“ORIGINAL SIX” REUNION NEWSLETTER - Hattenheim

ORIGINAL SIX REUNION
Volume 2, Issue 2 Newsletter 11 February 2008
Welcome to the 8th
“ORIGINAL SIX” REUNION NEWSLETTER
I wish to thank our wonderful committee Bryan Bourke (Seckold),
Debbie Noy (Gerhard), Lisa Twomey (Wenz), Robert Squires (Seckold),
Lionel & Wendy Stein, Michael O’Rourke (Flick), who together with
Jeff Stien, Fay Lawrence (Wenz), Carol Lewis (Seckold), Daniel Cox
(Seckold), Andrew Stein, Alan Stewart (Wenz), Michael Mina (Seckold),
Lindsay Horner (Wenz), Julie Murray (Wenz), Daniel Lewis (Seckold).
John & Edwina Macarthur & many others of you working behind the
scenes, for helping to make this unique reunion a most wonderful
tribute to our Original Six & Macarthur ancestors - you are terrific! Our
Ancestors would be proud of you. THANKS Julie Watt (Justus) coordinator
Februar 1838
S M Tu W Th F S
1 2 3
4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17
18 19 20 21 22 23 24
25 26 27 28
Where in the world is St Helena Island?
Middle of nowhere probably describes it best!
(See map & locality description)
From the Wikipedia online Dictionary the Island of
St Helena is situated 4000 miles from England
standing alone between the African & the South
American continents. Therefore by the 2 nd Feb 1838
the Kinnear would have travelled 4000 miles since
leaving England. After St Helena the Kinnear heads
towards the Equator where temperatures are high
170 years ago this month
vor 170 Jahren dieser Monat
We continue to follow the journey our ancestors undertook 170 years ago during
the month of February in 1838. They were at sea on board the Kinnear having left
England on 10 December 1837. On this day 170 years ago we ask ourselves, where
were they & how far had they traveled, were they sick of the endless days at sea,
what did they do to pass the time of day? Had they indeed sighted land as they
sailed towards their far off destination? Although we cannot know for sure we can
however get an idea of what the voyage was like for them through the letter
written by Johann Stein to the Mayor of Erbach in Germany dated 27 May 1838 He
wrote – “2 February, we passed within 500 miles of the island of St Helena”.
ST HELENA: is the most solitary
island of the Southern Atlantic
Archipelago alone it stands, in the
very midst of the South Atlantic
Ocean, 1140 miles distant from the
African Continent on one side, 1800
from South America on the other,
698 from the Island of Ascension,
and 4000 from England.
www.bweaver.nom.sh/j_melliss/jmellis
s-pt1.htm
all year round except for periods during the wet season where there are quick sunrises
and sunsets and equal hours of day and night. These hot and humid conditions no doubt made life for the heavily
dressed emigrants even more uncomfortable. Johann wrote – “25 Febrary, we passed the ‘Sonne Line’ [equator] and the
sailors had fancy dressing as we do at home at Carnival time. Every man had to cover his eyes and be guided on deck . As soon as
they arrived on deck three or four sailors were waiting with buckets of water which they threw over their heads. After that there was
a bucket of ships tar which they put on our faces. A pieve of a ring off a barrel in the hand of another sailor substituted for a razor.
Then we had to drink out of a cup. That the drink consisted of I cannot tell you, but it tasted awful. This was the sailors ceremony”
The buckets of water thrown over their heads in the line-crossing ceremony may have been a welcome relief for those
long hot humid days at the equator. How would we feel if we were at sea since 10 December last year on a boat the size
of the Manly Ferry, half way through our journey with still 2 months to go? With our reunion just over 2 months away
we are tempted to say “it’s going too fast” – yet 170 years ago would six families in the middle of the atlantic say of
their journey “it’s going too fast” - I know what I would rather be doing & being at sea isn’t it!!!
