Lutwyche Cemetery

I decided this week to cast my Brisbane city council vote in advance of polling day and that meant a long walk to the pre-poll office in Kedron Heights. It was an excuse to go somewhere new in my neighbourhood. I’d often passed Lutwyche Cemetery while driving up Gympie Rd but had never visited it. Though the graveyard has had no interments in three decades and is mostly ignored apart from the occasional dog walker, it remains a beautiful place, rich in history.

The cemetery and nearby suburb are named for 19th century politician and judge Alfred Lutwyche. Lutwyche was a NSW attorney-general who became Queensland’s first resident judge after it became a colony in 1859. He became the colony’s first supreme court judge two years later. Lutwyche lived in a grand house on Nelson St in my own next door suburb of Wooloowin and died in 1880. He was buried in St Andrew’s Anglican churchyard, though the cemetery named for him had just opened. Brisbane Cemetery (now Toowong Cemetery) had opened a few years earlier, but was already overcrowded and the growing city needed a second cemetery. In 1877 the Courier reported a council debate where “citizens of the village of Lutwyche” were lobbying for a public hall and reading room, and there was also “a sum on the estimates for a cemetery at Lutwyche”. Building began in the new year and by April the Church of England portion was consecrated. Five-year-old Walter Silcock was the first burial on August 4 that year.

During the Second World War, authorities built a War Graves section to bury 389 soldiers, both identified and unidentified. The remains of nine servicemen from the First World War were also moved to this section. The Imperial War Graves Commission erected the Cross of Sacrifice in 1950 using Helidon freestone.

The most famous of the First World War graves is William Edward Sing’s. Billy Sing was a sniper at Gallipoli who killed up to 300 Turkish soldiers. Born in Clermont to an English mother, he suffered racial prejudice on account of his Chinese father. He kept his head down, becoming a stockman and became an expert shooter. Recruiters agonised over his “unsuitable background” before accepting him into the army in 1914, aged 30. The rugged Gallipoli terrain was made for snipers such as Sing whose spotter was the later best-selling author Ion Idriess, and he quickly became deadly. The Turks assigned their best marksman against him in vain. Fellow soldiers witnessing Sing’s marksmanship dubbed him “The Assassin”. Later in the war he moved to the western front where he was not as effective, and was wounded in the trenches before gas exposure ended his military career. Suffering from injuries, he failed at farming and mining and remained in poverty after the war. He died in obscurity in Brisbane in 1943. This large memorial was unveiled for him at Lutwyche in 2016.

James Brennan was a little known Queensland politician who served in turbulent times. Brennan was born in Scotland and emigrated to Australia in his 20s, taking up mining at Gympie. He later worked for a meat export company in Brisbane and Townsville, and from 1902 managed a Rockhampton meatworks. In 1907 he stood for election as a Kidstonite for the seat of North Rockhampton. Former Premier William Kidston had left the Labour Party and formed his own party with support from moderates including fellow Rockhampton man Brennan. The election left Kidston as a minority premier but within a year he merged with Robert Philp’s conservatives, Philp briefly replacing him as premier. Brennan joined their new Liberal Party which held government under Kidston and later Digby Denham. Brennan resigned in 1912 when the seat of Rockhampton North was abolished. On retirement he moved to Wooloowin. He was buried here in 1917 next to his son William who died at Gallipoli.

Charles Moffatt Jenkinson (1865–1954) was a political contemporary of Brennan. Born in Birmingham, England in 1865, Jenkinson emigrated to Australia in 1883 and worked as a sports journalist before becoming proprietor at the South Brisbane Herald. In 1902 he was elected to Wide Bay as an opposition MP and year later moved to the seat of Fassifern. Though dismissed as a “sanctimonious job hunter” by the Brisbane Worker, he refused ministerial office. The highlight of his parliamentary career was an eight-hour filibuster, though he later voted for time limits to deny this expedient to others. In 1912 he became a Brisbane city alderman and was elected mayor in 1914. He immediately set out his vision for a new city hall at Albert Square (now King George Sq) and the foundation stone was laid in 1917. Jenkinson retired from council in 1916 and helped establish the large wartime Queensland Patriotic Fund for army wives and children. He returned to the Herald and in 1922 was described as “one of the regulars at Ascot and Albion Park racecourses”. He died aged 94 in 1954.

One of Lutwyche’s better known graves belongs to musician Harold “Buddy” Williams. Country and western music emerged out of the Appalachian mountains in the 1920s and singers like Jimmie Rodgers became popular with the rise of radio. Born in Sydney in 1918, the young Williams heard Rodgers’ music at a Dorrigo dairy farm and started busking illegally on the NSW North Coast as “the Clarence River Yodeller”. He enlisted in the Second World War and was seriously wounded at the battle of Balikpapan in Borneo. After the war Williams toured with the rodeo circuit and took his own variety show across Australia. He achieved lasting fame when fan Bert Newton had him on his TV show in the 1970s. Williams died of cancer in 1986. He was regarded as Australia’s first country star influencing those who followed including Slim Dusty. Williams was buried next to his daughter Donita who was killed in a traffic accident in Scottsdale, Tasmania in 1948, aged just 21 months. His grave contains a drawing of a guitar and words from his song Beyond the Setting Sun.

Buried in the Catholic portion is Patrick Short, Queensland’s first native-born police commissioner. His Irish parents Patrick and Mary Keogh emigrated to Ipswich in 1855. Patrick senior ran an engineering and blacksmith’s works though he died in 1862 when his son was three. Starting in the building trade, Patrick junior worked in south-west Queensland before joining the police force in 1878 and was posted to St George. He married Irish Catholic Eleanor Butler in 1880 at Roma. There were rumours that year that members of the Kelly gang had escaped Victoria so Short was assigned to border patrol. Though talk persists to modern times that Steve Hart and Dan Kelly lived out their lives in southern Queensland, Short found no trace of them and went back to regular duties. In almost half a century of service, he rose through the ranks becoming chief inspector in 1916 and commissioner five years later. He retired to Clayfield in 1925. A horse lover, Scott helped develop the police stud at Springsure and like Jenkinson, was often found at Brisbane racecourses. He died in 1941, aged 81.

Though the war had ended, there was tragedy on February 19, 1946 when an RAAF Lincoln bomber crashed at Amberley Airport near Ipswich killing 16 airmen. The plane was flying RAAF men home from Laverton near Melbourne but overshot the landing strip. Witnesses said the pilot retracted the under-carriage and attempted to lift the plane for a second circuit but it failed to respond and crashed before bursting into flames. The sixteen are buried together at Lutwyche. “Individual identification was not possible”, according to the grave plaque.

Lieutenant George Witton was a Boer War veteran, and a co-accused of Harry “Breaker” Morant. Witton was born to a Warrnambool, Victoria farming family in 1874. When the Second Boer War broke out in 1899, patriotic Australian colonies including Victoria rushed to send troops to fight in the conflict on the side of the British Empire. Witton served as a gunner before the war before enlisting in the Victorian Imperial Bushmen. In South Africa in 1901 he was recruited for the Bushveldt Carbineers, an irregular mounted infantry regiment, reporting to fellow lieutenant Morant. After the Boers murdered a captured British officer, Morant and another lieutenant Peter Handcock found Boer soldier Floris Visser with the murdered officer’s papers. Though Witton objected, they killed Visser after a de facto court-martial. That was one of six “disgraceful incidents” including the shooting of six surrendered Afrikaners cited in a letter signed by 15 Carbineers, which led to charges of several officers. Morant, Handcock and Witton were all charged with Visser’s killing. Morant infamously testified they shot him under “rule 303” referring to the 0.303 inch cartridge used in British Army rifles. Morant and Handcock were sentenced to death for murder. Witton was convicted of manslaughter and released in 1904 after Australian government intervention. In later life he was a succesful pastoralist and director of a Biggenden cheese factory. He died of a heart attack, aged 68, in 1942. He published his version of events in Scapegoats of the Empire: the true story of Breaker Morant’s Bushveldt Carbineers in 1904, though the book was hard to get, with many believing it was deliberately suppressed. In 2010, the British Government rejected a petition to review of the convictions of Morant, Handcock and Witton.

North Stradbroke Island by bike

We booked a four day stay at Point Lookout on North Stradbroke Island and decided to get there by public transport. That meant a train to Cleveland station, cycle to the ferry terminal, ferry to Dunwich and then cycle to Point Lookout, 19km away on the surf side of the island. I had done this trip before, but it was 20 years ago so I was overdue some “Straddie” love.

Pulling out into the broad expanse of Moreton Bay we passed Peel Island to the north. Peel’s Jandai name is Teerk Roo Ra meaning “place of many shells”. Aboriginal groups used Peel Island as a feasting and ceremonial site. Midden sites and a bora ring remain. Europeans first used it in 1874 as an immigration quarantine station for ships to keep contagious diseases out. Authorities gazetted the island’s north-west corner in 1906 and built a lazaret a year later to forcibly hold people from across Queensland with Hansen’s Disease (leprosy). It held 500 people in poor conditions over the years. Though drugs cured leprosy in the 1940s, the lazaret stayed open until 1959.

After a 25 minute water taxi journey we approach Dunwich. Like Peel Island, Dunwich was established as a quarantine station after the closure of Brisbane’s penal colony in 1849. We landed at One Mile Jetty where fishers were enjoying low tide access to the bay. The good news for cyclists is the jetty is 2km closer to Point Lookout than the car ferry terminal, further south.

