a history
Birth: N/A (née Catherine Mary Lynch)
Marriage: 1907
Spouse: Arthur Henry Pinsent
Death: 1972
Family Branch: Australia
PinsentID: GRO1282
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Birth: N/A
Marriage: N/A
Spouse: N/A
Death: N/A
Family Branch: Australia
PinsentID: GRO1675
Father: Colin George Pinsent: 1949 – 2013
Mother: Wife (GRO1602)
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Arthur Henry Pinsent: 1886 – 1971 GRO1272 (Stores Comptroller/Salesman, Melbourne, Australia)
Catherine Mary Lynch: xxxx – 1972
Married: 1907: Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Children by Catherine Mary Lynch:
Norman Arthur Pinsent: 1914 – xxxx (Married Doreen May Tullo, Victoria, Australia, 1938)
Ronald Francis Pinsent: 1915 – 1983 (Married Mary Evelyn Goode, Victoria, Australia, 1940)
Allan Henry Pinsent: 1917 – 2002 (Married Lorna Constance Gerloff, xxxx, xxxx, xxxx)
Arthur James Pinsent: 1921 – 2000 (Married Sheila Mary Park, xxxx, xxxx, 1947)
Marjorie Pinsent: xxxx – 2019 (Married Unknown, Hambleton, xxxx xxxx, xxxx)
Family Branch: Australia
PinsentID: GRO1272
Arthur Henry Pinsent was the only son of Joseph Henry Pinsent by his first wife, Annie Edith (née Miller). He was born and brought up in Fitzroy, in Melbourne where his father originally worked as a “carter” for his father (Thomas James Pinsent). Arthur’s father was a “baker” by the time he married Annie and a “builder” later in life. Arthur’s sister, Mary Elizabeth Pinsent married an American named Francis Hugh Cypher in 1914 and moved to the United States after the “First World War”.
Arthur’s early life must have been difficult as his father abandoned his mother when he was six or seven years old (1892-3). Some years later, when his mother filed for divorce in 1913, she told the court that his father refused to work and he had left her to go back to live with his own mother and father in Fitzroy! She had been left her to look after their children and had worked as a “tailoress” to support them (Melbourne Argus: Friday 14th November 1913). After their separation, Annie lived on Canterbury Road in Middle Park (near Albert Park Lake), which is not far from Fitzroy and it is likely that Joseph continued to see his children. Arthur Henry certainly picked up his father’s love of cricket from somewhere!
Arthur Henry Pinsent was a “clerk” when he married Catherine Mary Lynch in St. Patrick’s (Roman Catholic) Cathedral in Melbourne in October 1907. She was an interesting choice as he came from a Wesleyan Methodist family. They had five children, four boys and a girl in the years that followed. Arthur rose quickly in the business world and he was a “Comptroller of Stores” living on Nimmo Street, in Middle Park by 1919 (Australian Electoral Rolls: 1901 – 1936: Ancestry.com).
Arthur was on the Fitzroy Second XI cricket team in the early 1900s; however, he had become a regular player on the Middle Park First XI by the summer (northern hemisphere winter) of 1914. The team belonged to the “Victorian Junior Cricket Association” and played two-day matches against community teams from other parts of Melbourne. Australia being Australia, the games were well reported in the local press. According to: The Record (Saturday 12th December 1914) “A. Pinsent, formerly of Fitzroy second eleven, was the next man. A finer display of spirited batting has not been seen for some time at Middle Park. Griffiths, last man in, joined Pinsent, and 38 runs were wanted to win the match. Griffiths kept the wicket up while Pinsent piled on the runs. Griffiths got on to one at leg and was caught. The match thus ended in a draw, each side making 165 runs”. So much for Brunswick City.
