Sheep killed by lightning - 1857

While researching the history of the Goomburra Valley I encountered this story that captured my interest, about a storm which passed through on 19th November 1857.  Clearly a story that also captured the interest of a number of newspapers at the time, as this press release appeared in no less than nine papers, with The North Australian [1] being the first to publish on 1 December ... the quote below is from this edition.

DESTRUCTION OF SHEEP BY LIGHTNING—During a violent thunderstorm which visited the Goomburra station, Darling Downs, on the night of the 19th ultimo, 300 sheep were killed by the electric fluid. It appears that at the head-station the lightning was extremely vivid and dangerous and that in one yard 270 sheep were struck dead by an electric stroke, while at another yard about seven miles distant, 30 more were destroyed at the same time by the same destructive agency. The flocks in great terror were huddled together, and it required the greatest exertions of the watchmen and shepherds, who were summoned to their assistance, to prevent a large portion of the flocks from being smothered. At the time the accident occurred at the head-station, the man in charge of the flock, much to his credit, was standing by the flock keeping vigilant watch, and discerned the effect of the lightning in sufficient time to give the alarm ; and it is owing to this circumstance that the loss was not greater. Mr. Patrick Leslie, the newly elected member for the United Pastoral Districts, is the proprietor of the station where the disaster occurred.

Next to publish was the Sydney Morning Herald [2] on the 7th December.  Then deriving from the publication in the Herald the following papers, The Argus [3] on the 12th December, The Ballarat Star [4] on 14th December, The Goulburn Herald and County of Argyle Advertiser [5] (which references The North Australian ) on 16th December, Portland Guardian and Normanby General Advertiser [6] on 18th December, also on the 18th December The Bendigo Advertiser [7].  Followed by the The Armidale Express and New England General Advertiser [8] on 19th December. Finally the Ovens and Murray Advertiser devotes some space to the report in its Christmas Day edition (also quoting the North Australian). And so the 'news' cycle stops more than one month after the event took place.

While the story itself is interesting it is not unique. Use the phrase "sheep killed by lightning" in the Trove search tool and over 500 results appear. This set of articles about a specific event in Goomburra is also interesting as a reflection on the speed of media today.  In 1857 both reports and the papers themselves would have been mostly delivered by horseback, today 'news' of such age would probably be deemed too old to publish.


References

[1] LOCAL AND DOMESTIC. (1857, December 1).The North Australian, Ipswich and General Advertiser (Ipswich, Qld. : 1856 - 1862), , p. 4. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article78850984

[2] MORETON BAY. (1857, December 7). The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), , p. 8. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article13003657

[3] NEW SOUTH WALES. (1857, December 12). The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), , p. 5. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article7143285

[4] Local and General news. (1857, December 14). The Star (Ballarat, Vic. : 1855 - 1864), , p. 3. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66045626

[5] FORGED £10 NOTES. (1857, December 16). The Goulburn Herald and County of Argyle Advertiser (NSW : 1848 - 1859), , p. 2. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article118248536

[6] NEW SOUTH WALES. (1857, December 18). Portland Guardian and Normanby General Advertiser (Vic. : 1842 - 1876), , p. 2 (EVENING.). Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article64570054

[7] INDIA. (1857, December 18). Bendigo Advertiser (Vic. : 1855 - 1918), , p. 3. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article87977577 

[8] New South Wales Intelligence. (1857, December 19). The Armidale Express and New England General Advertiser (NSW : 1856 - 1861; 1863 - 1889; 1891 - 1954), , p. 3. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article189959432

[9] LOCAL COURT. (1857, December 25). Ovens and Murray Advertiser (Beechworth, Vic. : 1855 - 1918), , p. 2. Retrieved June 29, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article113235931

Gallipoli - The scale of our war

A recent trip to New Zealand gave rise to the privilege of a visit to the Te Papa museum in Wellington. Te Papa's vision is to be a forum for New Zealand "to present, explore, and preserve the heritage of its cultures and knowledge of the natural environment". It is a brief well met.

Currently Te Papa has an exhibition entitled "Gallipoli: The scale of our war" that is a moving and sombre commemoration of New Zealand's involvement in WWI.  With ANZAC Day approaching it seemed appropriate to reflect on the amazing storytelling that has taken place in this exhibit.

Te Papa teamed up with a number of Wellington companies to produce the exhibition, of particular note Weta Workshops, known for their work in the movie industry with projects such as Lord of the Rings, Avatar, Mad Max Fury Road and many others (our visit to Wellington also included a visit to Weta :-)).