Nearby is Dunwich cemetery. Overlooking the bay, it is possibly the second oldest cemetery in Queensland. These unusual stones mark the graves of inmates of the Dunwich Benevolent Asylum. The grave markers varied in design depending on the period when the inmates were buried. The Asylum was established as the quarantine station closed in 1865. Peel opened two years later.

A couple of kilometres into the ride we visited Myora Springs Conservation Area at Capembah Creek. A freshwater spring feeds the creek and a boardwalk sign says it pours 2.4 million litres of crystal clear water into Moreton Bay every day. This was a Quandamooka camping spot for millennia and remains a special place. The area’s wildlife includes freshwater prawns in the creek and koalas in the eucalypts and swamp mahoganies above.

The East Coast road is hilly and we were glad to settle in to our accommodation for the evening enjoying the sunset over Cylinder Beach. The beach gets its name from the gas cylinders used to power Point Lookout lighthouse which were brought ashore on the beach.

The following morning we walk down to Point Lookout. The point was named by Lt James Cook as the Endeavour passed on May 17, 1770. Cook wrote in his journal that at sunset “the Northermost land in sight bore North by West, the breakers North-West by West, distant 4 Miles, and the Northermost land set at Noon, which form’d a Point, I named Point Lookout, bore West, distant 5 or 6 Miles (Latitude 27 degrees 6 minutes)”. Cook’s latitude is wrong as it should be 27 degrees 26 minutes. He continued: “On the North side of this point the shore forms a wide open bay, which I have named Morton’s Bay”. Cook named it for James, Earl of Morton, President of the Royal Society in 1764, and one of the Commissioners of Longitude. Over the years the name of the bay was corrupted to Moreton. This view looks south to the beach down the east of the island.

The surf was strong and surfers enjoyed the big waves. The swells are often large at Main Beach, which is popular for its left hand point breaks. We kept an eye out for whales heading north. In summer humpback whales feed in the polar waters of Antarctica, and in winter migrate to tropical or subtropical waters of Fiji and Australia to breed and give birth. Thousands of humpbacks swim past Australia’s east coast between late May and early November each year.

Nearby is the North Gorge Walk. Normally you can take the beautiful 1.2km loop track around the headland but storm damage in the middle means it is only open for short segments at either end. The heavy waves crashing into gorge were a spectacular sight.

At the northern entrance to the gorge is this place marker. Designed by sculptor Delvene Cockatoo-Collins in 2019 the installation is called “eugaries”. An interpretative sign says the eugarie shells stand in a way often found in the shallow ocean, within the sand and on middens. Shell remnants have been found at Mulumba (the Quandamooka name for Point Lookout) showing evidence of a traditional gathering place and food camp. Mulumba means place of stone/rock in Jandai language. The eugaries symbolise people coming together while the patterns on the outer layer reflect their weathered nature.

I’ve written about Quandamooka native title but there is dissension over a proposed development next to the Gorge Walk called Yalingbila Bibula (Whale on the Hill). The development is an initiative of the Quandamooka Yoolooburrabee Aboriginal Corporation. An interpretive facility will house a 15-metre skeleton of humpback whale washed ashore in 2011 – one of the few complete humpback whale skeletons on public display in the world. The facility will also share Quandamooka stories, values and history. But many locals aren’t happy with the proposal and have set up a “Quandamooka Truth Embassy” on the northern side of the walk. They say the whale is not a totem of the Quandamooka and the remains should be returned to the sea not “hung in a whale coffin on the hill”.

They also say construction will impact kangaroos, koalas, possums and echidnas and it is a culturally significant area with a cave just below the site. It is a difficult problem to resolve as the island economy transitions from sand-mining which ended in 2019. The Minjerribah Futures Program wants to transition the island from an economic reliance on resources to cultural and eco-tourism but the local chamber of commerce says there is no funding for basic amenities like bike paths, disability access to the beach and showers.

We could have done with a bike lane on the narrow and dangerous East Coast road where not all vehicles adhere to the one and a half metre distance rule. We had a more relaxing ride on Saturday on this vehicle-free dirt track to Amity Point. We had a delightful 7km trip through the foliage with only the occasional mountain biker, birds and a hungry tree-climbing goanna for company.

Amity Point is the sleepiest of Stradbroke’s three settlements. Originally known as Pulan by the Nunukul people, Amity was home to an Aboriginal population of over 100. In 1824 John Oxley named the headland after the brig Amity he sailed in when establishing Moreton Bay penal colony. In 1825 the government established a pilot station to guide ships to the penal settlement. Hayles Cruises started a passenger ferry in 1935 and this was the main entry point to the island for many years.

Despite being a sand island, the forests surrounding Amity are subtropical rainforests with significant diversity in flora and fauna. Koalas (Phascolarctos cinereus) are common in the wild on Straddie, often in townships like this one in Amity. The Koala Action Group Queensland has documented dramatic decline of koalas on mainland South East Queensland with suggestions North Stradbroke Island should become an “island ark” for koalas. Sadly their study found that due to characteristics including low genetic diversity, Straddie koalas are unique, and the location and population should not be considered an island ark for the rest of SEQ, but conserved and managed as a separate entity.

After a coffee we found another route back to Point Lookout, a low tide cycle along beautiful Flinders Beach. Our company was white-bellied sea eagles and boaties in the channel to the north. There was a tricky section at the end of the beach where we had to dismount and carry our bikes in knee-height water across fallen trees but we were able to continue our ride home via, appropriately enough, Home Beach.

Still feeling energetic the following day, I risked the traffic and cycled the East Coast Road to Dunwich. My destination was the North Stradbroke Island museum on Minjerribah. There were displays on the Peel Island lazaret and the Dunwich Quarantine Station and Asylum. The Asylum was set up for destitute Queenslanders in 1865. It remained there until 1946 when it was moved to the vacated RAAF base at Sandgate, later renamed Eventide.

Back at Point Lookout I went for a run to the lighthouse, which is not on the sea, but on the top of a hill. The lighthouse was established in 1932 using automatic acetylene apparatus. It was painted red and white and when American supply ship Rufus King ran aground in 1942 on the South Passage Bar, its captain claimed he had mistaken the lighthouse for the one at Cape Moreton which was also painted red and white. To avoid confusion Cape Moreton was repainted in alternate red and white bands. In 1988 Point Lookout light was converted to a battery operated light float charged from electricity mains and the tower that housed the light prism was removed.

That evening we took the short walk to the North Stradbroke Beach Hotel for dinner with its lovely views of the sunset over Cylinder Beach. The hotel was opened in 1962 and was affectionately known by locals and visitors as the Straddie Pub. A total rebuild in 2006 has given it a more upmarket flavour. It’s a great place to unwind and for whale watching while having a beer or a bite to eat.

That left an early start the following morning for the 19km trip back to the ferry. There was plenty of time to enjoy the final views of Straddie and Moreton Bay as we motored back to Cleveland.

Pat Mackie and the Mount Isa Mines dispute

Union leaders Pat Mackie (in his favourite red baseball cap) and John McMahon (right) are interviewed by Albert Asbury of the ABC.

The dispute that rocked Mount Isa Mines for nine months in 1964-65 was the most tumultuous time in the city’s history. At the centre of it was workers’ leader Pat Mackie. Mackie has written two books about his life, the first about his life leading up to the dispute called Many Ships to Mount Isa, the second called The Story of a Dispute.

Enemies painted Mackie as the devil incarnate during the strike and his colourful background and petty criminal history on two continents was used against him by the media, the company and the government. Mackie was a committed unionist from his work in Canada and the US but this dispute pitted him and the workers against the unions as much as Mount Isa Mines owners’ the American Smelting and Refining Company (ASARCO). Management was driving down costs by cutting contract pay and increasing efficiency though that had its own price – 1300 miners watched by 750 “supervisors”.

Workers had to be members of the Australian Workers Union and the company compulsorily deducted union dues from pay. Though many workers felt they would be better off in a miners’ union, the rightwing AWU jealously protected its rights and refused to let other unions muscle in.

There were many staff grumbles including the poor quality of the shower rooms where the water often cut out, leaving miners to head home dirty potentially carrying poisonous lead. The problem festered for eight years before Mackie complained in May 1964. When he threatened to quit, workers asked him to fight it and other problems on site.

Workers wanted to hold a 24-hour stoppage against the advice of the union leader, who didn’t want to stir up trouble. Mackie also spoke against it, but for different reasons. He said a day-long strike would only lose them money and gain nothing. They needed to prepare properly for a strike and raise funds. The meeting agreed to give the company a week to fix the showers before taking further action.

The threat worked and the showers were fixed that week. Miners looked at other issues such as the chiselling away of contract rights which the AWU had ignored. Workers elected Mackie as local chairman and he used his union skills to organise delegates in all areas of the mine. In August 1964 the Queensland Industrial Commission turned down a wage increase as a “camouflaged bonus” which it was prevented from awarding. Peeved AWU management decided Mackie could not be chair as he wasn’t a six-year financial member of the union.

Workers sidestepped the union, electing a six-man committee including Mackie, to negotiate with the company. Mines manager James Foots said they were losing money and unable to offer wage increases. The workers countered that contract men would use their award right to revert to wages losing productivity for the company. In two weeks production dropped 40,000 tons as many workers left Mount Isa. The company reported the dispute to the Industrial Commission but they found the miners were not on strike, so the company applied again calling it a “go slow”.

The AWU sided with the company in wanting their workers to return to contract and called a meeting on October 11. Union rep Kevin Costello from Townsville sought approval of return to contracts which was rejected by jeering workers. Union boss Edgar Williams told Brisbane media the decision was due to “Mackie’s standover tactics”, beginning a personal campaign against Mackie. Liberal Minister for Labour JD Herbert told Queensland parliament Mackie was “doing the dictates of sinister international masters”.

