Family background
William Blundell was born in 1820 in Bodiam in Sussex, England, the son of Thomas Blundell, a labourer, and Elizabeth née Turley. He arrived in Sydney, aged 18, with his family aboard the Bounty immigrant ship, Maitland, on the evening of 5 November 1838. He was listed as a farm labourer and able to read and write and an immigration record indicates he was ‘sick’ with a ‘simple fever’.
In 1840 Blundell married Caroline Sargent. Caroline died in 1864, aged 38 years, ‘suddenly from natural causes after her confinement, having previously suffered from disease of the heart’. Their eldest son, William, died, of gastric fever, the following year, aged 16 years. Also in 1865 William married Mary A Challinor, who had four sons from a previous marriage. Another of William’s sons, Alfred, died in 1870. Blundell died on 7 March 1887, aged 67, ‘after a long and painful illness’.
Occupation & interests
William Blundell worked as a farm labourer as a young man. After arriving in New South Wales he worked as a drayman and storekeeper. He was declared insolvent in December 1861. In 1873 he endorsed ‘Moore’s Household Remedy Ointment’ (for Animals), stating that, in his 25 years’ experience, he had ‘never met anything to equal it for sore backs and shoulders’. In 1874 and again in 1875 Blundell was awarded the yearly tender for the conveyance of the mail to Kurrajong and Colo, once a week, on horseback.
Community activity
In 1859 William Blundell supported the second petition to create municipal institutions in Redfern, Chippendale, Waterloo Estate, Surry Hills and South Sydney.
Local government service
Blundell stood unsuccessfully for the Surry Hills Ward, in the first Redfern Council elections in 1859. In February 1861 his election to the Council (Surry Hills Ward) was contested but by March the objection had been overturned. He served on the Council until December 1861 when he was declared insolvent.
References
‘Advertising’, Sydney Morning Herald, 11 December 1861, p. 1, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/13055117
‘Advertising’, Empire, 11 December 1861, p. 1, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/60485457
‘In the Insolvent Estate of William Blundell’, NSW Government Gazette, 6 December 1861 (No.271), p. 2622, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/225140145
‘In Insolvency’, NSW Government Gazette, 21 February 1862 (No.41), p. 434, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/225230664
‘Supreme Court’, Sydney Mail, 6 December 1862, p. 8, https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/166690526
NSW State Archives, Entitlement certificates of persons on bounty ships; Series: 5314; Reel: 1292 and Immigration Records, Reference Number: 9/6184