Robert O'Hara Burke

St Clerans, near Craughwell in County Galway, is the birthplace of Robert O'Hara Burke, the Irish officer who later led the first successful south-north crossing of Australia before dying on that continent in 1861. A small West of Ireland village became world-known only because a restless young man left it for armies, police work and distant danger. Burke's fate still gives the place an edge: ordinary Galway soil produced one of Australia's most tragic explorers.