The tragedy of Nockatunga

The monument to the expedition at Noccundra.

On November 9, 1874, workers at remote Nockatunga station saw an unsteady rider stumble in from the desert. Near death from thirst, the man fell down in front of them. The workers recognised him as Lewis Thompson, the stockman they called “the piano tuner”. He’d left there nine days earlier heading west with two other men, an Australian bushie named Andrew Hume, and an Irish soldier and Victoria Cross recipient, Timothy O’Dea. The other two were still missing, presumed dead, in the relentless heat of a far western Queensland summer.

I’ve written about Andrew Hume before. Having read Darrell Lewis’ Where is Dr Leichhardt? I believed Hume was a conman who contrived a Leichhardt expedition just to get out of jail. But Hume did eventually go looking for Leichhardt and he died on that search. I recently read a more sympathetic account of his journey in Les Perrin’s The Mystery of the Leichhardt Survivor.

Hume’s hopes of finding Leichhardt were slim. Ludwig Leichhardt and six or seven others in his expedition went missing 26 years earlier in 1848 somewhere between western Queensland and the west coast. There was evidence at Glenormiston though Leichhardt’s group likely died far into the Northern Territory or even WA. Hume was at Nockatunga Station (now Noccundra) in far south-west Queensland searching for survivors.

Perrin begins the story in 1866 at Baradine, New South Wales where Hume went on a several-day alcohol bender. Having ran out of money, he launched a farcical armed raid on the pub, and drunkenly told patrons he was the bushranger “The Black Prince”. The shambles ended in his arrest and incarceration with hard labour for ten years, a harsh sentence. He was sent to Darlinghurst prison and then to Cockatoo Island before ending up at Parramatta jail in 1869. Here he read a report on a wild white man in western Queensland. He told authorities about his own travels in the early 1860s when he claimed to have reached the west coast. Far inland he met a white man living with an Aboriginal tribe. The man told Hume he was a survivor of an expedition party. Hume said he was bringing back this news when waylaid in Baradine. He claimed he didn’t want to mention this after the arrest as people would think it a ploy to get released.

Surprisingly, Parramatta prison officers were impressed by his story and got him to dictate a letter. The letter had two diagrams showing marks he found on remote trees; one saying “L C Nov 1847 Dig” and the other “L C Aug 1848 Rock”. Hume said he placed papers in a saddle bag under one of the trees hoping to bring them back at a later date. He was sure he could find them again. Though Hume did not divulge the name of the white man, his letter was sent at a time of intense interest in the mysterious fate of Leichhardt. There were two searches near Thargomindah into reports of an old white man living further west. If Hume’s story was true, it needed to be investigated. Many were sceptical. Hovenden Hely who travelled in Leichhardt’s failed second expedition said Leichhardt started his third and final expedition in 1848 not 1847 and marked his trees L or LL but never LC.

Yet the NSW Governor pardoned Hume after serving half his sentence and the government approved travel and expenses into the interior. The South Australian government agreed to pay for a voyage to Darwin where he would then travel south-west. South Australia was building the Adelaide-Darwin telegraph line and among those aboard was postmaster-general Charles Todd who was responsible for the line. Todd was unimpressed with Hume’s story and believed him a fake. When the ship arrived at Roper River in March 1872, the captain took the ship upstream as far as possible in floods as it would be closer to the line than Darwin. Hume disembarked but found his way forward blocked by the floods. He finally proceeded to the Line where he got a job while waiting for a horse. He stayed on the Line till its completion in August. He got a horse in December and then went missing for 12 months.

He arrived back at Roper in November 1873 and announced he’d found the white man. Hume identified him as Classen, another German in Leichhardt’s party. He carried a leather satchel which he claimed contained Classen’s writings, Leichhardt’s watch and other relics but he refused to show them to anyone. Hume wrote to Sydney authorities about his finds and sailed to Brisbane where he met Rev James Samuel Hassall, his former Parramatta jail chaplain. Hume told Hassall he travelled west of Tennant Creek into the Davenport Ranges. There he supposedly met Classen, now in his seventies, who told him he had survived as a tribal doctor. Classen wrote his story down for Hume and showed him Leichhardt’s remains in a coolamon tree. However surveyor-general AC Gregory (who also searched for Leichhardt) could not recognise locations Hume said he went to. Although Gregory, Todd and others pointed out discrepancies in Hume’s story, he was still eagerly expected when he arrived back in Sydney.

