Edmund Joyce

Edmund Joyce was born at Ducksmill, Tallow in May 1827 to David Joyce and Catherine Charty. In 1847 he enlisted in the British Army at Tallow during a recruitment drive for the 69th (South Lincolnshire) Regiment of Foot – no doubt influenced by economic conditions at the time. He served in England, Malta and the West Indies (Barbados) for the next 16 years. While based in England, he met and married Jane Dodd – a servant in the household of a retired soldier living near the Woolwich Arsenal.

After returning from the West Indies in 1863, Edmund was discharged from the Army, only to re-enlist five months later in the 91st (Argyllshire Highlanders) Regiment of Foot. In 1865 Edmund, Jane and their two sons shipped out to India, where for the next five years Edmund served in several garrison forts across the north of India (Bengal). Returning to England, he was discharged again, and looks to have worked on coal wharves on the Thames River for the next few years.

In 1875 Edmund, Jane, their younger son and two daughters (both born in India) boarded the immigrant ship “Sepia” for the long voyage to Australia. Their oldest son, now an adult, remained in England. The “Sepia” arrived in the Central Queensland town of Rockhampton in June 1875, and Edmund soon found work as a farm hand on Langmorne Station – about 40 kilometres from Rockhampton. Edmund spent his final years as a gardener for a prominent local businessman, dying in Rockhampton in 1897.