The following week, the same paper described a match played against Richmond City: “Four wickets were down for 20, Cockburn being responsible for three at a cost of 6 runs. Pinsent, who made a grand show last week, took the vacant crease, and gave a fine display for 30” (Record: Saturday 19th December 1914). Arthur was primarily a batsman and if to show that the Record reporter was not totally biased, the Prahran Telegraph (Saturday 23rd December 1916) reporter had this to say: “A. Park was run out when he had scored 15 and five wickets were down for 45. Pinsent and Irvine made a fine stand and put on 106 runs before Irvine was caught for 31. Pinsent treated the spectators to some lively batting. In eighty minutes he had scored 75, and hit no fewer than eight 4’s. He gave one possible chance at 35, but otherwise batted perfectly”. He was elected team captain at the start of the 1917 season (Record: Saturday 20th October 1917). The following year, he became an elected committee member for the “Middle Park Cricket Club” and he was appointed a delegate to the upcoming “Victoria Junior Cricket Association” meeting (Record: Saturday 21st September 1918).
In December 1923, the “Victorian Junior Cricket Association” sponsored a game to be played at Wangaratta over Christmas. Mr. A. Pinsent (Middle Park) was elected captain and the team (naturally enough) stayed at “Hotel Pinsent,” which his mother owned. They were entertained to a dinner and a social event of some sort (Melbourne Argus: Monday 17th December 1923). Although Arthur was primarily a batsman, his bowling had improved over the years and he was brought on to bowl for the team fairly regularly in the 1920s. In a match against Fremington and Kensington in November 1925, he took four wickets for 13 Runs off 40 balls, which is not too bad (Melbourne Argus: Monday 23rd November 1925)! I appreciate that you may have to play the game to appreciate the nuances.
Arthur was still an effective cricketer at the age of forty. According to the Melbourne Argus (Monday 19th November 1928) “Middle Park v South Melbourne Footballers: MIDDLE PARK SURPRISE: A. Pinsent 101: Middle Park winning the toss against South Melbourne Footballers opened with Pinsent and Miller, to the bowling of Orton and Dean. From the start both batsmen went for the runs, 50 appearing in 25 minutes, and 100 in 50 minutes. With the score at 111, Miller was caught off Bachelor for a well-played 49, made in 50 minutes and including five 4s. The next two wickets fell cheaply but McKee assisted Pinsent to add 55 runs for the fourth wicket, when Pinsent was bowled by Bachelor for 101, which took him just under two hours to make, and included one 6 and 14 4s. It was one of the best innings he has played in his long career in junior cricket, and he was heartily applauded at its finish”. Arthur seems to have retired after the 1929 season.
One reason he did so, may have been that his mother needed help running “Hotel Pinsent”. According to the Electoral Rolls Arthur was living at the hotel in 1931. He transferred the management of the Hotel to Melton T. Ivey the following year (Melbourne Argus: Tuesday 13th September 1932) and, presumably, returned home to Melbourne. His wife, Catherine, had, meanwhile, moved from Nimmo Street in Middle Park and was living in a house on Harold Street in the same part of town.
Although he would have been from out of state, Arthur was probably the “A. Pinsent” who wrote to the Editor of the Sydney Morning Herald (Tuesday 19th January 1932) supporting a recent a appeal by the Prime Minister encouraging people to “spend reasonably – and not hoard” following a banking crisis. He was a “comptroller” by profession and would have understood the danger. Arthur condemned a recent “Moratorium Amendment Bill” that he feared would freeze the assets of many small holders in New South Wales and that clearly “smashed confidence in the real estate market”. He hoped that some of the more egregious restrictive measures could be relaxed before too long. This is a useful reminder that the 1930s included the “Great Depression” and it was global in its scope.
At a “Middle Park Cricket Club” social event, “a Mr. O’Connor spoke of the great work done for the V.J.C.A. by Mr. Arthur Pinsent as secretary, and the high regard in which Mr. Rutter (Middle park’s delegate) was held in the association. There were more important things than winning premierships and Middle Park had shown cricket a great service by training for executive work such men as Mr. Pinsent and Mr. Rutter” (Record: Saturday 17th September 1932).
