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Dictionary of Sydney

The Dictionary of Sydney
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Ode to Major Lee 1865

The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.

Ode to Major Lee 1865

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National Library of Australia

[Sydney Punch, 14 January 1865, p7 via Trove]

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Subjects

Aging Fishing Poetry

People

Kendall, Henry Major Lee

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Sydney Punch

Natural features

Parsley Bay

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Vaucluse

Buildings

Vaucluse House

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National Library of Australia

Fishing

Poetry

Aging

Major Lee

Fisherman and local identity who lived on the Wentworth estate in a hut at Parsley Bay. He would go outside the heads to fish, catching lobster in Broken Bay, and sell his catch at Circular Quay. In February 1857, he and other fishermen caught a 15ft (4.5m) long shark 'Big Ben' off South Head which was then exhibited at Circular Quay. Described as a 'fighting man', Lee was a participant in Sydney's early boxing scene in the 1830s and 1840s, He was rumoured to have come from a wealthy family and come to Australia after killing a police constable in Dublin.

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Sydney Punch

Illustrated satirical periodical with various publishers from 1864 until 1888. Modelled on the English Punch magazine, Sydney Punch was established in 1864 by Edgar Ray, one of the founders of the older Melbourne Punch.

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Kendall, Henry

Poet whose work celebrating the Australian landscape was popular and widely published during the 1870s and 1880s.

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Parsley Bay

Narrow bay in the eastern suburbs with parkland and suspension bridge that is thought to have been named after the profusion of a native plant resembling parsley growing there.

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Vaucluse

Eastern suburb located on South Head named after Vaucluse House. It is one of Sydney's most expensive suburbs.

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Vaucluse House

Large Gothic-style residence surrounded by a nineteenth-century garden and outhouses on the harbour in Sydney's eastern suburbs. The original cottage was built by Irish convict Henry Browne Hayes in 1805, and he named it and the estate Vaucluse after the village of Fontaine-de-Vaucluse near Avignon in southern France. The house was greatly expanded by William Charles Wentworth after he purchased the estate in 1827. It is now a house museum run by the Historic Houses Trust.

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