In 1857 Cornelius O'Neill, an Irish Catholic, arrived in Victoria, Australia from Limerick in Ireland. He came from a family with some money and wanted to get an apprenticeship. The family story is that two of his aunts came out with him and stayed in Australia until he had been an apprentice for a while. Then apparently they both returned to Ireland.

In 1864 Anne Jane Love, an Irish Protestant, came to New South Wales, Australia on the Sandringham with her sister Mary. Anne was aged 18 and Mary was 14. They were part of a migrant program bringing girls from famine houses in Ireland to the New South Wales colony to work as servants and add to the small population of women there. Anne Jane and her sister Mary had an aunt in the colony, Isabella Allingham who had migrated with her sister Jane fourteen years before on the same assisted migrants scheme as their neices. Isabella Allingham married George Morrow and lived in Armidale, New South Wales.

In 1868 Anne Jane Love and Cornelius O'Neill married in Tamworth in the Roman Catholic Church. Anne Jane would often say that in Ireland the match would not have been possible. In 1873 Mary Love died at her Aunt Isabella and Uncle George Morrow's residence in Armidale. She never got married.

Cornelius and Anne Jane O'Neill had a large family. Cornelius worked as a wheelwright and Anne Jane was renowned as a bush midwife. They had ten children and lived in Brewarrina for most of their lives. Anne Jane O'Neill died in 1911 in Cobar and after that Cornelius and his sons and daughters moved to Marrickville, Sydney and lived in Silver Street. Cornelius died in 1921 at his son's house in Marrickville.

As they had so many children, I am sure that there is a large number of my cousins living in New South Wales and beyond. If you find a link in my O'Neill family tree to your family, please email me at NORTHEY-L@rootsweb.com

I would love to hear from you.