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On 14 March 1865 Vincenzo purchased two blocks of land opposite his
business in Spring Creek.^^ Five months later, on 16 August 1865, he applied for and
was granted British Citizenship.^ He was by now 28 years old and sufficiently
financiaUy secure to consider marriage; of the families included in this study, few men
married before reaching their late 20s or early 30s, indicating the important role
economic stability played in their decision. Through his friendship with Pietro
Gaggioni, a local settler from Gordevio in Ticino (whose story is included in a later
chapter), Vincenzo was introduced to a young Irish girl Anastasia Short;'^'* the
unofficial support networks of the mining years, which had assisted in the search for
work and lodging, now existed to help the immigrants in other capacities (and were
apparently less ethnically exclusive). Vincenzo and Anastasia were married on 27
April 1865 at St Peter's Catholic Church in Daylesford by the Rev. Fr Slattery.^* Soon
after, Anastasia gave birth to a girl Mary Ann, bom 23 January 1866. A second child
John Joseph arrived on 21 Febmary 1867 foUowed on 25 September 1868 by another
daughter Esther. As in many marriages between the EngUsh and ItaUan speakers,
Anglo-Celtic names were chosen.
To support their growing family, the Perinis worked hard in their hotel and
store. Vincenzo's original business ledger, which spans the years from 1865 to 1905
and was inherited by his granddaughter,'^* provides vivid detail of the business's
activities. It is an historically interesting document, not only as a list of customers and
items sold, but also as an indication of the degree to which the township ~ largely
made up of Italian speakers ~ operated as a cashless economy. Within the small-scale
subsistence communities of Ticino and northem Italy, farm produce and other items
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