The roots of S. Mary’s Echuca stretch back to February 1866, when a church was opened as part of the Bendigo mission, under the authority of the Archdiocese of Melbourne, writes Dr Donna Bailey.

By Dr Donna Bailey, Diocesan Archivist

Echuca has an extremely proud Augustinian and Brigidine heritage. The Augustinians served at Echuca for 118 years and the Brigidines for almost 110 years.

During the mid to late 19th century, the busy port of Echuca was the largest inland port and the third largest port in Australia, outside of Sydney and Melbourne. The township, surveyed in 1854, and located at the junction of the Murray and Campaspe rivers on the south side of the Murray River, was first named Hopwood’s Ferry. First land sales occurred in 1855 and, with the rail link to Bendigo established in 1864, the thriving port for wool and timber distribution had direct access to the Melbourne market and the export trade of wool. During the 1860s the Victorian Land Acts allowed for land to be taken up and farmed south of Echuca and, like other areas in the Diocese, these holdings were mainly settled by Irish Catholics.

On February 4, 1866, Bishop Goold solemnly blessed and dedicated the new Catholic church at Echuca and celebrated Mass. At that time Echuca was serviced by priests from the Bendigo Mission and this continued until December 1874, when it became a stand-alone mission. The erection of the mission meant that a considerable tract of country was detached for the priests stationed at Bendigo, such as the Rev. Fr Daniel O’Connell who had been working in the district for some years before being appointed as the first parish priest of Echuca.

Rev. Fr James McGillicuddy replaced O’Connell in 1877 and stayed at Echuca until 1886. Fr O’Connell, then Fr McGillicuddy, were supported by assistant priests during this era, including Rev. Fr Duncan McNab, who was a cousin to Mary of the Cross MacKillop. However, records show that both priests became ‘burnt out’ with the huge demands required from them in this ‘difficult mission’. The magnificent memorial window of the current St Mary’s Church was erected to the memory of Fr McGillicuddy in 1889.

The foundation stone for the current St Mary’s Church, Echuca was laid by the Right Rev. Martin Crane, Bishop of Sandhurst on November 7, 1875. The church was built in stages; new parts tacked onto the earlier church – the eastern side was completed in 1875, the incomplete construction of the Sanctuary occurred in 1877, and the completed church, including sanctuary and transept, was officially opened and dedicated in May 1890.

The first Augustinian priest, Rev. Fr Joseph Coleman, had arrived at Echuca in 1887 and was responsible for the 1887 - 1890 scope of works. Rev. Coleman was also responsible for building the original hall/primary school in 1887.

In 1889, the old church was finally demolished to make room for the front addition of the new church. Around this time, valuable documents were stolen from under the cornerstone of the old church. Other significant priests serving at Echuca include Echuca’s second Augustinian parish priest, Prior James Dominic Murray O.S.A. Murray who served Echuca between 1891 and 1898 was consecrated at St Kilian’s pro-cathedral as Vicar-Apostolic of Northern Queensland in 1898. Murray was the first Sandhurst priest to be elevated and ordained. He was known as a man of great wit and warmth and his name appears on the church bell at St Mary’s.

At the beginning of 1886, four Brigidine Sisters travelled from Tullow in Ireland to Australia via London and Naples to establish a convent and school at Echuca. The Brigidine Order was a teaching order and, at that time in Ireland, remained a semi-enclosed order. This must have been extremely challenging for the Sisters as they navigated their way towards an entirely different climate and culture. Passing through London during a freezing winter, they endured a violent snowstorm and later recorded in their Annals ‘the vehicles were dashing past, across us in every direction so rapidly and so unceasingly, that it seemed near impossible to escape injury’.

Stopping at Naples they were joined by Bishop Crane who was returning to Australia following failed eye surgery. They were also accompanied by Crane’s younger brother, Rev. Nicholas Crane O.M.I. Subsequently, both Bishop Crane and his brother Nicholas were closely associated with the Echuca Brigidine school and convent all their lives.

After only four years, Mother Borgia Hayden the leader of the small Brigidine community died after a short illness, aged 44. Her death certificate states gastric fever and abscess on the lung — in all, seven weeks duration. Mother Borgia’s two brothers, both priests, lived in Australia and were with her when she died. (One brother was a Rector of St Patrick’s, Manly and the other, a priest at the time, would eventually become Archbishop William Hayden of Hobart).

Her religious Sisters wrote of their devastation at Mother Borgia’s loss, ‘she left us orphans in a strange land and heretical town … and poor in every sense of the word, desolate and heartbroken’. Of interest, the first home of the Brigidine’s at Echuca, and still part of St Joseph’s school today, was Apsley House, the original home of Henry Hopwood, the first white settler at Echuca. The parish gifted the home to the Sisters on their arrival.