EARLY CONVICTS

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 623, 30 August 1933, Page 5

EARLY CONVICTS

(Press Assn

SHOULD HAVE MEMORIALS AS PQLITICAL MARTYRS REAL POLITICAL PATRIOTS

i. — By Telegraph — Copyright).

Sydney, Saturday. "This feeling of shame towards our convict pioneers is entirely unwarranted. Really, we should erect memorials to honour many of the early convicts, because, as political martyrs they fought for the privileges we enjoy to-day. So said Mr. Aubrey Halloran, pastpresident of the Royal Australian Historical Society, yesterday, when at Camperdown cemetery, Bishop Kirkby unveiled the anchor and chains of the Dunhar, which was wrecked off the Gap in 1857. In a tomb at the cemetery are buried the remains of 32 unidentified victims of the Dunbar disaster, and to commemorate the 76th anniversary of the wreck, the Vaucluse Council had given the relics to the cemetery trust. "There is a tendency among public^ bodies to resume our old cemeteries," said Mr. Halloran. "We should fight tooth and nail to preserve these.historic burial grounds, because they contain the remains of men and women who helped to give Australia a place among the important nations of the world." Mr. Halloran urged school-ehildren to devote the same time to Australian .history that they did to Roman, Greek and English history. During the ceremony the Police Band led the audience of over 500 in special hymns.