Profile
The Teirney family was another pioneer family who came to Swanson in the mid 1880s under the homestead settlement scheme. The family left Ireland as O’ Tierney, arriving in Auckland on the Waitangi in 1874. Laurence Teirney went to work as a groom on the Dilworth Estate, living in Wakefield Street in the city. When he and wife Bridget moved to Swanson, Laurence helped with religious instruction at the school and the building of the Catholic church. One of the daughters, Mary Teirney married Henry James Cobb in the church on 25 January 1899. This was the second marriage celebrated in the church before it burned down.
In October 1895 Laurence was elected as one of the first six trustees of Swanson Cemetery.
Ellen (Nell) Teirney’s husband-to-be Dick McGrath was killed shortly before their marriage by a falling tree. She never married and spent her 50 years looking after priests. She had a lifelong association with the district and with the new church at Ranui.
At some stage it seems that Laurence ran a horse drawn cab business, assisted by his eldest son Pat. Bridget Teirney was left to run the farm at Swanson and bring up the children. Bridget Teirney died in 1904 of blood poisoning through an accident with a needle. Family descendents recall they “would have starved” but for Bridget’s garden during hard times.
