Item 1 - The Diocese of Sydney - circular letter from Bishop Frederic Barker

Frederic Barker was born in Derbyshire, England, studied at Cambridge and was ordained in 1832. After a tour of Ireland for the Irish Home Mission Society he became Rector of St Mary's Edge Hill, near Liverpool (1835-1853). He married Jane Sophia Harden in 1840. In 1855 he was appointed Bishop of Sydney and Metropolitan of Australia, and he and Jane sailed to Sydney. He oversaw the foundation of Moore College and St Paul's College at the University of Sydney, as well as the formation of the Church Society in 1856. After Jane's death in 1876 he married Mary Jane Woods in 1878. In 1880 he travelled to England and then to Italy, in order to improve his health, but died in San Remo in 1882. Mary Jane died in 1910.