is a widow. She is at Bath. She lives at No.7 Lyndon Grove with Mrs Maxwell her mother, but she had this house in Holland Park Terrace. She lived there for a week or fortnight only. There has been a family living in the house. It is a house to be let. She has been out of town two or three months.

Cross-examined by Mr Phillips: Q: Mrs Savage has been away for the last two months? A: Yes, two months from the time we missed the things. She was not living there on the 12^th of November. Nobody lived in the house. She told me herself these were her own things. Her Christian name is Sophia. I only know that from what mistress tells me. Her husband has been dead two years and a half. I never saw Mr Savage.

Henry Garnet (policeman): On the evening of the 12^th of November, I met the two prisoners in Upper Seymour Street. They both had bundles. It was about ten minutes before ten o’clock. Preston went up to a door in Seymour Street and said to Hannibell, “This is No. 47”. I crossed over on the other side, and followed them down the street, into Portman Street. One went on one side of the street, and the other on the other. When they came to Oxford Street, Hannibell kept on the left hand, and Preston went on the right. I saw McLean speak to him. I then crossed over and asked Hannibell where he had come from. He said, “From Notting-hill”. Mrs Savage’s house is at Notting Hill. I asked where he was going to. He said, “To the Tower”. I asked if he knew the young man who was with him just now with the bundle. He said, he did and called out “George”. I said, we would go over to him, and not call him over. We went over to him and McLean had him in custody. We took them down to the watch-house, and in the way to the watch-house, I asked Hannibell what he had got there. He said, he did not know. I asked where he got them from. He said, he found them in Edgware Road. I had not then opened the bundles. When I got to the watch-house, I opened the bundles and found one counterpane in a handkerchief, and a counterpane in an apron in Hannibell’s bundle. There was nothing else in his bundle. I found a flint steel, a match, and two keys on Hannibell. One of them was a latch key, the other a common box key. I also found on him a bag. It dropped from under his clothes, while I was searching him. There was nothing in it. That is all I found on him. I saw the other bundle opened. There was a reticule in it. Also two waistcoats, a counterpane, a pair of small clothes, a piece of figured silk, a shirt and the skirt of a merino gown.

Cross-examined. Q: What kind of night was it? A: Very foggy. I do not remember whether it had been wet. The roads were not dry. There was a damp from the fog. There were a number of linkboys in Oxford Street. I did not go further. I believe it was such a fog a man might have been one hundred yards off with a link and not see him. I do not know what parish the house is in. [‘Linkboys’ carried burning torches to guide pedestrians in the dark].

Donald McLean (Policeman): On the evening of the 12^th; of November, I stopped Preston in Oxford Street. He had a bundle. I asked what he had got. He said, a counterpane. I asked him where he had brought it from. He said, from Kensington Gravel Pits. I asked where he was going. He said, to his sister’s, in St. John Square, Clerkenwell. I took him into custody. Garnett and Hannibell joined me. When I got to the station house, I opened the bundle. It contained a pair of small-clothes, two waistcoats, one shift, a shirt, a piece of figured silk, a counterpane, and a reticule bag. I found four plated forks in his pocket.

William Cowle (Policeman): I know Mrs Savage’s house. On the night of the 12^th of November, between twelve and one o’clock, I was called to the house, and found it had been entered, by a stone being removed in front of the door. It was a square stone, with an iron plate in the middle. It was the plate of the coal cellar. There was quite room enough for either of the prisoners to get down. The coal cellar is not more than a yard deep. I found the drawing-room window open. The inner doors of the house were open, they were not broken. I went upstairs and in the back bedroom I found a trunk broken open. The drawers in the house were also open.

Sarah Cottle: I know this reticule. There is a note in it, which was taken out, and laid on the ground. These counterpanes I had folded up the day before. All the things were taken out of the house that night. I know the reticule well. Mrs Savage never uses it. It was a present from a lady.

Cross-examined: Q: Do you know what Mrs. Savage’s husband was? A: A physician. The house in Berner’s Street is the house they used to live in when Dr Savage was living. She has never lived there since he died. She lived at her mother’s. There were two bills put up to let the house in Holland Park.

Hannibell’s Defence: On the 12^th of November, we were lighting a gentleman’s horse and chaise, down Notting Hill. I kicked against the bundle. I said to Preston, “George, here is a bundle”. We looked about and found another bundle, and four forks.

