The Franklin Harbour Tragedy Multi-Cache
The Franklin Harbour Tragedy
-
Difficulty:
-
-
Terrain:
-
Size: 
(small)
Please note Use of geocaching.com services is subject to the terms and conditions
in our disclaimer.
Background
There is very little at St Johns. It appears on the South Australian map a few kilometers south-east of Kapunda, but there is no township, no village, and since 2002, no ruins. There is however, a surprisingly large cemetery. The oldest headstone I found dated back to 1859. Apart from the featured memorial, look out for the grave of the former convict Patrick Ronan who died in 1865.
The Story
There is one memorial in the old cemetery that really stands out, that stops a casual reader of inscriptions in his or her tracks.
Franklin Harbour is nowhere near St Johns, it is in fact on the western side of Spencer Gulf. By road, or rough track in those days, it was a distance of about 300 miles (483km). Surely then this is simply a memorial to the seven members of the McCarthy family and not their actual grave? It does not seem possible that the grieving Martin McCarthy could have transported the bodies of his wife and six children all that way in mid-summer of 1880 – But he did!
The day the family perished was like a day from hell with the temperature reaching 105 F (40.5C) and howling northerly winds.
Martin McCarthy farmed at Carpo, twelve miles south-west of Franklin Harbour. He and his four eldest sons were reaping in a paddock well away from the family’s small homestead when they saw smoke in the distance. The smoke increased dramatically in a very short time then high flames became visible as well. A monstrous bushfire was heading towards them. The frightened McCarthy’s set off towards home but the fire was moving at such a pace that it soon became apparent that they had no chance of reaching there in time. They were forced to take refuge in the middle of a ploughed field.
At the home it was different. Martin’s wife, Mary and daughters Mary, Norah, Catherine, Ellen and Bridget and small son Joe had no chance of escape. The five sisters huddled together in the kitchen while their mother and little Joe frantically attempted to fill buckets of water at their tank. The house was surrounded by high, dense scrub, and a wall of flame, at times 40ft high, completely engulfed them.
When the worst of the fire had passed, the distraught Martin McCarthy and his four sons made their way up to the smoldering ruins and found what they preyed not to find. The bodies of the five girls were together in the kitchen while Mary’s remains and those of little Joe were found out by the tank.
McCarthy lost everything that day. Along with seven members of his family went all his material things. He lost his home, forty acres of standing wheat, 230 bags of cleaned wheat, his horse, his pigs, his dray, a spring cart, a roller, a winnowing machine and two wagons. The poor man was both emotionally and financially ruined.
Offers of help came from fellow farmers from miles around. When McCarthy made the statement that he wished he could bury his family by his former church at St Johns near Kapunda, where he had lived for many years and where his aged mother was still living, he no doubt did so with little thought of that being possible. But his friends rallied. An open boat was lent, large enough to take the surviving McCarthys, the seven charred bodies and three volunteer crewmen from Franklin Harbour across Spencer Gulf to Walleroo, a distance of about 50 miles (80km).
While those arrangements were being finalised, other friends quietly set about making coffins, using deal, the only timber readily available.
Neighbors began arriving from near and far and when all were ready, a lengthy, melancholy procession trailed off toward Franklin Harbour. The small craft left at 7pm. It must have been a terrible night on the water, with little or no sleep for anyone aboard. They arrived safely at Walleroo at 2pm the following afternoon.
What an impression their arrival created. Further help immediately came from all quarters and arrangements were quickly made for the sad group to travel onto Kapunda by train. When they finally arrived at the Kapunda Railway Station, they received a huge but sombre reception. It was by then the morning of the fifth day after the calamity.
Without delay the coffins were placed on drays to be transported to St Rose’s church for the funeral service. There the exhausted Martin McCarthy experienced further heartbreak for Father Maher, who conducted the mass, decided that the simple deal coffins could not be taken inside the church because a quantity of blood was seen to be oozing from them.
Wagons then carried the fragile coffins over the last leg of the terrible journey, to the burial ground at St Johns. The seven members of the McCarthy family were finally laid to rest.
The tragedy touched the hearts of people from far and wide. The Kapunda newspaper was swamped with offers of financial help for the man who had lost everything and despite Martin McCarthy’s initial objection to the proposal, a subscription list was commenced. A large committee was formed to administer the resulting ‘McCarthy Fund’ and representatives were appointed in each and every centre in the Kapunda district. Eventually one thousand pounds was raised. Through that practical outpouring of sympathy McCarthy was able to begin life again, as best anyone could under the circumstances.
When he died in 1908, at the age of 74, Martin McCarthy was buried alongside his wife and children at St Johns.
Reproduced from "Curiosities of South Australia No 1" by Russell Smith
The cemetery also contains (the names of) many well known identities. See if you can spot the graves of Pat Cash, Donald Mackay, Michael Jordan and James Browne. Can you find any others? Also look out for the touching memorial to little Damian McGee. One of the most poignant children’s graves I have ever seen.
The Cache
To find the cache go to the posted coords and locate the McCarthy memorial. Using information you find there:
Add the ages of all the children (except Mary) together and subtract from the South decimal minutes.
Add the age of Bridget to the East decimal minutes.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Ybbx ybj
Treasures
You'll collect a digital Treasure from one of these collections when you find and log this geocache:
Loading Treasures