The life and death of Peter Glynn. Imagine the convict experience from the view of a child or a teenager. For whatever reason, usually poverty, you have committed a fairly minor robbery and have been caught. You are taken to Court and tried in a perfunctory way. The Judge exercises leniency, or so he says,Continue reading “An unreformed character.”
Tag Archives: Brisbane hospital
Mr Humby and Mr Humby.
The earliest census returns for Moreton Bay had nearly 1600 people spread out over a vast area that ranged from the Darling Downs to the Logan, Pine River, Ipswich and Brisbane Town. In December 1849, there were two men named Humby in tiny Brisbane Town. Both were English. Both were transported convicts. Both had marriedContinue reading “Mr Humby and Mr Humby.”
The A-Z of Old Brisbane. Some of our “H” places.
Hamilton over the years. Houses and the riverbank, Hamilton. Herston’s beginnings. Highgate Hill then and now. Hotels in old Brisbane. The Brisbane Hospital. All images, unless otherwise credited, are from the State Library of Queensland.
The Fatal Race.
The beginning of 1850 was a time of much excitement in Brisbane Town. The Commissariat Office was seeking tenders for purchase of the “Old Windmill,” a venerable structure of some twenty-two years’ standing, and if no-one bought it, the Government was inclined to knock it down. The post office had received a small supply ofContinue reading “The Fatal Race.”
The Man who was Restored to the World.
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.”
The Health of the Colony – Free Settlement
FROM CONVICT HOSPITAL TO GENERAL HOSPITAL Sick people – please advise The years 1841and 1842 saw settlers, servants, merchants and labourers moving into or through the township. It seems to have escaped the notice of the Government that these people might need services and infrastructure in order to carve out their existence in Moreton Bay.Continue reading “The Health of the Colony – Free Settlement”
Please, Governor, may we have a hospital?
In January 1848, Captain Wickham, Government Resident for Moreton Bay, received a letter from the Colonial Secretary’s Office in Sydney, ordering the closure of the Convict Hospital at Brisbane. The result was that everyone and everything had to go – patients, paupers, medicines, furniture – the lot. What couldn’t be sold was to be shippedContinue reading “Please, Governor, may we have a hospital?”
The Brisbane Hospital 1885
If the early 1880s had been trying for the Brisbane Hospital, 1885 was a nightmare. Staff went missing, patients went missing and money went missing. The Hospital was the subject of a daring undercover story in the Courier, and an unfavourable Auditor-General’s Department report – the first conducted, apparently, in eighteen years. The year beganContinue reading “The Brisbane Hospital 1885”
Death of Dr Ballow – 29 September 1850
THE MORETON BAY COURIERSATURDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1850 WITH deep regret we record in this issue the death of Dr. Ballow, who expired at the Quarantine Station at about eleven o’clock on Sunday morning last, after a few days’ illness from typhus fever, which disorder he had contracted in the performance of his duty, as ActingContinue reading “Death of Dr Ballow – 29 September 1850”
A New Hospital announced – 16 September 1866
If you were ill or injured in Brisbane Town between 1842 and 1866, this was the place you went. A relic of the convict settlement, it opened its doors under Dr Henry Cowper, and was stewarded into free settlement by Doctors Kinnear Robertson, David Ballow and Stephen Simpson. By 1860, as the picture shows, the place was run-downContinue reading “A New Hospital announced – 16 September 1866”