But when it came to the handover of the artifacts, Hume claimed the satchel had been cut open and the contents stolen. He stuck to his story giving a detailed description of Leichhardt’s watch and chain. He told authorities it would be difficult to remove Classen from the tribe. Newspapers described Hume as an “impudent imposter” but wealthy supporters such as Eccleston Du Faur and John Dunmore Lang were willing to privately finance another expedition. This time he would go overland, and be accompanied.

Experienced bushman Peter Lorimer initially signed up but insisted he carry the money, which Hume refused. Three replacements were found but Hume took to alcohol and all three resigned their commission. Du Faur finally found an excellent replacement in Timothy O’Hea, a young Irishman awarded a Victoria Cross in Canada in 1866. Ironically O’Hea won it for defending the Empire from fellow Irish Fenians who had invaded from the US. He showed his valour putting out a fire on a munitions train, saving the lives of many passengers. He remains the only man to win a VC outside of battle. After returning to Ireland and then becoming a New Zealand constable, O’Hea arrived in Sydney in 1874. When Du Faur found out, he offered him a spot on the expedition. O’Hea immediately accepted.

O’Hea found Hume at Murrurundi and the two men took an instant liking to each other. O’Hea was interested in Hume’s life and became a sobering influence. They crossed into Queensland at Mungindi. While delayed due to stray horses, they recruited a third member, stockman and piano tuner Lewis Thompson. Like O’Hea, Thompson served in the army, in India, and the other two were impressed by his horsemanship and determination.

The trio proceeded west to the Warrego River at Cunnamulla and arrived at Thargomindah station in October. While they were welcomed at the station, the owner was away and the lack of his knowledge proved crucial. The trio passed the last outpost of white Australia, Bulloo Barracks, where Thargomindah township now stands. They arrived at Nockatunga on October 31 but Hume was determined to push on to the Cooper Creek before the wet season started.

It was difficult country. Charles Sturt was trapped for months in an exceptional dry year in his 1845 expedition and Burke and Wills died there 16 years later. Hume wanted to head along the Diamantina and Georgina systems and then north of the Simpson Desert to the Telegraph Line. They rode out on November 1, heading south-west.

Thompson said they followed the Wilson River to Noccundra Waterhole and then followed an indistinct track which they hoped would lead to the Cooper Creek. Most watercourses were dry, though they found water at Graham’s Creek. Hume was sure they were just a day away from the Cooper, 60 miles away and he dismissed O’Hea’s suggestion to fill their water bags. At the end of the day their bags were drained but Hume was confident the Cooper was close by. A day later, Hume was puzzled they still hadn’t found it, and they had no water for 30 hours.

The problem was that after following a north-south path for hundreds of kilometres the Cooper takes a right-angled turn west west of Noccundra. Hume’s limited map did not show this diversion and with the station owner absent no one else told them about it. They remained 30km south of the creek and were travelling parallel to it in searing temperatures. Midway through the next day Hume decided to turn back to Graham’s Creek, though they took a south-westerly path in the hope of finding water. After three days without water O’Hea became despondent.

They continued a fourth day without water, resting frequently. Although Hume believed they weren’t far from Graham’s Creek, O’Hea could go no further and Hume instructed Thompson to go ahead. Thompson staggered on and found a waterhole a day later, a place later called Thompson’s Creek. His horse would go no further so he walked back to where he left the other two but they were gone. Thompson went back to the waterhole and saddled his horse before another vain search for his comrades. On returning to Thompson’s Creek a third time he found five horses but no riders. Three horses had their saddles and packs removed and another horse carried flour but the bags were torn and the flour scattered in the wind. Late on November 8, Thompson rode back to Noccundra.

He arrived the following day having suffered great hardship. He said they got lost in the desert and the other two were missing and dangerously weakened. After two rest days Thompson led a search party of two station workers and a black tracker. They went to Graham’s Creek then Thompson’s Creek and found the horses where Thompson left them. The tracker found packs nearby. They reached the last camp where Thompson had left the other two. They found O’Hea’s rifle and other possessions and worked out the pair had unbuckled the spare horses but bafflingly had not followed them to Thompson Creek in search of water, 6km away, and instead gone in the opposite direction.

