The Canfell Brothers

Mick Canfell

The three Canfell brothers came to Lightning Ridge in 1903, and were amongst the earliest miners on the field. They were shearers, as most early miners were.

Sons of Patrick “Paddy” Canfell and Mary Birercree Berkery, Mick was born in 1874.

Michael “Mick” Berkery Canfell married Elizabeth Kings from Angledool, in 1907. They had seven children. Daughter Morilla 'Milly' was born in 1910. In later life, Milly would go on to marry Jack Murray Jr, son of John “Jack” Murray.

The Canfell miners are remembered by the opal field bearing their name. (The name of the field is often misspelled on maps as Cantwells, Camphills or Cantrills!)

In 1916, after having some success with opal mining, the Canfell brothers bought a property and moved to near Bollon, Queensland. Mick’s wife Elizabeth died in 1932, so he brought his four children back to the Ridge in 1937 and took over Albert Dominick's store and card rooms.

Mick went mining and his older daughter Violet managed the mixed business and two youngest, Joyce and Francis both attended school. When son Michael Joseph (aka “Bob”) died in 1941, Mick sent the youngsters to Milly in Bollon. He continued mining and, in 1941, he remarried Elsie Kezia King (nee Bruton), who had come from White Cliffs with her husband Tom King in 1910. Elsie died in March of 1982 at Lightning Ridge.

Mick Canfell died on 25 June 1957, and is buried at Grandchester Cemetery, Ipswich, Queensland.

Tom and Jim Canfell

Tom Canfell was born in 1876 in Darling Downs, Queensland, Jim was born in 1886 in Orange, NSW. Both were opal miners alongside brother Mick at Lightning Ridge. Tom passed away 31 August 1942, in Dirranbandi, Queensland. Jim passed away in 1950, drowning in the Castlereagh River at Coonamble.

Mick, Tom and James Canfell’s signatures sourced from a petition for a post office agency at the Three Mile Flat, circa 1912.

Article: Research by Leisa Carney, edited by Russell Gawthorpe. LRHS research compiled by Len Cram and Barbara Moritz. Sources: Lightning Ridge - The Home of the Black Opal: Unique to the World, Gan Bruce, 1983. pp. 75-76, 115; The Opal Book, Frank Leechman, 1961, p. 66; Lightning Flash Newspaper, 2 June 1994, p. 22; ‘Drowning Tragedy in Coonamble’, Gilgandra Weekly, 21 Dec 1950, p. 6.