Weta are known for their amazing special effects skills, which has included the development of software ('massive') to simulate large crowds; think of the battle scenes in Lord of the Rings - Return of the King. While a topic like "the scale of our war" may prompt the museum audience to expect a crowd simulation, and certainly the immensity of loss endured may invite the use of such simulation, the team rightly created a very personal journey which needed no crowd simulation to impart the scale of the war experience.  Instead the visitor is taken on a journey through the war punctuated by the lives of eight individuals.  These eight are chosen as representatives of the nearly 3,000 people who left New Zealand's shores to participate in WWI (93% of whom were killed).

The 'eight' are people whose lives have been well researched and for whom a 2.4x life size mannequin has been created.  The mannequins are both imposing and deeply intimate, placed in rooms that are small enough that the visitor is compelled to be close enough to observe detail down to the level of individual hairs on the bodies.  The mannequins alone represent 24,000 hours work.

But these 'eight' are also placed within a specific, somewhat labyrinthian, timeline that the visitor walks along guided via a red line on the floor. Crosses at each date in the time line symbolise the number of New Zealanders who died on that date. It is very confronting.  So confronting in fact that I needed to visit the exhibit twice, having bailed out on the first attempt from being overwhelmed and then coming back the next day.

Map of the display, showing its labyrinthian construction.

Floor decoration showing the use of crosses to acknowledge the New Zealanders killed.

A cut away uniform with cut away packs, which on closer inspection reveal the contents. In the midst of a display about war this seemed a fitting tribute to the 'unknown soldier' a young man who had become a ghost.

Lieutenant Spencer Westmacott, the first of the 2.4x mannequins

Lieutenant Colonel Percival Fenwick, 2.4x mannequin.

Three gunners, part of the Maori contingent, 2.4x mannequins.

One of the mannequin arms showing the attention to detail, each hair was added individually.

Private Jack Dunn, a man condemned to execution for falling asleep at his post.  Penalty commuted due to extenuating circumstances - pneumonia 2.4x mannequin with 2.4x flies.

Charlotte Le Gallais, Staff Nurse aboard the hospital ship the 'Maheno'. 2.4x mannequin with 2.4x letters. For Queensland readers the name 'Maheno' may ring a bell.  It is a shipwreck on the eastern shore of Fraser Island, having been run aground by a cyclone in 1935.

Another depiction of 'Lottie' this time as a miniature onboard a cutaway version of the Maheno.  This repetition of themes was a clear indicator of the care that had been taken in constructing the display narrative that went through this exhibition. 

Sergeant Cecil Malthus wades through a sea of remembrance poppies, part of the interactivity of the display.
Visitors were invited to write on a poppy and leave a message with the soldier. 

An opportunity to cleanse oneself at the end of the exhibition.  A profound and touching finale to a profound and touching exhibition.

This is a very well constructed exhibition, worth seeing for the skill with which it tells the story it is seeking to tell and the workmanship in the models. Entry to the museum is free, and from what I can tell the exhibition while listed as temporary will run until 2018.

Below are two links with more information.

• The official web page for the exhibition
• Video produced with Weta Workshops describing the making of the exhibition.

Hyde Park Barracks

This post is a report of a recent brief visit to the Hyde Park Barracks Museum.

I have chosen to blog about this particular venue as I was very impressed with the way in which the building and its collection had been curated. It found a great balance between engagement with the collection; concise and informative narrative, and some innovative and elegant displays.

The facility provides good free printed guides for adults and an interactive workbook for children.

As well as single entry tickets this facility can be included in a pass which covers this venue and three other museums:

• Museum of Sydney
• Justice and Police Museum
• Susannah Place Museum

The building has had a varied history, which can be divided into four phases:

• 1817 - 1848 Convict Period (50,000 convicts)
• 1848 - 1886 Immigration and Asylum Period (40,000 women and children)
• 1887 - 1979 Courts and Offices Period
• 1979 - today Museum Period

The main focus of the museum is on the first two periods of time.

The facility was listed on the UNESCO World Heritage Register in 2010, along with ten other Australian Sites which document the convict history of Australia.

For people interested in the history of Australia this site is well worth the time and small cost associated with a visit.

External view of the Barracks.  The building was designed by a convict architect, Francis Greenway, who received a full pardon for his work.

Rats which at other museums in Sydney are used as an icon for the arrival of the plague in Sydney in 1900 AD are here lauded as the archaeologist's friend as many of the items in the collection were preserved in the dry environment of rat nests. 'Ratty' is the mascot for the kids' interpretative guide.