Lucy Ralph of Uxbridge. Mary Preston of Kensington Gravel Pits. Amelia Abel of Kensington Gravel Pits. Mary Anderson of Camden Place, Kensington Gravel Pits. All gave the prisoners a good character ^[7]www.oldbaileyonline.org

Stephen Hannibal was found Guilty of breaking and entering and stealing and George Preston of stealing. Following their convictions both were sentenced to be transported for seven years. Stephen Hannibal was one of 262 convicts transported on the Surrey. The ship departed England in April 1834 and arrived at New South Wales in August the same year. Whilst on the Surrey, a description was recorded:

Reads and Writes. Protestant. Single. Groom. No previous convictions. 5 feet 7 and ½”. Copper coloured and pock-marked complexion. Black hair. Dark brown eyes. Nose flat. Sun imperfect inside lower left arm. Half cast.

Stephen Hannibal was put to work at Sydney, although he did not take easily to his new life: He absconded and was apprehended in 1836. In November of the same year, his misconduct and subsequent punishment was reported by The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser:

Stephen Hannibal, one of the cantankerous blacks from Jamaica, with an astounding brush up of his hair, which resembled in stiffness the wire which encircles the neck of a porter bottle, was charged with contumaciousness. (Refusing to obey or respect the law in a manner which shows contempt). He was ordered the day before to clean some fish: “clean fish is it,” said Hannibal, “think of my great progenitor who made Rome tremble on her marrow bones. Fish, eh! But I don’t know if you pay me, but what I will lay aside my dignity for the once and condescend”. His master, not being in any inclination to comply, gave him custody. His only defence was twirling his thatch on his little finger and displaying a set of ivories (teeth) that would not have disgraced a shark – fifty lashes. On the sentence being pronounced, he strolled from the bar in an insolent manner, and immediately put on his hat, which so shocked Mr Gisborne (the magistrate), that he had him brought back and sentenced him to an additional fifty.^[8]The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, 10^th November 1836. trove.nla.gov.au

The focus on the reporting of Stephen Hannibal’s physical features, (hair and teeth) and attitude to authority reflect the racist nature of the period and place. The reference to “cantankerous blacks from Jamaica” was to the fact that convicts from Jamaica were transported to New South Wales and Van Dieman’s Land (Tasmania) following the uprising of 1831-1832. The arrival of these individuals, and their ‘propensity for mischief’, appears to have caused consternation in Sydney well after the events of 1831-1832, and it may be that the refusal to conform by Black convicts in any way, no matter how small, was treated severely. Hence the disproportionate punishment for Stephen Hannibal’s witty demonstration of his knowledge of the classical history of Ancient Rome.

By 1843, Stephen Hannibal would have served his seven-year sentence. Most convicts transported to Australia remained in the country after their sentence expired. They were either limited by the terms of their parole, had established lives for themselves or simply were not able to afford the price of the three-month journey back to Britain. Stephen Hannibal was one of the few who returned, and he appears to have done so as a merchant seaman.

In August 1847 he registered as a Merchant Seaman: 386555 Stephen Hannibal. Born Poplar, Middlesex (he gave his date of birth as the 22^nd of October 1815), he was 5 feet 9” tall, a man of colour with black hair and eyes. His back was described as “marked”, which was either the result of the 100 lashes he received in 1836 or of the smallpox noted during transportation. He had first gone to sea as a cook in 1842 and had not served in either the Royal Navy or in foreign service. He could write and was resident in Kensington when unemployed.^[11]Britain, Merchant Seamen, 1835-1847. TNA 113. findmypast.co.uk His records contain references to service as both cook and steward (frequently ‘racially defined roles’) and voyages to and from Port Louis, Mauritius.

At St Jude’s Church, Upper Chelsea on the 7^th of July 1850 Stephen Hannibal married Elizabeth Mary Ives.^[12]London, England, Church of England Marriages and Banns, 1754-1938. London Metropolitan Archives (LMA). ancestry.co.uk He was a bachelor, 36 years of age and a steward residing at 11 Arthur Street. She was a spinster, 32 years of age and residing at 26 June Street. Stephen’s father was identified as John Hannibal, a butler (deceased).

