Watercolour of the Church courtesy of National Library.

By Lyn Forde – President/Research Officer of St Marys & District Historical Society Inc.

IN April 1840 The “Sydney Herald” recorded that “The new Church of St Mary Magdalene at South Creek was consecrated by the Lord Bishop on Wednesday last. The Church, which is a very neat building, elegantly fitted to contain about 500 persons, has been erected by subscriptions on a piece of ground given for that purpose by Captain King of the Royal Navy. Lady O’Connell has presented the Church with a very valuable plot of five acres of land in the immediate vicinity”. Previously, on the 23rd April Reverend William Grant Broughton had consecrated the church and with the churchyard both have been in use since that time with less burials now because “God’s little acre” has filled up totally over those years with the burials of some of the most prominent St Marys citizens as well as those who came out in chains and those who passed through or settled in the St Marys (South Creek) area. Of course the most prominent family buried in the churchyard is the family of Governor Philip Gidley King and his wife Anna Josepha King (Nee Coombe) who was born at Hatherleigh in Devon in 1765 and died on the 26th July 1844 at the age of 79 years. Philip was to return for the voyage home to England in August 1806 and when he was to embark in the Buffalo he completely collapsed and could not sail until February 1807. The stormy passage around Cape Horn delayed his arrival in England until November. He pressed the Colonial Office insistently for a pension but before it was granted he died on 3rd September 1808. He was buried in the churchyard of St Nicholas at Lower Tooting, London. In 1989 after the celebrations of the First Fleet re-enactment was fading into history, the headstone of Philip Gidley King was laid to rest beside the King Vault after it was brought from Tooting to St Marys. At the time of his embarkment to England Anna would take over the running the family property “Dunheved” at St Marys with the aid of managers. After King’s death in 1808 she was writing to her friend Sir Joseph Banks to see if he could intervene on her behalf regarding her petition to Lord Castlereagh for a widow’s pension. She was the Organizer of the Bridge Street orphanage for girls that provided wives for many settlers and she continued to help the poor and sick right up to her death. The name “St Mary Magdalene” commemorates the King family church in Launceston, Cornwall. Our church at St Marys stands on a grant of land made to surveyor-explorer John Oxley in 1823 and was acquired by Phillip Parker King in 1828. Before the church was built the people of “South Creek” had to wait for visits from the Reverend Samuel Marsden or Reverend Thomas Hassall who held services in a slab hut that was believed to be on the Great Western Road (Highway) where Victoria Park now stands. My maternal family has a long connection with St Mary Magdalene church and churchyard, starting with my mother Elaine Forde (Nee Hackett) and going back five generations to Susannah Bradley (Nee Rope) all buried there. Many interesting people besides the King family and their many descendants is Alexander Barber the district medical Doctor for many years. He was born in County Derry, Northern Ireland in 1850 and died peacefully in 1906 at Dr McCormack’s Private Hospital in Sydney from complications of an internal operation for a growth removal. His funeral was held at St Stephens church at Penrith and his remains buried at St Mary Magdalene. In 1892 Dr Barber bought the old home that belonged to Mr Tindale in Penrith known as “The Towers” and he and his wife Sarah lived there. Sarah was born in Ireland in 1848 and married Alexander in 1875. They moved from Ireland to New Zealand in 1877 and then later settled in Australia. She died aged 76 and is buried with Alexander. Another burial is that of William Garner buried in the churchyard along with his wife Harriett Ann Garner (Nee Coles). He was born in 1804 and became the first Mayor of the St Mary’s Municipal Council. William died in 1888 in Sydney where he went to celebrate the Centenary and suddenly took ill and died at the home of relatives.  Then comes Edward Lincoln born in 1816 and became Headmaster of St Marys Public School in Princess Mary Street. He died in 1863 at the age of 47. Benjamin Loveday was born in 1822. Ben came to St Marys in the 1840’s and was a builder who built “Tregear” the residence of the Lethbridge family and he  helped Joseph Sainsbury with the construction of Neale’s first store at St Marys. Ben also built his own home (later known as Mrs Barrett’s home on the Highway) and was known for his garden and grapes. Ben was planning on going fishing on the day he suddenly died at his son’s residence at Parramatta in 1898. Watercolour of the Church courtesy of National Library.

Sources – Trove, Ancestry, The Australian Dictionary of Biography. My book “In the Little Churchyard on the Hill”.