People Australia

Mary Dykes (c.1758-1820), a staymaker, was found guilty on 26 April 1786 at the Old Bailey, London, of stealing six guineas from a man. Sentenced to 7 years transportation, she embarked for New South Wales on the Lady Penrhyn in January 1787, arriving in Sydney in January 1788 as part of the First Fleet.

Dykes married (as Mary Dicks) Private Humphrey Evans on 12 April 1793 at St Philip's, Sydney. They both left for England when his term with the NSW Corps ended in 1797. After applying to return to the colony, they received a 135 acre grant at Toongabbie in July 1803. Humphrey died in August 1805 leaving Mary with two children.

As Mary Evans she appeared in the 1806 Muster occupying 135 acres at Toongabbie, with an assigned convict Hugh Kelly, who had travelled out to New South Wales on the same ship as the Evans in 1803 — the Rolla. Mary married Hugh Kelly on 14 August 1808 at St John's Parramatta. She is probably the Mary Kelly who died on 10 November 1820, aged 62, and was buried at St John's on 12 November.

* information from Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet (1989), p 113