In 1851, Elizabeth Hannibal was residing at Church Street Kensington. Born in Newington, Middlesex c.1819 she was married and a launderess. (It is likely that Stephen Hannibal was at sea). Living with her was Elizabeth Ives (her mother), born in Pevensey, Sussex c.1792. Elizabeth Ives was also married and a launderess.^[13]1851 England, Wales & Scotland Census. HO107/1468/250/39/168. findmypast.co.uk

In 1861 Stephen and Elizabeth Hannibal were residing at 9 Yeoman’s Place, Kensington. He was a porter by occupation and she a launderess. (Their places and years of birth being Poplar in 1816 and Stoke Newington in 1819 respectively).^[14]1861 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG09/20/88/35/250. findmypast.co.uk

In 1871 Stephen and Elizabeth Hannibal were residing at Ashmore Terrace, Bromley St Leonard, Poplar. He was a machinist by occupation. (Their places and years of birth being Poplar in 1816 and Stoke Newington in 1819 respectively).^[15]1871 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG10/569/140/15/73. findmypast.co.uk

In 1881 Stephen and Elizabeth Hannibal were residing at 77 Regent’s Street, St James, Kensington. Both were employed as domestic servants to Mr Oscar Klug, (born St George’s Hannover Square c.1852), Secretary to Du Barry Co Ltd. (Their places and years of birth being Poplar in 1815 and Stoke Newington in 1819 respectively).^[16]1881 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG11/127/22/9/145. findmypast.co.uk

Stephen Hannibal aged 69 years of 9 Devons Road, Bromley died in July 1884 and was buried at Tower Hamlets Cemetery.^[17]All London, England, City of London and Tower Hamlets Cemetery Registers, 1841-1966. CTHC/01/039. London Metropolitan Archives (LMA). ancestry.co.uk

Elizabeth Hannibal died at Poplar in 1898.

Postscript

After the baptism of Stephen and Amelia Hannibal, neither of his parents, John nor Mary Hannibal, can be identified on either ancestry.co.uk or findmypast.co.uk However, more is known about Stephen’s sister, Amelia:

In 1851, Amelia Hanable (sic) was residing at 10 Clarendon Road, Kensington. Born in London, Middlesex c.1821 she was unmarried and a live-in-parlour maid, one of four servants employed by Robert Spake Evans (born London c.1811), an Admiralty Civil Servant.^[18]1851 England, Wales & Scotland Census. HO107/1468/817/12/245. findmypast.co.uk

In 1861 Amelia Hannibal was residing at Northlands House, Wood End, Funtington, Westbourne, Susses. Born in London, Middlesex c.1821 she was unmarried and a live-in-housemaid, one of four servants employed by Caroline Raikes (born in the East Indies c.1843), a Landed Proprietor’s daughter.^[19]1861 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG09/629/37/10/63. findmypast.co.uk

At Brighton in 1863, Amelia married John Gasston (1794-1870), a bargeman. Upon his death, she became the chief beneficiary of his estate.^[20]’The Walsh Family Tree’ (annewalsh110) on ancestry.co.u’

In 1871 Amelia Gasston, a widow (born in Poplar c.1817) and proprietor of a Boarding House, was residing at 17 Fisher Street, Lewes, Sussex.^[21]1871 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG10/1067/64/10. ancestry.co.uk

In 1881 Amelia Gaston, a widow (born in London c.1815) and a nurse by occupation was lodging at 38 St Mary’s Road, Hastings, Sussex.^[22]1881 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG11/1025/61/46/511. findmypast.co.uk

In 1891 Amelia Gaston, a widow (born in London c.1818) and a Lodging House Keeper was residing at 24 Lansdown Place, All Saints, Lewes, Sussex.^[23]1891 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG12/798/11/16/104. findmypast.co.uk

In 1901 Amelia Gaston, a widow (born in London c.1819) was lodging at 11 North Street, Lewes, Sussex.^[24]1901 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG13/915/130/24/156. findmypast.co.uk

In 1911 Amelia Gaston, a widow (born in London c.1828) was an inmate of Lewes Union Workhouse, South Common, Chailey, Sussex.^[25]1911 England, Wales & Scotland Census. RG14/5052/9999/223. findmypast.co.uk

Amelia Gasston, aged 98 years, died in 1914 and was buried at the Church of St John sub Castro, Chichester on the 2nd of July 1914.^[26]East Sussex, England, Church of England Deaths and Burials, 1813-1995. East Sussex and Brighton and Hove Record Office – The Keep. ancestry.co.uk