Following my posting on The Old Dutch House, I received a comment from Leo van der Plas of Delft, the Netherlands. His von Rantzau website is a veritable mine of information on that aristocratic Teutonic family.
He confirms that Daniel Detloff von Ranzow, who was transported to Australia in 1838, was a son of Carl Ludvig von Ranzow, the son of Daniel Detlev von Ranzow and Johanna Elizabeth Cramer. He adds that Carl Ludvig was a former governor of Riouw, then residing in Malacca and Liem Akhaniong.
He further mentions that the Malakkan newspaper in 1836 carried an account of a fight which occurred between Carl Ludvig, Daniel Detloff and a servant on one hand and a Mr de Wind on the other - certainly unfair odds for a fight, more like a mugging.
Entry on for July 1836 on p 93 of Asiatic Intelligence, in the Asiatic Journal and Monthly Miscellany, vol xx.
So Daniel Detloff the younger, No 6095 in the van der Plas Rantzau database, appears to have been of a rather fiery nature, to say the least.
His father, the 'poor old count' Carl Ludvig was born in Mannar, in Northern Sri Lanka. The ancient port of Maha Tittha ('great harbour') had been in existence for two thousand years before the Portuguese built a fort there in 1560. This was captured in 1658 by the Dutch, who rebuilt it in its present form in 1686.
So Daniel Detloff is definitely in contention for the first Sri Lankan Dutch Burgher immigrant to Australia. The first Sri Lankan immigrants, were however, the O'Dean family.
Hon. Frederick North, later 5th Earl of Guilford, established the 1st Ceylon regiment, the first Malay regiment in the British Army, in 1802. It wore the distinctive scarlet uniform of the 'redcoats'.
Drum Major Jainudeen, a Malay of the 1st Ceylon Regiment, went over to the side of the King of Kandy - who had his own Malay regiment, the Padikkara Peruwa - in the first Kandyan War of 1803-1805. Upon the fall of the kingdom in the 2nd Kandyan War 1815, he was captured and transported with his Sinhalese wife Eve and children to New South Wales. Their arrival on board the vessel Kangaroo was reported in the Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser of 17th February 1816.
He was originally known as William O'Deen or O'Dean, but later became Hooden. Later still he was identified as John Wooden and the family became totally 'Aussiefied' (or, given their final name, 'lignified').
For more on Sri Lankan immigration to Australia, see James Jupp, The Australian people: an encyclopedia of the nation, its people and their origins, Cambridge University Press, 2001; ISBN 0521807891, 9780521807890.
A postscript: a 2nd Lieutenant Henrik Mattheus van Ranzow served with the 3rd Ceylon Regiment under the British, possibly one of the sons of August Carel von Ranzow. The Dutch were common but rich, and the German aristocracy noble but poor, so the latter served the former as merceneries.
Another PS: in the Parliamentary Papers, Volume 34 (London: HMSO, 1840), on p10 of 'Colonial Pensions' are two items: L 22 10 s paid as pension to Count ACF von Ranzow aged 71, in January 1820 and L 15 paid to his son and daughter at the same time.
ADDENDUM July 2012
Paul Thomas of Monash university has written a scholarly article on O'Deen, which may prove definitive. An abstract plus a pay-to-download version is available at:
ADDENDUM July 2012
Paul Thomas of Monash university has written a scholarly article on O'Deen, which may prove definitive. An abstract plus a pay-to-download version is available at:
So right! I am correcting it.
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