The judge deferred the case indefinitely. The AWU told the industrial court workers agreed to return to contract but were prevented by “confusion in the hall” and they intended to take action against “Mount Isa chairman Mackie”. Mackie took a day off on union business to sort out a threat by the boilermakers to stop work. Unknown to him the AWU had changed its by-laws stripping him of union representation and his legal entitlement to take time off on union business. He was sacked for taking a day off without permission. News quickly spread through the mine, but Mackie knew the company wanted to goad the workers into a walkout.

The following Sunday Costello chaired an angry meeting. As he rose to speak he was drowned out by shouts of “we want Mackie”. Sitting at the back, miners shoved a reluctant Mackie up to the stage. Costello shouted “I declare the meeting closed!” and left the building. Those that remained passed a vote of no confidence in union leadership and vowed to remain on wages. Ten weeks into the dispute, Mackie organised his men, helped by support from local businesses who paid him a £24 wage. He filed for wrongful dismissal in the Mount Isa Magistrates Court.

At the next meeting on November 1 the AWU tried to brand the action as “lawless” only for the local rep to be shouted down again in a call for Mackie. Again the meeting was closed. Again the workers held an unofficial meeting with Mackie as chair. Their demands were threefold, the original £4 wage increase, recognition of locally elected reps, and a 25pc rise in contract prices. Without official union support, the company would not discuss these demands.

Instead they upped the ante shutting down the copper smelter on November 13. Foots claimed it was too dangerous to continue. They did nothing to counter the media impression the shutdown was because of a “strike” led by “dangerous insurgents”. Even though the court found on November 23 there was no evidence of a go slow, the company appealed again on a point of law. On December 3 the court overturned the original decision, and ordered the AWU and its members to stop “taking part in an unauthorised strike” with onerous penalties for non-compliance. All workers could take up the offer, unless they were sacked for “misconduct”. But the only worker sacked for misconduct was Mackie.

A day later Mackie’s case for wrongful dismissal was dismissed as the onus of proof was on him. The following Sunday 1100 workers packed the Star Theatre for a miners’ meeting. Again the union official was howled down and closed the meeting, again Mackie chaired the unofficial meeting. The meeting voted to disregard the court order and added a fourth demand for Pat Mackie’s reinstatement. Mackie said the dispute was no longer about pay and conditions but “a struggle for self-rule and industrial legality”. That week the AWU formally expelled him from the union for “misconduct”.

On December 11 Foots stopped all underground copper mining due to the “go slow” and cancelled coal orders. The Nicklin government introduced a state of emergency forcing workers to go back to work on contract or be fined or face jail with no recourse to court action. Nicklin laid the blame on “one irresponsible individual … misleading them into foolish action.”

Mackie and the miners found friends in the Barrier Industrial Council which helped mobilise the Broken Hill mine workforce against similar threats. With the Broken Hill group set to attend that Sunday’s meeting the AWU sent state president Gerry Goding. The meeting took the usual course of boos and calls for Mackie. It perplexed Goding who believed the media hype it was a one man show. The town would not be browbeaten by the company, the courts, or the union.

The following week when the new shift reported for work, supervisors asked them to accept contracts and when almost all said no, they were handed a “pinkie” (termination slip). That day (December 15) Foots sacked the entire 5000-strong workforce and announced all work at Mount Isa Mines would cease, costing Australia a million pounds a week in lost exports. Four thousand people attended a public meeting where the Labour Council attacked the company. There were pledges of financial support from town and outside. Mackie remained leader of the fight against the government, the company and the union, despite no longer being an employee nor a union member.

On Christmas Eve the Industrial Commission granted a surprise £3 prosperity payment though embittered workers agreed to hold out for £4. In early January the AWU allowed Mount Isa miner Barry Baker to address a compulsory meeting with union and management ordered by court. Baker focused attention for the first time on underground working conditions. The company refused to discussed money matters preferring instead to discuss the new draft contract. They also threatened to withdraw the annual bonus if financial results were bad.

Pat Mackie “wields” a chair at the January meeting.

On January 16 there was a special meeting of all union members to get a local democratic representative body in the field. Court Commissioner Harvey, who had denied their claims, turned up and was heckled as was union boss Edgar Williams. The men shouted for Mackie to move up from the back. Someone pressed a chair into his hands which he took to the platform amid cheers. The officials closed the meeting and Mackie called for a Labour Council meeting the following day. The press reported that a “howling mob” had shut down the meeting and published photos of him “wielding a chair” with the inference that it was for violent purposes (belied by men cheering as he did the “wielding”). In Brisbane Williams blamed Communist infiltration which the press swallowed.

Mount Isa dug in. Mackie and John McMahon, President of the Labour Council, were elected to travel interstate to raise funds. On TV’s Meet the Press Mackie was set up, being asked his real name, criminal convictions and communist history. When sneeringly asked did he get others to script his speeches, he replied “No I don’t, but it looks like you do.” A reviewer reckoned Mackie had more supporters at the end than he started with. They also addressed crowds in Broken Hill and Adelaide.

Queensland’s government enacted laws giving police the power to keep strike-breakers out of Mount Isa. When McMahon boarded a plane from Sydney to Mount Isa he was ordered off in Brisbane. Mackie hid in Sydney and the union organised a car to drive home 2300km non-stop via Bourke. With road blocks all around Mount Isa, Mackie took a miners’ track via Duchess and snuck home. With no sign of police Mackie entered his house before he was moved to a safe house. McMahon took another flight from Brisbane to Darwin (intending to get off at Isa) but was ordered off at Longreach.

By end January national media was becoming aware of the dispute as the public mood shifted in the miners’ favour. The company reopened the mine on February 1 reemploying all miners who were on the payroll a day before the shutdown. They threatened to shut down the entire operation if miners did not return. Workers refused to go back until the government ended its emergency regulations and began picketing on February 1 – the first time there was an actual picket in the dispute.

Faced with the prospect of a general strike, Nicklin rescinded the legislation the same day. At a Labor Council meeting in the Bull Ring of the Isa Hotel, Mackie came out of hiding to a hero’s welcome. The following day masses of police flew out, while McMahon flew in to cheering unionists who carried a banner with the Irish greeting “Céad míle fáilte”.

There was another compulsory conference on February 4 but Mackie and the miners’ delegation were not invited as “unaccredited”. Negotiations foundered over the reinstatement of Mackie. Mackie flew to Melbourne to do more TV. Again he survived on-air intimidation with TV critic Frank Thring writing “this muscle-bound free-speaking gorilla brought fresh air into the stagnant swamp of television.” He stayed two weeks in Melbourne gaining popularity while Foots again threatened to close the mine.

Prime Minister Menzies threatened to intervene despite harsh words for “this curious character Mackie, not even an Australian”. When Federal parliament looked at the possibility ASARCO started the dispute to deliberately lower the price of its share it wanted to buy back, Foots backed off. Mount Isa Mines reopened on February 17, 1965 offering work for all on the books on December 14. It helped that copper prices were now much higher.

When the mine reopened, picketing resumed and stayed for the next seven weeks. The AWU and the Catholic Church urged miners to return to work. When a 15-year-old boy named Bernard Kelly died in a shooting accident while showing off his father’s gun, the father reported it was loaded “because of the trouble in town”. Media blamed the death on the strike with some families saying it was Mackie’s fault.

Nicklin brought in new laws banning picketing within half a mile of the mine gates while calling Mackie a “nomadic thief, swindler, dope peddlar, gangster and gunman”. On March 18 police enforced the new law, moving the pickets away from the mine to the town side with 100 officers guarding the river crossings. Mackie, who lived on the mine side, was placed under house arrest during picketing hours.

Having failed to get support for a national dispute, Mackie knew his situation was holding up resolution. On March 28 he advised workers to return to the job on guarantee of no victimisation. He quietened shocked workers saying they were beaten by overwhelming force. Most returned to work on April 2 and the AWU voted by a small majority to return six days later. As academic Raymond O’Dea wrote, the Mount Isa dispute had not been settled, “it merely jolted to a sullen stop.”

The company made a comfortable profit in 1964-65 and the share price rebounded. Relations improved between management and workers with ASARCO accepting new arrangements for wage bargaining. There would not be another major Mount Isa Mines work stoppage for 25 years.

Now a household name, Mackie left Mount Isa and moved to Sydney where he won defamation cases against media who maligned his reputation. He had no regrets about the dispute which he said stirred the Australian Trade Union movement into supportive action – a revelation he said, a whole community could unite behind a cause. “It was a triumph of the human spirit,” he concluded.

Six Keys: The 1932 Cloncurry bank robberies

The Bank of New South Wales in Cloncurry 1932. Illustration from the book Six Keys.

The Daily Mercury of Wednesday June 15, 1932 reported a daring robbery in Cloncurry the weekend before. Around £14,000 was stolen from two banks, so much cash it was “extremely difficult to carry on ordinary business” in the town. On state election night in 1932, thieves breached the strong room of the National Bank and made off with £11,000. The burglars also found the keys to the nearby Bank of NSW, where they helped themselves to another £3000. The culprits were never caught, despite a £500 reward.

The double robbery was the talk of the town. Police were confident they would solve the crime but ran into a wall of silence. No one was ever charged despite strong suspicions that last to this day. In 2010 author John Joseph Williamson put together his version of events in 6 Keys: The Cloncurry Bank Robberies. Williamson says his account was a fictional account of proceedings but used the names of real people. He could accuse at will without risk of defamation: all the characters involved were dead.

