Summary heading
Person registration completed as part of the Prime Ministers
Papers Project (December 2001).
Career within Commonwealth
Veronica (Vera) Catherine Forde (nee O’Reilly), daughter of an
Irish immigrant J K O’Reilly, was born in Wagga Wagga, NSW. Prior to her
marriage she was prominent in raising funds for the Catholic cathedral in her
home town and was President of the Mt Erin Ex-Students’ Association. She
married Francis (Frank) Michael Forde in February 1925. He was then aged 35 and
an ALP backbencher in the House of Representatives. They had four children
(three daughters and a son).
Vera avoided political involvement but played a supportive
role during her husband’s early Ministerial career in the 1930s, and during the
several occasions when he was Acting Prime Minister during World War II. In the
latter period the family moved from their home in Queensland to live in Strathfield
in Sydney. Vera became Chairwoman of CUSA and was active in other wartime
organisations.
In early 1945, Vera Forde accompanied her husband to the
Commonwealth Ministers’ Conference in London and then to the United Nations
Conference in San Francisco. She was on the first direct Washington-London
flight that year when oxygen masks were worn. Shortly after their return to
Australia in July 1945 she became Prime Minister’s wife for one week, following
the death of John Curtin. When Forde was appointed Australian High Commissioner
to Canada in 1946, the family moved to Ottawa where they lived until 1953. On returning
to Australia, they lived in St Lucia, Brisbane. For some years Vera was a member
of the Catholic Daughters of Australia and a member of the ladies committee of
Holy Spirit Hospital, Brisbane.
Reputed to be warm-hearted and unaffected, Vera Forde died
in Brisbane in November 1967. She is buried in Toowong Cemetery and was
outlived by her husband by 15 years.
Links to other Commonwealth Persons
25 Feb 1925 – 9 Nov 1967: CP 81, The Rt Hon Francis Michael
FORDE PC
Publications
End notes
Sources
Catholic Weekly. 23 Nov 1967, p6
Courier Mail, 10 Nov 1967, p3
Grattan, Michelle, ed, Australian Prime Ministers (Sydney,
New Holland Publishers, 2000), pp242-244
Herald, Melbourne, 1 Dec 1976, p27
Who’s Who in Australia 1965 (18th ed) and
1980 (23rd ed)