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- The Name "Slade" form 1327 to 1749As far back as 1290 there was a "Slade Hall" in the Parish of Cornwood, Devonshire.The "Crest" of "Ostrich feathers" and the arms of "Three Horses Heads" is believed to have been granted to "Slade of Slade Hall" in the reign of Edward 1, the "Motto" the being "Facta non Verba.""Maunsel, now the seat of John Slade, Esq; newly built, was the hereditary possession of a family of the same name for twenty generations. In the time of Henry II, William of Erleigh granted it to Philip Arbalistarius, in free marriage with his daughter, to be held by the payment of two young pigs every Whitsuntide at his court of Durston; which granted Ancilia, widow of the same William of Erleigh, confirmed to Philip de Maunsel, son of the above mentioned Philip, who married a daughter of Sir Hugh de Auberville, and was the first of this family that assumed the name of Maunsel, or Mansel. In this family the manor and ancient mansions continued till the time of Charles I, when it was purchased of their heirs by the family of Bacon, who resided here in the commencement of the present century (early 18th century). Robert de Mansel bore on his seal a hand clenched, but William, son of the said Robert, took the present arms, viz. Sable, three jambs argent."Excerpt from North Petherton - taken from Collinson's History of Somerset.
SLADE, ERNEST AUGUSTUS (1805-1878), Superintendent of Convict Barracks and Police Magistrate, was born on 30 June 1805, the son of General Sir John Slade (1762-1859), Baronet, and his first wife Anna Eliza, née Dawson. His father distinguished himself during the peninsular war at the battles of Busaco and Fuentes de Onoro and received the thanks of parliament and a gold medal for his services. Slade was an unruly and extravagant youth and his father hastened to get him into the army so that he would be under discipline and preferably out of England. A commission was bought for him for £450 and he joined the 54th Regiment as an ensign on 1 August 1822 and was promoted lieutenant in May 1825; in 1828 he transferred to the 40th Regiment and saw service in the Australian Colonies and India. He retired from the army in 1831 and returned to New South Wales in 1832 with a letter of introduction from the Colonial Office to Governor Bourke expressing the wish that he be placed in any office, which happened to be vacant when he arrived. In February 1833 Bourke appointed Slade Superintendent of the Convict Barracks at Hyde Park with a residence within the barracks and a salary of £150; the following October he was appointed also to the part- time office of third Police Magistrate for Sydney for which he received an additional £100 a year. He held these appointments until 1 November 1834 when he became involved in court proceedings, which received wide publicity. Because of the scandal to which these proceedings gave rise, Bourke told him that he could no longer hold his appointments; he was allowed to resign. Slade complained to the Colonial Office that he had been summarily and unjustly dismissed from his appointments; he admitted the irregularity of his own domestic establishment, but alleged in extenuation that many of the most respectable and useful justices of the peace of the colony were living in a state of concubinage with female servants. The convicts hated Slade. Even Sir Richard Bourke, Governor of New South Wales stated in a dispatch to lord Glenelg; Mr. Slade’s service to the Government in the punishment of Convicts have exposed him to the hatred of that class of persons in such a manner to interfere with the security of his life or property… The reason behind this dispatch to lord Glenelg was not to praise Slade… it was to make sure he didn’t come back to Australia. It seems that everyone wanted to get rid of Slade, even his own father. . It looks like he tried to get back at Bourke as on his return to England he alleged that Bourke had used the disclosures on his moral conduct merely as a pretext to deprive him of office, and that the real reason was that his severe treatment of convicts ran counter to the governor's own policy of leniency. He was re-examined by Sir George Grey on another part of his evidence in which he made allegations damaging to the character of the governor's son, Richard Bourke; the allegations were shown to be false and were expunged from the records. Under these circumstances it would of made life for Mary Ann Curran very difficult, it is not know if he made provisions for Mary Ann and her son, on his dismissal from the country. Most likely because of the character of the man he did not, therefore it would have been left to her father John Bury Curran to support his grandson. Ernest Augustus Slade returned to England and in July 1836 applied to the Colonial Office for another appointment; he was told that it was unlikely that one could be offered to him in the foreseeable future. As a witness before the select committee on transportation in 1837 he gave a lurid picture of the moral depravity of the convict population in New South Wales; he also claimed that he had devised the cat then in general use in the colony and boasted that, if punishment were administered with it under his own supervision, it never failed to break the skin in four lashes. In his statement to select committee he was asked the following: How long did you keep the position of police magistrate? Will you state to the committee about your domestic situation, Slade stated the following: I was living with a free girl, the daughter of a respectable man, holding office under the Government, and the girl was of irreproachable character before I became acquainted with her, her father and mother being both free as well as the daughter. By this girl I had a child (this girl was only the age of thirteen years!!!) and this child being dangerously ill, and the difficulty of procuring servants in Sydney being so great, she recommended to me to apply for a free girl out of the emigrant ship, David Scott. I wrote to Mr.Nicholson, a Magistrate of the territory, and the master attendant at Sydney, requesting him to send to Mr. Marshall, the superintendent of that vessel, to know if he could furnish me with a servant girl that girls name was Lavinia Winter... Slade was twice married and had one daughter. He died at Boulogne, France, on 5 March 1878.
He is the Ernest Augustus Slade Superintendent of Convict Barracks and Police Magistrate who had the reputation of living with in a state of concubinage with his female convict servants.. Sir Benjamin Slade the current Baronet of Ernest Augustus Slade’s ancestral home “Maunsel House” writes the following after I contacted him: His Grandson Herbert Grant Watson became ambassador to Finland and his sister married into the Dunlop family of Scotland. Indeed Ernest Slade was in Australia and got into a lot of trouble, there are still descendants over there! I do have photos and a portrait of him and there are good records here. He died in France because he was broke and escaping his debts.
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