As well as testimony from Roy Martell of Cloncurry, Williamson accessed the archives of the Queensland National Bank (now NAB) and Bank of New South Wales (now Westpac). While he also sourced newspaper articles, most of what he wrote was hearsay and a compilation of “apocryphal stories and anecdotes”. Williamson does not apologise for naming the robbers in his account. He said it was common knowledge in Cloncurry and their exploits were “already folklore”. He said recording the names was in the interest of Cloncurry and Queensland.

The year 1932 was the middle of the depression and Cloncurry was not spared, with many local mines closed down. It was a small town where everyone knew everyone. People were kept informed by the Cloncurry Advocate which came out every Saturday.

The QN and the Wales were the only two banks in town. QN branch manager Lewis Holland lived with his wife in the bank residence on the corner of Ramsay and Sheaffe St until Mrs Holland became disillusioned with remote life and left. Holland invited teller Stanley Spilsbury to move in. Spilsbury was fond of gambling and had a financial relationship with local identity and gambler Cyril Chaplain who gave him racing information and also, racing debts.

The bankers employed a live-in housekeeper Folly Faithful, a widow who liked and looked after them both. Faithful attracted the attentions of Eric Guerin, owner of His Majesty’s Hotel in Scarr St. Guerin was also the occasional accompanying violinist to the Bio Talkies cinema‘s silent movies. Guerin and Faithful struck up a relationship. After a movie, they went to the bank for tea where she introduced him to Holland and Spilsbury.

Guerin saw the two men were careless about bank keys left lying around. After reading in the North Queensland Register about a robbery in Townsville with duplicate keys made from impressions while the holders were at the town baths, Guerin had a similar idea. He studied the bank employees’ habits and noted they both went out every Saturday night. Faithful told him the money was kept in a strongroom which needed two keys to open, one with Holland, the other with accountant Justin Cosgrove. There were also two keys to the treasury safe, held by Holland and Cosgrove. Inside the safe were two locked drawers which held the money. Holland had the key to one drawer, Spilsbury had the other. There were six keys in all, held by three men.

The best time to rob the bank was Saturday night when the employees were out drinking and also when the safe was full with money for the week ahead brought in on the Townsville train. Guerin believed it would be easy to get the four keys held by Holland and Spilsbury. Cosgrove would be more difficult. He watched Cosgrove’s movements but he never strayed far from his keys. He would have to be lured away. Guerin also considered how to make duplicates of the keys. Needing allies he took Tom Anderson into his confidence.

Anderson was the owner of the Bio and a dodgy friend, well known in Cloncurry as a cattle thief. Anderson thought Guerin was joking and pointed out problems. Who would copy the keys and who exactly would carry out the robbery? Nevertheless, Anderson was excited, They considered talking to George Duffy, the key cutter who worked for the railways. Anderson noted Duffy was Cyril Chaplain’s man. They decided instead to go to Chaplain.

Cyril Chaplain was the “Little King” of Cloncurry. He grew up on a cattle property which he eventually managed. By 1932 the Chaplains owned two stations and the town slaughterhouse and stockyards as well as the iceworks and a butcher’s shop. They also owned the Big House, the grandest house in Cloncurry on the corner of McIlwraith and Seymour Sts. Cyril trained racehorses which his brother “Boomarra” Chaplain rode and he kept good relations with local police who ignored his betting activities.

Guerin and Anderson told Chaplain their plans. As well as getting his opinion on Duffy, they asked him to carry out the actual robbery. Chaplain said he would need to bring Boomarra in as well as Duffy. They agreed to split the takings, half to Guerin and Anderson, the other half to the Chaplain gang.

Boomarra and Duffy were best mates though Duffy was distracted by an affair with Peach O’Callaghan, wife of the new shire clerk from Townsville. Duffy was doing odd jobs at the house and the pair became entangled while the husband was away.

The five would-be robbers got together to work out a plan. Duffy arranged for overtime work to make impressions of the keys while they worked out a way to get Cosgrove’s keys. The plan was to convince him to go bathing at the Two Mile waterhole where they could take impressions while he swam. After they got the six impressions it would then be a matter of choosing the best time to do the robbery.

The gullied Two Mile was the most popular waterhole on the Cloncurry River and had privacy to dress and undress. Chaplain invited Holland for a swim to discuss a cattle deal. He also invited Cosgrove who was standing nearby. Chaplain and Duffy collected the bank men and drove them to the waterhole. While swimming, Duffy checked Cosgrove’s pants to ensure the keys were there but they needed a second outing to steal them to make the impressions. On that occasion Duffy invited Peach and her girlfriends to make the trip more appealing to the bankers. Peach was reluctant but Duffy said it would be worth her while which piqued her curiosity.

Duffy carried beeswax blocks to the river which he put in a case so they wouldn’t melt. Peach wanted to know what the beeswax was for. Duffy said it was polish for the car. On the day of the outing Duffy claimed to have a migraine so remained in the car while the others went swimming. Duffy grabbed Cosgrove’s seven keys and made impressions of them all, not knowing which ones were for the bank. When the job was done he returned Cosgrove’s keys to the pocket.

The next task was to remove Holland and Spilsbury’s keys. Guerin did this on a Saturday night after the men returned from their drinking and slept on the verandah. Faithful discovered Guerin in Spilsbury’s room. He told her he was putting the keys back. Instead he took them to the waiting Duffy who made copies. Whey they found out Faithful had caught him, Chaplain was furious. Guerin assured him Faithful would not spill the beans. Chaplain insisted Guerin would have to give her a job to get her away from the bank.

After getting the impressions, Duffy had to make the duplicates. He chose seven keys as two looked similar and then made an eighth key for the front door.

Meanwhile Chaplain worked on alibis for Duffy and Boomarra to carry out the robbery. He wanted them to start a routine at the Prince of Wales pub and park their car in the same visible spot. On Saturday night they would invade the bank to see if the keys work, but not actually rob it. Duffy did the break-in using Guerin’s plan of the house with Boomarra on lookout. Duffy had trouble with the strongroom key and played with it for over an hour, filing the web until it finally worked. He had the same problem with the second key.

Outside, Boomarra was holed up by a chatty friend. Boomarra was concerned but eventually Duffy arrived on the scene and they went to the pub. Duffy told him he had successfully worked two keys. Because of the noise Boomarra’s friend was making, Duffy had no time to do the rest. They would have to repeat the test three weeks later to try the other four keys. The second time they got them all to work and found a surprise inside the safe – duplicate keys for the nearby bank of NSW.

When the gang next met they decided to do both banks and to take a bag of silver coins also in the safe, which they would bury in a gully near the slaughterhouse. They set a date for the robbery of the following Saturday after finding out the Wales bank manager was away that weekend.

Saturday, June 11 was Queensland state election day and there was an election night party at the Katter house which the conspirators used as an alibi. The pubs were supposed to close on election day but police turned a blind eye. It was a busy day in town with people thronging from the stations. On the night, Boomarra was assigned “cockatoo” (watch) while Chaplain and Duffy went to the banks; first to the National where they emptied the safe and took the Wales key. They finished in 20 minutes but outside they found two drunks at Boomarra’s ute. Eventually they left and the robbers loaded the ute before driving to the Wales. Duffy and Chaplain went in by forcing a latch. They quickly opened the safe and took notes and silver in six heavy calico bags.

Duffy met Faithful and they went to the Katter party while Boomarra and Chaplain drove the ute to their house where they transferred the notes to another car before driving the ute back to town. At 3am Boomarra and Duffy drove to the slaughterhouse to bury the barrels containing the coins. Their car light was spotted by slaughterhouse worker George Park who resolved to investigate in daylight. Chaplain took the other car to an unoccupied outstation two hours away where he hid a metal trunk containing the money. The following morning Park found the site of the first overnight dig and uncovered six drums which contained the silver coins. He stole two drums and buried them elsewhere. He never reported his find to police and eventually claimed £500 from all six drums when the robbers failed to return.

No other suspicions were aroused until Monday when the Wales manager opened the safe to discover it was empty. Wondering where the thieves got the keys he rang the QN where Cosgrove had made a similar discovery. When he said Holland showed the strongroom to Cyril Chaplain earlier on Saturday, Spilsbury told him to be quiet about it, making Cosgrove suspect it was an inside job.

Police had similar suspicions especially when they realised the six keys were involved. They found a tyre imprint outside the bank, a Goodyear which the local tyre dealer reckoned he sold to six people. A similar tyre mark was found outside the Wales. Boomarra’s ute fitted the description.

Duffy discovered two coin barrels were missing and blamed Anderson, whom he felt didn’t deserve any takings. He punched Anderson who had no idea why he was attacked. Cyril told him it wasn’t Anderson as the silver he took to the bank on Monday was takings from the Bio on the weekend.

Most townspeople were in awe of the robbery and unwilling to communicate, much to police frustration. Criminal Investigation Branch sub-inspector Alfred Jesson and local police suspected Boomarra’s ute was involved and therefore Cyril Chaplain’s gang. But tyre shop owner Barney Long’s premises were torched which had the desired effect. Long was no longer sure whose tyre tracks were involved in the robbery.

Police believed the robbery needed inside bank knowledge and concentrated on Spilsbury who bet on the horses and owed money to Chaplain. Spilsbury denied all knowledge under hostile questioning, as did Holland. Both suffered with the bank for their cavalier attitude in leaving keys lying around but were never charged. Police interviewed Boomarra who said he was at the pub. Faithful vouched for Duffy who was at the party. Chaplain also provided alibis at the pub. Convinced the money was still in Cloncurry, police mounted road blocks for two weeks. Investigations came to nothing and rewards went unclaimed.

