Maria Fleming

First wife of John Park Fleming (q.v.). Sister of Celia Scott (q.v.) and possibly the sister of Anne Toby (q.v.) - the three women with their husbands were awarded half the compensation for 107 enslaved people on the Sherwood Park estate in Tobago having made a monetary claim for £3977 4s 4d (plus interest from 1819) under the will of Thos Bird dated 17/11/1791.

1. Identified as daughter of Daniel King of Port Glasgow and mother of two surviving children, Eleanor and John King Fleming of Ulah Walgett, New South Wales. Probably also the daughter of Ann Bird (Celia Scott, born c. 1797, was the daughter of Daniel King and Ann Bird, and they had another daughter as well, Christian, born 01/07/1804 in Port Glasgow). Daniel King is also described as "of Tobago" in the marriage notice of Celia in 1821 and as a merchant in Port Glasgow in the birth record of Christian in 1804.

2. Her son John King Fleming (q.v.) was born in 1837 in Glasgow and emigrated to Victoria in 1858 and subsequently bought land in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland.

T71/891 Tobago claim no. 12.

1. James MacLehose, Memoirs and portraits of one hundred Glasgow men who have died during the last thirty years and in their lives did much to make the city what it now is (Glasgow, James MacLehose & Sons, 1886), no. 37, John Park Fleming. See separate entry for Celia Scott. General Register Office for Scotland OPR 574 050 014.

2. 'Fleming, John King (1837–1916)', Obituaries Australia, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://oa.anu.edu.au/obituary/fleming-john-king-389/text390 [accessed 17/10/2012].