Early Days in North Queensland

by Edward Palmer

Suttor Creek station then belonged to Kirk and Sutherland, and was the farthest out station in that direction. On arriving at Bully Creek, a dry stage ahead of forty-five miles, caused the leader to leave 1,500 head behind him, the balance arriving at their destination on October 12th, 1862. Mr. R. Kerr was in charge, with four white stockmen, one blackboy, three gins, and a white man named Maurice Donohue, who died before he had been there very long, and was doubtless the first white man buried in the district. In the following year, 1863, a drought occurred on the Thomson, the plains were left destitute of grass, and the waterhole, on the banks of which the station was formed, was reduced to two feet in depth. When full there would be about eighteen feet of water in it, and it was afterwards found that it took eighteen months without rain to bring it down to that level. In about March of this year, Messrs. Rule and Lacy, as also Mr. Raven, arrived on Aramac Creek with sheep, the former taking up and stocking the country now known as Aramac station. Mr. Raven first settling down higher up the creek, afterwards returned to Stainburne, taking up and stocking the present Stainburne Downs. At the same time that these sheep arrived at the Aramac, three thousand cows from the Narran (N.S.W.) arrived on Bowen Downs, Messrs. Hill and Bloxham in charge; all these stock went out by the Barcoo, and the cattle suffered severely from the effects of the drought, one thousand head being lost en route. Four of the party, Messrs. Hill, Bloxham, Burkett, and Best, who took out these cows to Bowen Downs, decided to go upon an exploring trip on their own account. They went up Landsborough Creek, and on to the Flinders River, intending to go to Bowen; after getting over the Range on the east side of the Flinders, it commenced to rain, and continued an incessant downpour for four days, making the country so boggy that they could not travel; some of their horses died, and some got crippled by getting bogged among the rocks; so they decided to return to Bowen Downs. They got down from the ranges into one of the gorges, and then Mr. Best was laid up with rheumatic fever, and was unable to travel. Their supplies ran short, and they had to kill some of their horses for food; by the time Mr. Best was able to move, they had only three horses left; so they decided to kill one of these, take a portion of the flesh with them, and walk to Bowen Downs for assistance, leaving Mr. Best behind, as he was still unfit to travel. They left the two horses with him, and the remainder of the horse they had killed, jerking the meat for him before they started. The three then began their tramp, Mr. Bloxham being leader and guide; they promised to be back in twenty-eight days, and urged Mr. Best to remain where they were leaving him, but if he did move to be sure to follow their tracks. They also gave him directions as to the route to follow to reach Bowen Downs. They got to Bowen Downs in due course, after surmounting innumerable difficulties. Mr. Bloxham, who was the oldest of the party, was very weak on arrival, and suffering severely from the consequences of subsisting on jerked horse flesh; they were all wearing horse hide sandals, their boots being worn out. After several days spell, Mr. Bloxham made up a party and went to the rescue of the man left behind. The other two left for civilisation. The rescue party met Mr. Best on the twenty-ninth day from leaving him, a few miles from his camp. He had stayed the twenty-eight days as agreed, and started in on the twenty-ninth. They, of course, were very glad to find him, and the meeting was mutually satisfactory. During his sojourn in the gorge, Mr. Best only saw the blacks once; and then he fired his gun off to attract their attention, but they took no notice of him. Another report said that as he had been using his gun as a crutch, the muzzle had got blocked up with mud, and when he fired it off to scare the blacks away the gun burst with such a terrible roar that they never ventured near him again.

The first pioneer to stock country on the Flinders was James Gibson, who took up a run called the Prairie, in 1861. He also stocked several runs in the neighbourhood and on the Clarke River. He started two lots of cattle from the Barwon (N.S.W.), one in charge of Mr. E. R. Edkins, now of Mount Cornish, the other mob in charge of Mr. George Sautelle, now long settled at Byrimine station, near Cloncurry. These cattle passed by Goondiwindi, through the Downs country, by Yandilla, to the Dawson, by Rockhampton, and then by Fort Cooper and Bowen on to the Clarke River. These, according to the Land Office records, were the first runs taken up in the pastoral district of Burke. Their cattle were supplemented by other large mobs, all destined to form new stations in the far north, in connection with Mr. W. Glen Walker, of Sydney, an enterprising and speculative merchant. In 1864 the country first taken up by this firm was sold or transferred, and the cattle (as many as ten thousand head), were removed to the Lower Flinders then quite unoccupied. They travelled through Betts’ Gorge, a creek forcing its way through the basalt to join the Flinders. A large stretch of well-watered country on the Saxby Creek, known as Taldora and Millungerra was taken up by James Gibson in 1864.

