Hi Ken,

Thanks for the information about William Corkill. The details you gave for him in Australia may turn up a relative reading this message board who has already researched his line, which would be helpful for you.

Nora Ramus's file of "Immigrants from IOM to Victoria" has William's birth date as 1800, arrival 1838, no ship given, died 1878 aged 78, father William Corkhill, Death Regt No: 2497, Spouse Margaret Osborne, married 1841, Marr Reg No: 4394, spouse birthplace Cornwall, Descendants Yes, Descendants Birthplaces: Melbourne Williamstown. - So the same information that you already have. Nora's information looks as though it has come from the Vic B/M/D indexes, but I assume yours has come from the actual certificates which would have more details.

Thanks for including the interesting letter, which reminded me about the number of IOM people who were in the Port Philip district in 1850. There is also a copy on Manx Notebook: www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook/. You would enjoy looking through this website.

Unfortunately it is very difficult to find all the passenger lists from 1838 and earlier. I had a (Scottish) gt gt uncle who sailed on the 'Alfred' to Sydney, leaving in 1838 and arriving in Sydney Jan.1839. He and some others whose destination was Victoria, not NSW, then started overland to Melbourne which took them about 5 weeks. He had a cousin who had followed the same route a few months earlier - sailing to Sydney then overland to Victoria, but there is no existing passenger list for his voyage.
The PRO Victoria inward passenger lists online start in 1839.
NSW State Records free passenger lists have "Miscellaneous Immigrants 1828-43" but no Cork(h)ill that I could see.

There is a website: www.ozships.net/ozships/ which shows vessels arriving each year, and in 1837/1838 most of them went to Sydney or Tasmania, and a very few to Port Philip - you can check their passenger and crew lists. It looks as though as a seaman, he might have been crew?

I can't help you with the Australian family, so your family tree wouldn't help me, thank you anyway. If you have already looked at William's marriage certificate as well as his death cert, looked at the inscription on his gravestone (some have date of birth), looked at 'Trove' for newspaper refs to him (trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/search?adv=y), and can look through all the passenger and crew lists available, you have probably done everything possible to find references to the Isle of Man in his local records.

I'll see what else I can find in IoM records while you fill in the possible Australian gaps above (if any).
You will probably find some new refs to him on Trove if you haven't already searched this.

Sue