Where I live there is a Prince Alfred Park, named after the second son of Queen Victoria who visited Australia in 1867-1868. Many Australians may be unaware of the attempted assassination of Prince Alfred on 12 March 1868 at the beach of Clontarf in Sydney, by Henry James O’Farrell.

A Man of Honour is about that attempted assassination. This is a melding of an historical analysis of the event and historical fiction. Sometimes it is difficult to understand what is history and what is fiction. After a slow beginning, you get an interesting analysis of Sydney in the 19th Century, the role of Henry Parkes (who at that time was Colonial Secretary), the Prince, and the would-be assassin himself, O’Farrell.

The debate at the time discussed whether O’Farrell was claiming he was part of a Fenian plot to assassinate the Prince, or acting alone. This was pounced on by Parkes, who saw it as an opportunity to demonstrate his loyalty to the Crown by passing the Treason Felony Act on 18 March, making it an offence to refuse to drink to the Queen’s health. He also tapped into the intense anti-Irish sentiment.

Smith has used many of the official records from the trial and Parkes’ own interviews with O’Farrell to build up a picture of the man. Certainly, by the end of the novel one feels for O’Farrell as his life is revealed.

This is an interesting read about a significant moment in Australian political history that’s important to be told.

Reviewed by Anthony Llewellyn-Evans

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Simon Smith is a respected cinematographer who has spent the last four decades shooting documentaries for Australian TV and film. He has been privileged to hear and record the stories of First Nations communities, survivors of the atom bomb and the genocide of Cambodia, soldiers and artists and thinkers of all kinds the world over. With his camera, he has travelled all over Australia, China, Japan, Indonesia, PNG and Vanuatu, North America and Europe.

‘Someone in our family shot a prince’ was a story told to Simon by his mother when he was a young boy. It thrilled him then, and thrilled him again when he stumbled on it, in magical ways, almost a decade ago. He knew he had to find out more, and tell the world.

Simon plunged into researching the facts behind the family story. Then he began to write. The result is his first novel: A Man of Honour. Simon lives with his partner Ron, and their beloved cat Danny Boy, on Gadigal Land at Darlinghurst – only 100 metres from where his relative, Henry James O’Farrell, was incarcerated, tried and executed.