Original Six Reunion 1
I N S I D E TH I S ISSUE
AFTC February Issue ~ Page 6
Email from German Ambassador ~ Page 3
Flick info needed for Newsletter ~ Page 4
Historical Places: Oxley Cottage ~ Page 6
Interesting Book ~ Page 2
Our Reunion in the News ~ Page 3 & 4
Photo? Stein’s ~ Page 6
SBS Radio Interview Oct 2007 ~ Page 2
Souvenir Glass ~ Page 5
Above: Location of St Helena
famous as the place of exile of
Napoleon Bonaparte from 1815 to
his death in 1821. St Helena’s mean
temp 16*C & annual rainfall 40 inch

Interesting Book
"Greetings From The Land Where Milk And
Honey Flows –
The German Emigration to NSW" 1838-1858
by Patricia Cloos and Jurgen Tampke
In this book you will find 17 translated copies of
letters from several German immigrants to their
homeland including the letter written by Johann
Stein to the Mayor of Erbach 27 May 1838. The
remaining letters were from Germans who arrived
with the first large group of German emigrants to
Australia in 1849. A relative of Johann Justus
wrote one of those letters of 1849 after arriving on
the Beulah with Heinrich Joseph Stein the second
brother of Johann Stein to emigrate to Australia.
“Permission was given and Edward went to
Hattenheim in the Rheingau region where he
signed a contract with six winegrowers.
The author goes on to say “They proved
industrious worker, encouraging Edward
Macarthur to contract a second group from the
same region five years later who also were
expected to become reliable labourers.
The position in Germany at the time our Original
Six left Germany is noted in this book then is
followed by brief descriptions of where some of
the German’s settled. This invaluable book is
however out of print and second hand copies are
rare to find. However the book can be viewed at
libraries in Australia.
Patricia Cloos will be one of our special guests at
our Anniversary Dinner – Patricia will join our first
speaker David Nutting who has the Chronology of
Germans in Australia website
http://www.teachers.ash.org.au/dnutting/germana
ustralia/e/chron/chron1.htm
Don’t forget!!
Get your Reunion Dinner
payments to our Treasurer
--ASAP –
Numbers are limited!
Original Six Reunion 2
SBS German program
Call of the Ancestors
Thu, Oct 18 2007
In 1838 the first German immigrants were brought to Australia
by Edward McArthur to tend to his vineyards in Camden, NSW.
They were the families of Casper Flick, Georg Gerhard, Johann
Justus, Friedrich Seckold, Johann Stein and Johann Wenz. And
their descendants, up to 8 generations later, are now planning a
meeting at the very location where their ancestors first lived and
worked in Camden Park, 170 years ago. Trudi Latour spoke to
descendants from all of the 6 original families, brought together
by Julie Watts. For anyone out there who thinks they might also
be related to this group, contact them at
www.twomeycontracting.com/reunion
(Program in English language)
Eine Sendung von Trudi Latour mit den Nachkommen der
allerersten deutschen Einwanderer nach Australien.. Die 6
Familien von Casper Flick, Georg Gerhard, Johann Justus,
Friederich Seckold, Johann Stein and Johann Wenz wurden von
Major Edward McArthur aus dem Rheingau nach Australien
gebracht um Wein anzubauen. Sie mussten sich fuer 5 Jahre
verpflichten, bekamen aber ihre eigenen kleinen Haeuschen,
Felder und Hausvieh. Heute haben sie bis zu 8 Generationen von
Nachfahren, die sich im April diesen Jahres am Ort der
Vorvaeter, in Camden Park treffen wollen. Wer mehr wissen will,
kann sich bei www.twomeycontracting.com/reunion melden.