They found O’Hea’s dead horse half eaten by wild dogs. The tracker followed Hume’s horse tracks and eventually found it, also dead. Nearby was Hume’s belt and watch, his rifle, and his hat. But there was no sign of Hume, or O’Hea. After a long search Thompson found Hume’s body a half mile from the horse. He estimated Hume had been dead six days. The following morning they headed back to Nockatunga which they reached a day later. Bulloo Barracks sub-inspector Dunne was waiting and a JP who made out an inventory of the dead men’s possessions. Dunne led another expedition to Thompson Creek where he examined Hume’s body. They buried him there and had another unsuccessful hunt for O’Hea. His body was never found.

Dunne sent a message to the Charleville magistrate that Hume was dead and O’Hea was also presumed dead. Thompson gave Du Faur a similar message though he also supposed “he may have fell in with a party of blacks”. But that was about as likely as “Classen” suffering the same fate. The Leichhardt expedition probably died far to the west, their remains forever hidden by the desert, just like O’Hea’s.

Charles Sturt’s search for the inland sea

The Charles Sturt expedition leaves Adelaide in 1844.

Explorer Charles Sturt’s reputation was secure even before he set off on his final epic journey in 1844. Like fellow British army officer Thomas Mitchell he served in the Peninsular Wars and also like Mitchell took a liking to exploring New South Wales after he arrived in 1827. His first expedition in 1828 followed the Macquarie River west to the Darling and a year later he followed the Murray to its mouth in Lake Alexandrina. His party made the arduous return journey against the current, in the heat of an Australian summer. Sturt survived the ordeal but his health never fully recovered and the experience left him near blind.

He later served as commander on Norfolk Island before settling in South Australia. Sturt had a nagging concern which he expressed in 1840: ”Over the Centre of this mighty continent there hangs a veil which the most enterprising might be proud to raise.” Despite his ill-health Sturt was determined to raise the veil. In 1844 South Australia was on the verge of economic collapse and settlers hoped Sturt might find rich agricultural lands to save it. Sturt’s mission was more personal. He believed there was an inland sea (something that did not fool his contemporary Ludwig Leichhardt who knew hot inland winds meant a sea was unlikely).

Sturt is sometimes confused for another explorer – his near namesake John McDouall Stuart, a South Australian legend and perhaps an even greater explorer. Stuart learned at the knee of Sturt and Stuart was an important part of Sturt’s final expedition. Stuart was a surveyor whom Sturt hired for his mapping skills. They set off in a party of 15 from Adelaide in August 1844 with orders to explore north to 28 degrees latitude, a journey followed by Ivan Rudolph’s Sturt’s Desert Drama (2006).

Sturt’s deputy was Irish-born army officer James Poole while John Harris Browne was the expedition doctor. Others included head stockman Robert Flood, storekeeper Louis Piesse and Sturt’s manservant George Davenport, who like many of them had worked with Sturt before. They took 11 horses, 32 bullocks, 200 sheep, five bullock drays, one light cart. They even had a boat with sails and rigging, ready to sail the inland sea. They set off slowly east towards the Murray and Edward Eyre joined them at Moorundi. Sturt and Eyre had known each other since 1837 and Eyre was the first white traveller to cross the Nullarbor in 1840-1. Eyre and Sturt had a reputation for travelling unharmed through Aboriginal country, which was crucial as Moorundi was the edge of white settlement. As they passed the Great Bend of the Murray, Sturt was reminded of the loss of his friend Henry Bryan who went missing here five years earlier, presumably killed by local people. Sturt knew similar dangers lay ahead.

They pushed on to Lake Bonney. Eyre parlayed with Aboriginal people who did not molest the party while they stocked up with water. Instead they fed them with yabbies from the lake. The flooding river slowed progress as they made it to Lake Victoria (NSW). Here locals skirmished with an 1841 party so again Eyre went ahead to make the peace. They found him holding court with 70 people. Sturt noted locals placed the “utmost reliance” on Eyre who they called Great Chief.

The party had a decision to make. The plan was to head off on the fork in the river north to the Darling but progress was slow due to Poole’s slow chaining of the distance. To save time Eyre suggested they take the Anabranch, a shorter and more ancient, but drier, channel north. Sturt agreed. The gamble would pay off, but this was Eyre’s last day with the expedition and they would miss his diplomatic skills.