Chaplain paid off the others who were impatient to get money immediately. Then he bided his time and laundered the money through Townsville and Brisbane bookmakers at a 50 percent discount. Though Guerin took no part in the robbery, Chaplain remained grateful to him for the “fantastic idea”. Williamson said Guerin later told Roy Martell the story, saying “if you tell anyone, I’ll deny it”. Martell died around the time of publication. All the other participants were long dead. The Cloncurry robbery had descended into myth.

Contemplating history at Toowong Cemetery

Cemeteries are ineffably sad and poignantly beautiful places. Brisbane’s Toowong Cemetery is in the rolling hills beneath Mt Coot-tha and much of the city’s history and memories are buried here. The heritage-listed cemetery, Queensland’s largest, came into being as Brisbane grew rapidly westward in the 19th century. After the council set aside land in the 1860s, Queensland’s second governor Samuel Blackall was the first person to be buried here. He selected the highest spot on the land for his grave.

Blackall was an Irish soldier appointed governor in 1868 to popular acclaim but was plunged into a constitutional crisis. After a deadlock in parliament the Liberals lost the election but petitioned Blackall to dissolve the assembly saying it did not properly represent the colony. Blackall refused and the crisis rolled on through his tenure. The kindly and soft-spoken Blackall remained popular but by 1870 his health declined rapidly. He died January 2, 1871, aged 62. Parliament voted £500 for the erection of a monument over his grave. Designed by architect Francis Stanley, it remains the tallest spire at Toowong.

The second person buried in Toowong was 21-year-old Ann Hill, only child of Walter and Jane Hill. Born in 1850, Hill died of a lung complaint on November 3, 1871. Walter Hill was trained as a botanist in Scotland and appointed superintendent of Brisbane’s Botanic Gardens in 1855. He introduced the jacaranda and poinciana trees to Australia and helped popularise the mango and pawpaw trees. The Walter Hill fountain was named for him in the city botanic gardens.

Near Blackall’s monument is another to an administrator in the 1860s Queensland constitutional crisis. Maurice O’Connell was born in Sydney in 1812, the grandson of William Bligh. He formed an Irish regiment in the British Auxiliary Legion which fought in Spain’s Carlist Wars in the 1830s and returned to New South Wales where he was elected to parliament. He was a founder member of Queensland’s parliament in 1859 and president of the council for two decades until his death in 1879.

Nearby is the grave of Arthur Palmer, Queensland’s seventh premier. Born in Ireland in 1819, Palmer moved to NSW as a young man and worked his way up to become general manager for Henry Dangar’s properties. He moved to Queensland in 1861 as a squatter and entered parliament in 1866, serving as a minister. Blackall, in one of his final acts, appointed him premier in 1870. Palmer wanted to bring in free education but that lost him support from Protestants and Catholics who benefited from the state aid system and he was defeated at election in 1874. His later years were shrouded in controversy over his directorship of the failed Queensland National Bank. He died in 1898 before the Supreme Court cleared him and other directors of blame.

Another of Queensland’s early governors is Sir Anthony Musgrave. Born in 1828 in Antigua, Musgrave was a global servant of empire with colonial positions in Antigua, Nevis and Kitts, Newfoundland, Natal, British Columbia, South Australia and Jamaica. He was appointed governor of Queensland in 1883 and clashed with premier Thomas MacIlwraith over Musgrave’s power to issue pardons. He died in office on October 9, 1888.

This grave commemorates James Forsyth Thallon, Commissioner of Railways. Thallon was born in Scotland in 1847 and moved to Queensland for health reasons as a young man. He joined the railways and worked his way up. He became Commissioner in 1902 and led Queensland Railways through rapid expansion. He was a supporter of Queensland’s narrow gauge which he called appropriate for a “young country”. A popular manager, his staff were devastated when he died of dengue fever in 1911 and they launched a subscription to erect this monument a year later.

This unusual monument marks the grave of Edward McGregor, born in Edinburgh in 1862. He worked for fellow Scot Thallon in Queensland Railways for 20 years before buying the Grosvenor Hotel. He built the Lyceum Theatre which he ran until his death in 1939. His wife Mary Jane died 18 years earlier and the sculpture is of McGregor mourning her death in 1921.

On the western side of the cemetery is the Russian Orthodox plot. Brisbane was the first place in Australia to establish a parish of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1925, as many fled the Russian Revolution. That church was rebuilt as St Nicholas Cathedral Church in Vulture St. It is one of four Orthodox parishes in Brisbane with another at Tweed Heads and a mission in Toowoomba. The Russian cross has three horizontal crossbeams, with the lowest one slanted downwards. The top crossbeams represents Pilate’s inscription INRI. The middle crossbeam is the main bar where the hands are fixed, while the bottom crossbeam represents the footrest which prolongs the torture.

Nearby is the Greek Orthodox section. Greeks are the seventh largest ethnic group in Australia with almost 400,000 people of Greek ethnicity in the 2011 census. While most lived in Melbourne or Sydney, some worked the cane fields in Northern Queensland. Paul Patty was the youngest of three Patty brothers who came to Brisbane to open up two cafes on Queen St. Brisbane’s most famous Greek resident was Corfu-born Lady Diamantina Roma, wife of first governor George Bowen.

The Jewish portion on the east of the cemetery has 800 graves. The first Brisbane Jewish community began in 1865, and its synagogue, Sha’arei Emunah (now Brisbane’s main synagogue in Spring Hill), was consecrated in 1886. There were then 446 Jews in Brisbane with 724 in Queensland. A second congregation opened in South Brisbane for Russian immigrants in 1928 and another opened at Surfers Paradise in 1961. Few immigrants settled in Brisbane after World War II, and the growth of the community has been slow with less than 2000 Jews in Queensland today.

Dr Harry Lightoller was born in Manchester in 1876 and came to Queensland where he became a well-known doctor in Ipswich. After a long trip to Europe where he studied “diseases of women” he returned to Queensland and retired to Brisbane with wife Minnie. They died within three years of each other in the 1920s.

Almost 8000 Australians died in the Gallipoli campaign of the First World War. They included Lt Leslie Norman Collin of the 15th Australian Infantry Battalion. He died two weeks into the conflict which had already descended into stalemate. On May 8 a party from the 15th Battalion captured the Turkish trench in front of Quinn’s Post, a key position at Anzac Cove. Next morning, they were driven back with many killed or wounded as they ran for the Australian line. Leslie’s cousin Stanley Collin Larkin fought in Palestine with the 2nd Light Horse and probably took part in the charge at Beersheba. Stanley was tragically killed days before the armistice after “four year’s hard service” at Gaza on October 28, 1918.

The lives of all who died in that war are commemorated in another monument and Toowong cemetery had a crucial role in making Anzac Day a national day of commemoration. When army chaplain Canon David Garland returned from the war he met many people at the graveyard honouring dead relatives. For 20 years Garland organised an annual Anzac Day service at Toowong. He helped form an Anzac Day committee and in 1923 the stone of remembrance and cross were laid in time for 1924’s Anzac Day. The “Evermore” inscription is from the Book of Ecclesiasticus as recommended by Rudyard Kipling for each Stone of Remembrance across the Commonwealth.

Brisbane racked up the dead again in the Second World War including Flight Lt Duncan Matheson. Matheson died in an air crash near Alice Springs aged 36. He was a passenger on a Douglas C-39 heading for Birdum, NT. The overloaded plane of the 21st Troop Carrier Squadron of the 374th Transport Carrier Group crashed after takeoff. It had arrived at Alice Springs the day before after a forced landing during bad weather after flying from Batchelor. After taking off it was seen to bank to the north east of the airfield before crashing and exploding in flames. Matheson was one of 11 men dead.

After all the war memorials it was a relief to see the Temple of Peace, though it too was a sad story. Built by Brisbane dissident and Wobbly Richard Ramo in 1924, the heritage-listed memorial is a cross between mausoleum and Indian temple. Its dedication took the form of a pacifist rally. Ramo was grieving for three sons killed in World War I, and an adopted son who committed suicide. “All my hope lies buried here,” Ramo wrote. He interred the recovered ashes of three of his sons in a red flagged coffin. “There is no Heaven! We Shall not meet again. Make thy Heaven here and thou shalt not have lived in vain,” is written near the ornate temple’s door.

My final stop was a pilgrimage of my own. I knew about boxer Peter Jackson from my Roma days as he died there in 1901. Jackson was a black boxer from the Caribbean who learned his ringcraft after moving to Sydney aged 16. He had success in the ring in Australia and Britain and moved to America where he drew after 61 rounds with Jim Corbett but world champion John L Sullivan would not fight him because he was black. After an injury Jackson gradually went downhill and contracted TB. He was advised to move to the drier air of Roma where he died. He was buried in an unmarked grave at Toowong. After a public subscription, Sydney mason Lewis Page carved a dazzling white Carrara marble monument over Jackson’s grave with an image that looks nothing like Jackson. The inscription is Shakespeare’s Antony quote about Julius Caesar: “This was a man”. When Jack Johnson won a fight in Sydney in 1908 to become the world’s first black heavyweight champion, he visited Jackson’s grave. A.E. Austin of the Brisbane Courier said Johnson spent a quiet few moments in silent contemplation at the grave of his brother-in-arms. “It was an impressive sight to see the living gladiator kneeling for a moment over the tomb of he who was Australia’s fistic idol”, Austin wrote.

