Grace Campbell Ramsay (1818-1893)

Grace was born in 1818 in Dundee, Scotland to parents David and Mary Hill. Grace was the second of the Hill Sisters who set sail on 6 August 1858 on The Dolphin and arrived at Fremantle on 26 November (reference; reference). Grace, born in 1818, was the second oldest of the four sisters and 40 years old when she came to Bunbury. 

Two years after she arrived, Grace married widower William James Ramsay in 1860 (reference). William ran the Plough and Harrow Inn in Victoria Street which, when the building was being demolished in 1906, was described in the Bunbury Herald: "The establishment, while still in the flush of its youth and beauty, came into the possession of. Mr Wm. C. Ramsay, father of Mr Wm. Ramsay, of Minninup, and afterwards fell from grace to some extent by becoming a public house, as such being known as the Plough and Harrow. What a suggestion of quiet rural surroundings the name conveys, and how is the picture filled with besmocked rustics quaffing their mugs of nut-brown ale under the sheltering porch of the modest hostelry! But, alas, and truth to tell, there is no such gentle pastorale in the nigh-forgotten history of the Plough and Harrow. Rather it was the rendezvous of rough ploughers of the deep than simple settlers on the soil, the resort of hardy adventurers than the retreat of the bushland pioneer. For here it was that the men of the Yankee whalers who used to visit these latitudes and were want to seek the meagre shelter of the bay did frequently foregather in lusty carousal, and where schemes of contraband were often cunningly hatched. During its riotous days it was associated with names yet prominently connected with the South-West (reference)."

The Plough and Harrow was run in partnership with James Childs, who formerly ran a store on the property but had since gone into Bay Whaling and brewing colonial sugar beer. Childs had purchased a property on Mangles Road and lived on it until his death in 1846 (reference). James Ramsay, who had married Bridget Shanahan in 1853 and was now the father of three young children, gave up running the tavern in 1855 and purchased the Mangles Road property in 1856 (reference; reference; reference). By that time, the property had a substantial two-storey house on it which was known as the Minninup Homestead (reference). Unfortunately, Bridget died in 1859, aged 24, leaving behind the three young children - James, three years old, Anna, one year old and William, who was just a baby (reference).

In 1862, two years after Grace and William were married, tragedy struck again when William, aged 43, died, leaving Grace to manage the farm and bring up her three young step-children (reference). Grace brought up the children and managed the farm by employing ticket-of-leave men and eventually with the help of her stepson, James and his brother William (reference). William became well known for breeding horses (reference). An unknown person recalled Grace: "As a lad of about sixteen I had Sunday's dinner with Mrs Ramsay; she asked me to "have a wee drop of Scotch,' but her "wee drop" was three times more than I was used to and with nothing to break it down so I asked for water. Mrs. Ramsay threw up her hands in horror and said, "Why mon, you'll spoil it," but I preferred to spoil it, than to getting under the table." (reference).

Written by Gaye Englund for the Streets of Bunbury project.