The
Healy
Family
A genealogy of Daniel “Patrick” Healy,
born Mount Hawke, Tralee, Co. Kerry, Ireland, 13th May 1877,
died Maitland, NSW, Australia, 7th June 1963, and of his descendants.
Compiled by: David Healy
(Grandson of Daniel)
22/38
Cope St,
Lane
Cove NSW 2066
from records of Births, Marriages and Deaths, shipping arrivals,
Census information, and from correspondence with various Irish Government
authorities, and with the unselfish and gratefully acknowledged assistance
of my now deceased parents (Frank and Margaret) and various uncles, aunts,
cousins, particularly Susan (Healy) Felsch, and friends in Ireland.
Much information has also been gleaned, and confirmation of
other information, derived elsewhere, been obtained, from Jim Brokenshire’s
excellent publication “The Brunswick – Another River
and Its People”, 1988, Brunswick Valley Historical Society.
This
is by no means claimed nor intended to be an authoritative, or complete,
document. Rather, it is intended as a possible “starting point” for family
members, interested in compiling the histories of their particular branch
of the family, and will be added to as further information is obtained,
and facts clarified. Any elaborations, additions or corrections would
therefore be gratefully received.
Daniel
“Patrick” Healy
Contrary to the oral history accepted
by some Healy family members, Daniel Healy was neither born in Caherciveen,
Co. Kerry, nor on March 17th, 1877. Nor, indeed, does his Birth
Certificate show his second name as “Patrick”. In fact, records show that
he was born in Mount Hawke, Tralee, Co. Kerry (in Irish, Tra Lí, “The Strand on the Lee” Co. Cairi), Ireland, on
13th May, 1877, his birth being registered in Tralee on June
1st of that year.
Daniel’s
father was John Healy. Daniel’s Birth Certificate lists John’s Occupation
as Labourer. Daniel’s mother was Margaret, née Falvey, who was the registered
informant of Daniel’s birth, her mark (“X”) appearing on the original
of Daniel’s Birth Certificate. There is no record of John having owned
any land in Ireland.
The
supposed link with Caherciveen and the Ivreagh Peninsula is at least
tenuous, although the surnames Falvey (Margaret’s maiden name) and Brosnan
(John’s mother, Mary’s, maiden name) are concentrated in that area, so
it is possible that John was born, and might have grown up, in that region,
but there is no evidence (from Caherciveen Church records) of the family
ever having lived there. Given the large number of Margaret Falveys and
Mary Brosnans born in that part of Ireland around the relevant times,
attempts to locate information on John’s and Margaret’s parents and siblings
have proved fruitless.
Daniel had six siblings, all born in
Ireland:
Patrick born around 1864
Mary (Cotter)
born Tralee, 15/4/1866
Norah (Adams)
born around 1868;
m.
Frank Adams, 15/7/1888
Edward born around 1873
John
born June 1881, died Mullumbimby
10/10/1898
(Reg.
Murwillumbah, 1898/14847).
(The uncertainties as to the birth
dates of Daniel’s siblings Patrick, Norah and Edward, arise from conflicting
information on John’s and Margaret’s Death Certificates. The dates stated
above are the “averages” of the ages stated on the Death Certificates,
subtracted from 1907 to yield an approximate year of birth).
The family migrated to Australia around
1882 – 1883 (from information on John’s and Margaret’s Death Certificates,
and given that John Junior was born in Ireland in 1881) and is said to
have settled in Brisbane, although information on John Junior’s Death Certificate
suggests that the family had settled on the North Coast of New South Wales
around that time. An extensive search of shipping records of around the
1880’s has proven inconclusive, there being no evidence of a John, Margaret,
Patrick, Norah, Mary, Alice, Edward, Daniel and John Healy having arrived
on any one vessel. (Edit - please see subsequent
information provided by David Healy at end of page)
Consequently, the dates of their departures from Ireland, and from England
(since emigrants from Ireland to Australia typically travelled via England)
are not known; neither are their reasons for emigration, although it has
been recorded that crop harvests in the west of Ireland in the years 1877
- 1879 were extremely poor, particularly those of oats and potatoes. This
resulted in mass evictions of tenant farmers and high unemployment among
agricultural workers. It is likely that these factors might have been at
least part of the family’s reason for emigrating.
Little is known of Daniel’s boyhood
in Brisbane, although it is said that he attended St Anne’s Christian Brothers
School, Fortitude Valley. As mentioned previously, the family is said
to have lived in Brisbane for some years, although no record of them can
be found in the 1900 Queensland Census. That Census, however, shows an Edward
Healy, (“Uncle Ned”?), Telegraph Operator, then aged 30 (i.e. born 1869
or 1870), living at Roger St, (the 5th house on the right from
Walker St), Spring Hill, Brisbane. Given that John (Daniel’s brother) died,
as a young man, on the North Coast, and from information on John’s and Margaret’s
Death Certificates, it seems likely that the family moved to the North
Coast of NSW in the early 1890’s (although none of them appears on the 1899
– 1900 Electoral Roll for the Mullumbimby area). Both Daniel and John
Junior, probably Patrick, and possibly John and Margaret, were living in
the Mullumbimby area in 1898, at the time of John Junior’s death, Daniel
appearing on John’s Death Certificate as the Informant. There are no entries
for any members of the Healy family on Electoral Rolls for the Mullumbimby
area before 1903, after which entries for John, Patrick and Daniel appear.
