Who was Patrick Dunlea?

[MegsyB007]

And I found some other information that Im not 100% sure about, because its hard to confirm with very little information available, but I found out that a Denis Dunlea (their brothers name) who was born in 1837 (four years younger than John), died somewhere between October and December (thats all the UK registry gives you a three month period of deaths) also in 1864 the same time as John died. Possibly the same month, or up to two months after him. He was aged 27. I read this and thought, Oh no! Not again! But there were other Denis Dunleas in County Cork, and I couldnt confirm that this was actually their brother. I suspect it could have been though. That meant that the three brothers died at 27, 29, and 31 years old. So terribly sad. And James and Patrick wouldnt have known about Denis for another couple of months, until the news had travelled via ship from Ireland that their other brother Denis had died then too. I really hope it wasnt their brother, and it was some other Denis Dunlea, and Ive been searching and searching for further information about it, but its not online to find. I just have the name and dates that makes it possibly their brother. I didnt want to look up the other siblings after I found that, its too tragic as it is. Id hate to find out even more of them died so young.

 

[MegsyB007]

But I did end up finding out when our friend Patrick arrived here! Took ages, but I believe I found it!

I think he fibbed about his age he was only 15 in 1856 but said he was 16 to get on the ship without his parents, I believe. It says hes a farmer, like the other brothers said they were too. Im pretty sure this is Patrick, even though his first names not on it, only the surname. That means he arrived two years after James, and John arrived two years after Patrick. I wonder if his parents sent him to find his younger brother and send him home! And what James would have said when his 15 year old brother showed up, possibly unexpectedly! What the bleedin hell are you doing here??! Do mam and da know youre here?! :lol:

It sounds like something our eccentric Patrick would do! Just show up on his brothers doorstep and say, Surprise! :lol:

I like him! He obviously had an adventurous spirit, and sailing around the world on his own, at 15 years old, is certainly adventurous!

Well, thats it for now. Im not closing this out yet, because Im still looking for more information, and I still have to get a photo of James grave yet too. Its not online, and I plan to put it there! At least his one is a lot closer than Johns one, so it wont take an entire day to get there to find it and take a photo! Im hoping its in better shape than Johns one. Ill post it on here when I get it. Stay tuned!

Hows that Pagan Prospector?!

 

[Goldfreak]

Great research Megsy. You must feel like you have met him in real life by now.

 

[pinfire opals]

Wonder if you can get permission to treat it with a few coats of bond crete, that will seal it up from the elements for sure, it will just have to be re sealed every few years. Well done though good karma for sure coming your way. :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y: :Y:

 

[pagan prospector]

Hi Megsy well bloody hell i have been wondering about you and your mission for the last few days and lo and behold you popped up. Great job with the grave site. I reckon you are getting closer to some answers but you may need to ask the boys some more questions. You really seem to be enjoying this project as we all enjoy your posts good luck with the next bit
PAGAN P :Y:

 

[Didlea]

OK that's enough for now...

For the next chapter, I'll post tomorrow night, we move onto big brother James and his story.

Let me know if you think this thread is worthwhile, and I welcome any helpful opinions and comments...

Cheers,
Megsy

As my husband is a Dunlea, we have found all
this very interesting. Thank You.

 

[user 4386]

Damn - and I had urgent work that should have been done! Fascinating! And very though work, quite impressive....

I have been working around there recently. Of the places mentioned, Cape Clear is 4 km north of Pitfield, Springdallah is another 5 km north of that, and the Devil's Kitchen where he died (not called Hell's Kitchen - nowadays anyway) 4 km north of that. So 13 km by road north of Pitfield not right at Pitfield. I have seen another explanation for the naming of Cape Clear, that the track was narrow there and as carts carefully edged past each other they would yell "Kape clear" (Keep clear). But Cape Clear island is the southern point of Ireland and perhaps more credible.

He seems to have been far from poor when he killed himself.

What's in a name (apologies to Juliet)? Quite a lot it seems.

 

[nucopia]

An interesting indicator of some ones wealth in 1894 in todays terms.

