Charles Richard Wilson, history of the Caniba farmer, NSW.
C
harles Richard Wilson was born at Bowenfels on May 1st, 1873. He grew up in the Blue Mountains area and resided at Katoomba and worked as a linesman in that area until he enlisted for the Boer War in 1901 as an artillery man. He was invalided home in 1902 and on recovery he enlisted for the Boer War again in January 1903 in the Commonwealth Horse. Charles served in South Africa until the end of that war in May 1903. His photos are noted on the rear as being in
Upington, in South Africa. On return and working as a linesman in the Bega area he met Mabel Ellen Law and they married in 1904 on 26th December. Different work areas and an increasing family and eventually the family took up farming at Caniba, near Lismore in northern NSW. From 1905 until 1926, Charles and Mabel had twelve children, ten surviving to adulthood. As the family grew up, sons and daughters married and some also took up farming in the Casino/Lismore/ Bonalbo area. The family continued farming at Caniba until 1934 when the farm was sold and Charles, Mabel and the few children still living at home moved to Doubtful Creek and then to share with Daughter Mabel (known as Cissie) and son in lae Tom Nelson at Irvington. Charles Richard Wilson passed away in the Casino hospital in October 1939, aged 66 years. (His head stone in Casino cemetery says 65). My mother, Florence, was the ninth of the Wilson children, born on 19th February 1920. After the Caniba farm sold, she was with the family at Doubtful Creek and then worked on other dairy farms, also in Casino, Ballina and then along with her sisters, Sarah and Violet went to Sydney to work in a glass factory in 1941. Sarah married a serviceman, Alan Bullock, Violet joined the WRAAF and Florence moved back to where the family was now living at Bottle Creek. Florence met my father, Ted Holland at a Bottle Creek dance, they married and had three children, Malcolm, Douglas (me) and Lynette. Notes from my mother’s diary about life on the farm at Caniba around 1926/1930. “When I think of my father, I see him with his pipe and watch pouch on his belt at the back and his tobacco pouch which he always carried.” “This pouch was rubber like a bag you put your gold in these days, it was airtight, and you pulled the top up to open, let it go and it folded back in.” “We had a pet magpie called Jacko, he could talk but he had a set on the adults because Chas (Mum’s brother) and his mate Norman Bull used to torment him. So, Jacko would wait under the stairs and as they walked up, he would peck them on their feet and if saw them outside he would fly and peck them on the head. One day he got Dad and almost got killed for that. We found him down the creek bank, thought we had a different magpie. Poor Jacko, he could talk like us kids when we were fighting or playing”
1902, Charles Wilson, Commonwealth Horse, Boer War
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