Shep's Place Family Tree

Most of the children were born at Angaston before the move to Clare. From there together with his eldest son Arthur and brother Charles Radford he went gold mining to the Northern Territory where Arthur died, but the brothers extracted 80 pounds in weight of gold then worth 3,000 pounds, a fortune for the time. Instead of selling to the Darwin dealers they thought to do better at Sydney so embarked on the S.S. "Gothenberg" which was wrecked by striking a reef at Flinders Passage off Townsville, Queensland on 25 Feb 1875. Of 137 passengers only 22 escaped including Charles but Thomas drowned. He was aged 44. It was a common belief that divers sent to recover the gold did so, but kept it for themselves. Charles returned to found a family. He and Thomas had earlier formed, at Kapunda, the Yarn Creek Gold Mine and had extensive interests in it.

‎[Editor's note: The above is an extract from Eunice Margaret Stevenson's History of the Reeves/Wilson Family, 1986, 1999. It is not known what her sources were for Charles Radford being on the SS Gothenburg when it was wrecked. His name does not appear on the passenger list nor on the survivor list included in the Wikipedia entry about the ship and the sinking.]‎