Guns were a dodgy prospect in the 1840s – they seemed to go off accidentally in all sorts of situations. James McClelland was cleaning a pistol loaded with ball when it went off and injured him in the thigh. Pierre Louis Raul was walking through long grass carrying a gun loaded with buckshot when theContinue reading “The Man who was Restored to the World.”
Category Archives: Dundalli
Other “D” stories – Dundalli, Davis and Dowse.
James Davis “Duramboi.” James Davis (1808-1889) was a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside a forbidding, taciturn man. A blacksmith’s son from Glasgow, James Davis was convicted as a teenager of “theft, habit and repute” (a thief who associates with other thieves) in 1824 and transported to New South Wales on the Minstrel. He wasContinue reading “Other “D” stories – Dundalli, Davis and Dowse.”
The Milsteads of Dalby – the Plough Inn.
After travelling to Brisbane in February 1858 to support her daughter’s failed assault charge against a teacher, Theresa Whalin took stock of her life. She was a widow with a country hotel to run, a lot of land, and a wilful daughter to raise. There was another land sale afoot in Dalby in March, andContinue reading “The Milsteads of Dalby – the Plough Inn.”
Who Lives in a Place Like This? Part 1.
The Sketch Map of Brisbane Town in 1844, and the stories behind it. A rough, sketched map of Brisbane town in 1844 reposes in the John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland. It is attributed to Carl Friedrich Gerler, who arrived in Brisbane as a missionary to the Zion Hill establishment in 1844. The buildingsContinue reading “Who Lives in a Place Like This? Part 1.”
February 8, 1849 – The Death of Dick Ben.
On 18 October 1846, a settler named Andrew Gregor and his servant Mary Shannon were murdered by a group of indigenous men at Pine River. If the mass poisoning by the whites at Kilcoy in 1842 was the defining white outrage in the eyes of indigenous people, the Gregor-Shannon murders were the turning point forContinue reading “February 8, 1849 – The Death of Dick Ben.”
Death on the Pine River – September 11, 1847
On 11 September 1847, three men working as sawyers on the Pine River came under attack from a group of indigenous people who were armed with spears and waddies. William Waller and William Boller died, and James Smith was injured, but survived to give evidence to the Coroner. James Smith was working a two-man sawContinue reading “Death on the Pine River – September 11, 1847”
Moreton Bay and More 