Famine Commemoration
dardanup
The WAIFC committee and friends staying
at Prayer House in Dardanup
Irish Famine Commemoration - Sunday May 21st 2017
By Peter Murphy - John Boyle O’Reilly Association
The Western Australian (WA) Irish Famine Commemoration connection to Dardanup was a huge success. Over one hundred members of the Dardanup community including visitors from all over WA packed Dardanup’s Immaculate Conception Church on Sunday morning to hear poignant tales of hardships experienced by those young orphan Irish girls who arrived in the colonies on what was known as Bride Ships in the mid 1850's. Elizabeth Carbury, who happened to be one of those young girls, would settle in Dardanup and marry into the Maguire family.
Much praise for the events success goes to organisers Cr Danny Harris, Dardanup parish priest Father Wayne Bendotti and Irish Scene magazine proprietor Fred Rea including local volunteers who worked tirelessly to make sure all attendees were well catered for.
Elizabeth’s ‘Travel Box’, which housed all of her worldly possessions while on her 100 day journey from Ireland to WA on the barque Palestine to escape the ravages of Ireland’s great famine (An Gortá Mor), was to be the symbolic flagship that would bring her surviving clan and greater community together.
Notable speakers were Cr Danny Harris, Hon Consul of Ireland to WA Marty Kavanagh, Bill Marmick from York, Father Paschal Kearney from Bunbury and Father Wayne Bendotti. Carmel Charlton and Fred Rea provided the ambient music that echoed throughout the 60 year old church.
Emotions ran high when local children came forth to place garments and artefacts symbolic of Elizabeth’s worldly possessions into the replica travel box which was skilfully crafted and donated by the inmates in Ireland’s Arbour Hill prison.
After the church ceremony, a procession was led by Father Bendotti to Dardanup Pioneer Cemetery. There people gathered to reflect as Father Bendotti blessed those gravesites connected to Elizabeth Carbury and her ancestral clan.
A sumptuous lunch followed at the historic Thomas Little Hall, and where one of the best attended events seen in the Town of Dardanup for some years came to a humble close.
By Peter Murphy - John Boyle O’Reilly Association
The Western Australian (WA) Irish Famine Commemoration connection to Dardanup was a huge success. Over one hundred members of the Dardanup community including visitors from all over WA packed Dardanup’s Immaculate Conception Church on Sunday morning to hear poignant tales of hardships experienced by those young orphan Irish girls who arrived in the colonies on what was known as Bride Ships in the mid 1850's. Elizabeth Carbury, who happened to be one of those young girls, would settle in Dardanup and marry into the Maguire family.
Much praise for the events success goes to organisers Cr Danny Harris, Dardanup parish priest Father Wayne Bendotti and Irish Scene magazine proprietor Fred Rea including local volunteers who worked tirelessly to make sure all attendees were well catered for.
Elizabeth’s ‘Travel Box’, which housed all of her worldly possessions while on her 100 day journey from Ireland to WA on the barque Palestine to escape the ravages of Ireland’s great famine (An Gortá Mor), was to be the symbolic flagship that would bring her surviving clan and greater community together.
Notable speakers were Cr Danny Harris, Hon Consul of Ireland to WA Marty Kavanagh, Bill Marmick from York, Father Paschal Kearney from Bunbury and Father Wayne Bendotti. Carmel Charlton and Fred Rea provided the ambient music that echoed throughout the 60 year old church.
Emotions ran high when local children came forth to place garments and artefacts symbolic of Elizabeth’s worldly possessions into the replica travel box which was skilfully crafted and donated by the inmates in Ireland’s Arbour Hill prison.
After the church ceremony, a procession was led by Father Bendotti to Dardanup Pioneer Cemetery. There people gathered to reflect as Father Bendotti blessed those gravesites connected to Elizabeth Carbury and her ancestral clan.
A sumptuous lunch followed at the historic Thomas Little Hall, and where one of the best attended events seen in the Town of Dardanup for some years came to a humble close.