Before the arrival of the institutional Catholic Church in Maitland there were the convicts.
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Sent to Wallis Plains from Ireland in the early 1800s, these men were uneducated, illiterate and highly superstitious.
And according to historian Michael Belcher they were also the true pioneer Catholics of the Maitland district.
“The early European history of the Wallis Plains area was overwhelmingly male, convict and single,” Mr Belcher said.
“And a large proportion of these people were Catholics who, as far as the governing classes were concerned, were benighted and bereft of every advantage that can adorn the mind of man.”
Mr Belcher will explore the issue further in his talk – The Pioneer Catholics of the Maitland District: 1810-1835.
“The talk looks at if these men lived out their faith in any way and, if so, how did they live it out. And the reality is that they really didn’t have much chance,” he said.
“They came from Ireland which had a whole lot of prohibitive things attached to them. They weren’t even allowed to carry rosary beads . . . no iconography at all.”
Many of them, however, had the crucifix tattooed on their arms along with the date they had completed their sentence.
“The authorities and landholders were absolutely terrified of Catholics congregating because they were seen as troublesome so they were very prohibited in what they could do in terms of their religion,” Mr Belcher said.
Some of the men are buried at Glebe Cemetery, East Maitland, however most of them were buried where they died.
“They were buried where they fell, unmarked, unmourned, no prayers ever said for them, never remembered and totally forgotten,” Mr Belcher said. “Many of them would have died alone, which would have been horrible for them.”
Mr Belcher has based his talk on the 1828 census, before the East Maitland parish was established in 1835.
“The pioneers of the Hunter Valley were the convicts who came here and they did the hard slog.
“Other people contributed but the real hard work was done by the convicts and they are not acknowledged in the least,” he said.
“These guys built this nation so it’s really sad that they’re not remembered and not given due recognition for what they did.”
Michael Belcher will deliver his talk at St Mary’s Chapel, Victoria Street, Maitland, on Thursday at 7pm.