Hmmmmm...

A lot of what I thought I remembered wasn't there ... maybe it's further down in longer quotes ... read in more detail ... elsewhere ...? Anyway, these are the first four items quoted:

1919 Huon Times (Franklin) 24 Jan. 4/3 The nigger crew is making merry with the Diridgery doo and the eternal ya-ya-ya ye-ye-ye cry.

1919 Smith's Weekly (Sydney) 5 Apr. 15/1 The Northern Territory aborigines have an infernal—allegedly musical—instrument, composed of two feet of hollow bamboo. It produces but one sound—'didjerry, didjerry, didjerry—' and so on ad infinitum. … When a couple of niggers started grinding their infernal 'didjerry' half the hot night through, the blasphemous manager decided on revenge.

1924 Bulletin (Sydney) 18 Dec. 24/1 Didjeridoo—didjeridoo! A blackfellow blows through a length of bamboo.

1925 M. Terry Across Unknown Aust. 190 The didjiri-du … is a long hollow tube, often a tree root about 5 feet long, slightly curved at the lower end. The musician squats on the ground, resting his instrument on the earth. He fits his mouth into the straight or upper end and blows down it in a curious fashion. He produces an intermittent drone.

[It may also be that I read some of these quotes in rather more "politically correct(ed)" form!] Anyway, there id no doubt that all the authors of the earliest citations were sure that the instrument made a "~ didgery sound" - so there is no foundation for the invention of a very convoluted fake Oirish source for the name!

Regard(les)s,

Bob