W. O. Hodgkinson had been a member of the Burke and Wills expedition in 1860, and crossed Australia as second in command of McKinlay’s party in 1862.
In 1876, he led an expedition sent out by the Queensland Government to explore the north-west country from the Cloncurry to the South Australian boundary. The party was only a small one, but the work was well carried out, and the results were satisfactory and justified the expenditure incurred. They started from Cloncurry, which at that time, 1876, was already a settled mining township, but the country west and south was not well mapped out. They crossed the rolling plains on the Diamantina River, and in their reports describe life in the far west in its natural aspect, the game of the country, the vegetation, the spinifex, the awful sand ridges, and all the details of a journey made at the cold time of the year. The country, according to the vicissitudes of the season, may be either a desert or a meadow, for the rainfall is very uncertain. They followed up the Mulligan River in well-watered country, reaching Mary Lake, on the Georgina, and then on to Lake Coongi in South Australia. Mr. Hodgkinson’s expedition was described in a diction not much used by the old explorers, whose records were made in a matter-of-fact style, with little attention to effect. Nevertheless, his descriptions are eminently interesting and life-like, and have a charm for all who like to read a traveller’s report of an unknown land. Hodgkinson’s name is commemorated by the goldfield named after him, as well as the river upon which it is situated.
G. E. Dalrymple led the north-east coast expedition fitted out by the Queensland Government in 1872. This was altogether a coasting trip by boats, and led to much information about the high values of the rich alluvial lands fringing the banks of the rivers which run into the sea on the east coast of the northern part of Queensland. The Johnstone, the Russell, and Mulgrave Rivers were named by him, as well as the Mossman and Daintree. Here was found most magnificent scenery, and on the Johnstone they discovered some fine cedar (one tree measuring ten feet in diameter), besides a vast extent of rich land fit for sugar growing. All these rivers have since been opened up for cultivation, and sugar-cane, with other tropical products, has taken the place of dense scrubs that then lined the banks of these comparatively unknown rivers—although the boats of the “Rattlesnake” had been into the Russell and Mulgrave Rivers in 1848. The country appeared to Dalrymple to be inhabited by very large numbers of blacks, and game was to be found in abundance. The name of Dalrymple is perpetuated in many places on the map of Queensland. A township on the Burdekin River, as well as several mountains and other remarkable features, have been named after George Elphinstone Dalrymple, who was a splendid type of man in every sense of the word. He was at one time treasurer of the Colony.
A search expedition for Leichhardt was promoted by the ladies of Melbourne, and although very little is recorded of its work, it has a melancholy interest from the fact that the leader, a man of great promise and energy, lost his life in endeavouring to carry out the task entrusted to him, and he now lies in an unmarked grave on the bank of a lonely billabong near the Cloncurry River, a few miles from his brother’s station, Dalgonally.
The expedition was entrusted to Duncan McIntyre, who had found on the Dugald River, during a private expedition in 1861, two horses that belonged to Leichhardt’s last expedition. Mr. McIntyre went out with camels and horses, and formed a depôt camp at Dalgonally station on Julia Creek in 1865. He went on to Burketown, then just opened, for the purpose of buying stores; at the time of his visit the Gulf fever was at its worst, and he took ill and died on his return to the camp. He is spoken of as a man of high attainments and of large experience in bushmanship, and his untimely death was fatal to the objects of the expedition, the leadership of which was assumed by Mr. W. F. Barnett. A short trip was undertaken by him, in company with J. McCalman as second in charge, Dr. White, a medical man, Colin MacIntyre, G. Widish, and Myola, a blackboy. They started with nine camels, six of which were young ones, ten horses, and stores for five months. They travelled westward over the Cloncurry to the Dugald to the camp, marked XLV. of Duncan McIntyre on his first expedition to the Gulf, the camp where he found the two horses that Leichhardt lost on his last trip. Near here is the grave of Davy, one of their blackboys, who died from fever. After travelling over the country in the neighbourhood for a few weeks, and not having any fixed plan or instructions, they returned to the depôt camp. The expedition, which was well equipped, was eventually given up and the party dispersed. In consequence of the death of the leader, no notes of his journey were obtainable. The camels remained on Dalgonally, the property of Mr. Donald McIntyre, for years, and increased to quite a herd. The ladies of Melbourne sent a handsome gravestone suitably inscribed to be erected over the lonely grave of the explorer, but for many years it lay unnoticed on the beach at Thursday Island, and is probably still there.
The trip of Major-General Fielding to Point Parker is in no sense of the term an exploring trip through new country, but rather an exploratory survey for railway purposes through a fairly well settled tract. Nevertheless, some notes of the journey may be found of interest.
In 1881, negotiations were entered into between the late Mr. (afterwards Sir) Thomas McIlwraith, then Premier of Queensland, and a syndicate called Henry Kimber and Co., to construct a railway on the land grant principle, between Roma and Point Parker, on the Gulf of Carpentaria. These negotiations resulted in the formation of a larger syndicate called the Australian Transcontinental Railway Syndicate, Limited, which initiated their scheme by making certain proposals to the Government of Queensland, and sending out General Fielding to traverse the proposed route in 1882.