At Lake Victoria, locals told Sturt there was a river at Laidley’s Ponds (near today’s Menindee) that came from the north west. This excited Sturt as it was the direction he wanted to travel. He sent riders ahead who found water in the Anabranch so they set off in mid September. Heavy rain made conditions muddy and difficult. They were helped by native guide Nadbuck who had invaluable knowledge of the hostile area they were entering. They were delayed when Flood lost two fingers in a shooting accident chasing feral cattle. Sturt cut down rations to enable his men stay longer in the field.

Though the Anabranch was in flood, it was desolate country. Scouts found out the Anabranch suddenly dried up ahead. Sturt took advice to push east towards the Darling proper, 30km above the confluence with the Murray. Though narrower than the Murray, it was verdant and beautiful though Sturt knew the summer heat left it barren. At night he bolstered camp security though he held good relations with local owners, who remembered a massacre during Mitchell’s travels. Rough and rotten river flats played havoc with the drays and prevented Sturt from moving through hostile areas as quickly as he liked.

The further north they went, the more Aboriginal groups they met. Nadbuck knew the protocols to keep the peace and Sturt described them as “merry people”. South of today’s Pooncarie they noticed debris in the water and the following morning the river had risen 1.2m. In three days, the river overflowed its banks, invading the flats, making travel even slower. On October 10 they reach Williorara river at Menindee where they planned to move away from the Darling, much to everyone’s unease.

Map in expedition member Daniel Brock’s To The Desert With Brock

Poole and Stuart set off on horses to seek a way forward. They crossed the Scrope Range to what was later called the Barrier Range and Poole described what he called an inland sea towards today’s Broken Hill. Though Sturt thought it might be a mirage, the party headed forward. From Lake Cawndilla, this was new country to white eyes. When Sturt got to a peak they had a clear view west and everything was “dark and dreary”. His hopes of an inland lake or a river to the tropics were dashed. They found a profusion of beautiful flowers later named Sturt’s desert pea (Swainsona formosa) adopted as the floral emblem of South Australia. He also named an outcrop as “broken hill” in remembrance of a feature in Wales, and the name was later was applied to a larger area.

They relied on wells as they pushed forward but Sturt was worried. “In the barren and stony ranges through which I had to force my way, no spring was to be found.” While crossing the tableland and hills, he found a watershed high ridge. Colonial secretary Lord Stanley ordered him to find such features so Sturt named it “Stanley’s Barrier Range”. Later called the Barrier Range, it was the border between the Murray-Darling system and insignificant drainage west to the desert. They found an important water pool they called Rocky Glen and struggled to find a way through the impenetrable Barrier. When they did, they were confronted by seif dunes. These were sausage-shaped sand ridges which were tiring for the horses to cross, with temperatures rising to 47C. Sturt crossed into the Plains to the west, to confront another immense wilderness ahead.

The party waited at Morphetts Creek while Poole and Browne went west to find water. They were searching for Lake Torrens but it was not where Eyre said it was. Browne suspected it might be a chain of lakes, proved correct a decade later. They returned after two weeks without finding water or an inland sea. Sturt sent Flood to search 70 miles north. He returned after three days having found a creek 40 miles away with good grass. The entire party arrived at Floods Creek early on December 10, 1844, four months after leaving Adelaide. Poole led another expedition north as the summer temperatures rose. They arrived back on Christmas Day having ventured as far as modern Tibooburra, and found water at Evelyn Creek near Milparinka. Sturt risked the 120km journey with only one creek on the way. The weather cooled on the 28th and they rode through the night. They found the site despite Poole leading them the wrong way. By the time they got there, it was greatly reduced and they needed to find new water fast. On January 27 they found a new depot site at an Evelyn Creek tributary they called Preservation Creek with deep and sheltered pools. What they called Depot Glen would become both their salvation and their prison.

Depot Glen was 16km west of Milparinka with plenty of water, a “romantic and pretty spot”, according to Sturt. They recovered from illnesses and sought advice from Aboriginal groups. Sturt planned a new break-out group north. Six months after leaving Adelaide they crossed the now Queensland border immersed in sanddunes. They travelled 200km north finding no water and went back. They tried a second route that took them to Cameron Corner (where the SA/Qld/NSW borders meet) but found only desolate scrub and 50-degree temperatures. Beaten by seif dunes and lifeless desert, they returned to Depot Glen exhausted and thirsty. Abundant birdlife convinced them water was near but a westward exploration found nothing either. Months passed by and their water supply diminished. A plan for Poole to lead a consignment back to Adelaide was put on hold when Poole fell seriously ill.

