Alfonso Bernard O'Reilly (3 September 1903 – 20 January 1975) was an Australian writer and

bushman The San peoples (also Saan), or Bushmen, are the members of any of the indigenous hunter-gatherer cultures of southern Africa, and the oldest surviving cultures of the region. They are thought to have diverged from other humans 100,000 to 200 ...

of Irish descent. He was born and raised in

Hartley Hartley may refer to: Places Australia *Hartley, New South Wales * Hartley, South Australia ** Electoral district of Hartley, a state electoral district Canada * Hartley Bay, British Columbia United Kingdom * Hartley, Cumbria * Hartley, P ...

in the Blue Mountains, about north-west of Sydney and later moved to the

McPherson Range The McPherson Range is an extensive mountain range, a spur of the Great Dividing Range, heading in an easterly direction from near Wallangarra, Queensland, Wallangarra to the Pacific Ocean coastline. It forms part of the Scenic Rim on the border ...

near Beaudesert in

South East Queensland South East Queensland (SEQ) is a Bioregion, bio-geographical, Megalopolis, metropolitan and Statistics, statistical Regions of Queensland, region of the States and territories of Australia, state of Queensland in Australia, with a population of ...

, Australia. He is part of the family that established the

O'Reilly's Guesthouse O'Reilly's Rainforest Retreat is a tourist destination in the Suburbs and localities (Australia), locality of O'Reilly, Queensland, O'Reilly, Scenic Rim Region, Queensland, Australia. It is situated in the heart of the Lamington National Park, tw ...

in the

Lamington Plateau The Lamington National Park is a national park in the McPherson Range on the Queensland/New South Wales border in Australia. From Southport on the Gold Coast the park is to the southwest and Brisbane is north. The Lamington National Park is k ...

. On 20 August 1931 Bernard O'Reilly married Viola Gwendoline King in Brisbane. They had a daughter, Rhelma.

Plane crash rescue

O'Reilly is best known for the discovery of the 1937 crash site in

Lamington National Park The Lamington National Park is a national park in the McPherson Range on the Queensland/New South Wales border in Australia. From Southport, Queensland, Southport on the Gold Coast, Australia, Gold Coast the park is to the southwest and Brisbane ...

of a

Stinson Model A The Stinson Model A was a moderately successful airliner of the mid-1930s. It was one of the last commercial airliners designed in the United States with a fabric-covered steel tube fuselage before the introduction of stressed skin alumin ...

airplane, the ''VH-UHH Brisbane'', and the organization of rescue crews that retrieved two survivors. Using his bushcraft and geographical knowledge, as well as inferring from the plane's filed flight plan, O'Reilly found the crash site. On the second day of his search he came upon two survivors and the wreckage of the aircraft in the extremely rugged and mountainous rainforest terrain. He then trekked through the same difficult terrain to get help and return the next day with rescuers. The rescue operation gained national headlines with reports broadcast live on the radio. At a ceremony in Sydney, O'Reilly was presented with a plaque and a cheque raised by public subscription. At the ceremony he paid tribute to the two survivors and one of the five victims, Jim Westray, who died from exposure after breaking his ankle and crawling several miles while trying to get help for the others. In years afterward, O'Reilly's nephew, Peter O'Reilly, organized bush tours recreating his uncle's "remarkable feat."

Published works

O'Reilly wrote three books on the theme of Australia's

Great Dividing Range The Great Dividing Range, also known as the East Australian Cordillera or the Eastern Highlands, is a cordillera system in eastern Australia consisting of an expansive collection of mountain ranges, plateaus and rolling hills. It runs roughl ...

, which lies inland from its east coast and is where he lived: ''Green Mountains'' (1940, ), ''Cullenbenbong'' (1945, ), and ''Over the Hills'' (1963, ). The first part of ''Green Mountains'' is his own account of finding the aeroplane; the second part describes the O'Reilly family's early years in the Blue Mountains and their move to Lamington. This and ''Cullenbenong'' were the inspiration for Charles Chauvel's 1949 film ''

Sons of Matthew ''Sons of Matthew'' is a 1949 Australian film directed and produced and co-written by Charles Chauvel (filmmaker), Charles Chauvel. The film was shot in 1947 on location in Queensland, Australia, and the studio sequences in Sydney. ''Sons of Matt ...

''. In 1971 he published a collection of poems, ''Songs from the Hills'', . The Australian philosopher

David Stove David Charles Stove (15 September 1927 – 2 June 1994) was an Australian philosopher whose writings often challenged prevailing academic orthodoxy. He was known for his critiques of postmodernism, feminism, and multiculturalism. Philosophy Hi ...

has written a short appreciation of O'Reilly's life and books. O'Reilly was played by Jack Thompson in the TV movie ''

The Riddle of the Stinson ''The Riddle of the Stinson'' is a 1987 Australian television film about the 1937 Airlines of Australia Stinson crash at Lamington, Queensland, Australia and the rescue of its survivors by local Queenslander Bernard O'Reilly (author), Bernard O'Re ...

'' (1987).

Later life

Bernard O'Reilly died on 20 January 1975 at Beaudesert. He is buried at St Johns Catholic Church in Kerry.

References

External links

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Bernard O'Reilly

AustLit AustLit: The Australian Literature Resource (also known as AustLit: Australian Literature Gateway; and AustLit: The Resource for Australian Literature) is a national bio-bibliographical database of Australian literature. It is an internet-based, ...

Bernard O'Reilly

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1975 deaths 20th-century Australian non-fiction writers Australian people of Irish descent Writers from Queensland 1903 births {{Australia-writer-stub