Anecdotes from the Archives

And after 1868...

We may think that the story of the early Sisters starts and finishes with the opening of Mount St Mary’s in February 1868. Of course, that was only the beginning of the story of our Sisters.

At various times, more Irish Sisters and novices/postulants were brought to Hobart. As early as 1870, when Bishop Murphy attended Vatican 1 in Rome, he stopped by in Ireland to gather Sisters Patrick Hickey and Catherine Murphy, who were both professed that year. Together with postulants Honorine Beechinor and Mary Hickey, they set sail for Sydney/Hobart in October 1871, arriving in Hobart in February 1871.

It is interesting to note that Catherine Murphy was a niece of Mother Francis X Murphy and Bishop Murphy and a cousin to two of the other Sisters, Mother Francis Xavier (Ellen) Beechinor and Honorine Beechinor. A number of the Beechinor and Murphy men and women came to Hobart as priests and Sisters.

Honorine is an interesting case study: aged only 17 when she arrived in Hobart, she completed her schooling at St Mary’s and proved herself a very capable student. In the 1871 examinations she attained either a first or second place in Grammar, Grecian History, Irish History, French and Italian. She was described as a popular and talented young woman. Certainly, in the modern era, she would have been sent to university as well. Very soon she was sent to Launceston as part of the fledgling new community there.

Their work in Launceston went so well that in 1876 Pope Pius IX awarded all the Sisters in Tasmania a Papal Medal.

Irish Sisters continued to volunteer to join the Tasmanian Sisters over the many decades. Sometimes actual sisters both joined, notably the Sisters Patricia (Mary) Fallon and Brendan (Annie) Fallon, and the Sisters Paul (Ellen) Hogan and Michael (Sarah) Hogan. It must have eased their homesickness to have their own dear Sister close by. Unlike the foundation Sisters, these Irish Sisters did get to visit their families in Ireland.

But that is a story for another day…