(Programm in englischer Sprache)
http://www20.sbs.com.au/podcasting/index.php?ac
tion=feeddetails&feedid=2&id=8158
Current rating: To rate our interview go online
To forget one's ancestors is to be a brook without a source, a
tree without a root.” Chinese Proverb

“ORIGINAL SIX” ~ REUNION IN THE NEWS
It's time for the pioneers to wine and shine
Grape growing in Sydney is as old as the colony itself,
writes Daniel Lewis, who traces six immigrants
who helped sow the dream in 1838
Saturday, 09 February 2008 Page 11 News courtesy SMH
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/its-time-for-the-pioneers-to-wine-and-shine/2008/02/08/1202234167193.html
German vinedresser reunion
WHEN six vinedressers from Germany were brought out to work on the Macarthur family's vineyard at
Camden in 1838, Sydney's wine industry was already 50 years old.
Vine cuttings brought from the Cape of Good Hope and Rio de Janeiro by the First Fleet were planted at Farm
Cove in 1788.
One hundred and seventy years after Friedrich Seckold, Johann Justus, Johann Stein, Caspar Flick, Georg
Gerhard and Johann Wenz arrived at Camden Park, their many descendants are holding a reunion, yet the
Sydney basin - the cradle of Australia's vast wine industry - is not an official wine region.
To get such recognition from the Geographic Indications Committee, a region needs more than a great history. There must be at least
five vineyards each with more than five hectares of grapes, and Sydney only has four.
New England, north of the Hunter Valley, was officially declared the state's newest wine region last month, but the marketing power
of NSW regional wine branding doesn't have much effect on NSW wine drinkers.
David Lowe, president of the NSW Wine Industry Association, said: "South Australia, Victoria and Western Australia are all
parochial wine-drinking states. They love and support their own. To date that has not been the case in NSW.
"NSW wine accounts for only 13 per cent of wine sold in NSW restaurants and most wine consumers cannot name more than two to
three NSW wine regions despite NSW producing 34 per cent of Australian wine.
"This does not make sense given NSW is home to some of Australia's icon wines, oldest family wineries and 14 diverse wine regions,
each with their own regional heroes."
Mr. Lowe said the situation was due to the governments of other states historically doing far more to promote their wine regions and
to the "cosmopolitan attitude" of NSW people. "NSW tries to be like New York. It tries to look at things that aren't local. It's antiparochial
in many ways. It pursues trends and fashions more than any other state." To get Hilltops, Hastings River and Southern
Highlands as well known as the Yarra Valley, the Barossa and Margaret River, a major marketing strategy and the new brand NSW
Wine will be launched in Sydney next week ahead of NSW Wine Week (March 9 to 15). The aim is to build international recognition
and make the domestic market aware of the NSW wine regions and its strengths like shiraz in Gundagai or Riesling in New England.
Julie Watt, 48, is not a wine drinker, but her great-great-great grandfather was the German vinedresser Johann
Justus and she is organizing the April reunion. It will include a visit to Belgenny Farm, which was part of the
original Camden land grant made to John Macarthur in 1805.
Belgenny has Australia's most complete and authentic set of Georgian farm buildings as well as 500 vines to
mark the fact Australia's first commercial vineyard and winery operated there.
Included in the rich archive Mrs. Watt has compiled on the "original six" is the five-year contract signed by the
Macarthur’s and the Germans.
Each worker was promised £15 a year and a cow. In return, they pledged "to control themselves in their lives
and manners as good Christians and as honest and diligent Germans".
The Polish explorer Paul Edmund Strzelecki met the Germans at Camden Park and said they were men who
were "either driven there by necessity, or seduced by the hope of finding, beyond the sea, fortune, peace and
happiness - perhaps justice and liberty".
And it might not be long before Camden is part of an official Sydney wine region, says Jonathan Auld, who owns the historic
Tizzana Winery at Ebenezer and heads the Nepean Hawkesbury Winemakers and Grape Growers Association.