In 1894 £18,778 GB pounds is equivalent to £3,122,655.19 GB pounds in todays money or $ 5,862,575.87 AUD
For an Irish immigrant farmer of 23 that arrived in Melbourne in 1854 to a wealthy family man business man and member of Melbourne society 40 years later, that is a very impressive achievement.

 

[Moneybox]

I've never seen this thread before. It kept me glued to the screen for the last hour or two. Thank you Megsy for a sad but great story, I hope it's not finished there....

 

[MegsyB007]

It's nice to see this thread has come back around again from September 2019 when I last posted to it.

I'm sorry about the punctuation being all over the place, but when the forum changed platforms, the formatting all went haywire in this thread, which was very disappointing.
If I had access to it, I'd change it back again and fix it. Being a proofreader, it drives me a bit barmy (or a lot actually!).

And that a Dunlea has read it now, is amazing too! I wonder if he is related to James in some way, since he's the only brother who had children out of the three brothers in the story?
Although they did have other brothers in Ireland too, so who knows...

And yes nucopia, that was quite an achievement, wasn't it? James did very well for himself. I have a feeling it started with success on the goldfields to make his stake for the stores later.

Goldierocks and Moneybox, I'm so glad you enjoyed it, but sorry it kept you from what was was scheduled that day. A sign of a good story though, so it's also flattering that you read all the way through it. I did enjoy researching and writing this story very much and like knowing people are enjoying it.

I took a break from it back in Sept 2019, but might get back to a snippet of information I'd found back then, that might be interesting to follow up. We'll see how it goes.

Cheers,
Megsy

 

[user 4386]

It's nice to see this thread has come back around again from September 2019 when I last posted to it.

I'm sorry about the punctuation being all over the place, but when the forum changed platforms, the formatting all went haywire in this thread, which was very disappointing.
If I had access to it, I'd change it back again and fix it. Being a proofreader, it drives me a bit barmy (or a lot actually!).

And that a Dunlea has read it now, is amazing too! I wonder if he is related to James in some way, since he's the only brother who had children out of the three brothers in the story?
Although they did have other brothers in Ireland too, so who knows...

And yes nucopia, that was quite an achievement, wasn't it? James did very well for himself. I have a feeling it started with success on the goldfields to make his stake for the stores later.

Goldierocks and Moneybox, I'm so glad you enjoyed it, but sorry it kept you from what was was scheduled that day. A sign of a good story though, so it's also flattering that you read all the way through it. I did enjoy researching and writing this story very much and like knowing people are enjoying it.

I took a break from it back in Sept 2019, but might get back to a snippet of information I'd found back then, that might be interesting to follow up. We'll see how it goes.

Cheers,
Megsy

It was much more interesting than preparing for my surgery the following day - although I did get that done of course. But it was a good diversion. Look forward to anything else you find.

 

[MegsyB007]

It was much more interesting than preparing for my surgery the following day - although I did get that done of course. But it was a good diversion. Look forward to anything else you find.

I hope it all went well and you're on the road to recovery now.

Cheers,
Megsy

 

[user 4386]

I hope it all went well and you're on the road to recovery now.

Cheers,
Megsy

Yep - just removed my gall bladder - up and about next morning with a Panadol.

 

[Jaros]

It usually takes 3-4 weeks to recover from the operation.

 

[user 4386]

It usually takes 3-4 weeks to recover from the operation.

Not going to change any of my 4x4 wheels before that.....

 

[MegsyB007]

Well it's been 3 years and 7 months since I went to Scarsdale to find John's grave and did a bit of a clean up there.
I didn't think it would take this long to visit his brother James' grave that is literally 25 minutes from my home. Where did that time go?!
But I finally got to the St Kilda General Cemetery today to have a look for James' grave. And after being disheartened to see the state of John's grave, I can't tell you how deeply saddened I was when I finally found James' resting place, after nearly two hours of walking around this cemetery, that is, quite frankly, an absolute disgraceful shambles. I could not believe how bad this cemetery is! Granted, it was opened in 1855 and was one of the original cemeteries in Melbourne, but the state of disrepair of it, is absolutely terrible.

