I can confidently say that I know absolutely NOTHING about Anthony Corvan's service in New Zealand!The only morsel of information that has been found is as follows:
On October 6, 1866, after the minimum three years' service required, Anthony Edward Corvan( indexed as 'Cowan')was discharged from military service by substitute.
Substitution was referred to in the article I published in a blog several entries ago, headed "Conditions of Military Settlement in New Zealand". The relevant points state:
"15. On the expiration of three years from the day of his arrival at Auckland, each settler having fulfilled the conditions, but not otherwise, will be entitled to a Crown Grant of the town allotment and farm section allotted to him, and will thenceforth be subject only to the same militia services as other colonists.
16. Any settler desiring to leave his settlement will be permitted to do so on providing a substitute approved of my the Government; such substitute will be subject to the same liabilities and entitles to the same privileges as the settler whose place he takes."
The actual entry for Anthony Corvan/Cowan reads: "Date and cause of becoming non-effective - October 5th (?) 1866 discharged by substitute.”
This explains why I could not locate any reference to Anthony Corvan or Cowan as one of those soldiers granted land after service. He was also never mentioned as being awarded a particular medal which was awarded to all soldiers who took part in the 2nd Maori War.
Who knows why Anthony chose to stick out his three years and then give up any benefits the minute he became eligible for them? As far as we know he never returned to Australia, but remained in the Auckland area. The Daily Southern Cross Newspaper on March 21 of 1867 carried a small reference to an Anthony Cowan being punished with several other men in "the usual manner" for drunkenness.
I perhaps may not have thought much of this reference if it wasn't for the fact that he continued to appear for years for various misdemeanors, sometimes as "Anthony E. Cowan". The "E" was the decider for me- Anthony Corvan and Anthony Cowan may have had a slight chance of being different people despite the Cowan/Corvan names both being used for our Anthony, but the addition of the "E for Edward" sealed it for me. I of course have checked to see if an Anthony Cowan was born in New Zealand or came in by ship, but with the exception of our man in 1863, there is no record of other Anthony Cowans in New Zealand. There is also the coincidence of Anthony Cowan not appearing in newspaper reports until five months after our fellow left the Volunteers.
Now...where do we start when we painstakingly try to piece together a man's life from newspaper court reports? The first mention of Anthony Cowan was in March of 1867 and the last in November of 1876. This sudden disappearance from the newspaper isn't from any change in character by our Anthony,but rather from the fact that the online editions of the Daily Southern Cross stop in 1876. There was one last reference to Anthony in 1879, but that was in another newspaper.
Anthony was newsworthy over 40 times:
1967: March 21.
1868: January 1; December 23; December 30
1869: January 26; March 19; July 21; July 23; November 2; December 7
1970: January 18; February 2; March 24; April 5; April 27; October 3; December 22.
1871: February 21; June 30;July 1; September 5; September 8.
1872: January 26; February 16; March 6; November 25.
1873: January 16; July 19.
1874: September 5; September 23; November 26; December 4; December 5.
1875: March 6; March 22; April 14.
1876: May 25; May 29; June 21; November 29.
1879: June 26.
Many of these appearances before the court were for drunkenness and vagrancy, but on occasion Anthony displayed signs of mental illness and violence, and he spent substantial amounts of time in Mount Eden Gaol. I honestly think that he ended up viewing gaol as his home-supplying a roof over his head and food in his belly.
The next few blog entries will be Anthony Cowan/Corvan's story s told solely by newspaper reports from the Daily Southern Cross.
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