How an accident at Mount Isa Mines in 1927 led to the flying doctors

A. Affleck, Pilot; Rev. JA Barber; Dr. G. Simpson.QANTAS VICTORY. Photo: National Library of Australia.

A few weeks ago I wrote about the birth of the Flying Doctor service. Much of the information in the article came from a book Angels in the Outback by former Australian Inland Mission director Max Griffiths. Since then I was contacted by Mount Isa historian Barry Merrick who told us that like the information on the RFDS history site, important details have been left out when it came to the accident in Mount Isa in 1927 that had a direct bearing on the service.

“I researched this information and have collated it from late July 1927 to August 2nd 1927, including photographs,” Merrick said. “Dr George Simpson was conducting what we call today a feasibility study into medical services for the Outback. However, on August 1 1927, a miner was thrown down a shaft here and was unable to be transported to Cloncurry by ambulance, in those days the road was via Duchess. MIM hired the QANTAS mail plane to evacuate him to Cloncurry Hospital.”

Merrick forwarded a compilation he put together of the events based on newspaper reports and diaries from the era.

In 1927 Mount Isa was four years old, there were two hotels, two shops, a picture show, and a couple of boarding houses. Harry Smith had installed an ice works and the railway line was approaching from Duchess while a plane brought the mail.

Dr Simpson started his study of medical services with a visit to Camooweal in July 1927 where he reported there was a bush hospital of eight beds and a resident doctor. Driving to Cloncurry – which took him 26 hours via Duchess – he noted on July 31 “lunching at a dry creek we arrived at Mount Isa about 3:30. It is a flourishing tin town, houses, and mines, supporting a luxurious pub.”

“We called on the local doc., Dr. Doreen Hungerford, who lives in a tidy house set on high piles. No drunk could negotiate the stairs to her consulting room,” Dr Simpson wrote. “She is a gallant, capable girl, and very popular with the 200 odd inhabitants in the town. We had not long to exchange compliments here as our objective was still far ahead.”

By the time Simpson had arrived in Cloncurry on August 1 there was an accident at the mine in Mount Isa. As reported in the parliamentary proceedings, “(William) O’Brien and two mates were being lowered down Doherty’s shaft in a skip. When 6 or 7 feet above 300-ft. plat the skip stopped momentarily and tipped the three men into the shaft. O’Brien’s pelvis was fractured. The other men were not hurt.”

The injured miner could not be transported safely by road to Cloncurry Hospital which was eight hours away road trip, so they rang the hospital for medical assistance.

O’Doherty Shaft with the shaft entrance sloping down to the left. Photo: Mount Isa Mines Photographic Collection.

According to the Queensland Times (August 3) “QANTAS received a call from Mount Isa, for a plane into the Cloncurry Hospital a man whose spine was injured. The mission doctor (Simpson) volunteered to go with the plane, and was allowed to do so.”

According to Dr Simpsons’s Journal, “About midday Mr. Evans (pilot) came across and said he was flying out to Mount Isa to bring in a case of a fractured pelvis and spine. I had offered to go with him when the trip was first projected the evening before, and he now said he would be delighted to take me.”

They went straight out to the Cloncurry aerodrome 4km away and were soon flying over Cloncurry in the QANTAS DH50. “We passed high over Duchess, then turned to the right, and we were soon swooping down on Mount Isa, and the waiting group beside the ambulance,’ Dr Simpson wrote. “Dr Hungerford was rather surprised to see me again, but we had little time for exchange of compliments, as we had no lunch and wished to get back as soon as possible.”

Because the mail plane was not fitted out for the evacuation the QANTAS mechanic and Dr Simpson made adjustments to accommodate a stretcher and ensured it was safely anchored by arranging extra supports. Then he carefully directed the loading of the suffering man on to the aircraft and attended him during the return flight.

QANTAS Plane Hermes at Cloncurry. L:R: Ambulance Officer Jack Lisson; Dr. George Simpson; Pilot Mr. Evans. Photo: National Library of Australia.

Dr Simpson said the vibration on the return trip upset O’Brien, so he gave him morphine and brandy “which he promptly vomited”. “Evans made a beautiful landing, and the aerial medical service of the A.I.M. was an established fact,” he wrote. “The ambulance was waiting to convey the patient to hospital, and it was a rough, bumpy trip – much worse than the air part.”

Merrick wrote that unconfirmed reports said O’Brien was very vocal about his experiences.

“I suffered sheer hell, agony,” O’Brien said, “but that was while I was in the ambulance. Red dust had blown in drifts across the road and we had to crash through these like a boat through waves, spraying dust in all directions. Every jolt sent me through the roof with pain. In the air, though it was just like heaven: it was smooth and painless in comparison”.

“The trip gave Simpson a valuable experience of the problems associated with carrying a prone patient in an aircraft,” Merrick concluded. “Doctor George Simpson was able to demonstrate the use of an aerial service for medical evacuations and in May 1928 the Australian Inland Mission Aerial Medical Service was operational and later became the Royal Flying Doctor Service.”

Long overdue compensation for Palm Islanders in Mulrunji case

Photo of Palm Island courtesy of Palm Island Shire Council

A dark and shameful episode in Queensland history has come to end with the news the Queensland government will pay a $30m settlement and deliver a formal apology to the people of Palm Island. It comes as the federal court found police officers breached the Racial Discrimination Act and acted unlawfully in responding to riots over the death in custody of Cameron Doomadgee (known as Mulrunji) in 2004. The settlement, subject to approval by the federal court, resolves a class action involving hundreds of claimants, lead by Lex, Cecilia and Agnes Wotton.

Palm Island was a Queensland gulag, a concentration camp for Aboriginal people or an “island Siberia” as historian Henry Reynolds called it. Lex Wotton was not old enough to remember the last time locals rioted against injustice in 1957. But he knew the story and heard about the heavy-handed police response. The police attitude has not changed with police union boss Ian Leavers claiming they did nothing wrong in 2004 and the settlement was made to “criminals”. Leavers is paid to defend members but should have kept quiet rather than add to a flagrant injustice.

His officer Chris Hurley has been the centre of attention since the coroner found him guilty of killing Mulrunji with three fatal punches, a death compounded by the casual treatment of his body and lies police told the family after his death. Fourteen years later no-one has been convicted of his death despite numerous court actions. Mulrunji stupidly taunted police as they made an arrest but his arrest was needless as were Hurley’s punches which left him dying in the cells.

When his worried family arrived, Hurley told them Mulrunji was sleeping and colluded with officers to cover up the death. When the truth came out about the death of a popular local man, anger quickly seethed in a community used to discrimination. When they surrounded the station, police sent in the riot squad. At 5am they broke into the home of community leader Lex Wotton – who was never implicated in the riots – and arrested him at gunpoint in front of terrified relatives. In 2016 Federal Court Justice Debbie Mortimer ruled police had breached the racial discrimination act as they responded to the riots. It’s hard not to agree with the Palm Island mayor it is the police who need to apologise not the islanders.

Police are state government employees and the state government overstepped the mark in 2004 as they did in 1957. In 1957, Palm Islanders had almost no rights at all. Their movements and almost all aspects of their life were controlled by Queensland’s infamous Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897. Palm Island reserve was created as a penal settlement for Aboriginal people across northern Queensland, and many were jailed for trivial offences. Saxby Downs stockman Albert Hippi was sent there because he “frightened women and tried to get liquor” while in 1924 Paddy Brooks of Millaa Millaa was exiled for causing “discontent”.

Palms was ruled by a succession of harsh administrators beginning with Robert Curry. Curry arrived when the settlement started in 1918 and ruled with a rod of iron for 12 years. Floggings were frequent as well as summary removals. In 1929 Home Department recommended a police magistrate inquiry into Curry’s assault of a woman with a whip until “she fell senseless to the ground”.

After his medical officer reported him for flogging, Curry went wild. In the early hours of February 3, 1930 he ran amok with a gun shooting and injuring the medical officer before smashing the officer’s wife skull with the butt of his rifle. He then set fire to his own house killing his son and step-daughter inside. After he fled to another island and then returned, the medical officer ordered Aboriginal man Peter Prior to shoot him dead. Prior was charged with murder but the Supreme Court judge threw the case out saying it only made it this far because Curry’s killer was not a white man.

In the war years the US Army posted black American soldiers to the island to protect white Australian sensibilities from black men on city streets (the paranoid fear was they would have sex with white women). These soldiers gave the islanders a powerful new sense of their own identity and the Second World War was a time of political awakening for Aboriginal people. But islander hopes were brutally quashed with the arrival of a new supervisor in 1953 named Roy Bartlam.

Bartlam was an ex-policeman obsessed with control. He believed Murris could not think for themselves and used intimidation and police brutality to cement his reign. Locals were punished if they did not salute all whites they passed in the street. If they were late for roll call or curfew, they were imprisoned. People faced seven day’s jail for laughing or whistling. Blacks were jailed for being untidy or not having their hair cut. Women were sent to prison for not having skirts below knee-length.

Bartlam’s rules led an all-out strike in 1957 with eerie foreshadowing of the 2004 riots. A Murri man was charged with threatening Bartlam, but broke away and was joined by demonstrators who attacked police and abused settlement officers. As Bartlam hid in his office, Aboriginal people went on strike and controlled street corners. They sent a letter to Brisbane authorities demanding “adequate meat supply, increased wages, better housing and for Bartlam to leave the island.”

Just as in 2004, authorities over-reacted. RAAF planes rushed 20 police to the island, greeted by 250 demonstrators. After several days of siege, Bartlam’s men arrested the strike leaders in the middle of the night and the strike was ended. The leaders were exiled and Bartlam stayed but the strike had some success with immediate improvements in diet and conditions.

