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To many people in England the mention of
Australia conjures pictures of
tented gold-fields and tall, black-bearded, red-shirted bushrangers; of
mounted police recruited from "flaxen-haired younger sons of good old
English families, well-groomed and typically Anglo-Saxon"; of squatters
and sheep runs; of buckjumpers ridden by the most daring riders in the
world; and of much more to the same purpose; but never is presented a
picture of the sea or sailor folk.
Yet the first half-century of Australian
history is all to do with the
ocean. The British sailor laid the foundation of the Australian nation,
and, in the beginning, more than any other class, the sailorman did the
colonising—and did it well. This, however, is the story of most British
possessions, and generally it is gratefully remembered and the sailor
duly credited and kindly thought of for his work. But in these days
the dry west wind from the back blocks seems to have blown the taste of
brine and the sound of the seethe of the curling "white horse" out of
the mind of the native-born Australian; and the sailing day of a mail
boat is the only thing that the average colonial knows or cares to know
about salt water.
To write on such a subject as this, one has
to leave out so much, that
it is necessary to begin almost in the middle in order to reach an
ending. Sea exploration and coast surveying opened the ways; whaling—it
may surprise the reader, but it is nevertheless true—was once the main
support of Australia and New Zealand; and runaway sailors formed a
very considerable part of the back country population, such men making
handier and better farm labourers, stockmen, and, later on, miners,
by reason of their adaptability to strange surroundings, than
ticket-of-leave men or the average free emigrant.
The first four successive Governors of
Australia—in the beginning, be
it remembered, the continent was one colony—were captains in the Navy.
Governing in those rough days was not a mere master-of-the-ceremonies
appointment, and Phillip, Hunter, King, and Bligh, if they made
mistakes, considering their previous training, the populations they
governed and the times in which they lived, amply justify Palmerston's
words that if he wanted a thing done well in a distant part of the
world; when he wanted a man with a good head, a good heart, lots of
pluck, and plenty of common sense—he would always send for a captain of
the Navy.
Phillip, the first of these Governors, was
sent out to found "a penal
settlement at Botany Bay, on the coast of New Holland," and did the
work
in such fashion, in spite of every discouragement from the forces of
nature, the Home Government, and his own officers, as to well entitle
him to a place among the builders of Greater Britain. What was known
of Australia, or rather New Holland—the name of Australia was still in
futurity—in 1788, when Phillip first landed on its shores?
Let us say nothing of Spanish, Portuguese,
and Dutch voyages; of wrecks
and piracies; of maroonings, and massacres by blacks; of the
discoveries
of Dampier and of Cook, but sum the whole up thus: the east coast of
Australia, from its northernmost extremity to its southernmost,
was practically unknown to the world, and was absolutely unknown to
Englishmen until Cook's first voyage. Cook, in the Endeavour,
ran
along the whole east coast, entering a few bays, naming many points,
and particularly describing Botany Bay where he stayed some little
time;
then he sailed through Torres Straits, and thence, via Batavia,
home
to England, where he arrived in June, 1771. The English Government took
no advantage of his discoveries until 1786, when Botany Bay was
fixed upon as the site of a new penal settlement; and this choice was
determined, more than anything else, by the advice of Sir Joseph Banks,
who, from the time of his voyage with Cook in the Endeavour
till his
death, took the keenest interest in the continent; and colonists are
more indebted to the famous naturalist for his friendly services than
to
any other civilian Englishman of the time.
Phillip's commission ordered him to proceed
to Botany Bay, but
authorised him to choose another site for the settlement if he
considered a better could be found. He arrived with his fleet of
transports in 1788, after a voyage of many months' duration, so managed
that, though the fleet was the first to make the passage and was made
up of more ships and more prisoners than any succeeding fleet, there
was
less sickness and fewer deaths than on any of the convoys which
followed
it Phillip made a careful examination of Botany Bay, and finding it
unsuitable for planting, the settlement was removed to Port Jackson.
After landing the exiles, the transports returned to Europe via
China
and the East Indies, and their route was along the north-east coast of
Australia. The voyages of these returning transports, under the
navy agent, Lieutenant Short-land, were fruitful in discoveries and
adventures. Meanwhile Phillip and his officers were working hard,
building their homes and taking their recreation in exploring the
country and the coast for many miles around them. And with such
poor means as an indifferent Home Government provided, this work of
exploration went on continually under each naval governor, the pressing
want of food spurring the pioneers ever on in the search for good
land; but that very need, with the lack of vessels, of men who could be
trusted, of all that was necessary for exploration, kept them chained
in
a measure to their base at Sydney Cove.
Phillip, white-faced, cold and reserved, but
with a heart full of pity,
was responsible for the lives of a thousand people in a desolate
country
twelve thousand miles from England—so desolate that his discontented
officers without exception agreed that the new colony was "the
most God-forsaken land in the world." The convict settlers were so
ill-chosen, and the Government so neglected to supply them with even
the
barest necessities from Home, that for several years after their
landing
they were in constant distress from famine; and disease and death from
this cause alone was an evil regularly to be encountered by the silent,
hard-working Phillip. The only means of relief open to the starving
settlement was by importing food from Batavia and the Cape of Good
Hope, and to procure such supplies Phillip had but two ships at his
disposal—the worn-out old frigate Sirius (which was lost at
Norfolk
Island soon after the founding of the settlement) and a small brig of
war, the Supply—which for many weary months were the only means
of
communication with civilisation.
The Home Government, when they did despatch
a second fleet, instead of
sending supplies for the starving people under Phillip's care, sent
more
prisoners, and very little to eat was sent with them. The authorities
seem to have had an idea that a few hundred shovels, some decayed
garden
seeds, and a thousand or two of Old Bailey men and women criminals,
were
all the means needed to found a prosperous and self-supporting colony.
How Phillip and his successors surmounted these difficulties is another
story; but in the sea history of Australia the work of the naval
governors occupies no small space in it. Remember, too, that the Torres
Straits route and the Great Barrier Reef, now as well charted as the
Solent, were only then being slowly discovered by clumsy old sailing
craft, whose masters learnt to dread and avoid the dangers of the
unknown coast as children grow cautious of fire, by actually touching
it.
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