Australia Day Luncheon Address - 2017
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1788 AD Magazine of the Fellowship of First Fleeters ACN 003 223 425 PATRON: Professor The Honourable Dame Marie Bashir AD CVO Volume 48, Issue 2 49th Year of Publication April/May 2017 To live on in the hearts and minds of descendants is never to die AUSTRALIA DAY LUNCHEON ADDRESS - 2017 (as given by) Michael Pembroke Judge of the Su- it would diminish the revenues available to New South preme Court of New South Wales, (21 January 2017) Wales. Some things never change. Dame Marie, Sir Nicholas, distinguished guests, Denis Parkes and Phillip Smith and ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for inviting There is another connection between the visionary Gillian and me to lunch. And thank you for the privilege Henry Parkes and the inspirational Arthur Phillip. Parkes, of addressing you on this auspicious occasion. more than anyone else, appreciated the significance of From Colony to Federation Phillip’s foundational achievement. It was he who com- As some of you may know, my roots go back to the es- missioned the colossal statue of Phillip that stands just tablishment of the colony of New South Wales and the inside the Royal Botanic gardens opposite the State Li- foundation of modern Australia. My brary. Phillip is facing towards the Heads at the entrance mother can trace her lineage to John to Sydney Harbour, the majestic sand- Lucas, seventh child of Nathaniel Lu- stone portal through which he first cas and Olivia Gascoigne, who arrived came in an advance party, in a long- safely - courtesy of Arthur Phillip - in boat rowed by seamen, on 21 January Botany Bay in January 1788. Nathan- 1788; the same entrance through iel became a favourite of Philip Gidley which so many hundreds of thousands King, Phillip’s trusted lieutenant and of grateful, sometimes desperate, mi- subsequently a Governor himself. In grants have since arrived in this won- 1806, King appointed Nathaniel as the derful country. colony’s Supervisor of Carpenters – a On that summer day in 1788, Phillip’s job description that we would proba- men were the first Europeans in all bly now call ‘Director of Public history to enter what he described as Works’. the ‘finest harbour in the world’. His Michael Pembroke In 1817, Nathaniel’s son John mar- civil officers, mostly educated, young, ried the daughter of Captain Rowley somewhat romantic men of the late of the Marine Corps. Their eldest son, also called John, Enlightenment, were awed by the sparkling beauty of lived from 1818 until 1902, seeing in the new century what lay before them. They believed – like Phillip - that and the new nation. He had a successful career in politics they were serving the cause of humanity and recorded and business, and was much favoured by Henry Parkes, moving descriptions in their journals. who appointed him to the Legislative Council. Parkes By the time Phillip departed, less than five years later, a was, of course, the ‘father of Federation’ and Phillip was, new society, built from absolutely nothing, had begun to as the plaque laid recently in Westminster Abbey attests, thrive. Phillip thought the colony would one day become, the ‘founder of modern Australia’. to use his own words, ‘the Empire of the East’ and ‘the My mother can therefore justly claim that her ances- most valuable acquisition Great Britain ever made’. His tors were ‘present at the creation’ – at the establishment optimism was justified - and has been amply demon- of the colony of New South Wales in 1788 and at the strated - but the little settlement only pulled through in founding of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901. Lu- its first years because of Phillip’s leadership and the per- cas, by the way, opposed Federation because he thought sonal qualities that he demonstrated. (to page 3) Registered by Australia Post Publication No. 100002063 PRICE $2.50 Phone 02 9360 3788 LuncheonFounders available Pic- Fellowship of First Fleeters, 105 Cathedral Street, Woolloomooloo, NSW 2011 Email:[email protected] turenow onGallery e-mail. First Fleeters on Facebook: www.facebook.com/FirstFleeters Details on page 12 Membership Enquiries:[email protected] WEBSITE: www.fellowshipfirstfleeters.org.au Pages 8-9 Founders April/May 2017 PRESIDENT’S PEN FOUNDERS The magazine of the Jon Fearon Fellowship of First Fleeters Editor , Layout and Artwork Jon & Karys Fearon Australia Day has come and gone and each year the Ph. 02 4311 6254 voices for change get louder, and perhaps even more E-mail: [email protected] compelling. There is no doubt, even taking into account the current ways we celebrate our ‘Australianness’, that DIRECTORS 2016-2017 the day remains divisive in many of our communities. President/Chapter Development It seemed quite fitting therefore that our luncheon speaker