Photo of Marrickville Road and nearby Illawarra Road, Marrickville
Mother – Maternal lines of Morris Family & Clingan Family
Dorothy Amelia Morris (Mrs. R.G. Fitzpatrick) of Erskineville, took ill suddenly and lost consciousness while visiting her mother and son at Ermington. An ambulance conveyed her to the Parramatta Hospital where she died on 16 November 1966, with her family nearby.
Elsie Amelia Morris was born to Frederick George and Dorothy May Morris, on 16 February 1923, at the Royal Hospital for Women, Paddington, New South Wales. Her birth was registered on 5 March 1923 with the christian name Elsie. However on the 15 July 1923 she was baptized by the Reverend W.T. Price, Church of England, as Dorothy Amelia Morris. W.H. Young, Deputy Registrar General, NSW Births, Deaths and Marriages noted these changes to her Birth Certificate on 19 September 1923. She was thus known as Dorothy or Dot. This baby girl was the second child; her brother Alfred was one year older and her younger siblings Frederick (John) and Stella were born between 1925 and 1928.
Ancestors of Dorothy Amelia Morris
Her father, Frederick, was employed as a motor lorry driver. Frederick’s employment directly caused his family to be affected by the falling prices of Australian wheat and wool in the mid-1920s. Then the Wall Street crash of 1929 inflamed his financial difficulties. By the 1930’s a worldwide economic depression exacerbated the families financial problems with unemployment reaching a peak of 32 per cent in 1932. Dorothy Amelia Morris and her family suffered during the great depression, and their unemployed and desperate father, Frederick, deserted his wife and children.
Between 1925-1939, Dot and her family were living in the Sydney suburb of Marrickville, where she attended the local Public School. After completing school studies her occupation involved domestic duties, she also worked in the local woollen mill. Dot was aged 16 when the Second World War broke out.
Three years later, in 1942, Dorothy and her partner Stanley Lloyd Hall had one child, a son. The partnership between Dorothy and Stanley lasted for five years. Stanley married his new partner, Jean Schofield, at Marrickville in May 1946.
Siblings of Dorothy Amelia Morris
- Alfred George Morris [1921-1966]
- Frederick James Morris [1924-1977]
- Stella Constance Morris [1928-1963]
Dorothy married her new partner, Ronald Grant Fitzpatrick, at Randwick in August 1946. They had one child, a daughter. Following their marriage, the family encountered financial and other difficulties and the two children, were raised by their respective grandmothers during their early development years. It was not until 1954-1956 that the children lived together with both Dot and her husband Ronald at Riverwood and Revesby, New South Wales.
Children of Dorothy Amelia Morris
By 1964 the marriage of Ronald and Dorothy was in trouble. They had separated, and Dot was living by herself at Erskineville.
Two years later, while visiting her mother and son at Ermington, Dot suffered from a “Stroke” and was admitted to Parramatta hospital where she died on 16 November 1966, she was only 43 years old. The cause of her death was chronic hypertension and cerebrovascular accident.
Dorothy Amelia Fitzpatrick née Morris was buried on the morning of 19 November 1966 in Lawn 1_Zone C/#/811 at the Church of England Lawn Cemetery, Rookwood.