Rats were not kind to all of the artefacts placed in their care.

Clever use of visual prompts allows the visitor to intuit the one time presence of a staircase.

Convict Period - On the third floor a row of hammocks allows visitors to experience a bit of life in the barracks, albeit with a lot less noise and smell than the original inhabitants needed to endure.

Convict Period - Cut out figures act as story boards for selected persons from the 50,000 convicts who passed through the facility.

Convict Period - a display label - a good example of a concise narrative that easily allows the visitor to imagine the story.

Immigration Period - The use of cut out cards gives a sense of layers

Immigration Period - Elegant boxes with multiple glass layers allow for the display of multiple artifacts on different layers.  On some of the boxes the opening of the lid would activate a switch with triggered an audio or a video element.

Immigration Period - screen printed panels allow for one of the 40,000 stories to be told.

Immigration Period - A more encompassing view of the boxes and bed used in the immigration display.

The Warwick Gold Hoax - 1852

Investigation into the history of gold in the Warwick region on 'Trove' uncovered a curious incident in which a local 'artist', a Mr Edward Thomson hoaxed a Mr Edward Hammond Hargraves. Hargraves is the man credited with discovering the first payable gold field in Bathurst [1], the discovery that started the gold rush to that part of Australia.  It is a juicy little story and I should not have been surprised that Maurice French had written of it [2].  

According to numerous sources Hargraves and money had trouble staying together; he had a number of failed ventures in colonial Australia, visited the gold fields in California where he upskilled in the latest gold prospecting techniques and then returned to Australia.  The Australian dictionary of Biography notes ...

He returned to Sydney in January 1851, planning to win a fortune not so much by finding gold but by claiming the government reward for discovery of a payable goldfield. 

...

Although Hargraves exaggerated and falsified his finds he never denied his main purpose. The government gave him £10,000 and from 1877 an annual pension of £250. [3]

SBS notes

The audacity of Hargraves knew no bounds. He claims in his autobiography "it was never my intention ... to work for gold, my only desire was to make the discovery, and rely on the Government and the country for my reward". [4]

French describes Hargraves as a 'charlatan', 

Intrinsically lazy and an inveterate dreamer, Hargraves was more a skilled self publicist than a prospector. [2]

He had certainly cheated his partners in the Bathurst venture.  As French tells the story, this little episode from the papers is a test by Warwick locals into the credentials of the person of Edward Hargraves.

Mr Hargraves wrote to the colonial secretary of the day informing him thus [4] ..

... I have received a note from Mr. Patrick Leslie enquiring whether it was likely that a gold field would be found in the northern districts, I have replied in the negative, so far as my researches have gone. The Canning Downs gold excitement was got up with a leaden bullet covered up, or rather over, with gold leaf, previously beaten out into a nugget, like looking specimen. The perpetrator of this hoax, a Mr. Thompson, an artist, told me so himself, in presence of other gentlemen.

In conclusion, I regret that my labours in these districts should have been of so little avail; but if the inhabitants cannot boast of a gold field, they can assert without fear of contradiction, that they are in possession of the finest part of New South Wales ; indeed, it is the best country I have ever seen.

I have the honour to be, Sir,

Your most obedient servant, 

E.H. HARGRAVES.

Thanks for the compliment about the fineness of our district!  Hargraves' 'name-and-shame' strategy brought a robust response from Mr Thompson who took out letters in both the Sydney Morning Herald [6] and The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser [7].  The text of which follows.

ORIGINAL CORRESPONDENCE.TO E. H. HARGRAVES. ESQ. 

Per favour of the Sydney Morning Herald.

Sir,

I observed in the fifth article of your official report on the northern districts, an assertion, which I beg leave, with all due deference to you, most flatly to contradict. You state that the "Canning Downs" gold excitement was got up by means of a leaden bullet, covered with gold leaf, having previously been beaten into a nugget-like shape - that the perpetrator of this hoax (a Mr. Thomson, an artist) told you so himself, in the presence of other gentlemen. That I was the perpetrator of this hoax (if hoax it could be called), I don't deny ; but you must be labouring under some mistake in supposing that I told you the bullet was the cause of the Canning Downs gold excitement. I was not aware of having made such a statement to you, or to any one else. On the contrary, when you were at Warwick I told you that I had found gold in small quantities, at Lord John's Swamp, the Severn, and in gullies leading into M'Intyre's Brook ; and that I had every reason to believe it would be found to pay if properly worked. The fact of gold having been found at Lord John's Swamp may be proved by the testimony of Messrs. Patrick Leslie, W. Leith Hay, E. Moriarty, surveyor, and many others, who were present when I washed out gold from the soil at Lord John's Swamp. Messrs. Samuel Burgoyne and R. Wright were present when got at the Severn, and Messrs. Burgoyne and M'Lachlan when got in a gully leading into M'Intyre's Brook.