As late as 1969 blacks were banned from the main street, Mango Avenue, and new Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen equated Aboriginal activism with black terrorism. When local leader Fred Clay and union organiser Bill Rosser started a newsletter called Smoke Signal to document life under the Act, they were thrown off the island.

Though some land rights and an Aboriginal council were established in the 1980s, the island still had inadequate housing, poor sewerage and infectious diseases. Easier access to alcohol led to an upsurge in violence and suicide. While regulations were introduced in 1972 which declared all Aboriginal workers must be paid an award wage, these regulations did not apply to workers on government reserves such as Palm Island, where payment was labelled a “training allowance”, despite many employees having worked for decades. In the 2000s Palms remained a deeply troubled and desperately poor place hidden from view from mainstream Australia. Locals called it “Fallujah” but this Fallujah never made the national news until the 2004 riots.

In Mulrunji’s inquest the Deputy Coroner found Hurley had contributed to his death. The police union was furious, the government backed off, and Hurley was never stood down. The largest police awards ceremony in Queensland history issued bravery awards for the cops involved in quelling the riot. Premier Beattie refused a call for a Royal Commission. In 2009 Lex Wotton was jailed for seven years for his part in instigating the riot, though he was released on parole in 2010. In 2013 his family filed the class action and the Federal Court found in their favour in 2016.

As Justice Mortimer said about police in his scathing judgement: “If content is to be given to the obligation, contained in the QPS Operational Procedures Manual to consider ‘cultural needs’, then in the case of Palm Island those cultural needs could not possibly be understood or met in any genuine way without a good working appreciation of the racism and oppression that characterised the island’s history.” Something Leavers would do well to understand.

A visit to Paronella Park

I’d driven the road from Townsville to Cairns in 2013 but at that time I’d not heard of Paronella Park. I headed up that way again in 2017 and in the intervening years I’d heard multiple times Paronella Park was worth a visit and had won many tourism awards. So I added it to my itinerary between Cardwell and Innisfail. The park is not new, it has been open since 1935. As I drove north I saw many billboards advertising its charms and wondered why I didn’t notice it before. Was it simply clever marketing in the last few years that had raised its profile?

Paronella Park is an extraordinary place with an extraordinary story. Situated at Mena Creek it is a 15km detour from the Bruce Highway, 200km south of Cairns.  I parked on the south side of the creek at a lookout admiring Mena Creek Falls. It was the dry season so not at its most spectacular but sitting pretty right next door was Paronella Park in all its glory.

The Park is approached by a swing bridge which looks down on the creek below and part of the ornate park. The park was a pre-war dream of Spanish immigrant José Paronella who wanted to build a Castilian castle in the Australian tropics. Paronella was born in February 1887 in La Vall de Santa Creu, a small village in Catalonia. On five hectares of virgin scrub beside Mena Falls he built a park with a castle, picnic area by the falls, tennis courts, bridges, a tunnel, and covered it with 7500 tropical plants and trees that is now a lush rainforest.

José Paronella’s father tended olives for local farmers and his grandmother’s tales of “romantic Spanish castles” and the “nobleza” profoundly influenced José’s dreams. He moved from Catalonia to Cairns in 1913. For 11 years he worked hard, cutting sugar cane then purchasing, improving, and reselling cane farms. By 1921 he was an Australian citizen and a wealthy man. Paronella received an extortion letter from The Black Hand demanding £500. The Black Hand was established in Sydney and Melbourne, and was making inroads into the Italian communities in Innisfail with many murders, bombings, and blackmails. Paronella was susceptible to extortion as he had been involved in tax evasion. In 1924 he returned to Spain under a false name intending to marry Matilda Soler, his betrothed before coming to Australia. But Matilda had found another man so he married Matilda’s younger sister Margarita instead. He took Margarita back to Australia where the couple worked hard together to build their fortune. They also had two children Teresa and Joe (Jr).

José first saw his park in 1914 but it wasn’t until 1929 he was in a position to buy it which he did for £120. Immediately he got to work building his pleasure gardens and reception centre for public enjoyment. Paronella was strongly influenced by the Moorish architecture and gardens of Spain, and the design of villa gardens visited during his European honeymoon. He also admired the work of Antonio Gaudi, and created garden elements inspired by the Alcazar Garden in Seville and the Botanic Gardens in Madrid.

The earliest structure, the Grand Staircase, was built to carry river sand to make the concrete. The steep structure has reminders of past floods. The two brown tiles half way up represent the 1996 flood level (lower) and 1967 and 1994 (upper). Near the top is a third tile representing the huge height of the 1946 flood.

After building a house for themselves, the Paronellas started on the castle and accompanying lookout towers and pillars. Apart from the stone house, all structures were constructed of poured, reinforced concrete from old railway track. The concrete was covered with a clay and cement plaster with fingerprints a reminder it was all done by hand.

It took six years of building and the buzz grew at the scale of the project. In 1933 the Brisbane Sunday Mail reported what the “pleasant-faced Spaniard” was up to in the Deep North. The paper was impressed but struggled to avoid racist overtones. “Joe Paronella. An amazing fellow of 47 and with none of the swagger the world has pinned to his race.” When asked him why he put so much effort into it, he replied: “I wish to do something. I make my money in (the) sugar industry and in selling my farm. I travel and see the world twice. Never do I see any place as beautiful as Queensland.”

Paronella did much of the work himself. He employed a canecutter who had worked as a carpenter in Malta and the canecutter’s nephew to work on the project full-time. He used many unemployed men who moved to Innisfail and exchanged food and shelter for labour. In 1935, the Park was officially opened. Queensland governor Leslie Wilson was at a conference in Innisfail and visited the new park. Wilson told journalists “Paronella has created a place of beauty which will be a great attraction to visitors in the future. His buildings are of unique design. The Park is a credit to North Queensland. It is absolutely remarkable to see what one enterprising man can do.” Access to Mena Creek from Innisfail had improved and the park was immediately popular. It boomed during the war years as thousands of American servicemen arrived with money to spend.

The theatre showed movies every Saturday night. When they removed the canvas chairs from the hall it was transformed into a venue for dances and parties. The highlight of the ballroom was a myriad reflector, a great ball covered with 1270 tiny mirrors, suspended from the ceiling. Its pink and blue spotlights shone on the reflector from the corners of the hall and when rotated slowly, it produced a coloured snowflake effect. Upstairs was the Paronella Museum housing coins, pistols, dolls and samples of North Queensland timbers. A disastrous fire swept through the Park and destroyed the hall and cafe in 1979. The Park was closed for years, but was slowly revived despite further cyclone and flood damage.

The tunnel of love was built in 1932-1933. The reinforced concrete structure provided a short cut to the fernery. It was closed in 1993 for safety reasons. The closure has allowed a colony of little bent-wing bats to grow from 40 to 500.

Paronella planted these majestic rows of Queensland kauri pines (Agathis robusta) in 1933. They can live for a thousand years. He planted 7000 trees and the park was threaded by pathways, bridges and avenues. He also built a shaded orchid and fern house for Margarita to tend exotic plants.

An astonishing feature is a hydroelectric power station, the first in North Queensland. Installed in 1933 it worked using gravity to Paronella’s own design. Water falls nine metres into the turbines coupled with a DC generator.  A belt-driven governor controlled the speed and changed the angle of water flow to maintain constant rotation speed. Paronella used the station to power the park though he had to change it to AC after the 1946 floods. Cyclone Larry destroyed it in 2006 but the current owners restored it with the help of a German company specialising in old hydro systems. Running again since 2010, it powers the park and also supplies the grid.

Two years after the significant damage of the 1946 floods, José died of cancer, leaving Margarita, Teresa, and Joe, to carry on. Teresa married and moved to Brisbane while Joe married Val in 1952, and they had two sons, Joe (José) and Kerry. Floods, renovations and maintenance kept them busy. After Margarita died in 1967 and son Joe in 1972, Val found it too hard and sold up in 1977. The park was closed after the 1979 fire. Mark and Judy Evans purchased it in 1993 with a plan to restore the Park. They see it as a work of art, and work on maintaining and preserving, rather than rebuilding.

A visit to Mt Frosty mine

North West Queensland is full of the most amazing wildernesses but December is not the best time to go exploring. The intense heat and constant attention of flies make any outdoor adventure difficult. Nonetheless I was keen today to check out a place called Mt Frosty. Its name alone might cool me down.

I didn’t know much about it. All I knew was the mine was somewhere off this dirt-track starting from this right hand turnoff on the Barkly Hwy (pictured above), just before the sign saying you were 50km out from Mount Isa. I left the bitumen and drove south.

After 3km the dirt road petered out at this water outstation for cattle. There was no defined track any further and I thought this was a wasted trip. But when I stopped and got out of the car, I almost immediately saw two things that assured me I had arrived.

Off to my left were the rusting iron remains of mineworks while straight ahead and deep down below there was the impressive two-sided tailings waterhole, complete with its own rusting campervan. The whole scene in this remote landscape reminded me of Mad Max.

When I walked around the back of the waterhole more of the mine structure came into view. Mt Frosty gets its name from the quartz that litters the ground. But what did they mine there? When I went back to my computer later that day, I found the information on Mt Frosty mine was contradictory. Someone said it was a gypsum mine, another called it calcite, but the best documented evidence I found was that it was a limestone mine.

The mine was owned by local legend Clem Walton (who also founded nearby Mary Kathleen uranium mine). At Mt Frosty in the 1950s and 60s they mined for limestone which was used by Mount Isa Mines.

