Description
Four brothers and a sister emigrated from Ireland to the Colony of Victoria between 1853 and 1858, They came as part of the gold rush, but not because of the lure of gold. They came to farm the new pastoral and agricultural estates. Life in Northern Ireland during the early 19th Century provided limited opportunities for families. After years of hard work as agricultural labourers on the large estates of the far-off colony, they became successful landowners. Their children were born as first-generation Victorians who continued in the traditional trades. However some embarked on new careers as novel opportunities became available after Federation.
Barry J Conn is a fourth generation Australian who grew up on a wheat and sheep farm at Wail, in the Wimmera district of western Victoria. He was briefly a mathematics and science secondary school teacher at the Horsham High School before becoming a botanist employed in Bulolo and Lae, Papua New Guinea, and then Melbourne and Sydney, Australia. He published many scientific papers, including the ‘Trees of Papua New Guinea’ (three volumes) and one children’s book, ‘My brother Neville is a pest.’ He retired as Principal Research Scientist from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney in 2015 and, together with his wife, now lives in rural Victoria.
Specifications:
Publisher: Greenhill Publishing
Year: 2024
Format: Paperback
Pages: 368pp
ISBN: 9781923333260
239 A'Beckett Street Melbourne, Victoria, 3000 
03 9326 9288 
office@historyvictoria.org.au 
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Carl Ireton –
Barry writes a wonderful history of four branches of his family and their emigration from Ireland to the colony of Victoria, South Australia. He writes extensively, and it’s very well researched, into their lives and with each succeeding generation, what life was like while farming, welding, factory work, and just making a life for themselves back in their day. His chapter about his great uncle Jim, who was a fireman and a greaser aboard the S.S. Waratah I found very interesting, as it details what is known of his early life, his marriage to his love Elizabeth, and how he sailed away on the ship just five months after their marriage and was then lost at sea. Jim was a prolific writer and correspondent and sent postcards to his family wherever the ship made port. Barry writes about others in the Conn family, and how they lived and got by back in their day. It’s a wonderful book and I highly recommend it to anybody who enjoys Australian history.
Carl Ireton –
Although I am not a member of your Society, I have just finished reading the history book “Tracings” by Barry J Conn. Loved every page of it. The epilogue was very moving, with the comparison between the family dynamics back then compared to today being very thought provoking. Of course, back then, you had to work and produce, or you starved, and the more children you had, the more productive you could be on the farm. It is kind of sad that families did not have the same kind of sentimentality that we feel today with families. But back then, unless you had a lot of money, you had to work or starve.
What amazed me was how old Joseph and Jane Conn lived until they passed away; Joseph dying at the age of 77 years, in 1882, and Jane dying when 85 years old, in 1888. Life was hard in Northern Ireland as it was all around the world during that time. We know that the mortality rate was pretty high back then from diseases, poor hygiene, injuries, etc. These people and, as the author has illustrated, their children, were incredible people.
From this book, I have learned a lot about Australian geography and the early history of the colony of Victoria. The level of research by the author must be commended. His attention to all the details concerning their lives, as well as the times that they lived in, is astounding. But then again, that’s what makes a great historian.
I really liked the insight into the lives of these people, for example, all the daily chores people had to do back then to survive. The influence of the sole teacher of small community schools is wonderfully illustrated by the poem that Beatrice Dean’s teacher (Nathan Spielvogel, who later became very well-known) gave her on her last day of schooling. The fact that he rode a bicycle to the Village Settlement school daily, some distance from Dimboola (in the Wimmera), so that he could teach the children at this small school, seems amazing when compared to modern times. Life could be so fragile back then, it seems, and it is sad that Beatrice’s mother died at such a relatively young age leaving Beatrice to be responsible for the home duties of her family.
The chapter about James (Jim) Conn and Elizabeth Hart on their wedding day was beautifully written. James’ letters to Elizabeth and to his sister Grace Conn – Wow! He was quite the correspondent. In his letters, he described what was happening on the S.S. Waratah as well as the ports of call that they visited. And what I really liked is he put together the entire two voyages of the Waratah, life aboard the ship and the interesting occurrences all in chronological order. Which I really appreciated. For me, researching everything, I was finding information piecemeal and with James Conn, it was like a crossword puzzle with his letters. The author has just put it all together for the whole story. So sad that his last letter, written to his younger sister Grace Conn, was posted from Durban, the day before the ship disappeared in a terrible storm. This shipping disaster deserves to more widely recognized, Tracings provides an important summary of the tragedy, told through the personal experience of James Conn and his grieving family.
To the author, thank you for writing such a great book. The book is about the Conn family from Ireland. It follows the lives of four brothers and their sister who emigrated to the Colony of Victoria, where they grew and prospered. I found it very well researched when it comes to the details of where they lived, how they lived, and each member of the family as they grew. The painstaking work that the author must have put in when it came to writing about their lives, their hardships, their strength in adversity and how they grew as a family in Australia.
I have really enjoyed reading about the history of the Colony of Victoria and the extended Conn family, and how life was and how people lived, and how they helped to settle it. All the wonderful photos of them and the research that the author put into it is just incredible. And I have loved every minute of it. Thank you for writing such a wonderful book about your family. Your surviving family members today are very blessed to have this wonderful history of your family through this book.