Rev Joseph Collier

Title:

Rev

First Name:

Joseph

Middle Names:

Blake

Preferred Name:

Surname:

Collier

Order:

Date of Birth:

Place of Birth:

Cruicetown, Co Louth

Country of Birth:

Ireland

Date of Ordination:

1878

Place of Ordination:

Country of Ordination:

Ireland

Ordination Diocese:

Ballarat

Seminary:

Date of Death:

20-Apr-1929

Place of Death:

Country of Death:

Date of Burial:

Place of Burial:

Country of Burial:

Find A Grave URL:


Appointments Table

Diocese
Place
Role
Start Day
Start Month
Start Year
End Day
End Month
End Year
Source
Ballarat Ballarat18781879Linane Vol 2
Ballarat Inglewood18791881Linane Vol 2
Ballarat Carisbrook/Maryborough18811886Linane Vol 2
Ballarat KoroitLinane Vol 2
Ballarat St ArnaudLinane Vol 2
Sale ?18881889Linane Vol 2
Adelaide North Adelaide1892Linane Vol 2
Adelaide Kadina1893Linane Vol 2
Adelaide West Terrace/Cathedral1899Linane Vol 2
Items per page:
0 of 0


Biographical Notes

Fr T.J. Linane, From Abel to Zundolovich, Vol. 2: Biographies of Priests on the Australian Scene up to 1900, 1980, pp 65-66:

Collier, James Blake, Irish, Golden Jubilarian
Service in Ballarat, Adelaide, and South Africa
A versatile and much-travelled man. He was born in Cruicetown, County Louth, and educated at St. Kyran's Kilkenny . A study of the Ballarat priests shows he is the only one educated at St. Kyran's to come to the Ballarat Diocese. Ordination took place at the hand of Cardinal McCabe in 1878, and he arrived in Melbourne on the 'Keats' in July of that year. Very soon he achieved notoriety as a Catechism teacher and preacher. Ballarat itself was the first place of service, 1878-9; then Inglewood, 1879-1881. While on the Carisbrook-Maryborough Mission from 1881 to 1886 he achieved further notoriety - becoming embroiled in a libel case against the 'Maryborough Standard'. The newspaper charge was that he was extorting monies from parishioners. Probably the newspaper should have said that he was being generously given money - an outcome of his eloquence. The complainant was awarded damages of £250, - a victory that priests seldom won in 'blarneys' with 19th century parochial newspapers. The £250 helped him make an overseas trip to Ireland in 1886. When he returned he was far from being in good standing with the difficult Bishop, James Moore. Short stays in Koroit and in St. Arnaud, where he had a brother practising as a doctor, ended his Ballarat career. Obtaining an 'exeat' he went off to the short-staffed diocese of Sale. But the stay there about 1888-9 was very short, so bags were packed for Adelaide. North Adelaide (1892); Kadina (1893) and West Terrace (Cathedral) are the Directory tracings. In 1899 he left for South Africa and gave thirty faithful years of service. A report of his death in the Melbourne Advocate indicates that he died at Port Elizabeth in July 1929. The age was 77 and so he had attained a Golden Jubilee.
(Footprints, Vol. 2, No. 8)
Ref.: MDHC File, Torquay.

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A Prayer-Calendar of Deceased Priests & Deacons in Australia 1788-2009, compiled by W.T. Southerwood, Sixth Edition, 2009, p 51: Joseph Blake Collier, died 20 April 1929.