It was not all about cricket. Mr. Arthur and Mrs. Pinsent attended social events, such as the “Mayor’s Balls” at the Town Hall in Fitzroy in 1928 and 1930; the second of which, we are told, was enhanced by strategically placed red and green electric light bulbs (Table Talk: Thursday 26th June 1930). The Pinsents celebrated their “Silver Wedding” in October (Melbourne Argus: Saturday 22nd October 1932). They also acknowledged the death of Arthur’s mother, Annie Edith Pinsent (née Miller, later Stewart), who died in October 1936 (Melbourne Argus: Saturday 10th October 1936). Her executors put “Hotel Pinsent” up for sale the following year (Melbourne Argus: Saturday 6th March 1937).
Arthur Henry Pinsent was made a life member of the “Victorian Cricket Association” in May 1937 (Melbourne Argus: Friday 28th May 1937) and took on the job of “coach” at Middle Park in 1938 (Record: Saturday 19th November 1938). That year, he also served as “chairman” of the “Victoria Junior Cricket Association” team when it visited Tasmania (Advocate: Tuesday 27th December 1938).
The Electoral Rolls show that Arthur Henry, his wife and family had moved to St. Kilda in Melbourne by 1936 and were living on “Charnwood Crescent” in St. Kilda West in 1937. Arthur Henry Pinsent was marked down as being a (presumably commercial) “traveler” at the time: presumably he was no longer tied up with cricketing obligations every summer and had more time to move around. Arthur and Catherine lived on “Charnwood Crescent” until the late 1950s or early 1960s. They then moved to “Warrigal Road” in Oakleigh, southeast Melbourne (Electoral Rolls: 1963). By then, their children had left home and Arthur’s wife Catherine was able to do something other than “home duties”. She became a “clerk”. Arthur was still down on the rolls as being a “traveler”, but he had probably retired by then! The two of them were still living on “Warrigal Road” in 1968 – and I suspect that is where Arthur Henry died in March 1971. Catherine died the following October.
Catherine and Arthur had four sons and one daughter while living in Melbourne in the 1910s. The boys all married and at least three of them are known to have had children. Their lives are described elsewhere. Their daughter, Marjorie also married. She seems to have become Marjorie May Hambleton and died in April 2019 (Melbourne Herald Son: 30th May 2019). Whether she had any children I do not know.
Grandfather: Thomas James Pinsent: 1833 – 1915
Grandmother: Elizabeth James: xxxx – 1908
Father: Joseph Henry Pinsent: 1863 – 1945
Mother: Annie Edith Miller: xxxx – 1936
Thomas James Pinsent: 1858 – 1932
William Henry Pinsent: 1860 – 1860
Elizabeth Pinsent: 1861 – 1870
Joseph Henry Pinsent: 1863 – 1945
Charles Samuel Pinsent: 1864 – 1930
William John Pinsent: 1866 – 1905
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Birth: N/A (née Annie Edith Miller)
Marriage: 1885, 1925
Spouse: Joseph Henry Pinsent, James C. Stewart
Death: 1936
Family Branch: Australia
PinsentID: GRO1269
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Allan Henry Pinsent: 1917 – 2002 GRO1605 (Salesman, Melbourne, Australia)
Lorna Constance Gerloff: 1923 – 1975
Married: xxxx: xxxx, xxxx
Children by Lorna Constance Gerloff:
Son (GRO1615)
Son (GRO1885)
Family Branch: Australia
PinsentID: GRO1605
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Allan Henry Pinsent was the third son of Arthur Henry Pinsent by his wife, Catherine Mary (née Lynch). He was born in Middle Park in South Melbourne in 1917 and grew up there with three brothers and a sister. Allan’s grandmother, Annie Edith Pinsent, was well known to the “better class” of society in Melbourne. She was the proprietress of “Hotel Pinsent” in Wangaratta – northeast of Melbourne.
