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| ==== Rosewood ==== | ==== Rosewood ==== |
| In 1843, four years after his arrival in the colony, TLM-P optimistically judged he had enough money to lease and stock a property: Rosewood at Moreton Bay (between present day Ipswich and Laidley, located 'at the junction of Lockyer and Laidley Creeks'.((Prior, T L M, Rosewood, Moreton Bay,18/09/1843, https://indexes.records.nsw.gov.au/searchhits_nocopy.aspxtable=Depasturing%20Licenses&id=67&frm=1&query=Surname:Prior; Patricia Clarke, 'The Murray-Priors at Bromelton 1844-1853' in Patricia Savage (compiled), //They came to Bromelton: a brief outline of the life and times of the early pioneers who came to Bromleton - from the pages of history, personal diaries, old letters and family recollections//, Patricia Savage, 2004, p.18; [[http://www.medicalpioneers.com/|Medical Pioneers Index]])) TLM-P bought the lease from Dr John Goodwin (c1800-59).((see [[http://www.medicalpioneers.com/|Medical Pioneers Index]]; Thomas A. Darragh and Roderick J. Fensham (eds), //The Leichhardt diaries. Early travels in Australia during 1842-1844//, Memoirs of the Queensland Museum| Culture, Volume 7, Part 1, Brisbane: Queensland Museum, 2013. Thanks to David Godden for this reference.)) \\ | In 1843, four years after his arrival in the colony, TLM-P optimistically judged he had enough money to lease and stock a property: Rosewood at Moreton Bay (between present day Ipswich and Laidley, located 'at the junction of Lockyer and Laidley Creeks'.((Prior, T L M, Rosewood, Moreton Bay,18/09/1843, __ BROKEN-LINK:https://indexes.records.nsw.gov.au/searchhits_nocopy.aspxtable=Depasturing%20Licenses&id=67&frm=1&query=Surname:Prior; LINK-BROKEN __ Patricia Clarke, 'The Murray-Priors at Bromelton 1844-1853' in Patricia Savage (compiled), //They came to Bromelton: a brief outline of the life and times of the early pioneers who came to Bromleton - from the pages of history, personal diaries, old letters and family recollections//, Patricia Savage, 2004, p.18; [[http://www.medicalpioneers.com/|Medical Pioneers Index]])) TLM-P bought the lease from Dr John Goodwin (c1800-59).((see [[http://www.medicalpioneers.com/|Medical Pioneers Index]]; Thomas A. Darragh and Roderick J. Fensham (eds), //The Leichhardt diaries. Early travels in Australia during 1842-1844//, Memoirs of the Queensland Museum| Culture, Volume 7, Part 1, Brisbane: Queensland Museum, 2013. Thanks to David Godden for this reference.)) \\ |
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| As Patricia Clarke points out, TLM-P stuck out on his own in largely uncharted country for Europeans, 'just three years after Patrick Leslie and his brothers had begun the wave of squatter settlement on the [[wp>Darling_Downs|Darling Downs]]'.((Patricia Clarke, 'The Murray-Priors at Bromelton 1844-1853' in Patricia Savage (compiled), //They came to Bromelton: a brief outline of the life and times of the early pioneers who came to Bromleton - from the pages of history, personal diaries, old letters and family recollections//, Patricia Savage, 2004, p.17.)) It appears that TLM-P was overly optimistic about the capital needed to run a station, as he soon left Rosewood. When he wrote to the Ludwig Leichhardt in September 1843, he mentioned that he intended 'selling my station and believe I have already got a purchaser'. He had stocked it with sheep and horses.((TLM-P to L. Leichhardt, 27 September 1843, MLMSS683, pp.105-08)) TLM-P still saw opportunity to the north of what was then the colony of NSW. From his time at Rosewood onwards, TLM-P lived in what became, from 6 June 1859, the colony of Queensland. It was very much a frontier settlement attracting settlers like him with military experience. Moreton Bay had just ceased to be a penal colony, so had no new convicts, but a significant proportion of the small white population remained 'unfree'. It is estimated that in 1846, 15 per cent of the population of County of Stanley (which included the major centres of Brisbane and Ipswich) were convicts.((Ross Fitzgerald, //From the Dreaming to 1915: A History of Queensland//, Vol.1, St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1982.)) \\ | As Patricia Clarke points out, TLM-P stuck out on his own in largely uncharted country for Europeans, 'just three years after Patrick Leslie and his brothers had begun the wave of squatter settlement on the [[wp>Darling_Downs|Darling Downs]]'.