Original Six Reunion 3
Daniel Lewis (Seckold)
Our very own
‘Rural Reporter’ with the
Sydney Morning Herald

Photos & footnotes from the SMH article as featured previous page
Bound by history … Julie Watt, a descendant of Johann Justus, meets William Macarthur-Stanham
at the Macarthur home in Camden. Photo: Dallas Kilponen courtesy SMH
Driven by necessity … vinedressers from Germany with a
man believed to be Johann Stein on the left. Photo courtesy
Edna Watterson (Stein) from Gunnedah, NSW courtesy SMH
FLICK FAMILY
The descendants & family of Casper Flick will be featured in the Next
Week’s Newsletter. Information needed ASAP Please scan and email
anything of interest pertaining to the Casper Flick and his family &
descendants. We require copies of Casper’s family BDM cert.,
Naturalization cert., letters, notebook entries, photos, family tree charts
etc. If every Flick family sends in something then we will have a most
wonderful FLICK FAMILY NEWSLETTER After the Flick newsletter
there will be a newsletter for each of the other 5 Germans, Georg Gerhard,
then Johann Justus, Friedrich Seckold, Johann Stein, & Johann Wenz. To
have these newsletters in time for the reunion it is imperative to have
them issued pretty much one after the other. So please get your copies
rolling in – Thank you for your help in honour of our ancestors.
Can you identify the men in
this photo?
One is believed to be John Stein and I
wonder if the fellow on the right is
Jacob Stein? Compare the photo of
Jacob & his wife Anna Maria (Rt) as
featured in Robert Stein’s book
“A Fine Australian Vintage”
Maybe it’s the nose!
Good nose for the ‘bouquet’?
Original Six Reunion 4
Our Continued Media Efforts
Daniel Lewis (Seckold) the Sydney Morning Herald
Jeff Stien recently submitted multiple media releases Australia
wide ~ 248 newspapers
~ 220 Family History Groups
~ 26 Specialty newspapers and 4 Television Stations
THANKS JEFF & DANIEL
Debbie Noy (Gerhard), Dianna Mellino (Flick) & many others
together with myself have written to local papers/family history
groups concentrating in particular the areas where our ancestors
first settled after leaving Camden. I have approached SBS
Television as a follow-up to their Family History TV show “Who Do
You Think You Are” suggesting they consider doing a TV story about
a unique reunion coming soon to honour the first group of German
vinedressers to Australia. I might be biased but I think it makes for a
great television story.

11 February 2008
Dear Julie
Thank you very much for keeping me informed about
the preparations for the Rheingau in Camden Festival.
I am impressed by the enthusiasm paired with
professionalism the organizers and you in particular
display in preparing this unique event.
Unfortunately I will be away at the time of the festival,
but I am aware that Consul General Dr. Gruber has
marked the event in his calendar. Therefore I would
like to advise you to keep in touch with the Consulate
General; I have arranged with Dr. Gruber that the
Consulate General will approach the Embassy if they
are in need of additional assistance.
Let me again commend you on this splendid initiative
and wish you a smooth preparation and glittering
realization of the event.
Best regards,
Martin Lutz
German Ambassador to Australia.
Volkswagen Group Australia have offered to sponsor
our “Original Six” Reunion
for our lucky Name
Badge draw. They are also
donating carry bags for us to use
as our Sample Bags or Doggy Bags
We are grateful for their kind
generosity.
Original Six Reunion 5
Genealogy Humour
VISITOR INFORMATION PACK
Have you requested a Free Visitor Information Pack from
the Camden Visitor Centre? The Visitor's Information pack is
full of things to see, places to stay and maps that will show you
how to get there. If you would like a free copy of the Visitor
Information Pack mailed to you then go to this link please
www.twomeycontracting.com or phone 02 4658 1370
John Oxley Cottage
John Oxley Cottage was built as a workman’s
cottage in the 1890’s on land granted by Governor
Lachlan Macquarie to the Australian explorer and
surveyor, John Oxley. It was officially opened as
Camden’s Visitors’ Centre in 1989, having been
restored by Camden Council.
Original Six Reunion Commemorative Riesling/Grape-juice Glass
Add this beautiful glass to your collection and always remember the reunion
when you sit down to sip the nectar of the vine in whatever form you like it.
