Margaret, called Peggy on ships indent, sailed from Gravesend, Kent, on May 6th 1821, bound for India. She was listed as a maid to a Mrs Keys (referred to as Mrs Lock in some reports), doctor's wife, resident of Bombay. The ship "Blenden Hall",of 450 tons, was on charter to the East India Company and on board were 84 passengers.

On June 22nd 1821, the ship ran aground on Inaccessable Island, 97 km from Tristan Da Cunha Island, in the South Atlantic.

On November 10th 1821, all but two passengers and six crew were rescued by Islander from Tristan Da Cunha. British Colony. . The six crew had drowned on an earlier attempt to reach help.

Margaret and Stephen White were among 7of the survivors who chose to remain on the island. They married on the island and had three children before returning to England. Stephens Father insisted they have a church marriage, in England, which they did. They emigrated to Van Diemans Land in1832.

Their ship, the 304 ton bark "Rubicon' arrived in the Derwent on June 18th 1832.

Fixed up a lot of details, by Lyn Silva 9 July 2016.

http://www.tasfamily.net.au/~schafferi/index.php?file=kop69.php#_ftn13

1841 Australian Death Record - Margaret WHITE born c1807 died 3/8/1841 Hobart

ORIGINS

There is some debate about the origins of Peggy with the following being suggested

1) Australian Aboriginal

• Some of Peggy's descendants are of aboriginal descent
• https://www.aph.gov.au/DocumentStore.ashx?id=02edfa7e-1b00-4184-973... "A letter received from the Archives Office of Tasmania confirmed that the usual claim for Aboriginality in this family (re Tatnells/Nichols/White) has been through the White family. The letter went on to state “I think it is now well established that while members of the White family may be dark, they are not Aboriginal"

2) half-caste Regis Mohawk, Native American Indian, and English
Curator note: I think someone has confused Indian (as in born in India) with Indian (Native American Indian)

3) Bombay, India

• https://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/ctee/Witnesses/WOLFA.htm - "Peggy Vass, a Portugueses Indian"
• https://vdlworldimmigrants.wordpress.com/listing-of-people - "Margaret Vass, listed in the passenger list as Peggy, a Portuguese/Indian half-caste of Madras (or Bombay) maid to Mrs Lock, wife of a doctor resident in Bombay"
• descendants have mtdna M30-C16234T which is a South-Asian or India-specific maternal lineage
• http://www.tasfhs.org/downloads/Volume8Number4_1987.pdf "Peggy, who was of Portugese-Indian descent"

4) Portugese

• https://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/ctee/Witnesses/WOLFA.htm - "Peggy Vass, a Portugueses Indian"
• https://vdlworldimmigrants.wordpress.com/listing-of-people - "Margaret Vass, listed in the passenger list as Peggy, a Portuguese/Indian half-caste of Madras (or Bombay) maid to Mrs Lock, wife of a doctor resident in Bombay"

Evidence is needed to support these claims.

LINKS

• https://gw.geneanet.org/breton29?lang=en&n=vass&oc=0&p=margaret+peggy
• https://www.parliament.tas.gov.au/ctee/Witnesses/WOLFA.htm
• https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=12523.45
• https://www.ancestry.com.au/genealogy/records/charlotte-matilda-whi...
• http://www.tasfhs.org/downloads/Volume8Number4_1987.pdf
• https://www.tdob.org/03-august
• https://www.tristandc.com/po/stamps202005.php
• https://vdlworldimmigrants.wordpress.com/listing-of-people/

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There are a large number of families who have claimed Aboriginal Ancestry through Mary
Ann Tatnell who had “Aboriginal blood”

Information provided by the Archives Office of Tasmania:

A letter received from the Archives Office of Tasmania confirmed that the usual claim for
Aboriginality in this family (re Tatnells/Nichols/White) has been through the White family. The
letter went on to state “I think it is now well established that while members of the White family may
be dark, they are not Aboriginal.

Stephen White, his wife Margaret (Peggy) nee Vass, with five children arrived on the barque Rubicon
on 19 June 1832 to settle in Tasmania where they had a further four children. The couple met on the
South Atlantic Island of ‘Tristan D’Acunha’ after the vessel White was sailing in was shipwrecked
on another island in the vicinity.

Stephen married Margaret ‘Peggy’, a ‘half-caste Portuguese from Bombay’, on the Island.