((Patricia Clarke, 'The Murray-Priors at Bromelton 1844-1853' in Patricia Savage (compiled), //They came to Bromelton: a brief outline of the life and times of the early pioneers who came to Bromleton - from the pages of history, personal diaries, old letters and family recollections//, Patricia Savage, 2004, p.17.)) It appears that TLM-P was overly optimistic about the capital needed to run a station, as he soon left Rosewood. When he wrote to the Ludwig Leichhardt in September 1843, he mentioned that he intended 'selling my station and believe I have already got a purchaser'. He had stocked it with sheep and horses.((TLM-P to L. Leichhardt, 27 September 1843, MLMSS683, pp.105-08)) TLM-P still saw opportunity to the north of what was then the colony of NSW. From his time at Rosewood onwards, TLM-P lived in what became, from 6 June 1859, the colony of Queensland. It was very much a frontier settlement attracting settlers like him with military experience. Moreton Bay had just ceased to be a penal colony, so had no new convicts, but a significant proportion of the small white population remained 'unfree'. It is estimated that in 1846, 15 per cent of the population of County of Stanley (which included the major centres of Brisbane and Ipswich) were convicts.((Ross Fitzgerald, //From the Dreaming to 1915: A History of Queensland//, Vol.1, St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1982.)) \\ |
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| The context to these purchases is important. As Helen Gregory points out, they were a gamble on the future prosperity of the Brisbane region 'at a stage in its development when the future was by no means assured.'((Helen Gregory, 'Squatters, selectors and - dare I say it - speculators', //Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland//, XI:4, 1983, p.85.)) It appears that both TLM-P and his first wife Matilda were optimistic about the future of their new country. Rosa Praed claimed that Matilda wrote to her mother-in-law Eliza M-P, that 'Some day this will be a flourishing country; its capabilities are greater than any of us know, and our descendants may be building towns on this wild land which we have reclaimed from the wilderness.'((Patricia Clarke, 'The Murray-Priors at Bromelton 1844-1853' in Patricia Savage (compiled), //They came to Bromelton: a brief outline of the life and times of the early pioneers who came to Bromleton - from the pages of history, personal diaries, old letters and family recollections//, Patricia Savage, 2004, pp.19-20.)) \\ | The context to these purchases is important. As Helen Gregory points out, they were a gamble on the future prosperity of the Brisbane region 'at a stage in its development when the future was by no means assured.'((Helen Gregory, 'Squatters, selectors and - dare I say it - speculators', //Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland//, XI:4, 1983, p.85.)) It appears that both TLM-P and his first wife Matilda were optimistic about the future of their new country. Rosa Praed claimed that Matilda wrote to her mother-in-law Eliza M-P, that 'Some day this will be a flourishing country; its capabilities are greater than any of us know, and our descendants may be building towns on this wild land which we have reclaimed from the wilderness.'((Patricia Clarke, 'The Murray-Priors at Bromelton 1844-1853' in Patricia Savage (compiled), //They came to Bromelton: a brief outline of the life and times of the early pioneers who came to Bromleton - from the pages of history, personal diaries, old letters and family recollections//, Patricia Savage, 2004, pp.19-20.)) \\ |
| ==== Hawkwood and massacres ==== | ==== Hawkwood ==== |
| By 1854, TLM-P decided that he had to look to Brisbane and also further north for opportunities. He sold the lease to Bromelton and, as shown, bought considerable land in and around Brisbane((e.g. //New South Wales Government Gazette//, 4 August 1854, p.1679)). Also in 1854, he applied to select 640 acres on the west bank of the [[wp>Albert_River_(South_East_Queensland)|Albert River]].((Helen Gregory, 'Squatters, selectors and - dare I say it - speculators', //Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland//, XI:4, 1983, p.81.)) His most significant acquisition was a property called Hawkwood (its indigenous owners called it Naraigin) on the Auburn River, a tributary of the Burnett river (north of what is now the Sunshine Coast).\\ | By 1854, TLM-P decided that he had to look to Brisbane and also further north for opportunities. He sold the lease to Bromelton and, as shown, bought considerable land in and around Brisbane((e.g. //New South Wales Government Gazette//, 4 August 1854, p.1679)). Also in 1854, he applied to select 640 acres on the west bank of the [[wp>Albert_River_(South_East_Queensland)|Albert River]].((Helen Gregory, 'Squatters, selectors and - dare I say it - speculators', //Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland//, XI:4, 1983, p.81.)) His most significant acquisition was a property called Hawkwood (its indigenous owners called it Naraigin) on the Auburn River, a tributary of the Burnett river (north of what is now the Sunshine Coast).\\ |
