Family History 1.4

Charles Gaze childhood

There was a story in the family during my childhood that Charles went to a Church of England school in Putney. Putney is quite a way from Bloomsbury where they lived, but I guess being in the transport business had its advantages when you wanted to cross London (and the river) cheaply.



We have no record of Charles's educational achievements except a booklet of pen and ink and watercolour maps that he made in 1844.

Charles's Map of Europe, 1 March 1844

 The only other evidence of what was going on within the family is this accounts page on the inside of the cover of the old account book he used for writing his diary of the voyage from London to Auckland twenty years later.
 
It is headed "Pieces". Whatever pieces may have meant, the account covers monthly amounts that indicate a reasonable turnover for the value of money in 1840.
 
And wherever Charles went to school, he was taught to write clearly enough, as will become clear from the extracts from his diary we look at when we come to the voyage to New Zealand.