Michael Jon FEARON, BA. Dip Ed. Stud (TESOL), Pembroke was willing to venture into the debate and make some suggestions Vice-President/Events/ of his own. Our membership covers a large range of personal views on any Maintenance manner of subjects and there seems nothing wrong with a good hearty debate Denis SMITH OAM on what we hold dear as a Fellowship, be it individually or collectively. Treasurer There is much merit in the suggestion by the indigenous leader, Noel Pearson, Kevin THOMAS, FCA,FCPA,FCIS that our nation should be celebrating together not one but three arrivals - In- Office Manager/Secretary/ digenous, British and Migrant, but I doubt if 26 January would be the most suit- Facebook able date on which to do it. Therese LUCK At the luncheon our MC, Rod Best, gave a moving Acknowledgement of Coun- Research/Web Site Co-ordinator try and several have asked for a copy. Rod has kindly allowed us to reproduce it John BOYD JP. here: Chapter Liaison Karys FEARON, BN At the start of today’s lunch, let us remember that: Archives Our ancestors were here in 1788. Robert LAMB. Mech Eng. Cert. We know of the people who lived here then. Indeed, some of us may be Abo- & Machinist Cert. riginal. Archivist/Events We have the family stories, over generations, of the tragedies between our Sharon LAMB. Assoc. Dip Land & eng Survey Drafting families and the Aboriginal peoples. Minute Secretary We remember both the good times and the bad. We acknowledge the decima- Karen LOVETT, BA. Dip Ed tion of a culture and its survival and growth. Family Trees/Database/Computer We acknowledge the elders of the Gadigal people of the Eora nation who first Management interacted with us. We know that this was their land and still is. Tony HOLDEN We proclaim Australia Day as a day when we honestly recognise our history: Plaques/Maintenance as together we forge a nation, acknowledging and respecting what did happen Chris COUNTER and truthfully and sincerely avoiding future wrongs. Membership Val COUNTER To take up this theme, several of our members have asked recently if we list those who have both First Fleeter and Aboriginal ancestry. As far as I know, this has never been formally done, but that is no reason why we shouldn’t get on with it now. Contact me if you have both strands in your DNA. This could be a CONTENTS worthwhile research project within that elusive subject, ‘Australianness’. 1. Australia Day Address - M Pembroke 2. Directors; President’s Pen; Don’t be Don’t be alarmed alarmed. 3. Michael Pembroke address continued 4. Toast to our Ancestors This is not a 5. Toast continued; From the archives, political state- Chapter Secretaries ment nor is it 6-7. Owen Cavanaugh and Margaret a symbolic Darnell, Part 2 e n a c t m e n t 8-9. Annual Luncheon Picture Gallery foreshadow- 10. New Arthur Phillip Memorial un- ing an Austra- veiled in the New Forest lian Republic! 11. Chapters in Action Page 10 ex- 12. New Members; Deaths; At the Helm; Thank You Ray, Letter to Editor plains all. 2 April/May 2017 Founders Humanity and Compassion will be put on his trial as if he had killed one of the Garri- son’. And Phillip’s official instructions - I should remind Among those personal qualities were humanity and com- you, because they are often overlooked - required him to passion. Phillip was not just the founder of modern Austra- ‘conciliate the affections of the Aborigines’; to encourage lia, he set the tone for the generous, liberal and fair- everyone to ‘live in amity and kindness’ with them; and to minded society that we have inherited – one of which we punish those who should ‘wantonly destroy them or give can be proud, and which we should strive to maintain, not- them any unnecessary interruption in the exercise of their withstanding the modern-day clamour from some less gen- several occupations’. Phillip took his instructions seriously. erous souls. When he was ritually speared at Manly Cove, and expected Phillip demonstrated his humanity in several ways. You to die, he directed that there be no retaliation. all know his attitude to slavery. He had witnessed Portu- Nonetheless, as we all know, the Aborigines were un- guese slavery in Brazil and Dutch slavery at the Cape of doubtedly dispossessed, their lands appropriated, their Good Hope and well knew the dominant role played by fishing and hunting grounds ruined. Phillip and his officers British commercial interests in the Atlantic slave trade. may have been enlightened, tolerant and chivalrous in ac- From London before departing, at a time when slavery un- cordance with the spirit of the age, but they could not see derpinned the prosperity of all of the world’s colonial pow- that they were invaders. Nor could Phillip understand why ers, he wrote that ‘There can be no slavery in a free land Bennelong, whom he kidnapped and treated like a son, and consequently no slaves’.