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| For TLM-P and his growing family, living conditions at Hawkwood were primitive. Rosa Praed's reminiscences always need to be read with caution, and she left Hawkwood when she was 7 years old, but described their home as a hut made of wooden slabs with gaps between them, windows without glass and mostly earthen floors. She recalled that, in this primitive dwelling, TLM-P hung his collection of paintings which were later donated to the [[brisbane_art_gallery|Queensland Art Gallery]].((Kerry Heckenberg, 'A taste for art in colonial Queensland: The Queensland Art Gallery Foundational Bequest of Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior', //Queensland Review//, 25:1, June 2018, pp.119-136; Rosa Praed, //Australian Life, Black and White//, 1885, pp.31-32; Rosa Praed, //My Australian Girlhood//, pp.60-61.)) The four years they stayed at Hawkwood were marked by 'great anxiety and hard work'.((//Australia's Representative Men//, ed. T.W.H. Leavitt, Improved Edition, Melbourne: Wells and Leavitt, c.1889, entry for T.L. Murray-Prior. The book used is the one TLM-P owned, signed by him and dated 14th June 1889. It is likely that TLM-P provided the information.))\\ | For TLM-P and his growing family, living conditions at Hawkwood were primitive. Rosa Praed's reminiscences always need to be read with caution, and she left Hawkwood when she was 7 years old, but described their home as a hut made of wooden slabs with gaps between them, windows without glass and mostly earthen floors. She recalled that, in this primitive dwelling, TLM-P hung his collection of paintings which were later donated to the [[brisbane_art_gallery|Queensland Art Gallery]].((Kerry Heckenberg, 'A taste for art in colonial Queensland: The Queensland Art Gallery Foundational Bequest of Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior', //Queensland Review//, 25:1, June 2018, pp.119-136; Rosa Praed, //Australian Life, Black and White//, 1885, pp.31-32; Rosa Praed, //My Australian Girlhood//, pp.60-61.)) The four years they stayed at Hawkwood were marked by 'great anxiety and hard work'.((//Australia's Representative Men//, ed. T.W.H. Leavitt, Improved Edition, Melbourne: Wells and Leavitt, c.1889, entry for T.L. Murray-Prior. The book used is the one TLM-P owned, signed by him and dated 14th June 1889. It is likely that TLM-P provided the information.))\\ |
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| Hawkwood was relatively isolated and the 1850s was a time of bitter war between the white settlers and the Aboriginal people who had lived there for some 50,000 years. A flashpoint occurred in 1857, in what is now known as the [[wp>Hornet_Bank_massacre|Hornet Bank massacre]]. The definitive research into this massacre is a thesis and subsequent book by Gordon Reid.((The thesis is available at {{https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/handle/1885/110512}}; the book is Gordon Reid, //A Nest of Hornets: The Massacre of the Fraser Family at Hornet Bank Station, Central Queensland, 1857, and Related Events//, Oxford University Press, 1982. Among the numerous other studies of this massacre, see A. Laurie, 'Hornet Bank Massacre October 27, 1857', //Royal Historical Society of Queensland Journal//, 5:5, 1957.)) A succinct summary is at [[https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=1516|Colonial massacres - Hornet Bank aftermath]]. The Hornet Bank massacre was the murder of 11 members of the Fraser family and staff who lived on Hornet Bank station; the women were also raped. The murders were by Yiman (variously Jiman or Iman) language group as well as some men who had belonged to the notorious [[wp>Australian_native_police|Native Police]]. The massacre was reputedly in retaliation not just for the seizure of Aboriginal land, but also for the rape of Yiman women by the young men of the Fraser family - which took place despite the pleas of their widowed mother. More information about this massacre is in the private section of this website.\\ | |
