Sheehan Heritage
During the 1980’s I traced our Sheehan family into Launceston, Tasmania; Dad (John Edwin Stewart 1920 - 2007) was born there.
Our Sheehan’s are first found in Tasmania around 1844 or so, but unfortunately I haven’t been able to find related shipping records for Sheehan’s that I can link to our family.
Our first Sheehan in Tasmania appears to be Daniel Sheehan, born in 1844 but his birthplace is not stated. Daniel married Mary Conboy or Conroy in 1875, and their son, George Patrick (b:1875) married Grace Ruth Wilkins (b:1877) in 1898 at Launceston.
George and Grace had a son, George Stewart (b:1899) in Launceston who married, Aug 1919, Iris Kennedy (b:1900 in Newtown, Sydney) and their 2 boys are my father and uncle.
Dad has a younger brother Norman Oswald George (b: Sydney 1923) who now lives in Noosa. Wayne Matheson, a 3rd cousin, who contacted me as a result of this website, has let me know that George Stewart’s brothers followed his move from Launceston to Sydney in the mid-1920’s.
As things turned out, George Stewart and Iris separated in 1932 when Oswald Kennedy decided to quit the lease on the Star Hotel in Newcastle and move back to Sydney. Looking at older family documents, now passed down to me, it could be said that this move may have been brought about by John Sheehan being invited to attend a school for gifted children in Sydney, the first of its kind in Australia. George stayed in the Newcastle area, settling on the western shores of Lake Macquarie where he died in 1970, while the rest of the family did move back to Sydney.
As kids, John was the studious, introverted type while Norman was the gregarious sportsman and extrovert. They both joined the RAAF during WWII; Norm flew Sunderland’s from Pembroke Dock in Wales, while John flew fighter bombers and fighters in the Northern Territory and New Guinea before joining Test and Ferry Flight at Bankstown - where he met Mary Therese (Lynne).
After the war Norm claimed to suffer badly from PTSD. He eventually became a solicitor and barrister in the Hay/Deniliquin region before divorcing and relocating his practice and life to Melbourne. John returned to the advertising industry where he continued to work until he retired in the late 1980’s.
At the time of John’s death he and his brother were unreconcilably estranged and had been for 20 years or more.