Travelling for love
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Robert and Mary Christison
19th century marriage by sail and mail
If ‘frequent sailing points’ had been issued in the 19th century, Robert Christison would have accrued many. Between 1852, when he first immigrated to Australia from Scotland, until 1910, when he returned to England for the last time, Christison crossed the world 12 times.
In 1877 at the age of 40, Robert Christison returned to Scotland after the death of his father. He met and married an aspiring artist, Mary Sympson Tovey, who was 35 years old. Robert and Mary returned to Queensland together, to Lammermoor, the property that Robert established 15 years earlier to breed thoroughbred horses and run cattle. Robert built an artist’s studio for his wife and she established an English garden. Tragically, Mary died of malarial fever in 1879 before they had been married for a year. Robert was devastated.
Soon afterwards, Robert received a letter from Mary Godsall, an artist and friend of his late wife, offering her condolences.
The letter must have touched Robert’s heart for he decided to return to England, met Mary and married her in 1880.
The second Mary Christison did not adapt well to the climate or landscape at Lammermoor. She missed the green rolling hills, the rain and her cultured London life. She was often ill from the heat.
For several years, Mary, Robert and their growing family divided their time between Lammermoor, Stanthorpe and Tenterfield where the weather and countryside is more English. They were often separated as Robert needed to be at Lammermoor to run the station. However, in 1887, after the death of their baby son and the birth of their fourth child, Mary decided that she had had enough of the Australian heat, dust and flies. She sailed for England with their children urging Robert to join her as soon as possible.
Over the next 20 years, Robert travelled back and forth between Lammermoor and London three times and wrote frequently to his wife and children. In 1893, Mary attempted to live in Australia again, spending summers in Hobart and winters at Lammermoor.
Although their children loved living on the station, Mary still pined for England.
Robert and Mary spent more of their married life apart than together. While they loved each other and their children, they wanted to live on different sides of the globe. This is still a common dilemma today for long distance lovers.
For more information about the Christison family, read Christison of Lammermoor which is available in the John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland. This book is a rambling account of Robert Christison’s life by his eldest daughter Mary Montgomerie Bennett.
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Last updated: 19th October 2009
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