BLACKBRIDGE CEMETERY
Lower Hutt, New Zealand
Cook Family
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The Cook family arrived in the Hutt Valley on the “Bengal Merchant” on 20 February 1840 from Glasgow.
The passenger list shows:
Cook, Matthew 35, shoemaker and Gardener
Wife – 35
William 17
Matthew Jnr 15
M (son) 11
George 6
A (son) 2
As Thomas Cook’s age when he died in 1913 was 68 years, he must have been born in New Zealand about 1845. The family came from Lanark in Scotland.
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Thomas married Charlotte Judd on 23 March 1868. The Evening Post of 7 April 1868 reports - On March 23, at the Waiwetu, by the Rev. William S. McGowan, Mr Thomas Cook, to Carlotte, eldest daughter of Mrs M.J. Judd, Heath Cot.
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Charlotte was the daughter of William Judd and Mary Jane Lonsdale, who married on 12 August 1844. William had arrived in Wellington on the “Bolton” on 21 April 1840, and Mary had been a passenger on the “Bengal Merchant”. Charlotte was born on 21 May 1848 in Wainuiomata. William Judd was born in Bicknor, Kent on 15 August 1824
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There is a report – I am not sure where it came from – that reports. My family arrived in Wellington New Zealand on the "Bengal Merchant" on the 20th February 1840, from Lanark near Glasgow, they were MATHEW COOK, and WILLAM COOK, they were brothers and came with their wives and children. They first settled in Petone and Lower Hutt area, later purchasing land in the Pauatahanui Judgeford area. A son of MATHEW COOK, THOMAS COOK owned a timber and packing case factory in Petone, supplying the gear meat company with casks and boxes, he taught his brother WILLIAM COOK about the business, and WILLIAM moved to Palmerston North and started a large timber company, supplying butter boxes, casks and timber to the famers and brewery in the area.
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Charlotte died on 18 November at Petone, aged 49 years and was buried on 20 November 1897.
FUNERAL NOTICE. THE Friends of the late Thomas Cook are respectively invited to attend his Funeral, which will leave his late residence, 54, Hutt Road, Petone, at. 1.15 p.m. To-morrow for the Knox Church Cemetery, Hutt. J. R. Croft, Undertaker, 131, Jackson Street, Petone. (Evening Post 2 April 1913
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Thomas Cook died on 1 April, 1913. Both he and his wife are buried at Blackbridge cemetery.