796 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [June i, 1894. 
and instructions about the transfer were lianded 
over to a Colombo notary in larjjc practice. 
Through some lapse or other the matter was 
left uncompleted, the Notary died, and when his 
papers were looked through the deeds were found 
and returned to the Bank. The management 
of the Bank in the meantime had clianged liands 
and the land was again privately sold! This land 
is now tlie Woodcote Estate. Tliis was not the 
only instance of the kind. In 1847 Wm. Kudd 
bought and paid for 300 acres of land in Kitool- 
galle from J. C, Albrecht, but probably owing to 
the troubles wliich followed soon after, he never 
interested himself any further in the jiurcliase. 
More Trouble.— Expenses attendant on the 
education of some of his children in England 
were a severe drain on his resources and to 
add to this a trustee who held Railway and 
Bank shares in trust for his wife in the North 
of England failed, and by some one's fraud 
several thousands of pounds' worth of stock 
were lost to the lawful owner. Wm. Kudd 
now bought that large tract of land known as 
the Morankande and Udahena estates (1869) ; 
but the failure of a local firm to help him to niee t 
(according to arrangement) the instalments as 
they fell due, resulted in the loss of both these 
properties. In 1870 the Uplands estate was 
sold, and bought by the mortgagee, Mr. A. H. 
Fryer for £3,500, and thus after forty years' 
hard work the pioneer planter was homeless 
and almost penniless. 
However, by the aid of his cousins, the Messrs, 
Rudd Bros, he now purchased the Coldstream 
estate, in Ambagamuwa, from Messrs. John 
AVhyte and Wm. Bissett for £6,500. Just 
about this time there was a boom in the 
value of coffee land, and the bargain was hardly 
concluded when it was considered very lucky 
for the purchaser, although there was a time 
when nothing v/ould have induced Wni. Rudd 
to venture into Ambagamuwa in search of coffee 
prosperity. 
In June 1873 Wm. Rudd married his third 
wife, Miss Adelaide Smith, from Lancashire. 
He sold to his son, Mr. Ralph Rudd, that 
portion of Coldstream north of the river for 
£5,500. This was distinguished by the name of 
Ivanhoe. For some time he continued to work 
Coldstream, but his health \va« now very in- 
different. 
The Emjj. — His wife hav ing preceded him 
by some nionths, he finally left Ceylon on the 
6th of June 1876, his 65th birthday, and on 
his arrival in England he took uji hib reeideuce 
near Exeter. Here on the 29tli March 1877 he 
died, leaving in England his widow and 
daugliter. Just previous to his death lie ha<l 
sold all his interests in Ceylon to his son, Mr- 
R. P. Rudd. 
Wm. Rudd was a man of l>road vicwi*, 
somewhat reserved and stern, and of ureal 
mental and physical vigour. In hLs early dayw 
in Ceylon, he endeavoured as far an time and 
circumstances would permit him, to remedy the 
defects of his education and as soon as he was 
able to afford it, he constantly suppoited n 
free Press and later on when his superior know - 
ledge of the Central Province carried weight, 
be frequently wrote for the press. 
Of his children who at present survive him, 
Mr. John Rudd is the Superintendent of Police 
S. P , Mr. Ralph Rudd, who purcha.sed Cold- 
stream and Ivanhoe and other places, ^but who 
could not tide over the depres.sion of short crops 
and leaf disease of the early "eighties," left Ceylon 
12 years ago for Victoria with his younger 
sister, and they are now in Melbourne, where 
he holds the post of chief clerk to the Melbourne 
Harbour Trust. The youngest son. Mr. Ben- 
jamin Rudd, is the Manager of the Kiri- 
inetiana coconut plantation in tlie Chilaw Dis- 
trict, the property of Mr. Frederick Schrader- 
It will be seen from the foregoing that Mr. Wm- 
Rudd, beginning his planting career as an assis- 
tant to Mr. Geo. Bird, in 1834, continued for 42 
years in active work as a coffee planter, during 
wliich time his career was marked by all the 
vicissitudes of fortune which distinguished the 
enterprise itself ; but all through, Mr. Rudd 
won himself the reputation of being an honest, 
industrious and upright Englishman — a good intel- 
ligent planter — the friend of many and the 
enemy of none. 
Mr. Rudd had his spice of humour and could 
tell a good story as well as act the hero in 
one : his brief but expressive report on a shuck 
coffee estate has often been quoted : — " All 
whips and walking-sticks ! " 
