One of the expeditions in search of Burke and Wills was led by John McKinlay, who travelled through a great part of North Queensland, and reported favourably on its capacity for settlement. He started from Adelaide in August, 1861, and arrived at the Albert River in May, 1862, thus crossing the continent a second time. He was a bushman well fitted for such an enterprise by experience, endurance, and decision. The second in command was W. O. Hodgkinson, subsequently Minister for Mines in Queensland. McKinlay found a grave near Cooper’s Creek which he examined, and found a European buried there, which he understood from the natives to be a white man killed by them, but afterwards it was known to have been Gray’s burial place. The party made an excursion into the melancholy desert country described by Sturt many years before, consisting of dry lakes, red sand hills, and stones. They travelled through to the Cloncurry district, and onwards to the Gulf, passing through country now under occupation, Fort Constantine, Clonagh, and Conobie being the principal stations there, and thence over the Leichhardt River to the Albert, which was reached on May 13th. McKinlay expected to receive supplies from the “Victoria,” but she had sailed three months before, and thus short of provisions and generally hard up, he had to tackle a long overland journey to the settlements on the eastern side of North Queensland, a most trying and harassing undertaking, which, however, he accomplished successfully. He had first to eat the cattle, then the horses, then the camels. They killed their last camel for food—it was called “Siva”—and it proved a saviour, as they arrived at Harvey and Somer’s station, on the Bowen, with their last piece of camel meat, and one horse each left. They had a hard rough trip from the Gulf, travelling in by the Burdekin, and McKinlay proved himself a daring and most persevering and experienced explorer. The McKinlay River—a branch of the Cloncurry—and the township of McKinlay are named after him.
Though not pertaining to any exploration or discovery connected with North Queensland, it will be interesting to refer shortly to the Horn Exploring Expedition which was carried out on a scientific basis to make known the country in the more central part of the Australian continent. The scientific exploration of central Australia, or that part known as the Macdonnell Ranges, had long been desired by the leading scientific men of Australia. The party consisted of sixteen in all, with twenty-six camels, and two horses, and made a final start from Oodnadatta (which is the northern terminal point of the railway from Adelaide), on May 6th, 1894.
In the very centre of the continent there exists an elevated tract of country known as the Macdonnell Ranges. These mountains, barren and rugged in the extreme, rise to an altitude of nearly 5,000 feet above sea level, while the country surrounding them has an elevation of about 2,000 feet above the sea level, and slopes away towards the coast on every side, which at no point is nearer than 1,000 miles. The mountains are at the head of the Finke River; the region is called Larapintine from the native name of the river. The existence of these ranges saves that portion of the continent from being an absolute desert, as they catch the tropical showers, which flow down the sides of the mountains, and cause inundations in the low country, and a spring of grass, which, however, is not permanent, the rainfall being from five to twelve inches annually. These ranges measure, from east to west, about 400 miles, with a width of from twenty to fifty miles, the entire area covering more than 10,000 square miles of country. Apart from these ranges, there are several remarkable isolated masses, about 32 miles S.S.W. from Lake Amadeus. Rising like an enormous water-worn boulder, half buried in the surrounding sea of sand hills, is that remarkable monolith known as “Ayers’ Rock.” Its summit can be seen more than forty miles away, as it rises about 1,100 feet above the surrounding plain. The circumference at its base is nearly five miles, and its sides are so steep as to be practically inaccessible, although Mr. W. C. Gosse, the explorer, succeeded with great difficulty in ascending it. It is quite bare of vegetation, except a few fig trees growing in the crevices. Fifteen miles west of Ayers’ Rock is another remarkable mountain mass called Mount Olga, rising to 1,500 feet from the plain. The Finke River flows south from these Macdonnell Ranges towards Lake Eyre, and water is only found after floods. Both alluvial gold and quartz reefs are found in the ranges. Professor Ralph Tate, of the University of Adelaide, and Mr. J. A. Watt, of the Sydney University, assisted in drawing up the report.
CHAPTER IV.
EXPLORERS IN NORTH QUEENSLAND.
The second journey of Edmund Kennedy, in 1848, was confined to the east coast of North Queensland, and is one of the most mournful narratives of disaster and death; only three of the party returning out of the thirteen that started.
The party was hampered with an unsuitable outfit of drays, as well as some undesirable men, unused to the bush and out of accord with the objects of an exploring expedition.
The members of a party going into an unknown country have to depend on the fidelity of each to all, and according to the devotion displayed by each, so will success or failure attend the expedition. Kennedy had men in his party he had better have left behind.
His troubles and trials commenced after landing at Rockingham Bay, near the site of the present town of Cardwell, in trying to pass over swamps, and then cutting his way through tangled, dark, vine-scrubs to the summit of the steepest ranges in North Queensland. They were obliged to leave their carts and harness behind, and wasted much time in looking for a place to ascend the ranges. They quarrelled with the blacks soon after starting, and some of the men took fever. They reached the Herbert, and went into the heads of the Mitchell and Palmer Rivers, passing over the site of the Palmer goldfield. Here the strength of the party began to fail, and horse flesh was their main dependence for food. At Weymouth Bay, Carron and seven men were left, all sick with disappointment and hardship, and in a low state of health. Kennedy and Jacky, with three men, pushed on along the coast northwards to Cape York. One man was wounded by a gun accident, and he and the other two were left at Pudding Pan Hill, and were never heard of again. The leader and Jacky went on, intending to return to the scattered party. They were followed by hostile blacks, who speared the horses, and afterwards mortally wounded Kennedy himself, who died in Jacky’s arms. Jacky himself was also speared, but he buried his leader in a grave dug with a tomahawk, and after many hairbreadth escapes and much privation, he reached the northern shore, where the “Ariel” was waiting for the arrival of the party. Only one man, and he an aboriginal, endured to the end, and but for his keen bush knowledge, courage, and splendid devotion, neither of the two other survivors would have been rescued, nor any tidings of the mournful fate of the party have been made known to the world. The “Ariel” sailed to Weymouth Bay, and found the two men, Carron and Goddard, barely alive, the only survivors of the eight left there by Kennedy.