Posted by Rob Marshall on April 16, 2007 at 17:16:49 from 64.136.27.226 user Binnacle.
In Reply to: Re: Charcoal burners' wives? posted by Peter Hyland on April 16, 2007 at 15:32:00:
My thoughts are that unless the Billies married women very much younger than them, they would be elderly to say the least and the hard rough life would not have been a viable lifestyle. possibly when they were younger they did in fact live at the burning.
It is stated that both the Billies have lots of children, G/children and great G/children, none of which appear to have decided on the same life, as none are mentioned helping the two Billies.
So as it was the custom in those days to take care of elderly relatives it could well be that the wives if still alive would be living with one of the children. as in the Swainsons.
Rob