Brian Condon: Letters and Documents in 19th Century Australian Catholic History
[Source: Adelaide Archdiocesan Archives Ms. draft]
Parramatta
20 May 1822
Sir,
Having left Sydney for Parramatta on Saturday 18th. inst., I was not honored until yesterday on my return to Sydney with your letter of that Sunday's date in reply to a note of mine of the 9th. inst. and requiring me by the direction of His Excellency Sir Thomas Brisbane to furnish you with a copy of the document therein referred to, relative to a piece of ground which I stated was granted to the Roman Catholic inhabitants of Parramatta by *Major G....* and Governor for the purpose of having erected thereon a temporary Chapel and School. I have to regret that I am unable to comply with your requisition and to repeat what, Sir, I had the honor to mention to His Excellency, the expression of my belief that there is no document in existence on that subject, as Mr James Meehan the late deputy Surveyor General was directed by His Excellency in the Parramatta Court during the late General Muster to give the ground alluded to in compliance with my request and who accordingly accompanied me and two other persons on the same day to point out the piece of ground alluded to.
I have Sir to state also that Major General McQ. whilst Governor of this territory granted me three other allotments of ground, one in Sydney, Windsor and Liverpool for four Chapels or school houses for which I have no written document to produce. But the reference I am enabled to make will be with you, Sir, I have every reason to hope, satisfactory enough to establish the veracity of my statement, and I beg to assure you Sir that in soliciting these allotments for the specified purpose, I was not actuated by any sinister motives but solely with a view to the public good. On the contrary, I was thereby prevented from putting forward a claim at that time for a participation of the indulgences which were then liberally bestowing on many persons, I cannot say less deserving of them, but if the uninterrupted assiduity in the performance of very laborious and painful public duty and the indefatigable exertions of so humble an individual as myself in endeavouring to secure the peace and increase the prosperity of the Country by promoting its improvement in morality, as favourably regarded a very numerous portion of its inhabitants can communicate any confidence as to the success likely to result from such a claim, I had a right to entertain it.
With respect however to the ground now in question, His Excellency the Governor either considers that the appropriation of it in the manner proposed would be attended with some inconvenience to the service or he does not. If His Excellency does, Mr. Therry waits on His Excellency so far from expecting a clarification of the late Governor's grant that I solemnly declare, if my right to it, even indisputably legal, be irrevocably established, it would yet be to me a source of the highest gratification instantly to relinquish it. If His Excellency does not, I now beg leave to solicit it in my own name and that if the Roman Catholic inhabitants of Parramatta. I shall, Sir, Deo volente, in the course of this day wait on Mr Meehan at his residence in the district of Airds to ascertain whether he possesses the required document and to obtain his written evidence on the subject in order to evince how much disposed and determined I am to conform to every wish as well to obey every command of His Excellency and with what sentiments of respect and consideration
I have the honor to be, Sir,
[J.J. Therry?]
[Note: The most extensive collection of transcriptions of Fr Therry's correspondence remains Eris O'Brien's The Foundation of Catholicism in Australia; life and letters of Archpriest John Joseph Therry, Sydney, Angus & Robertson, 1922]