Today, Friday the 5th February 2016 I drove the 10 minutes into the city (from my house), to try to find the grave of James Heneker Jnr who was interred there on 20 June 1926 at the age of 77 years.
The cemetery (the largest urban (and very historic) cemetery on West Terrace, in the city of Adelaide, South Australia is beautifully kept with wonderful native flora, and as a treat to me, whilst wandering through the graves and lawns, there were numerous Lorikeets the beautiful green, blue red parrots that sit on the lawns pecking away, or making their raucous sounds up in the gum trees. Other birds sat on top of head stones, blissfully unconcerned by my presence. This was especially touching to me, as my father was a lover and breeder of these wonderful birds. It made me think of him, even though his ashes are scattered up in Parachilna Gorge, in the north, however it seemed appropriate that there were ancestors of the Heneker family lying at rest here in this blissful spot.
A fair bit of driving around (as this is a very large cemetery),and with directions from their website I finally found Section: Eyre South, Path Number 7S, E/W : W, site number 6.
Sadly there was no head stone. I think I found site number 6 (although there is no numbering for each individual grave). I took a photograph of the area, which was all I could do. The lovely thing about it was that of all the places it could have been, it was next to the Caroline Clark Memorial Garden. See the photograph below with some information on a plaque.
Photograph taken by Vicki Lovell (nee Heneker) at West Terrace Cemetery, Adelaide, South Australia 05/02/16
The photograph below, is Eyre South, Path Number: 7S, West. I believe the grave (which was site 6) may be one of the unmarked graves on the right between marked graves.
Photograph taken by Vicki Lovell (nee Heneker) at West Terrace Cemetery, Adelaide South Australia, on 05/02/2016
Working now as a nurse, I previously worked as a Library Technician at the State Library of South Australia and then Noarlunga Library Services. I was lucky enough to work at the State Library in the Archives department, which is now a separate entity and housed at a suburban site. then Noarlunga Library Services. I always loved English and Australian history, and began my Heneker family history in about 1980, well before the advent of the internet, and now of course with so many digitised records online there is a treasure chest of information out there, and it just keeps growing. One of the most wonderful treasures we have here in Australia is the Trove website, the free digitised newspapers of nearly every place in Australia, provided for free by the National Library of Australia. This has opened up so much day to day information for people searching for further information about their ancestors. I chose to write a blog as a way for me to put down a lot of information I had that wasn't necessarily easy to slot into a "family tree" as such. And I wanted to record some of the stories of the Heneker clan, and especially James Heneker (1826-1917) who arrived in South Australia as a 12 year old boy with his family. Like most of us in the genealogy community I have become obsessed, and of course, this is really a never ending story. The community of bloggers, and also Facebook specialist pages has allowed me and many of us to learn from each other, and to use some of the many amazing tools that are out there now for us to use and enhance our research. I just want to stay awake at night reading or researching or just browsing online for more and more information and I am sure I am not alone. My one wish?? Dad Neville Laurence Heneker 1929 - 1987, this is for you, for all the things you told me, and the stories you related, often when we were up north in the Flinders Ranges, at Beltana, Hawker, Blinman and many other amazing places. I wish you were here, so I could share all this new information that has come to light. And of course for you Pa (Laurence Douglas Heneker), your stories were incredible and watching you sleep out under the stars at Arkaroola with a rock for your pillow is an image I will never forget. Oh if only we had digital cameras back then...I think of you both every time I write my words and read my books. I love you both.