Allan’s father was a noted Middle Park cricketer into the 1920s and it is not that surprising that two or three of his sons took up the sport. The Albury Banner and Wodonga Express (Friday 30th January 1931) shows that “A. Pinsent” played for a “Victoria Junior Cricket Association” eleven against a team from Wangaratta in 1931. This could, I suppose, be a youthful Alan. Also we find that N. Pinsent and A. Pinsent played for Middle Park in a match against the “Lands Department” in February 1934 (Melbourne Argus: Monday 26th February 1934). The N. was Norman Arthur Pinsent and the “A. Pinsent” probably Allan Henry Pinsent. He would have been seventeen years old by then. When Mr. Richard John Webb married Miss Dorothea Grave Gavins in Caulfield, on 17th July 1937 (The Herald: Melbourne) he asked Allan to be one of his “groomsmen.”
Allan was keeping wicket for the Elsternwick (Melbourne suburb) sub-district cricket team by 1940. He had a very good season that year. According to the Sporting Globe,“Allan Pinsent, Elsternwick’s wicketkeeper (Sub-District Firsts), had a hand in the dismissal of seven out of the first eight wickets taken against Brunswick, stumping two, catching four, and assisting in a run-out. So far this season he has taken 25 wickets and has only allowed 14 byes” (Sporting Globe: Melbourne: Saturday 24th February 1940). That should make sense to anyone who has ever played the game. His skill is also shown by the fact that he was chosen for a “Victoria Junior Cricket Association” team that played in Perth, West Australia, over Christmas 1941 (The Western Australian: Saturday 15th November 1941).
Allan played for Elsternwick until at least January 1942 (Sporting Globe (Saturday 24th January 1942) and then seems to have served overseas with the “Australian Armed forces”. I do not know where he served; however, there is a wall plaque in the Springvale Botanical Cemetery in Victoria that shows that “Cpl. A. H. Pinsent, Army Ordnance Corp.” died in 2002 (Australian Billion Graves Cemetery Index). This clearly refers to Allan as it fits with his known date of death. Allan rejoined the Elsternwick team in December 1944 and the Melbourne Argus tells us: “Cricket Team Changes: Sub-District Moves: Pinsent has returned from service outside Australia and will play for Elsternwick. He replaces Dudgeon, who is not available” (The Argus: Friday 1st December 1944). He seems to have had a relatively short engagement with the “Ordnance Corp”!
The military authorities had requisitioned Elsternwick Cricket Club’s ground for the duration of the war but they returned it to the club in November 1945 and Allan resumed his position behind the wickets (The Age: Thursday 1st November 1945). He played for the team regularly through until at least March of 1952.
Allan married Lorna Constance Gerloff sometime after the war and they were living with his parents on “Charnwood Crescent” in St. Kilda in 1949. Allan was a “salesman” and Lorna was a “winder” – although, once again, of what sort I do not know. They were still with Allan’s parents in 1954; however, they had moved to “Kirkwood Street”, in Sandringham, a beachside-suburb of Melbourne by 1964. That was to be their family home until at least 1980 (Australian Electoral Rolls: 1903 – 1980: Ancestry.com). Lorna died there in April 1975 and was buried in “Williamstown Cemetery” in Melbourne. Her husband passed away in July 2002 and was buried beside her. They were later joined by a young grandchild, Samara Jane Pinsent who, sadly, died of leukemia at the age of six in April 2004 (Australian Billion Graves Index).
Allan and Lorna had at least two sons, although I do not know when. At least one of them married and had children. The family is probably still living in Melbourne.
Grandfather: Joseph Henry Pinsent: 1863 – 1945
Grandmother: Annie Edith Pinsent: xxxx – 1936
Father: Arthur Henry Pinsent: 1886 – 1971
Mother: Catherine Mary Lynch: xxxx – 1972
Mary Elizabeth Pinsent: 1889 – xxxx
Norman Arthur Pinsent: 1914 – xxxx
Ronald Francis Pinsent: 1915 – 1983
Arthur James Pinsent: 1921 – 2000
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