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Catholic Weekly
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1 February 2004
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Dunbar mystery unraveled
New school bid for ‘male-only’ offers
Twins among high achievers
Parents urged to read new books
Steps to safety
Priests honoured
Doing the Lord’s work
Religious named
Pregnant pause: To do or not to do? Oh, baby!
Insurance board post
Caring for needy
Lay Catholics
Editorial: True blue
Letters: Thanks to institute
Conversation: Mons Paul Ssegemogerere, vicar general of Kampala, Uganda - Helping his country tread the right path
Today – God’s gift to us all
Refugee children say ‘thanks’
Chinese community has much to celebrate
The stained-glass detective
Teacher, priest and puppeteer
Riding a wild horse ...
Up there, Ignatius!
Mates give Bulls’ groom Super send-off
Dunbar mystery unraveled
COMPLETE: How the window looked before its removal from the old St Mary’s Cathedral. The centre panel is from the cartoon discovered in the Hardman archives.
A Sydney researcher has solved a 138-year-old mystery surrounding the first stained-glass window in St Mary’s Cathedral.
The centre of the three-panelled window, a poignant memorial to the wreck of the Dunbar, went missing after it was moved following a fire which destroyed the old cathedral in 1865.
As part of her Masters degree studies at Sydney University, Robin Hedditch travelled to England where she discovered the original drawings (cartoons) among old company records of the manufacturer of the window.
The cartoons were contained in a dusty roll – marked simply “Sydney window” – among archives of the John Hardman studio which are held by the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.
Hardman supplied stained-glass windows to churches all over Australia in the 19th century.
The Dunbar memorial window was commissioned by Archbishop John Bede Polding, the first Archbishop of Sydney.
It was donated by the Hon Daniel Egan in memory of his wife and two stepchildren, who were among the 121 passengers and crew who drowned when the ship foundered at South Head in 1857.
The Dunbar was on its second voyage to Sydney. Despite treacherous weather conditions on the night of August 20, the ship attempted to enter Sydney Harbour rather than wait until morning. It was driven into the reef at the foot of South Head and began to break up immediately. In the following hours, all but one of the passengers and crew perished.
According to NSW State records, residents were drawn to the scene for the morbid task of identifying friends, relatives and business associates The emerging city was staggered by the extent of the tragedy.
A mass funeral for those who died and who, in most cases, could not be identified was held on September 24. The interments took place at St Stephen’s Cemetery, Newtown, where there is still a monument to the victims.
Ms Hedditch says her find is significant for both the history of St Mary’s and the nation.
It means that the design of the window can be reconstructed for the first time since the three panels were installed in the cathedral in 1860.
A reconstructed centre panel, which features an image of the Blessed Virgin above a scene depicting waves surrounding Mrs Egan and her children, would complement the remaining side panels, which now grace the chapel of the Benedictine Monastery at Arcadia, near Dural.
The senior curator at the Birmingham Museum, Glennys Wild, says she is pleased the story of the missingwindow can be told in The Catholic Weekly.
“Who knows? The article may even flush out the missing window, possibly from some building nobody would have considered so far,” she said.
Ms Wild says the missing panel may be in a private chapel in Australia.
“As a Marian subject, my hope is that it may have been installed in a convent somewhere, its format altered somewhat in the process and its association with the Dunbar lost over time.
“It would be wonderful to find it if it does survive, even if only in part.”