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| One of the most unusual things about this massacre is that its aftermath was recorded: it was just one of the ways that TLM-P supported his daughter's [[rosa_praed|Rosa Praed]]'s desire for Australian material for her novels.((Patricia Clarke, 'A Paradox of Exile: Rosa Praed's Lifelines to her Australian Past', in //Landscapes of Exile: Once Perilous, Now Safe//, eds. Anna Haebich and Baden Offord, Oxford: Peter Lang, 2008.)) When he dictated his memory of this time to his second wife Nora to send to Rosa,((Introduction to Praed papers, JOLQ, p.3.)) TLM-P justified his actions by stating the Hornet Bank murders were part of an Aboriginal conspiracy to exterminate the whites. Other settler families were threatened when there was a gathering of Aboriginal people some six weeks after the Hornet Bank tragedy. Hawkwood employed three unnamed Aboriginal men and one woman (from the coast, not from the local area), as well as Ernest Davies, Sydney Ling, a German doctor, and 'one or two others'. They had 'plenty of arms and ammunition'.((Reid, //A Nest of Hornets//, Masters thesis, p.134)) TLM-P states that a group decided on a preemptive strike against the local Aboriginal people. Leaving shearing to others, a vigilante troop of 13 or 14, including TLM-P and two of his Aboriginal employees, set off. He claimed that the Aboriginal men in the party wanted to kill women and children as well, but he prevented that by stating he would withdraw the Hawkwood group if he saw any woman or child hurt. In his reminiscences, Ernest Davies stated that in their six-week 'hunting' expedition, in the name of 'rough justice', they killed as many men of the Upper Dawson 'tribes' as they could.((Reid, a Nest of Hornets, Masters thesis, pp.136-39 provides more details.)) According to TLM-P, 'The war was kept up for 18 months, during which there were continually one or two parties out, and gradually a good many of the ringleaders were accounted for [killed] ... These 18 months of warfare were an anxious time for us. Business often took me then a good deal from the station. When I came home I used to canter pretty sharply to the top of the ridge from which the place was visible with my heart in my mouth, for there was always the fear that all hands might have been massacred.'((TLM-P, memoir, pp.37,41)). For sample pages of TLM-P's description of the massacre, click on [[Hornet Bank]].\\ | |
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| TLM-P and the rest of the vigilante group returned to their properties after the Redbank murders.((TLM-P memoir, p.41)) Eventually, their actions are believed to have resulted in the deaths of some 150 Aboriginal people: some 80 shot by the original vigilante group; 70 by the Native Police. Later retaliations are thought to have added another 150 to the overall number killed. Queensland at the time was very much a frontier settlement, with minimal consequences for taking Aboriginal lives.((Mark Finnane and Jonathon Richards,'"You'll get nothing out of it"? The Inquest, Police and Aboriginal Deaths in Colonial Queensland', //Australian Historical Studies//, 123, April 2004, pp.84-105.)) Going to a magistrate would have been of little use: TLM-P was not only a magistrate, he and three other magistrates wrote to the Colonial Secretary demanding harsher penalties for Aboriginal resistance.((Reid, //A Nest of Hornets//, Masters thesis, pp.117-18.)) In his memoirs, TLM-P shared the common view that it was reasonable that William Fraser, who had survived the massacre of his family, embarked on a lifetime of indiscriminate murder of Aboriginal people. William Fraser became a folk hero among whites despite being 'one of the greatest mass murderers in Australian history'.(([[wp>Hornet_Bank_massacre]])) He subsequently died of old age without facing prosecution.\\ | |
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| Information about the Hornet Bank massacre has been complicated not only by an unwillingness to acknowledge that it was a result of a war between white and black for the possession of land, but also by the unreliable memory of Rosa Praed when later writing //Australian Life: Black and White//, London, 1885 and //My Australian Girlhood//, London, 1904. As Reid (pp.iv,77) comments, Rosa was a novelist rather than an accurate recorder. As well, Rosa was only 7 years old when she left Hawkwood, and she wrote about that time 27 years later.\\ | Hawkwood was relatively isolated and the 1850s was a time of bitter war between the white settlers and the Aboriginal people who had lived there for some 50,000 years. A flashpoint occurred in 1857, in what is now known as the [[wp>Hornet_Bank_massacre|Hornet Bank massacre]]. The definitive research into this massacre is a thesis and subsequent book by Gordon Reid.