The dates of John’s and Margaret’s
births, and of their marriage, are not known, and such records in Ireland
are difficult to trace, official records being kept for Protestant marriages
only since 1845, and births only since 1847, and Roman Catholic births
and marriages only since 1864. Many records were also lost during the Irish
Civil War, when the Records Office in Dublin was bombed. From John’s Death
Certificate, he would have been born in 1840 or 1841, father’s name James,
by occupation a Farmer, and mother’s name Mary, née Brosnan, while Margaret
would have been born in 1837 or 1838, father’s name Daniel, also by occupation
a Farmer, and mother’s name Margaret, maiden name unknown. The search for
more information on John’s and Margaret’s births and marriage continues,
as more such records are preserved, copied and compiled in Ireland.
Both
John and Margaret died in 1907, and are buried in adjacent plots in the
Roman Catholic Section of Rookwood Cemetery, Sydney, NSW. The story is
told that Margaret was in hospital in Sydney, and that John, having been
advised that she was near death, travelled to Sydney, by ship, the “S.S.
Newrybar” (the “S.S. Noorebar” in Jim Brokenshire’s book), to be with her
at her death, only to die himself on the journey. John’s Death Certificate
shows his date of death as 30th September 1907 (Registered No.
1907/12134), cause of death renal and cardiac failure, while Margaret’s
Death Certificate shows her date of death as 17th October, 1907,
at Rydalmere Hospital (Registered No. 1907/15529), cause of death peritonitis.
It was necessary for Daniel, at the time only recently married (some seven
weeks previously), to travel to Sydney to handle the formalities, and Cemetery
records show that both burial plots were purchased by him. The graves are
unmarked (i.e., no headstones), but are readily identifiable from reasonably
clearly marked adjacent graves. Both graves are in Section “D” of the Roman
Catholic section of Rookwood; John’s grave is No. 2199, while Margaret’s
is No. 2198. While both graves are unmarked, they are nonetheless well maintained
by Cemetery authorities.
As mentioned earlier, the precise date
of Daniel’s arrival in the Mullumbimby area is not known, although he was
certainly in the area by 1898, and appears on the 1903 Electoral Roll. He
is said to have been the first customer of the Bank of New South Wales (now
the Westpac Banking Corporation) in Mullumbimby, which branch opened in 1902.
Daniel married Bertha Teresa Reilly,
the first white female born in Mullumbimby (father William John Reilly,
Farmer, mother Bertha Augusta, née Schlichart) on 7th August
1907 (Registered No. 1907/8186), the first wedding at the newly-built (indeed,
at the time, still incomplete) St Johns Catholic Church, Mullumbimby.
Daniel and Bertha Healy family
Back: Ted, Bill, Bertha Teresa (Reilly) Healy, Daniel P Healy, Pat,
Cec
Front:
Kathleen, Stan, Dick, Frank, Hilda
Sitting: Harold
Bertha’s father, William John (“Billy”)
Reilly was a pioneer of the Mullumbimby area, and he, and his family, are
frequently mentioned in histories of the town. References to him appear
in records in the Mullumbimby Historical Museum, and a photograph of him,
along with his fellow Aldermen of the first Mullumbimby
Municipal Council, hangs in that Museum. Much of the background of the Reilly
family, including photographs, appears in the book “The Brunswick – Another
River and Its People“, referred to previously. (It is interesting to note
the strong family resemblances between members of that family and some
of Daniel and Bertha’s children and grandchildren!). Other information on
the Reilly family is included herein.
After their marriage, Daniel and Bertha
lived in a house adjacent to Daniel’s brother, Patrick’s house in Main
Arm Road, Mullumbimby, Daniel working as a Roadbuilding Contractor, building
still-used (at the time of writing) parts of the Pacific Highway (including
at McLeods Shoot), before purchasing No. 7, RSM, Brunswick Rd, Mullumbimby,
in around 1918, and taking up Dairy Farming (both Daniel and Bertha are
listed at that address on the 1923 Electoral Roll; the 1919 Electoral Roll
cannot be located).
Daniel and Bertha lived in Mullumbimby
for the remainder of their lives, where they raised 10 children (2 daughters
and 8 sons). Bertha died in 1953 and Daniel in 1963; both are buried in
the Roman Catholic Section of Mullumbimby Cemetery.
The last Healy in Mullumbimby, Hilda
(Akers) died in 1996, thus severing the last living link with the town
of this pioneering family, which had had family members living in the town
for some 100 years. Hilda is also buried in the Roman Catholic Section of
Mullumbimby Cemetery, along with her maternal grandparents (William and
Bertha Reilly), her brother, Bill, and his first wife, Blanche (née O’Keefe)
and various uncles, aunts and cousins (both Healy and Reilly).
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subsequently information provided by
David Healy shows John and Margaret Healy and all seven of their children
arrived in Brisbane on the Indus 22 Aug 1884. The family name was shown
as Haily. See image below.
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