James CAREY; Ireland - Australia (1817-1889), Lost in Oz - but not forgotten
And if you come, when all the flowers are dying
And I am dead, as dead I well may be
You'll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an "Ave" there for me.
A gravestone in the RC parish cemetery in Dunloy,
County Antrim, N. Ireland bears an inscription
which begins Erected by John CAREY in memory of
his beloved mother Margaret CAREY who died in
1903 and his father Richard CAREY who died 1908
aged 81 years. It ends with also his uncle,
James CAREY, who died in Australia in 1889, aged 72 years.
As Richard CAREY was my maternal great
grandfather I enquired about his brother. No
documentation remained about James CAREY so the
date he sailed on (and with whom) the ship which
carried him there and from whence, its port and
date of arrival, what he worked at or where and
the site of his grave, are all unrecorded. Oral
history recollects James as arriving and living
in Melbourne as a bachelor and, before he died,
willing his property to his relatives at Glenbuck
Townland, Rasharkin Civil Parish, County
Antrim. Eventually, subsequent to probate, some
£800 pounds was allegedly transferred to Ireland
(around £60,000 - $Au 143,241.76 in 2005 terms)
and distributed among his nephews and nieces.
This injection of funds (and possibly previous
sums) allowed the family, back home, to invest in
businesses and farms and laid the foundation of
their subsequent prosperity. One of his nephews,
John Carey used his share to buy a farm in
Gortgole (Rasharkin) about 1912, and his niece
Ellen, (my grandmother), used her portion to
purchase a leather workshop and two shops in Ballymena (Co. Antrim).
Several family descendants are millionaires, some
several times over and one is a Papal Knight of
the Order of St. Gregory. Many others have
succeeded in commerce and the professions and
some have scaled the heights of academia. At
least 7 entered and served in the priesthood
throughout their lives at home and abroad. Their
genealogy can be viewed by typing Postman Bill into the Google search engine.
Death certificate requests to the various
Australian states (except Tasmania) and a search
of the Oz probate records by Genfindit did not
yield any positive information. Efforts by
various kind Aussie E-list members were to no avail.
James left an impoverished Ireland for Australia
in the desperate times of the1846-1850 potato
famine. His subsequent lonely efforts down under
fueled the progress of those he left behind and
they represent a disproportionately large
contribution by an individual to the prosperity of his relatives.
A number of Carey descendants are now living in
Australia. These and any visitors from back home
would like to visit Jamess last
resting-place. They could kneel there among the
microlaena grass under the Eucalyptus trees and
intone an Ave for the repose of his soul.
And I shall hear, tho' soft you tread above me
And all my dreams will warm and sweeter be
If you'll not fail to tell me that you love me
I'll simply sleep in peace until you come to me.
Liam
"A bird in the bush is worth two in the cat"