The first man to open the way to the Albert at Burketown was Mr. N. Buchanan, with cattle from Mount Cornish and Bowen Downs on the Thomson River; he selected Beame’s Brook station on the Albert, eighteen miles above the present site of Burketown, and also occupied another run on the Landsborough River, a tributary of the Leichhardt, on a waterhole about twelve miles long. Following him in order of succession came Mr. J. G. Macdonald’s cattle from the Burdekin. These travelled by a different route via the Einasleigh and Etheridge Rivers, the latter called after Mr. D. O. Etheridge, one of the overlanders, a man long resident there afterwards, and well known. They followed the route opened up by Mr. J. G. Macdonald when on his private exploring expedition to the Gulf country a year or two before. The country this stock occupied was on the Leichhardt River, at a place called Floraville, situated where a great bar of rocks crosses the river above all tidal waters, the falls being about twenty feet in height. Another run this firm took up at the same time was situated on the Gregory River, and called Gregory Downs; but this country was abandoned later on, and is now held by Watson Bros.; it is an excellent piece of well-grassed cattle country, watered by the finest perennial river in North Queensland, a clear, flowing stream of water, shaded by palms, pandanus, and ti-trees. The Gregory River, named by the late Mr. W. Landsborough in honor of the Honorable A. C. Gregory, M.L.C., C.M.G., the well-known explorer and scientist, has never been known to go dry. In March, 1896, Mr. G. Phillips, C.E., estimated the flow of the river—which was then low—at 133 millions of gallons per day at Gregory Downs. There can be no doubt that the discharge is due to a leak from the great artesian beds underlying the Barkly Tableland, on which the town of Camooweal is situated, on the head waters of the Georgina River.

The Barkly Tableland was also named by Mr. Landsborough in honor of Sir Henry Barkly, Governor of Victoria, 1856-1863.

Donor’s Hills station was settled by the Brodie Bros., who came from Murrurundi, in New South Wales early in 1865. They travelled by Bowen River and along the Cape River route, and took up the country about the junction of the Cloncurry and the Flinders Rivers, near some peculiar isolated ironstone hills, which were named Donor’s Hills. It was considered a good run and well watered, and is now held by Mr. Chirnside, of Victoria, being still stocked with sheep. Among the last wave of pioneers was Mr. Atticus Tooth, who brought cattle from the Broken River, near Bowen, and took up a run on the lower Cloncurry, which he called Seaward Downs; the stock belonged to a business firm in Bowen called Seaward, Marsh and Co. It now forms part of Conobie run, taken up by Messrs. Palmer and Shewring, who brought sheep and cattle from Pelican Creek, in 1864. The cattle were driven from Eureka, in the Wide Bay district, by Edward Palmer, one of the firm who from that time resided on the station, and who is the author of these notes. The stock followed the route up the Cape River, and were detained in the desert at Billy Webb’s Lake nearly two months waiting for rain to take them through. After the usual vicissitudes of travelling stock down the Flinders, and searching for country all round the Gulf it was decided to occupy Conobie, where the Dugald, Corella, and Cloncurry Rivers form a junction. The sheep were placed on the run in May, 1865, and then the trip back to Brisbane had to be undertaken in order to apply for the lease of the country.

One of the partners, Mr. W. Shewring, died about a year afterwards from the effects of the Gulf fever, and also several of the men. They were all buried on the bank of the large lagoon, near which the head station was formed.

Supplies to this place were carried from Port Denison by bullock dray, but the first wool was shipped for Sydney from the new port, Burketown. The price of everything was extremely high, flour and sugar often selling at one shilling per pound, while wages for ordinary hands ranged from thirty-five shillings to fifty shillings a week, and men were scarce even at that.

Pioneers as well as explorers, the settlement of Cape York Peninsula will always be associated with the names of the Jardines. The account of their trip from Bowen with cattle and horses through the most troublesome country ever traversed by stock, will stand as a lasting monument to their superior bushmanship and hardihood. The narrative of the journey adds a most interesting page to the records of Australian exploration, as it was conducted throughout without any mishap, although surrounded with many dangers, through a country almost unknown and during a season when the risks were much increased by reason of the advent of the annual heavy rains. The uncommon task of taking a mob of cattle such a distance with success, reflects the highest credit on the Jardine Brothers.

The origin of the trip was a report made by the first governor, Sir G. Bowen, in 1862, to the Imperial Government recommending Somerset, Cape York, as a harbour of refuge, coaling station and entrepôt for the trade of Torres Straits and islands of the North Pacific. The task of establishing the new settlement was confided to Mr. Jardine, Police Magistrate at Rockhampton, who was qualified by experience and judgment to carry out the work. Mr. Jardine proposed to establish a cattle station there, by sending cattle in charge of his two sons through the Peninsula, in order to supply the requirements of trade with fresh beef. Frank and Alick Jardine, aged respectively 22 and 20, carried out the task of overlanding very creditably, being strong, active, and hardy young men, full of resource and inured to bush work and discomforts.

Those who know by experience what a wet season means in the Peninsula, with flooded creeks and rivers, poison plants killing the horses and cattle, and hostile blacks always on the alert to damage anything in their way, will understand the full meaning of the successful issue of such a trip. The writer settled a cattle station on the Mitchell River in 1879, and can thus enter fully into all the troubles of these young overlanders, and appreciate the magnitude of their task.