The Eliza Kennedy Epitaph and the missing grave.

Grave of Eliza Kennedy

Eliza Kennedy's Headstone Cobham Lake NSW

Eliza Kennedy’s grave is beside the Silver City Highway on the sandy bank of Cobham Lake. Apparently the lake was quite deep once but silted up in the dry years. The gravestone is broken and the first word of her epitaph is difficult to read:

"Her(?) charity covereth a multitude of sins".

In 1987 I met up with Harry Blore, an old tank plasterer at Milparinka.

Harry said she lived and worked at Granny Blore's Tavern, on the edge of the lake, after her husband, a sailor, had left her in Adelaide. He said she was prone to fits and may have drowned during a seizure.

Then an elderly lady in Tibooburra suggested Eliza may have worked as a prostitute at the tavern. She told me that Eliza drowned while trying to save the tavern keeper’s two young daughters who got into difficulties while swimming in the lake.

I assume the headstone refers to her bravery somehow being seen as a balance for her perceived lack of morals.

I have looked around the lake for the ruins of the tavern and found a lot of rubbish and bottles on the NE corner of the lake, but I'm not sure if this is where it was. Does any one know any more about this headstone?

Another mystery along the Highway is the disappearance of the grave at the White Cliffs turn off.

I was told many years ago that it was the grave of an Aboriginal bloke from Tibooburra. He apparently hitched a ride back to Tibooburra from Broken Hill with Blake Whitehair, the original owner of the Corner Country Store.

Blake had his old truck loaded with store supplies and made his passenger ride on top of the load. The bloke then went to sleep and was thrown off on a rough section of the road and was killed.

He was buried where he was found and the grave had a wood post and netting fence built around it.

Sometime in the 90’s the intersection was re aligned and all trace of the grave disappeared.



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