Historical information

From an ABC article about and exhibition containing the letter from Patience Whitmore:
The hardships and tragedies often faced by new arrivals are also detailed in this exhibition, especially in a letter written by Patience Whitmore who arrived in 1853... Widowed before she left Britain, she made the trip to Australia with her second husband and children, although two of those children and her second husband died on the way out. She married for a third time after arriving, and that husband also passed away fairly early on, with Patience following not long after. The remaining children were sent off to an orphanage. Even though that sounds like a terrible life, apparently, compared with the life she might've had back in Britain, Patience considered herself to be very lucky, which gives you some insight into what life in Britain must've been like at the time.

Physical description

Letter written by Patience Whitmore in 1853.