((The thesis is available at {{https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/handle/1885/110512}}; the book is Gordon Reid, //A Nest of Hornets: The Massacre of the Fraser Family at Hornet Bank Station, Central Queensland, 1857, and Related Events//, Oxford University Press, 1982. Among the numerous other studies of this massacre, see A. Laurie, 'Hornet Bank Massacre October 27, 1857', //Royal Historical Society of Queensland Journal//, 5:5, 1957.)) A succinct summary is at [[https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=1516|Colonial massacres - Hornet Bank aftermath]]. The Hornet Bank massacre was the murder of 11 members of the Fraser family and staff who lived on Hornet Bank station; the women were also raped. The murders were by Yiman (variously Jiman or Iman) language group as well as some men who had belonged to the notorious [[wp>Australian_native_police|Native Police]]. The massacre was reputedly in retaliation not just for the seizure of Aboriginal land, but also for the rape of Yiman women by the young men of the Fraser family - which took place despite the pleas of their widowed mother. More information about this massacre is in the family section of this website.\\ |
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| TLM-P sold Hawkwood in the year after the Hornet Bank massacre. The property had not been a financial or any other success. It appears the final straw was another outbreak of scab among his sheep. The family was apparently popular with his neighbours as they are said to have gifted him some 900 sheep to help replenish his flock.((Reid, A Nest of Hornets, Masters thesis, pp.214-15. It is possible that this is a confusion with the initial scab outbreak, or vice versa - or that scab was endemic.)) For TLM-P's next venture, he tried to leave behind the problems of livestock.\\ | TLM-P sold Hawkwood in the year after the Hornet Bank massacre. The property had not been a financial or any other success. It appears the final straw was another outbreak of scab among his sheep. The family was apparently popular with his neighbours as they are said to have gifted him some 900 sheep to help replenish his flock.((Reid, A Nest of Hornets, Masters thesis, pp.214-15. It is possible that this is a confusion with the initial scab outbreak, or vice versa - or that scab was endemic.)) For TLM-P's next venture, he tried to leave behind the problems of livestock.\\ |
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| ==== Ormiston ==== | ==== Ormiston ==== |
| After selling Hawkwood, TLM-P bought a banana plantation on the bay of the area now known as [[wp>Ormiston,_Queensland|Ormiston]], some 25km from central Brisbane.((Reid, A Nest of Hornets, Masters thesis, pp.215; Isobel Hannah, 'The Royal Descent of the First Postmaster-General of Queensland', //Queensland Geographical Journal//, vol. LV, 1953-54, p.12.)) One factor in TLM-P's decision to move closer to Brisbane was Matilda's deteriorating eyesight. She had contacted trachoma while at Hawkwood: it was a disease then known as 'sandy blight' because it feels like sand permanently and painfully in the eye. ((https://www.hollows.org/au/eye-health/trachoma))\\ | After selling Hawkwood, TLM-P bought a banana plantation on the bay of the area now known as [[wp>Ormiston,_Queensland|Ormiston]], some 25km from central Brisbane.((Reid, A Nest of Hornets, Masters thesis, pp.215; Isobel Hannah, 'The Royal Descent of the First Postmaster-General of Queensland', //Queensland Geographical Journal//, vol. LV, 1953-54, p.12.)) One factor in TLM-P's decision to move closer to Brisbane was Matilda's deteriorating eyesight. She had contacted trachoma while at Hawkwood: it was a disease then known as 'sandy blight' because it feels like sand permanently and painfully in the eye. ((__ BROKEN-LINK:https://www.hollows.org/au/eye-health/trachoma))\\ LINK-BROKEN __ |
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| ==== Creallagh ==== | ==== Creallagh ==== |
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| Note: the Beaudesert Museum has numerous holdings relating to the Murray-Prior family, see [[https://beaudesertmuseum.org.au/main/images/BEAUDESERT%20HISTORICAL%20MUSEUM.pdf]]\\ | Note: the Beaudesert Museum has numerous holdings relating to the Murray-Prior family, see __ BROKEN-LINK:[[https://beaudesertmuseum.org.au/main/images/BEAUDESERT%20HISTORICAL%20MUSEUM.pdf]] LINK-BROKEN __\\ |
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| ==== Murray Prior Range ==== | ==== Murray Prior Range ==== |