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 sterling patriot, he established the Geelong and Western District St. Patrick's Society, as a bond of union amongst the Irishmen of the district, and the organisation continues to flourish, and to maintain the principles of loyalty to faith and fatherland which he eloquently enunciated in his opening address.

From its earliest days Geelong has been largely peopled by the Irish. No better evidence of this could be furnished than the significant fact that the address of welcome to Victoria, presented to William Smith O'Brien on his liberation from captivity in Van Diemen's Land, was actually signed by every member of the Geelong Corporation. In the Corporation of Melbourne the address to the exiled patriot was far from meeting with so unanimous and so favourable a reception. And further, when Smith O'Brien