Prayer Calendar: Deceased Priests who have ministered the Catholic Faith throughout Toowoomba and districts, 1864–2025, Compiled by Annie Carrett, Diocesan Archivist, 2001, Updated by Gabrielle Saide, Diocesan Archivist, 2023:
Rev Thomas O'Connell, died 19 Sep 1927

Born in Ireland, he came to the Brisbane Diocese in 1900. Rev Thomas O'Connell was put in charge of the Toowoomba Mission from 1881 until 1898 and was responsible for considerable expansion in the Church in Toowoomba. He opened the Church at Greenmount in 1884 and St Patrick's at Highfields. During the 1880s his energies were mainly spent in preparing for the start of the permanent St Patrick's Church in Toowoomba, canvassing funds etc. He continued for six long years, determined not to open the church with any debt. On St Patrick's Day 1889, he saw his dream realised. In 1895 he saw to the building of a new St Mary's Church at Drayton. Pugh's list him as being in Toowoomba in 1909 and 1910. He died aged 75 and is buried in Nudgee Cemetery.
(Ref. Linane O53, Southerwood and Pugh's)

Reproduced by permission of Bishop Ken Howell.

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Denis M. Long, Pioneer and Early Priests, Archdiocese of Brisbane, Deceased or retired by 1929, 2021, pp 182-183:
Fr Thomas O'Connell

Thomas O'Connell was born the son of William and Nellie (nee Egan) O'Connell in the townland of Glengall in Co Tipperary on 26 December 1851.(1) He was baptised in the parish of Ballingarry on 27 December 1851.(2)

The parish of Ballingarry is only a few miles from Thurles. Thomas received his ecclesiastical education at St Patrick's College in Thurles, established in 1837, and opened a missionary department in 1842 to educate and train priests for foreign mission in America and Australia. Fr Thomas O'Connell was ordained a priest in Thurles on 29 June 1876. He arrived in Brisbane late in 1877. He was the oldest priest in the Archdiocese when he died in 1927.

His first appointment was to Warwick as a curate to Fr James Horan. On 1 January 1881 he was appointed as priest-in-charge of the Toowoomba mission to succeed Dr Robert Dunne. He served there until 1898 when he was succeeded by Denis Fouhy.(3)

Dr Neil Byrne informs us that Fr O'Connell had chronic alcohol problems.(4) It appears that about 1898 he had an accident, as his former curate in Toowoomba Fr Richard Walsh

gave some interesting reminiscences of the five years he spent with Fr O'Connell, and touched on the unfortunate accident that had disabled him.(5)

Fr O'Connell was residing at Perkins Street in Sandgate in 1905 and was present at the funeral of his former curate Fr Bailey in 1907. By 1915 he was living at Latrobe Terrace in Paddington (opposite the tram sheds). When Dean Lee opened the new Rosalie presbytery in 1915 he invited Fr O'Connell to reside there.

Dean Lee, deeply respected and loved by his fellow priests, organised the celebrations for Fr O'Connell's sacerdotal golden jubilee on 29 June 1926. The celebration began with a Solemn High Mass in Sacred Heart Church. Dean Lee invited the priests attending the Mass to a luncheon in the Rosalie presbytery. Up to forty priests attended, showing their love and respect for Fr O'Connell and the generosity of the Dean.

As Archbishop Duhig was overseas attending the Eucharistic Congress in Chicago at the time so his vicar-general, Monsignor James Byrne, presided at the Mass.

The occasional sermon was preached by Monsignor Byrne, who said: In the first place on an occasion like this I think it is my duty to express, on behalf of all the priests assembled here this morning, and of the large congregation, our deepest gratitude to the respected and highly esteemed pastor of Rosalie for having given us the opportunity of assembling here today to pay tribute to the oldest of the pioneer priest at present living in Queensland. It is in keeping with Dean Lee's life that he should act up to the occasion, and I feel that I am only voicing the sentiments of everyone concerned when I register to him my deepest gratitude. Fifty years is nothing in the life of the Church. In the life of a nation it does not count for much, but 50 years in the life of an individual means a tremendous thing; it means practically a man's life.

If we go back to the time Father O'Connell was inspired to leave his native land, a young, gifted and energetic priest just raised to the altar of God, we can imagine what a sacrifice it was for him then to give up his home and come out to Australia. Fifty years ago Australia was not much as a country; in was in the eyes of the Irish people a terra incognita. But Ireland was sending emigrants to the new lands and the exiles went to America – to all parts of the world. Young Father O'Connell took his stand in the ranks of these pioneer apostles and registered his name 50 years ago to come out here to Queensland and to perpetuate in the minds of the Irish exiles the glorious privilege of the Australian priest. He took up his position with the pioneer priests and did his part as a man while God left him his health; and his zeal and energy have left for him an imperishable name in Toowoomba.

He was afflicted years ago so that he was compelled to retire from active participation in the work of the priesthood, but how do we know that it was not all for the best. Father O'Connell has watched the little mustard seed grow during the last 50 years into the beautiful tree which now adorns this fair land of Queensland, where he rocked the cradle of catholicity. He helped in the establishment of the faith here, and during the years of his illness he has been alive to pray to Almighty God that the choicest blessings of heaven should fall upon His Church.

We are assembled to congratulate him for all that. Coming now to the end of his life, he would surely say with the Apostle to the Gentiles: 'I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.' That beautiful faith of St Patrick is just as lively this morning in the heart of our jubilarian as it was on the morning of life 50 years ago when he took ship to far-away Queensland. Let our earnest prayer this morning be that what years are left to him might be years of happiness, and the choicest blessings of God may be bestowed upon him until the time when he gives up his apostolic soul. In beseeching God to grant you all the blessings, Father O'Connell, which the present occasion demands, thanking Him for all that He has done in the past and for what He is doing at the present time, we can leave your future with absolute certainty in the hands of a merciful God.(6)

At the Luncheon Dean Lee proposed the toast to the Jubilarian, Handing him a purse of £40. Many present priests added words of congratulation, to which Fr O'Connell replied:

Fr Tom O'Connell, in reply thanked them all very sincerely. He expressed his appreciation especially of the Dean's kindness. When he (Fr Tom) was in hospital without friends, he (Dean Lee) had stood by him and his kindly interest had done much to give him courage to carry on. The old pioneer priests had managed to lay the foundations of the Church in this young country, and on them the younger generation were building a handsome edifice, faithfully and well. He wished for them all God's blessings, and hoped that when it came time to celebrate their golden jubilees they would have much more to their credit than he.(7)

Fifteen months after the celebration Fr Thomas O'Connell died in the Mater Misericordiae Private Hospital on Monday 19 September 1927. He was in his seventy fifth year. In the absence of the archbishop Monsignor James Byrne preside and preached at the Solemn Requiem Mass in Sacred Heart Church Rosalie on 20 September. His dear friends for many years Dean William Lee officiated at Fr O'Connell burial in the priests section of Nudgee Catholic cemetery.(8)

Footnotes
1. Qld, death registration, 1927/B2455
2. NLI, Parish of Ballingarry, baptismal records.
3. Catholic Advocate, Brisbane, 22 Sep 1927 p. 27.
4. Neil Byrne, Robert Dunne – Archbishop of Brisbane, p. 209.
5. Catholic Advocate, Brisbane, 1 Jul 1926 p. 34.
6. Catholic Advocate, Brisbane, op. cit.
7. Ibid.
8. Catholic Advocate, Brisbane, 22 Sep 1927 p. 27

Reproduced by permission of Fr Denis Long.