The Irishman Eugene Francis O’Beirne (or O’Byrne) (b. ca. 1810, d. sometime after 1864) accompanied the English travellers Milton and Cheadle. Cheadle, Milton, O’Beirne, and four native Indians crossed the Yellowhead Pass in 1863. Nearly starving in the North Thompson Country, they safely reached Kamloops, where O’Beirne separated and proceeded to Victoria. After working there as a church secretary, he went to San Francisco, and later to Australia “where, upon occasion, he enlivens the bush fireside by an account of hair-breadth escapes during that terrible journey across the Rocky Mountains.’” In Milton and Cheadle’s book, The North West Passage by Land, O’Beirne appears as a bumbling loudmouth, a Bible-quoting lush whose cowardice continually landed the party in trouble. George Grant, who travelled through the pass with Sanford Fleming in 1872, corroborated Milton and Cheadle’ account on several points, including that of the character of Mr O’B.

O’Beirne, a graduate of Cambridge University, arrived in the Red River settlement (in present-day Manitoba) in 1861, after stays in India and the United States. In the spring of 1862, O’Beirne accompanied one of the group of Overlanders (adventurers from eastern Canada bound for the Cariboo goldfields) to Fort Carleton. From Fort Carleton, the Hudson’s Bay Company sent him upriver to Fort Edmonton. At Fort Edmonton, Milton and Cheadle reported that they “made the acquaintance of Mr. O’B., a gentleman of considerable classical attainments, on his way to British Columbia. Altogether his appearance showed a curious mixture of the clerical with the rustic. His speech was rich with the brogue of his native isle, and his discourse ornamented with numerous quotations from the ancient classics.” O’Beirne begged to accompany Milton and Cheadle to British Columbia. In spite of the grumblings of their Indian guides, the Englishmen acquiesced and O’Beirne joined the party. The Hudson’s Bay Company servants at the post donated ten pounds to buy the Irishman a horse. They arrived at Kamloops three months later, ragged and half-starved. O’Beirne had proved to be a helpless, quarrelsome, and uncooperative companion, although possibly his behaviour can be partially explained by the defects of his character and physique, and the fact that he was twice the age of his two hosts.
At Kamloops, Milton and Cheadle gave him supplies and arranged for him to proceed alone to Victoria.