‘Leap Year Times’ Saturday, February 29th 1992
prepared by Mrs. McGloin’s 4th Class at that time.
Mrs McGloin, our Teacher, thinks that the McDonald children are wonderful.
As we all know, she is very interested in history.
Two years ago, when the Burnaby Farmhouse was falling down, Jason and Fergus Mc Donald were playing in the garden near the house. By a broken window, they found some old letters.
Their sister, Lisa brought these letters into school. It was discovered that they were very important indeed. One of the letters was part of an eye witness account of the death of Colonel Fred Burnaby written by a soldier who was holding his hand when he died in Sudan in 1885.
Another letter was from Disraeli, Prime Minister of England. It is dated 1877 and the address is 10 Downing Street. It congratulates Burnaby on his book, which we think is ‘The Ride to Khiva’.
The third letter is a note from Don Carlos, a Spanish prince, who Burnaby met when he went to Spain during the Carlist wars. This man was a pretender to the Spanish throne. The note is about a dinner inviation and the date is 1882.
These letters are being kept in a safe place until we have our own heritage centre in Greystones.
Well done to our three young historians.
