Title'Kildorrery', LeichardtPhoto Number007333DescriptionHonora May (known as May) Courtenay was born in Melon, Ireland in 1878.
Her father was headmaster of a local school and she had an elder sister, Mary. Sadly, May’s mother died during childbirth, and her father was unable to take care of her.
May was left in the care of cousins, the Hannan family who lived at ‘Kildorrery’, Leichhardt, NSW. May’s teenage cousin, Johanna Creagan, also a cousin of the Hannan’s brought her to Australia when she was just a baby.
May lived at ‘Kildorrery’ with the Hannan family who raised her as their own, and loved her dearly.
The Creagan family farmed 'Mayfield' and 'Angelsboro' at Dunmore and it is presumed May met John Hambly on her visits to the Creagan family at Shellharbour, whom she married 11 January 1905.
According to descendants of the Hambly family, John and May began married life on the farm, living in not much more that a shed. May delivered their first son, John Reginald (Reg) in the shed. The Hambly’s landlord, George Laurence Fuller of Dunmore House, visited the farm at the time. On seeing the shed and the newborn baby, Mr. Fuller reputedly said that May Hambly would never deliver another baby in a shed, and set about building 'Glanworth', the farmhouse that was to be the Hambly family home for the next 80 years.
John and May had another three sons, Charles Benedict (Dick), Thomas Andrew (Tom), and Maxwell Joseph (Joe),
On John and May’s retirement to Wentworth Street, Shellharbour in 1945, 'Glanworth' was farmed by their sons Tom and Joe, and eventually Joe’s son James Joseph (Jim).