The Mad Max feeling grew with all the graffiti on the mine works scattered up the hill.

This photo reminded me of a ski resort. More particularly it reminded me of the Sarajevo 1984 Winter Olympics site after it was abandoned.

In his autobiography Aussie Rogue Raymond D. Clements described a time when he and a mate quit work at Mount Isa Mines after just four hours. His friend got a job on a cattle station near Dajarra while Clements got a job at Mt Frosty working for Walton. Clements reckoned his friend had the better deal, “you won’t die of led (sic) poisoning”.

Walton sent newcomers like Clements out to crush rocks with 15-pound sledgehammers to test their mettle. Clements passed muster and graduated to work a drill for blast holes and helped the foreman charge up and fire the rockface. This photo above reminds me of the German defences on Normandy,  a turret bristling with guns.

Clements said that after the tip truck dumped its load of limestone on the large cast iron screen, workers broke it up with sledgehammers. The broken rock went through the crushing plants and was stockpiled until roadtrains took it to the Mount Isa copper smelter. This photo above reminded me of another nearby abandoned mine at Kuridala.

Clements said the crushed limestone was used for flux in the smelting process of copper. Smelting no longer uses limestone and the mine was abandoned in the 1960s. However there is still plenty of valuable minerals around here. Australian mining company Hammer Metals has formed a joint venture with Swiss-giant Glencore (current owners of Mount Isa Mines) after acquiring AuKing’s interest in Mt Frosty.  It is in the Mary Kathleen Shear Zone which hosts several copper-gold, uranium (though that cannot be mined legally) and rare earth element prospects.

Having checked out the buildings, it was time for a closer investigation of the waterhole and its tunnels where the mining operations took place. Not to mention the campervan. How did it end up there?

The van was in a dilapidated state wedged tight between rocks. I wondered if it had been thrown over the top, but it wouldn’t explain its careful position and its relatively undamaged bodywork.

But to drive it down such rough terrain also looked unlikely, unless it was driven completely on its rims. One thing I am certain of is there would have been one last almighty party to farewell it, overlooking the amazing lake with its impressive overhangs.

References to Mt Frosty are few and far between. In 1975 Nationals state member for Mount Isa Angelo Bertoni spoke in parliament about the joys of his electorate in a debate about tourism. Mount Isa, he said, was a jumping-off point for other attractions. “It is rich in native flora and fauna, and Aboriginal paintings. One Aboriginal fertility painting in rock 30 miles from Mount Isa has been there for 2000 years. Tours can be taken to the Aboriginal paintings, and from there to what we call Mt. Frosty, with its lime deposits and pools of water. One could fossick around there for hours and hours. The tourist to the Inland will feel that here is something quite different from what can be seen along the coast.”

Bertoni was right about it being different and you could fossick around Mt Frosty for hours. But maybe not in December. The flies would have carried you away long before.

Remembering the impact of the Queensland Native Police

Qld Native Police 1863

There are many reasons why Australia needs to negotiate with its Indigenous inhabitants and most are buried in Australian history. Many would like those memories permanently buried, but on Remembrance Day we cannot allow this.

The first Australians came here before the island of Australia existed. They landed on Sahul, a giant continent linking New Guinea, mainland Australia and Tasmania. Their earliest landing sites are long gone, buried under rising shores of warmer times but evidence suggests a human presence of 68,000 years. They spread across Sahul rapidly – the earliest identifiable human outside of Africa was found in far western New South Wales.

New Guinea and Tasmania eventually split away from Australia but all three had cultures that survived millennia and shaped their environment through adroit use of fire – even Tasmania with just 5000 souls succeeded.

The largest number of people came to Queensland, attracted by favourable climate and rich food sources. White people didn’t land here in numbers until the 1830s. “They are doing nothing with the land and we want it” was their belief but with numbers favouring Aboriginal people, whites didn’t immediately get what they want. It wasn’t until advanced weaponry of the 1840s and 1850s the Europeans began to win the war.

Authorities in Sydney turned a blind eye to violence on the frontier, with homilies about British law while enabling Squatters to take “vacant” country. Matters worsened with the separation of Queensland from NSW in 1859. Penniless Brisbane authorities needed to sell Aboriginal country to raise revenue. They had a vested interest in crushing resistance.

Attitudes were hardened by two events around separation: the killing of 11 settlers at Hornet Bank in the Upper Dawson in 1857 and the killing of 19 of the Wills party at Cullin-la-Ringo near Springsure in 1861. The Frazers at Hornet Bank were well known for interfering with Aboriginal women while at Cullin-la-Ringo there was evidence of abduction of two local boys. But causes were overlooked amid cries of overtrusting the Aborigines and righteous fury about “black savages”.

Both massacres prompted massive revenge sprees. Few lived to tell the tale. Gordon Reid’s history on Hornet Bank suggests native police and armed settlers killed 150 to 300 Jiman people. At Cullin-la-Ringo a reprisal gang killed every adult black they found in a 100 mile radius. Settlers killed with impunity and the frontier pushed further west and north.

Making settlers feel safe was the job of the Native Police. Native Police forces (usually a group of three to eight Indigenous men led by a European officer) were at Hornet Bank and across the Australian colonies in the 19th century. Their need came with the expansion of British control of Australia in the 1840s developing from rough convict patrols. Indigenous troopers were often recruited at the point of a gun. It was the Empire’s divide and rule tactic to use Native groups with no loyalties to other groups. They enjoyed important advantages including familiarity with the terrain, and had less medical problems in tropical areas. They were also paid less and expected to camp in the open during operations and feed themselves.

They dispossessed Aboriginal people everywhere but nowhere was their impact as great or as long-lasting as Queensland. Yet on this day commemorating military history, few have heard of them. Jonathan Richards’ defining history of Queensland’s Native Police is called The Secret War. Even today it remains mostly a secret. The Queensland Native Police were, as Richards says, “the symbol of Native policy, invasion and dispossession throughout the second half of the 19th century.”

They were always known as a murderous force but the Queensland Native Police survived into the 20th century because it suited their employers. They were a successful military enterprise. By quelling resistance on the frontier, they increased the government’s land values.

The Native Police were police in name only,  more properly a “special forces” unit with a specific purpose to suppress Indigenous resistance to colonisation. Native Police had the advantage of horses and better firearms while efficient postal and telegraph systems allowed smooth transmission of orders.

Many officers were former army men from other parts of the Empire and the old boy network ensured many were never punished for misdeeds, including murder. Because the force operated on the frontier it was constantly on the move, westward and northward. For four decades Native Police barracks mapped the moving front.

The official view was the Native Police operated in response to Aboriginal attacks in “unsettled” areas. In 1872 Colonial Secretary Arthur Palmer claimed the Queensland government “had never followed a policy of extermination” but this was a blatant lie, exposed by newspapers of the era. In 1868 the Burketown correspondent reported casually that “everyone in the district is delighted with the wholesale slaughter dealt out by the native police and thank Mr Uhr (sub inspector of native police) for his energy in ridding the district of fiftynine (59) myalls.”

Energy was one way to describe it, another way was “terror”. Retribution was more practical than prevention. Commanders deliberately terrified and intimidated Aboriginal people with violence and threats, backed by gunfire. Robert Orsted-Jensen’s book Frontier History Revisited (2011) estimated around 11 people died in each “dispersal”.

Long term police commissioner David Seymour claimed their tactics were justified against ferocious fighters though his call to his officers to report full details of every “collision” was mostly ignored. Words like “collisions” and “dispersals” were euphemisms designed to overlook the fact that lives were lost.

Many whites despised the Native Police, but its supporters were remote settlers who believed, as Charles Bradley in Bowen did in 1871, “the Blacks were more dangerous and daring” without police presence. By then the frontier had moved to the northern goldfields and miners were as determined as farmers to ensure Aboriginal people did not get in their way. With open warfare at the Palmer River goldfield near Cooktown, the Native Police were powerless, other than assisting with revenge parties whenever whites were killed.

Elsewhere it was collision after collision, safe in the knowledge that, as a regional paper said, “You will never get a jury to bring in a verdict of murder for the killing of a black”.  Police gave few details about their operations, though one officer told an inquest some people “asked for trouble”. Top brass turned a blind eye they were breaking British law on the frontier every day. Settlers, miners and police all knew indiscriminate killing was wrong, so it was hidden.

As late as 1897 Native Police commissioner WE Parry-Okeden argued the force was still needed. In a report to parliament called “North Queensland Aborigines and the Native Police” Parry-Okeden wrote it was “a well known fact, that the only control possible to be obtained at the outset and maintained over wild or uncivilised blacks is by the exercise and exhibition of superior force.” That force, he said, could only be applied by people “they recognise as capable of competing with them in their own tactics, tracking, bush cunning, lore or living”. White discipline was always required. “I reiterate that a strong well-officed Native Police detachments constantly patrolling among them are absolutely necessary,” he concluded.

The end of resistance a few years later made patrols unnecessary. Black trackers were rolled into the regular Queensland police while the native force was quietly forgotten. The Native Police was an inconvenient reminder of Queensland’s violent times. But it had done the work of its masters and the Aboriginal people had been defeated. Many were killed, while survivors would be mopped up into reserves and missions at Barambah (Cherbourg), Mappoon, Yarrabah, Woorabindah, Palm Island and other places. Queensland belonged to the whitefellas.

Noel Loos estimates 10,000 Aboriginal people died in frontier conflict in Queensland, about half the total number of Aboriginal dead in frontier Australia. The monuments to them are few and far between.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we should remember them.