Online I had found the name of the religion's section and the grave number, and if the graves all had numbers on them, it would be bloody helpful! But I finally worked it out and was devastated to see where he's laid to rest. You be the judge...



How terrible is that? Not even a cross or a headstone of any kind for him. Just a post. I was so sad to finally see that was the 'wealthy' brother's resting place! I was expecting a big fancy grave. John's grave doesn't seem bad at all now.

Cheers,
Megsy

 

[Mackka]

Maybe he took his wealth with him and didn’t want to waste any of it on a headstone. Mackka

 

[Grey Panner]

And I found some other information that Im not 100% sure about, because its hard to confirm with very little information available, but I found out that a Denis Dunlea (their brothers name) who was born in 1837 (four years younger than John), died somewhere between October and December (thats all the UK registry gives you a three month period of deaths) also in 1864 the same time as John died. Possibly the same month, or up to two months after him. He was aged 27. I read this and thought, Oh no! Not again! But there were other Denis Dunleas in County Cork, and I couldnt confirm that this was actually their brother. I suspect it could have been though. That meant that the three brothers died at 27, 29, and 31 years old. So terribly sad. And James and Patrick wouldnt have known about Denis for another couple of months, until the news had travelled via ship from Ireland that their other brother Denis had died then too. I really hope it wasnt their brother, and it was some other Denis Dunlea, and Ive been searching and searching for further information about it, but its not online to find. I just have the name and dates that makes it possibly their brother. I didnt want to look up the other siblings after I found that, its too tragic as it is. Id hate to find out even more of them died so young.

Speaking of deaths in the bush, at Marble Bar there is a memorial listing over a hundred pioneer deaths and giving the causes.
Causes listed include mining accidents, drownings, spearings, deaths from exposure and apoplexy.
There were only a couple of cases where the victims died in bed.
Things were a lot rougher in the old days.

 

[grubstake]

Well it's been 3 years and 7 months since I went to Scarsdale to find John's grave and did a bit of a clean up there.
I didn't think it would take this long to visit his brother James' grave that is literally 25 minutes from my home. Where did that time go?!
But I finally got to the St Kilda General Cemetery today to have a look for James' grave. And after being disheartened to see the state of John's grave, I can't tell you how deeply saddened I was when I finally found James' resting place, after nearly two hours of walking around this cemetery, that is, quite frankly, an absolute disgraceful shambles. I could not believe how bad this cemetery is! Granted, it was opened in 1855 and was one of the original cemeteries in Melbourne, but the state of disrepair of it, is absolutely terrible.

Online I had found the name of the religion's section and the grave number, and if the graves all had numbers on them, it would be bloody helpful! But I finally worked it out and was devastated to see where he's laid to rest. You be the judge...

How terrible is that? Not even a cross or a headstone of any kind for him. Just a post. I was so sad to finally see that was the 'wealthy' brother's resting place! I was expecting a big fancy grave. John's grave doesn't seem bad at all now.

What about his wife Margaret, who you mentioned earlier in the thread was also buried at St Kilda? Have you looked for her grave there? Maybe James was exhumed and reinterred with her, in which case the stick in the ground might be just a place-marker.

 

[MegsyB007]

What about his wife Margaret, who you mentioned earlier in the thread was also buried at St Kilda? Have you looked for her grave there? Maybe James was exhumed and reinterred with her, in which case the stick in the ground might be just a place-marker.

Good question! I just looked it up on 'Find a Grave' that has her listed as 'Joan Margaret Dunlea' who was supposedly interred in 1921 (which is wrong, her name was Margaret and she died in Feb 1916. Some people need to check their facts before they put listings on Find a Grave. I'll be correcting that with the proof!).
But it says that Margaret's grave number puts her next to James, that's also an unmarked grave.
I wonder what happened there. I'd like to think there was something for them originally, and with the state of disrepair of that cemetery it's not difficult to imagine there was and it's since been damaged and removed. So sad there's nothing there for them now.

Cheers,
Megsy