To return to the great northern leaden bullet hoax. It was perpetrated long after I had given up digging at Lord John's Swamp, where I had swamped more time and money than I could well afford (artists in this colony are not proverbial for being overburdened with heavy purses) ; so that the bullet could not have been the cause of the Canning Downs gold excitement, as you are pleased to term it. I, more willingly than I otherwise would have done, gave up (for the time) the search for gold, having heard that the great Hargraves was about to visit the district. But, alas! when he came what did he do? He jogged quietly along the road on the old chesnut, and saw some black mud rocks, and porphyritic schist. (What are these?) When at Warwick, not-withstanding the entreaties of many that he would visit M'Intyre's Brook, the great Hargraves could not be prevailed upon to exchange the comforts of Darling Downs for a camp, with beef and damper, at the Brook.

You have been blamed, and I think not unjustly, for not making an attempt in this neighbourhood ; but, with the tools you had, I was at a loss to know how you could give any place a fair trial. When I saw them previous to their sale by auction at Ipswich, they appeared to be most inadequate, at the same time flimsy articles. The pick did not seem to have much to do for some considerable time, being thick with rust down to the very point (but the black mud rock might have caused that). The prospecting pan bore most suspicious traces of beef or some other viands.

Some ill-natured people have asserted that I was supplied with gold dust by Mr. George Leslie, and that when visitors came to the Canning Downs diggings, I what they call "peppered" the hole, and then washed out the provided gold dust in their presence, so as to inveigle them into the belief that it was there in quantity, Now, on behalf of Mr. George Leslie, as well as for my own credit, I declare this to be a gross and malicious falsehood. Some of said charitable individuals are of opinion that I was a paid agent of the squatters of these districts, to deceive and humbug the multitude by the above means. This, also, I now beg leave publicly to contradict. My digging exertions at Lord John's Swamp, and elsewhere, were as much for my own amusement as any thing else. Digging is good for the health, and, judging from appearances, seems to have agreed with you in an eminent degree, seeing that your condition is certainly improved within the last year or two.

In conclusion, I beg to inform you that I intend to try the digging in this district again, and heartily hope may be successful, if it is only to prove that the great E. H. Hargraves knows just about as much of geology as I do, and that is precious little. At the same time I regret that E. H. Hargraves would not find something better and more satisfactory for his official reports concerning the auriferous qualities of the northern districts than the trivial piece of tomfoolery he has deemed fit to make mention of.

I beg to remain, Sir, &c, 

EDWARD THOMSON   

An Artist. Warwick, Darling Downs, August 9.

There is a larrikin feel to the artist's response and it is one of the things that amazes me about old newspapers - the way in which persons can be so freely maligned in the press.
As history will prove there was gold to be found in the region but it was not enough to become the region's focus.

References

[1] State Library of NSW (Edward Hammond Hardgraves Retrieved Jan 13, 2016 from http://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/discover_collections/history_nation/gold/rumours/hargraves.html

[2] Maurice French (1989) 'A leaden bullet covered with gold leaf': Gold discoveries on the Darling Downs before separation.
https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:205779/s00855804_1989_13_11_417.pdf

[3] Bruce Mitchell, 'Hargraves, Edward Hammond (1816–1891)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/hargraves-edward-hammond-3719/text5837, published first in hardcopy 1972, accessed online 13 January 2016.

[4] SBS http://www.sbs.com.au/gold/story.php?storyid=32

[5] LATEST NEWS. (1852, July 28). The Moreton Bay Courier(Brisbane, Qld. : 1846 - 1861), p. 1 Supplement: Supplement to the "Moreton Bay Courier". Retrieved January 13, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3713062

[6] ORIGINAL CORRESPONDENCE. TO E. H. HARGRAVES. ESQ. (1852, September 11). The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), p. 3. Retrieved January 13, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12939920

[7] Original Correspondence. (1852, September 15). The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser (NSW : 1843 - 1893), p. 4. Retrieved January 13, 2016, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article663503