Maria Carden Abbot arrived in the Port Phillip District of the Colony of New South Wales on board the sailing ship 'Branken Moor', on the 3^rd December 1841.

Maria was 19  years of age when she sailed for Australia by herself.  One must wonder why Maria had the need to leave her home, family and security to come such a long way to make a new life for herself in a country so far from her native Ireland.

Maria had been born into a family of the Landed Gentry of Ireland.  Her great-uncle was Sir Henry Carden 1792-1847 the head of the Carden Family in Ireland when Maria left for Australia, and her grand-father was Nicholas Carden Esq.

Maria herself was born at 'Jockey Hall'.  Jockey Hall, her family home,  and was about half a mile south of  Templemore, and on maps of the area the Jockey Hall site was surrounded by a 30 acre area of land.

Maria's mother, Elizabeth and her father William Abbot were probably ostracised by members of the other Carden Families, who all lived in and around the area of Templemore, Co. Tipperary, Ireland.  Maria was a Catholic and  her Catholic religion would have been intolerable and unacceptable to them, as the families of Carden did not appear to recognise a Catholic marriage as legitimate.  (It is unknown when this family took on the Catholic faith, it could possibly have been with either her parents or her grand-father.).

There is a lot of guess work in trying to piece together the reasons  why Maria Carden Abbot made the decision to leave Ireland.  By the 1930's, Carden families were no longer resident in Tipperary and had returned to live permanently in the U.K.   Perhaps at a later date more information will come to light that will answer some of the questions that must be left unanswered at the present time.  It is very hard to find information in Ireland during this period because of the destruction of so many Government Documentation and records held by the Churches in this area. There had been many years of  fighting between the English and the Irish, of whom the Carden Family were the unwelcome interlopers in Ireland from the mid 1600's to the 1930.