Post by braided-rug on Apr 24, 2006 15:06:44 GMT 10
I may put this in my blog too, but thought missviolet may enjoy reading it, also those who enjoyed the other writing I posted that Agnes wrote.
Shackleton - Erikin
With two horses in a spring cart filled with our possessions, a brindle kangaroo dog and a youth whom we had brought with us from Melbourne, my husband and I arrived at Cookine Spring (now Shackleton) on the evening of March 30, 1909.
We left Victoria in the ill-fated Koombara on her maiden voyage with little money but plenty of hope and spirits, being assured by the West Australian Office in Bourke St. that a knowledge of farming joined to the Agricultural bank was all that was necessary. We had both been born and reared on wheat and sheep farms in the far-famed Wimmera so we had the knowledge, and looked to the Ag. Bank for their part of the job.
When the project of "Going West" was first discussed between us there was some doubts on our part, because of adverse reports were all we had ever received about the West, and Queensland was the much lauded State - there everything was as much boosted as the West was decried. Finally, I decided the question by a formula much favoured by elderly ladies of my acquaintance when they were in doubt - you shut your eyes, opened the Bible and jabbed home a pin; opened your eyes, read the indicated line or verse, and there you were! Certainly I had tried it out before a time or two with rather unsatisfactory results, such as "Naphtali begat Padahel" or "The King of Jarmuth one, the King of Lacish one", which had no bearings on the cases in point.
However, this time, having completed the formula, I read "he maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters". And after that who could have any doubt? Not we! So Westward Ho! for us.
There was already a pioneer at Cookine, and actually a fenced-in paddock of ring-barked jam trees. Mr. Murcoot of the Lands Dept. had selected land there and sent young Bert Alp up to take charge - Bert Alp also had a Block nearby.
Mr. Murcottt, who dropped dead there on the Cookine block during the summer of 1915-16, was the engineer who had designed the Circular Railway of Vienna, the Railway to Khartoum, certain bridges over the Murray, and many other important works throught the Empire, and his wife was a highly accomplished musician and quite a charming person So it can be truthfully said that the very first pioneers of the Shackleton District were of no common mould.
Those Murcoot blocks of land chaged hands more than once and are now in the possession of the Jones family who also own the Bert Alp block.
I always remember the feeling of disgust and horror I felt as we drove through the "Lakes" on our way to Cookine. I had never seen anything like them before and they certianly did not fit in with the "Green Pasture" prophecy; but the jam patch of Cookine looked more promising so I cheered up a bit, especially as I viewed the great patches of dried everlastings under the trees, and young Alp told me of their beauty in during the Spring season.
We pitched our tents and camped there while my husband and the Melbourne youth found the whereabouts of our unsurveyed land - roughly some 20 or 25 chains south from a rocky outcrop now know as "The Granites" and still occupied by Mr. Beaton. So dense was the forest and undergrowth that they rode for nearly two days before finding the Rocks, then they chopped the road in and cleared a space in the very heart of the dense gimlet thicket whereon to pitch our Home. There was unlimited firewood very handy certainly, and no winds from Heaven or elsewhere could blow harshly on our frail tenement, but these advantages were offset by enormous clouds of dreadful tormeting sandflies which nearly drove us to distraction. (I have read since that sandflies were the primal cause of the Bourke and Wills Disaster - they tormented and tortured the wretched men at the Coopers Creek Depot so painfully that they first couldn't take it, and I do not doubt the story). Once the timber was cleared and the winds could blow freely, the terrible pests were eliminated; but they took some standing up to. Where I hear the newcomers of today complaining and snivelling of the hardness of the times, and I remember what we, the pioneers, had to face, I feel quite justified in declaring that "the Breed does not still hold good!: If we had not been made of much sterner stuff, the District of Shackleton - Erikin would still be Virgin Bush tenanted by a few kangaroos, wallabies, snakes and lizards, instead of one of the best wheat and sheep areas in Australia.
...to be continued.
Shackleton - Erikin
With two horses in a spring cart filled with our possessions, a brindle kangaroo dog and a youth whom we had brought with us from Melbourne, my husband and I arrived at Cookine Spring (now Shackleton) on the evening of March 30, 1909.
We left Victoria in the ill-fated Koombara on her maiden voyage with little money but plenty of hope and spirits, being assured by the West Australian Office in Bourke St. that a knowledge of farming joined to the Agricultural bank was all that was necessary. We had both been born and reared on wheat and sheep farms in the far-famed Wimmera so we had the knowledge, and looked to the Ag. Bank for their part of the job.
When the project of "Going West" was first discussed between us there was some doubts on our part, because of adverse reports were all we had ever received about the West, and Queensland was the much lauded State - there everything was as much boosted as the West was decried. Finally, I decided the question by a formula much favoured by elderly ladies of my acquaintance when they were in doubt - you shut your eyes, opened the Bible and jabbed home a pin; opened your eyes, read the indicated line or verse, and there you were! Certainly I had tried it out before a time or two with rather unsatisfactory results, such as "Naphtali begat Padahel" or "The King of Jarmuth one, the King of Lacish one", which had no bearings on the cases in point.
However, this time, having completed the formula, I read "he maketh me to lie down in green pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters". And after that who could have any doubt? Not we! So Westward Ho! for us.
There was already a pioneer at Cookine, and actually a fenced-in paddock of ring-barked jam trees. Mr. Murcoot of the Lands Dept. had selected land there and sent young Bert Alp up to take charge - Bert Alp also had a Block nearby.
Mr. Murcottt, who dropped dead there on the Cookine block during the summer of 1915-16, was the engineer who had designed the Circular Railway of Vienna, the Railway to Khartoum, certain bridges over the Murray, and many other important works throught the Empire, and his wife was a highly accomplished musician and quite a charming person So it can be truthfully said that the very first pioneers of the Shackleton District were of no common mould.
Those Murcoot blocks of land chaged hands more than once and are now in the possession of the Jones family who also own the Bert Alp block.
I always remember the feeling of disgust and horror I felt as we drove through the "Lakes" on our way to Cookine. I had never seen anything like them before and they certianly did not fit in with the "Green Pasture" prophecy; but the jam patch of Cookine looked more promising so I cheered up a bit, especially as I viewed the great patches of dried everlastings under the trees, and young Alp told me of their beauty in during the Spring season.
We pitched our tents and camped there while my husband and the Melbourne youth found the whereabouts of our unsurveyed land - roughly some 20 or 25 chains south from a rocky outcrop now know as "The Granites" and still occupied by Mr. Beaton. So dense was the forest and undergrowth that they rode for nearly two days before finding the Rocks, then they chopped the road in and cleared a space in the very heart of the dense gimlet thicket whereon to pitch our Home. There was unlimited firewood very handy certainly, and no winds from Heaven or elsewhere could blow harshly on our frail tenement, but these advantages were offset by enormous clouds of dreadful tormeting sandflies which nearly drove us to distraction. (I have read since that sandflies were the primal cause of the Bourke and Wills Disaster - they tormented and tortured the wretched men at the Coopers Creek Depot so painfully that they first couldn't take it, and I do not doubt the story). Once the timber was cleared and the winds could blow freely, the terrible pests were eliminated; but they took some standing up to. Where I hear the newcomers of today complaining and snivelling of the hardness of the times, and I remember what we, the pioneers, had to face, I feel quite justified in declaring that "the Breed does not still hold good!: If we had not been made of much sterner stuff, the District of Shackleton - Erikin would still be Virgin Bush tenanted by a few kangaroos, wallabies, snakes and lizards, instead of one of the best wheat and sheep areas in Australia.
...to be continued.