Denis Higgins was born in Castlemagner in 1787. A shepherd/labourer, he married Honora (Norry) Murphy in 1822, he 35, she 19 and they had 5 children in the next 6 years; John (1822), Mary (’23), Catherine (’25) followed by Joanna and Denis Jnr, both of whom died in childhood.
Circa 1820, the introduction of the steel plough resulted in massive unemployment and acute privation and although Geoff O’Donoghue has posthumously pardoned Denis of sheep-stealing, he was, nonetheless, dispatched to Sydney Cove aboard the ‘Governor Ready’, arriving down-under on 16th January, 1829 after a journey of 117 days. Continue reading “A Castlemagner Castaway”