Thomas Ulick Burke (1826–1867) was a well-known figure in gold-rush Victoria, Australia, famous as the victim of the "Break O' Day" aka "Scarsdale" aka "Piggoreet" murder.
Thomas Ulick Burke (1826–1867) was a well-known figure in gold-rush Victoria, Australia, famous as the victim of the "Break O' Day" aka "Scarsdale" aka "Piggoreet" murder.
Life
Thomas Burke was born in 1826 in Normandy to a military family based in County Galway, Ireland. His parents were Captain John Burke of Her Majesty's 16th Lancers, Tiaquin, County Galway, and Jane Lowe.
Burke emigrated to Australia in 1858 from Ireland, where he had been working for the Provincial Bank of Ireland at Limerick. He arrived during the Victorian gold rush, moving first to Melbourne where he worked for the Bank of Australasia, before becoming manager of the Smythesdale branch of the bank around 1860. Smythesdale in the 1860s was a prosperous gold-mining town on the Woady Yaloak River in an area which supported a large though itinerant population of miners and other workers.
