These pages have been created and are maintained by Nigel Malthus of Christchurch, New Zealand - a descendant of Bob's older brother, Sydenham (Syd, probably).
Some time soon I hope to include some more detailed Malthus genealogy; for now I can say that we think all surviving Malthuses in the world are descended from Sydenham, through his grandsons Charles and Henry, who both migrated from England to New Zealand in 1862.
Their brother, another Sydenham, had one son, Robert. Robert died childless in the Isle of Wight in 1972, having decided after much research that there was no other Malthus in Great Britain. Thomas Robert Malthus had three children but no grandchildren.
However, there was one strain of the English family believed to have gone to the Schleswig/Holstein area, now northern Germany or Denmark, some centuries ago.
I have seen an apparently authentic World War Two German military helmet with Malthus handwritten in ink on the headband. My brother Bill reports that in his travels in Germany, studying the language, his tutors were quite happy to claim Malthus as a German name, but he was unable to find any actual German Malthuses.
More recently (October 1999), a distant cousin reported that a German woman he had worked with in London also claimed the name was known in Northern Germany. But my repeated attempts to find any Malthuses listed in online directories anywhere in Europe keep coming up blank. So if you are a Malthus who does not recognise my version of your ancestry, please get in touch!
Those interested in genealogy could look in on Mark Mawtus, of England,whose name appears to be an offshoot of Malthus, only rarer.
This space I wanted to fill with a nice picture, specifically, The Graham Children, by William Hogarth. However, it is held by the National Gallery, London, whose reproduction fees are prohibitive. You know the one: a group of 18th century children - a couple of girls standing centre, a toddler sitting at left, and a boy at right. He smiles in wonder at a bird in a cage; a cat at the back of his chair leers at the bird with less wonder and more intent. If you really want to see it, search the gallery web site.
The thing is, one of the Graham girls was to become the mother of Thomas Robert Malthus: Henrietta Catherine Graham married Daniel Malthus, of Hadstock, their children being TRM and Sydenham and six girls.
Meanwhile, Henrietta's sister, Anna Maria, married and had a daughter, Mariana Georgina, who eventually married her cousin, Sydenham. So TWO of the girls in the Hogarth painting may be my great-great-great-great grandmothers.
Exactly who is who, however, is not clear. I had been under the impression that Henrietta was the one second from right, standing beside her brother, and Anna was the toddler at left. But some sources, including the gallery, have it that the toddler was actually a boy, who was dead before the painting was done (1742).
Christchurch, New Zealand.