Category Archives: New South Wales

“The Singing Flame”: Destruction of public records.

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By: Jennifer Harrison. One hundred years ago, on 30 June 1922, the Four Courts building in Dublin was bombed and thousands of government records were destroyed in the blast. Ever since, historians have rued the extensive devastation of valuable source material which the current Irish project Beyond 2020 seeks to remedy. Ernie O’Malley in his book, The Singing Flame, described the carnage: ‘Flame sang and conducted its own orchestra simultaneously’. Staunch Republican O’Malley who reported directly to Michael Collins and … Continue reading

My Great Grandfather Alfred

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For some time now I’ve had a photo of a man in a military style uniform in my possession. It was passed to me by my mother when she moved house as she knew of my interest in our family’s history. The photo was originally found in my Nan’s wardrobe after she passed away in 2004. The simple frame was barely holding together, there were no markings or inscriptions on the photo itself to indicate who this gentleman was, or … Continue reading

Not Just Any Railway Guard

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When a fellow researcher shared a death transcript for my third great uncle, Andrew George Lee, I noticed that his occupation was listed as “railway guard” and thought “well that’s different to the usual farmer, carpenter or labourer” and filed it away for later. Recently though, when I began looking at the Lee family in more detail, something grabbed my interest when I found his obituary on Trove. Not only was Andrew a train guard but he was at the … Continue reading

The postmaster, the bolter and the draper

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Can a life be affected if begun in war? Perhaps for William Thomas Phillips, born in Portugal on 6 December 1813, during the Peninsular War, this isn’t a question which needs to be asked. He was only four years old when his parents, James and Lydia Phillips, and older siblings, Henry and Jane, finally returned to peacetime in England in 1817 following the aftermath of the Battle of Waterloo. Aged nine when the family arrived in New South Wales, Australia … Continue reading

At School in Newcastle in 1816.

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Four-year old Catherine Irwin sat in a school room in a slab hut in Newcastle in May 1816. Nearby sat her seven-year-old brother, William and 15 other girls and boys aged from 3 to 13 years. The Irwin children were in Newcastle with their father Ormsby Irwin, a life-term Irish convict, who had been convicted in Sydney for the manslaughter of Sergeant Robert Morrow of the 73rd Regiment. Catherine and William’s mother, Eleanor Irwin who had been convicted of the … Continue reading