Captain Benjamin DarleyPrint Page

The plaque, erected by the parishioners. commemorates Captain Benjamin Darley who in 1864 gave the land on which the church is erected. 

In 1864, Captain Benjamin Darley and his wife Katherine, the daughter of D'Arcy Wentworth, one of Manly's earliest and largest landholders, gave the Anglican Bishop of Sydney a 200 foot frontage on the Corso for a new church, parsonage and schoolhouse. 

"When I gave advice to the rector of St. Matthew's (Mr. Ebbs) on the erection of the church on this site, I was not aware that it was the original of the first temporary church in Manly in 1843." said the Coadjutor Bishop, Right Rev. d'Arcy Irvine, in his address at the opening of the new St. Matthew's Church yesterday. The church was erected at a cost of £18,000, nearly two-thirds of which has been paid. The site was presented to the Church of England by the late Captain Darley, to whose memory a tablet has been erected. The new £2500 organ, which was presented by Sir William Macpherson (ex-Premier of Victoria), in memory of the late Lady Macpherson, before her marriage a resident of Manly, will be installed next week. The Governor (Sir Philip Game) and Lady Game will attend the church today, when Rev. A. Klllworth will conduct the service. 
Sun (Sydney), 21 September 1930.

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