In the old Ipswich Courthouse in East Street 150 years ago, the Kerwin brothers John and William Kerwin made an appearance that shaped their family’s destiny. I told a version of this story live on West Bremer Radio.

They were members of a big Ipswich pioneering family from County Tipperary in Ireland. Both John and William had survived the Irish Famine at its worst and arrived in Australia in 1855 during the Gold Rush. They hit the goldfields of Beechworth, Victoria, and must have done OK, because they then settled in Redbank Plains, Ipswich, Queensland, and got some land. They started farming and expanded into grazing, so they did well for themselves.

They would have been somewhat influential because in 1873 they backed the successful election of William Walsh to the Queensland parliament, and not long after that he became the speaker of the legislative assembly.

So the Kerwin brothers were doing well by the time they made their appearance in the Ipswich Courthouse on Friday the 23rd of October 1874.

They were there because they had both ridden their horses into town from Redbank Plains, and then gone on the tear. But both should have known better, you see John was fifty-one old and William was thirty-seven. But they were celebrating something, or maybe just having fun, because they galloped their horses through the streets of Ipswich. They galloped so hard in fact that they were arrested for speeding. Or in the words of the day, they were charged with “furious riding in the public streets”.

John and William Kerwin were each ordered to pay a fine of £2 with 3s. 6d. costs, or in default to be imprisoned for seven days. That wasn’t so bad for two successful graziers. But the thing is, from that point on, things began to go drastically down hill for the brothers.

Their mother Mary died two years later in 1876 and is buried in Ipswich cemetery.

Specifically for John Kerwin, his son John Junior died after accidentally shooting himself while climbing through a fence. John himself didn’t see out the century because he died on April Fool’s Day the 1st of April 1899.

But worse was to come for William Kerwin. First of all, William married a cousin Mary in Ipswich.

Then his son John Joseph was sliced in two while shunting with the railways in Maryborough. He fell in front of a waggon loaded with timber, which ran over him and cut him in half. Both halves were brought back to Ipswich and buried together in the cemetery here.

A year earlier John Joseph had already lost his twenty year old wife and one year old son, so losing his own life was almost to be expected with the bad luck he was having.

In the meantime, another one of William Kerwin’s sons William Junior was electrocuted. He was an engine-driver at the North Ipswich railway workshops and was electrocuted there. They didn’t find his charred body until hours later.

So the Kerwin brothers had a terrible time after appearing in court. Having survived the famine, they came to Ipswich where a son accidentally shot himself, another was sliced in two, and yet another was electrocuted. One of the brothers even fell foul of April Fool’s Day.

If we are to learn anything from the Kerwin brothers of Ipswich 150 years ago, then that’s got to be please don’t speed through the streets of your town and stay safe.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO A VERSION OF THIS STORY TOLD ON WEST BREMER RADIO.

Photo credits:
Old Ipswich Courthouse, 2024 – Harold Peacock 20241020_060709.
William Henry Walsh – State Library of Queensland.
William Kerwin c1892 – State Library of Queensland.
William Kerwin, Ipswich Cemetery – Find a Grave uploaded by Anne here lies 2018.