Where it all happened



Mountain Vale - a new life

 The community at Mountain Vale consisted of some interesting characters and it seems that there were scoundrels among them. Nobody trusted anybody else and there was good reason for that. I found a newspaper notice announcing the death by murder of James Green at Bishopsbourne some years before Ephraim arrived there. Could this be the father of James Green who owned Mountain Vale?
This is the land taken as a grant by Ephraim Doe somewhere in the early 1860's. He had to pay it off but the transaction was never completed as he was sentenced to live at Port Arthur for 15 years. However, there were a few adventures in the intervening years to keep the Doe family busy.
The children were now of school age but education was not introduced to this area until 1874 by which time they were long gone. Formal learning was something these children had to undertake themselves in their adult years. Ploughing, housekeeping, cooking and farming the cool unsuitable country was their lot in life.