Sarah East Peek

According to her obituary notice, below, Sarah was born on Sydney Harbour in February 1842. Her mother must have been pregnant when she set sail from England with her younger sister Elizabeth on 29 August 1841. The ship arrived on 23 December.

The first NSW document to contain her mother Sarah East’s name is a record of her marriage to George Henry Boulter at Maitland on 27th September 1842, just seven months later. It's unlikely that he was the baby’s biological father as he was not on board ship when Sarah arrived in Sydney. It seems more likely that he met her there or when she arrived in Maitland. So altough Sarah took Georg'es surname, we don't know who her biological father was.

George Boulter came to Australia in 1830 as a convict and gained his freedom in 1836.

Sarah's early childhood was not easy. Soon after giving birth to another girl in 1845, whom she called Charlotte, her mother broke up with George Boulter maybe because he was an ex-convict and always getting into trouble. There are a number of references to a George Bolter/Boulter/Bolton/Boulton in the Maitland Mercury index in 1844 and 1845, most of which deal with a charge of cattle stealing from "Windermere" in the Lochinvar district so Sarah and her mother were probably better off without him.

By 1848 when Sarah remarried George Dean, George Bolton had died as she is listed as a widow. She already had a 15 month old daughter Mary Ann with Dean and was 7 months pregnant with the next child.

When Sarah Dean died in 1855 her daughter Sarah Boulter was 13, her sister Charlotte was 10 and the four Dean children were all under 8. George Dean remarried but there were no more children.

Sarah East Boulter married James Peek when she was 23 over the next 22 years produced 11 children who obviously loved and respected her as can be seen from her obituary:

Maitland Daily Mercury, Thursday, 26 July 1923

Late Mrs. Sarah Peek

The funeral of the late Mrs. Sarah Peek, a former well-known and much-respected resident of West Maitland, who died at Ettalong Beach, Woy Woy, on Tuesday, took place today. The body was brought to Maitland on the early afternoon train, and the interment was made in the Church of England cemetery, Campbell's Hill, alongside the remains of her late husband. The late Mrs. Peek was born on Sydney Harbour and had lived in Maitland practically all her life. About 1912 she moved to Sydney and recently went to reside with her daughter, Mrs. Williams, at Woy Woy. She leaves a family of five sons — Messrs. Norman Peek, headmaster of Albion-street School, Sydney: Dr. Harold Peek, Buckinghamshire (England); Messrs. Bert and Lyn Peek, of the G.P.O. (Sydney), and Rupert Peek, a land agent in Martin Place (Sydney). The daughters are Mrs. E. Norman (Sydney), Mrs. Oliver (Muswellbrook), Mrs. Cunningham and Mrs. Abbott (Sydney), and Mrs. Williams (Woy Woy). The chief mourners at the funeral were the sons and sons-in-law, and Mr. Cecil Fewtrill, a cousin. The service at the graveside was conducted by Rev. Blake Hobart.

Sarah had 11 children and lived till she was 81. In her latter years she became stone deaf and conversed in writing. When her last child Linley was born in 1887 she was 45 years old. Ten of her 11 children survived - George died as a baby, allegedly from eating rhubarb.