COMMANDER THEOPHILUS MOULTRIE KELSALL, R.N. & SON CONRAD

The first cover is addressed to Capt. T.M. Kelsall R.N., Youngaton , Westward Ho’, Devon, England and the two stamps are both Victorian ‘Stamp Duty’, a green Half Penny and a pale mauve Two Pence, both cancelled with MELBOURNE/ 12 P/ OC 31/ 99 and the reverse was postmarked with a Bideford receiver (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Click to Enlarge

There were 2 letters from Maleson, England & Stewart, Solicitors at 46 Queen Street, Melbourne, Victoria dated 31 Oct 1899 addressed to Captn  T. Moultrie Kelsall R.N., at the address on the cover, which read: “Dear Sir, We received a letter from your son Mr Conrad M. Kelsall on the 2nd Instant stating that he had decided to invest in some land near Cairns [Queensland] and requesting to forward him the £500 which you instructed us in your letter of Decr last to hold in case it should be required of him.  We therefore forwarded him a draft for that amount and herewith we beg to enclose his receipt.  Yours faithfully, Malleson England & Stewart” (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Click to Enlarge

The enclosed receipt read: “Received from Captain T.M. Kelsall R.N. per Malleson England & Stewart the sum of Five hundred pounds being the amount authorised to be paid to me as per my father’s letter to them dated the 28th December 1898.   20th October 1899 Conrad M. Kelsall, and there was a ‘Four Corners’ orange One Penny Queensland stamp affixed with a manuscript 20/10/99, with a faint pencilled “Please affix Queensland Stamp Duty” placed below (Figure 3).

Figure 3: Click to Enlarge

The second cover was addressed to Capt. T. Moultrie Kelsall R.N., Westward Ho’, N. Devon, England in a similar hand of the first cover, and the Victorian blue 2½d Stamp Duty was cancelled MELBOURNE/ P.M./ 19.8.00/ 3 (Figure 4).

Figure 4: Click to Enlarge

The enclosed letter was written in a similar hand as the first from the same firm of Melbourne solicitors, and it reads: “Dear Sir, We beg to acknowledge receipt of your letter of the 16th Ultimo and we have as requested therein forwarded to your son Mr. Conrad M. Kelsall to the address given in Bank Draft for £50 and debited your account herewith.  We ever  Dear Sir, Yours faithfully  Matheson England & Stewart” (Figure 5).

Figure 5: Click to Enlarge

The Kelsall name is said to derive from the village of the same name in Cheshire, England and the name derives from “Kell’s nook or recess”.  The village is mentioned in the ‘Domesday Book’ (1086) and the name Adam de Kellsall appears as early as 1277.  William Kelsall was Sheriff of Chester in 1335 and Stephen de Kelsall was Mayor of Chester in 1350.  In 2007 there were 3200 Kelsalls in the U.K. (the majority (83%) in Lancashire, Staffordshire and Cheshire), 600 in the US, 600 in Australia and lesser numbers in Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa.

The information on Theophilus Moultrie Kelsall is fragmentary, contradictive and confusing for he was born in Fareham, Hants, England on 22 June 1831 (as on gravestone) but also given elsewhere as 1832, the son of John Theophilus Kelsall and Elizabeth Anne Stephens.  He had 6 siblings, of whom Ellen Hume Kelsall (married name Fowke) his oldest sister was a correspondent.  He was buried in Northam, Devon where his death is inscribed as being 8 May 1910 at Youngaton, Westward Ho! where his wife Marie (Maria) Anna Kelsall (daughter of Professor H.W. Brutger, also spelt Brutzer) is interred as well as his elder son Conrad Moultrie Kelsall is buried there, with his wife, Piera Migliorini Kelsall.

Theophilus entered the Royal Navy ca. 1851, rose to the rank of Captain and commander of several ships and retired in 1870 to the coast guard at Ramsgate.  A picture of the young Theophilus in uniform is seen in Figure 6.

Figure 6: Click to Enlarge

He married his wife Maria Anna about 1845 and they had 9 children, 7 daughters an 2 sons, of which the elder Conrad Moultrie was third in line, followed by his brother Alfred H. Kelsall.  Three of his daughters were born in France.  The entire family is seen in a later photo and Conrad has not yet been distinguished from his younger brother (Figure 7).

Figure 7: Click to Enlarge

This association of the father and son with Australia as described in the two letters is not mentioned elsewhere at the many websites I have visited in researching the family.  Why Theophilus had money in the hands of the Melbourne firm of solicitors has not been mentioned before and how Conrad decided to buy land at Cairns, in coastal north Queensland is totally obscure.  The sum of £500 that he received from his father would have afforded him to purchase a large property.  It is possible that he was living in Australia in the late 1890s, but this was probably only temporary for he was buried in Devon, England.