"Return with us now those
thrilling days of yesterday, when out of the past comes the
thundering hoff beats of that great Sinclair horse,
Norseman."--- My vote goes to Norsewoman.
Remember the story of Norseman (can also be
found in the History pages
www.clansinclairusa.org under
"the Miners") who was owned by
Laurie
(Laurence) Sinclair a Norseman, a native of the Shetland Islands, from
where his family, parents and six children, emigrated to Australia in January
1864. He was a descendant of Thomas Sinclair of Skelberry and his
extended family wound up in the crofts at Dunrossness before several of the
sons set sail for Western Australia.
Quite a few
daughters in these generations married into Irish and Shetland families.
Ray Lower, Genealogist, Clan Sinclair USA has more on this
line.
(so there is even a Shetland
link)
Prior to his success on the
Gold fields he worked with the Dempster Brothers when they pioneered
Esperance. It was after an unsuccessful visit to the Coolgardie Gold
(Australia) field in 1893, when returning to Esperance via Dundas, he was
told that his brother George and Jack Allsop were prospecting out from Dundas,
14 miles to the north. He decided to look them up. They were in
the vicinity of the town now called Norseman and investigating a few specks of
alluvial gold in a small gully.
Upon reaching
George's camp, Laurie tethered his horse to a tree for a well deserved rest.
During the night the horse became restless and pawed the ground. The
next morning, When Laurie was attending to his horse's needs, he noticed
that the animal appeared to be lame and he immediately began to inspect the
horse's hooves to find the cause.
It was soon apparent that a
rich specimen of gold bearing quartz was stuck in the animal's hoof.
Full of excitement, Laurie told his brother of the find and they both agreed
that a rich gold bearing reef of quartz existed in close proximity to the area
the horse had pawed. After much labor of picking and shoveling the
ground around the pawed area, a rich quartz reef was located by the brothers
Sinclair and John Allsop.
Laurie Sinclair filed the First Reward Claim
of the new filed at 3 p.m. on the 13th day of August,1894. Laurie, a proud
"Norseman" himself, had named his horse, Norseman, after this origin of the
Clan Sinclair. Consequently, Laurie named the new goldfield "Norseman"
which is still the name of the town which sprang up around the find.
Maybe there is a Norwegian word we could use
instead of woman or filly or pony? The name then becoming
Norse_____.
Laurel