Andrew Stein from Robert Stein Winery Mudgee, NSW has produced an
“Original Six 1838 –2008” commemorative Riesling 2007 vintage for the
reunion. Daniel Cox (Seckold) has designed our label for the bottle – the
bottles will be sold through the winery as soon as prices are available we will
have details on our website ASAP.
We have obtained a delightful Sparkling Grape Juice with red & white
available. The juice is from Camden Region at a winery called “Cobbitty
Wines” owned by the Cogno Brothers. The committee taste tested the juice
last meeting - the red being voted the favourite.
http://www.twomeycontracting.com/registrations.htm to view & order glass download registration
& payment form online

Australian Family Tree Connections
Magazine February Issue 2008
Features an article written by Julie Watt (Justus)
“The Original Six ~ Rheingau to Camden Park
1838-2008”
Extract from article…
On an autumn day in the year 1838 the barque “Kinnear”
(about the size of the Manly Ferry) arrived at its intended
destination of Sydney Cove on the 23 rd April. On board and
in cramped conditions so typical of early emigration ships,
were six families from Germany no doubt keen to feel solid
ground under their feet once more. They had been greeted with
the most beautiful sight before them after passing the lighthouse
earlier on the evening of 21 st April 1838. Of their arrival one
member of the group Joahnn Stein in a subsequent letter home to
Germany, wrote of their relief and gratitude -
“Our destination had been reached. Thanks be to God”
http://www.aftc.com.au magazines available at the newsagents or back issues available directly from
AFTC online or PO Box 322, GOSFORD NSW 2250
"They gave all and came that we might enjoy what they had only dreamt about."
26 to 27 April 2008
http://www.winediva.com.au/wine-vents/wineevents.asp?month=Apr
2008 Camden Events Calendar
http://www.camden.nsw.gov.au/page/2008_events.html#Apr
26 - 27 April 2008
Original Six Reunion
Celebrating 170 years since 6 German Vinedressers and their families
arrived in Sydney. Ph. 4683 3973.
Camden to London and Paris: The Role of
the Macarthur Family in the Early New
South Wales Wine Industry
Julie McIntyre*
The University of Sydney
Abstract The wine industry has been largely overlooked as a
subject of historical analysis in Australian history despite its
significance in the nineteenth century and its renewed vigour in
the late 1900s. This article situates the development of a
particular aspect of the industry within a broader consideration
of the themes of colonization. It outlines the role of the
Macarthur family in wine growing as well as exploring William
Macarthur’s view of viticulture as a means of moving beyond
pastoralism to further ‘civilize’ the colony of New South Wales.
www.blackwell-synergy.com
Original Six Reunion 6
Free PAF
Family History Software
Personal Ancestral File
(PAF) is a free genealogy
and family history program.
PAF allows you to quickly
and easily collect, organize
and share your family history
and genealogy information.
http://www.familysearch.org
Reunion: Celebrating 170 years of
German Vinedressers arrival in
Camden
Contact: Julie Watt Camden NSW
2570, Ph +61 (0)2 4683 3973 Email
wattlebee@bigpond.com Web
www.twomeycontracting.com/reunion
CAMDEN AREA FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY
Meetings / What's On
26 - 27 April 2008
170th Anniversary Reunion - 'Kinnear'
The Original Six ~ Rheingau to Camden Park
~ 1838-2008~
Celebrating 170 years since Edward, James and
William Macarthur brought out the 6 German
vinedressers (FLICK, GERHARD, JUSTUS,
SECKOLD, STEIN WENZ) and their families. They
arrived in Sydney on 23 April 1838 on the 'Kinnear'.
http://camdenhistory.org.au/fhwhatson.html
Did You Know that…?
The Macarthur’s were interested in recruiting
vinedressers from Germany, Switzerland or
France, and had hoped that two or three hundred
skilled labourers could address the lack of
experience that impeded the development of
wine growing. Because the government had
other ideas they only allowed the Original Six
German vinedressers & their wives & children to
emigrate at first.