Finally in July they had their first rain in five months and after two wet days the rising waters threatened the camp. Poole was well enough to travel on July 14 and led a group south. But Poole died two days later. The party returned to the Depot to bury him and Piesse led a new Adelaide-bound party. Sturt led his group 100km to Lake Pinaroo and on July 28 named a depot the Park (later Fort Grey). Sturt penetrated into South Australia but found only barren country and no water. They found a dry Lake Blanche but no inland sea and little else so rode back to the Park. On August 18 they found Strzelecki Creek which Sturt named for the Polish explorer. Sturt’s next fateful decision was to head north-west.

This was difficult flat country with no visible vegetation but billions of stones. Sturt called it a stony desert and it became known as Sturt’s Stony Desert. Ironically this feature was the result of an inland sea, a pre-historic one formed millions of years earlier. They found shallow pools and wells that kept them alive. On the brink of disaster they found a beautiful creek on September 3 they named Eyre Creek after that “courageous and chivalrous officer”. From here the plain ran into the fiery dunes of the Simpson Desert. Close to the centre of Australia, Sturt ordered his men to return to the Park worried retreat might be cut off. The Simpson was not crossed until 1936 by Edmund Colson using camels.

Sturt staggered back to the Park on October 1 subsisting on “an insufficient supply of food and drinking water that your pigs would have refused.” He felt he had failed and decided on one last tilt at the desert. He took Stuart and two others on a new journey leaving October 8 as temperatures soared to 38 degrees. Five days later they found a broad creek Sturt named for his friend Judge Charles Cooper. Despite its large body of water he called it a creek and not a river because it wasn’t running water but a series of sheets of water separated by dry creek beds. They camped 15km west of modern Innamincka near where Burke and Wills would die in 1861. They followed the creek north until it disappeared into muddy puddles. They found a waterless plain and followed it north west before arriving back in the Stony Desert.

They passed Lake Etamunbanie (SA) and were near modern Birdsville (Qld) where Sturt climbed a summit and found no attractive way forward. Sturt admitted defeat on unraveling the mystery of the dead centre and slowly and sullenly led his horse down the hill. The journey back starting October 21 was a race against time. They found enough well water to make it back to the Cooper with the loss of only one horse. They surveyed more of the creek, 250km eastward. They were surrounded by friendly Wangkumara people who told them there was no water eastward. With Sturt unable to determine the Cooper’s source in the Channel Country tangle they retreated to the Park. But with the advance party running late, on November 6 the men at the Park decided to retreat back to Depot Glen. Browne left a note for Sturt.

Sturt’s party rode into the Park a week later and read Browne’s letter. Sturt was in agony with scurvy but they set off again on November 16 riding all night arriving at Depot Glen at noon the following day after 18 hours in the saddle. The next problem was finding a way back to the Darling. Initial sorties along the most direct route were failures, so they gambled on the way they got there a year earlier. Sturt had to be transported by dray, leaving Browne in charge. To get 180km to Floods Creek they hatched a plan based on the Aboriginal “possum bottles”, skinning a possum and turning it inside out using a neck for a water bottle. They created a “bullock bottle” capable of carrying 150 gallons and rode to Floods Creek which was losing water rapidly.

The men created a second bullock bottle, left their whaleboat behind and began their dash south on December 7. From Floods Creek they found further water south and Sturt pushed the team to Lake Cawndilla on December 19. The lake was a parched expanse of cracked mud and the Darling was not in flood. Here they found Piesse with a rescue party with the all-important antiscorbutic lime juice. They began the descent down the Darling on Boxing Day and again chose the Anabranch to avoid the dangerous tribes on the Murray-Darling confluence. They sent letters to Adelaide. Newspapers rejoiced at the “safety of the beloved Captain Sturt and his adventurous band”.

Sturt recovered to ride unaided into Adelaide. To avoid a welcoming committee he rode in at midnight on January 19, 1846 to embrace his wife. The official party rode in to a great welcome on January 28. Sturt retired to England and felt the “fearful desert” had defeated him but prospectors and selectors followed his routes. The Cooper became a practical way to the interior, though the inland regions remain difficult country that only Aboriginal owners truly understand.