Born on this day
Wednesday, January 21, 1801. : Unofficial founder of Melbourne, John Batman, is born.
John Batman was born in Parramatta, Sydney, on 21 January 1801. As a native born Australian, Batman was interested in opening up new pastureland and promoting the growth of the colonies. He applied for land in the Westernport Bay area of southern Australia, now Victoria, but was not granted any. In May 1835, he led a syndicate calling themselves the ‘Port Phillip Association’ to explore Port Phillip Bay, looking for suitable sites for a settlement. On 6 June 1835, he signed a ‘treaty’ with the Aborigines, giving him free access to almost 250,000 hectares of land. In August that year, Governor Bourke declared Batman’s treaties invalid, and issued a proclamation warning off him and his syndicate as trespassers on crown land. Despite the attempts at government intervention, the foundling settlement of Melbourne remained, and flourished.
Batman’s place in Australian history is unique for several reasons. He was the first 19th century white to acknowledge that Aborigines were the original owners of the land in Australia. He set out to undertake an annual rental for what was then a reasonable amount of food and goods, rather than buy it from them for a pittance or exploit their trust. Batman held the indigenous people in high regard, writing of ‘that much injured and most unfortunate race’. Further, he is the only native-born Australian, or ‘currency lad’, to have founded a state capital city.
Australian Explorers
Wednesday, January 21, 1863. : Explorer John McDouall Stuart receives a huge public welcome in Adelaide after his successful crossing of the Australian continent.
John McDouall Stuart was a Scottish-born explorer who was determined to cross Australia from south to north. Stuart led a total of six expeditions into Australia’s interior, with five of them being attempts to be the first to cross the continent from south to north, commencing from Adelaide. He succeeded on his fifth attempt, reaching the northern waters at Chambers Bay in July 1862.
The return journey of 3,400km is considered one of the great survival stories of Australian exploration. While the crossing was successful, years of arduous expeditions had taken their toll on Stuart, and his health had deteriorated badly. The constant blinding glare from the desert sun combined with advanced scurvy to produce almost total blindness. By August 1862, Stuart could no longer ride, and was carried back 960 kilometres between two horses on a stretcher mounted between two long poles. He arrived, sick but triumphant, in Adelaide on 21 January 1863. This was, ironically, the same day that the state funeral of Burke and Wills was held, the men who were Stuart’s greatest “competition” in the race to cross the continent.
Stuart never fully recovered from the exertions of his journeys, and died only three and a half years later, truly a hero in the eyes of Australians.
Australian Explorers
Wednesday, January 21, 1863. : Victoria’s first ever state funeral is held, in honour of explorers Burke and Wills.
Robert O’Hara Burke and William Wills led the expedition that was intended to bring fame and prestige to Victoria: being the first to cross Australia from south to north and back again. They set out in August 1860 from Melbourne with preparations, supplies and equipment costing almost 5,000 pounds. Because of the size of the exploration party, it was split at Menindee so that Burke could push ahead to the Gulf of Carpentaria with a smaller party. The smaller group went on ahead to establish a depot at Cooper Creek which would serve to offer the necessary provisions for when the men returned from the Gulf. In December 1860, during the summer, Burke decided to push on ahead to the Gulf regardless of the risks. He took with him Wills, Charles Grey and John King.
The expedition to the Gulf took longer than Burke anticipated: upon his return to Cooper Creek, he found that the relief party had left just seven hours earlier, less than the amount of time it had taken to bury Gray, who had died on the return journey. Through poor judgement, lack of observation and a series of miscommunications, Burke and Wills never found the supplies left for them by the relief party. They perished on the banks of Cooper Creek. King alone survived to lead the rescue party to the remains of Burke and Wills, and the failure of one of the most elaborately planned expeditions in Australia’s history.
Alfred Howitt located and brought back the bodies of Burke and Wills to Melbourne. On 21 January 1863, Victoria’s first ever state funeral was held, in honour of Burke and Wills. The Governor himself took part in the procession, which was watched by about 40,000 people.
Australian History
Saturday, January 21, 1815. : The first road is completed over the Blue Mountains in NSW, under the direction of William Cox.
William Cox was born in Wimborne Minster, Dorset, England in 1764. Following a prestigious military career in England, he became Lieutenant in the New South Wales Corps in 1797, being made paymaster the following year. He brought his wife and four sons to Australia, leaving England in August 1799 and arriving in Australia on 11 January 1800. Cox briefly endured allegations of misappropriating funds, for which he had to return to England, but after being cleared of all charges, he returned again to Australia in 1811. He resigned his commission, becoming principal magistrate at the Hawkesbury, and also taking on responsibility for erecting many government buildings.
In May 1813, Blaxland, Lawson and Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains, finding rich farming land in the Hartley region. George Evans, Deputy Surveyor-General of New South Wales, was keen to progress beyond the discoveries made by Lawson, Blaxland and Wentworth so the colony could expand beyond the Great Dividing Range. Leaving Sydney in mid-November 1813, Evans soon reached the termination of the explorers’ journey. He continued on through the countryside, eventually reaching the site of present-day Bathurst.
Upon Evans’s return to Sydney, he recommended building a road which would follow the ridge track determined by Blaxland, Lawson and Wentworth. Shortly after this, William Cox was commissioned to build the road to Bathurst, using convict labour. The original Great Western Highway was 3.7m wide, covered 161 km and incorporated twelve bridges. It was completed on 21 January 1815. Following completion of the road, Macquarie travelled along “Cox’s Pass”, taking eleven days to reach the site of Bathurst, where the Union Jack was raised. The road was particularly significant, as it opened up the western plains for settlement.
Australian History
Sunday, January 21, 1827. : The entire Australian continent is claimed as British territory when Major Edmund Lockyer formally annexes the western third at King George Sound.
When Lieutenant James Cook charted the eastern Australian coastline and named it New South Wales in 1770, he made the first formal claim, taking possession “of the whole eastern coast, from latitude 38 degrees S to this place, latitude 10.5 degrees S, in right of His Majesty King George the Third”.
Because of the strong Dutch presence to the north and Portuguese interests in Timor, the authorities in Great Britain felt it was necessary to establish a definite western boundary. Captain Arthur Phillip, commander of the First Fleet, was entrusted with the formal claim. As Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief of New South Wales, Phillip was required to take formal possession on behalf of the British Crown, of territory “… extending from the Northern Cape or extremity of the coast called Cape York, in the latitude of ten degrees thirty-seven minutes south, to the southern extremity of the said territory of New South Wales or South Cape, in the latitude of forty-three degrees thirty-nine minutes south and of all the country inland westward as far as the one hundred and thirty-fifth degree of east longitude reckoning from the meridian of Greenwich…”. The boundary to the west was established at 135 degrees E as this was considered acceptable to Portugal, then Britain’s oldest ally. Due to enduring French interests in the area, in 1824 the British trading post of Fort Dundas on Melville Island was established to consolidate the British presence on the northern coast. Because Fort Dundas lay just outside the western boundary, the Governor, Ralph Darling, following the Commission outlined in Letters Patent issued on 16 July 1825, extended the western boundary of New South Wales to 129 degrees E.
British interests next turned to the west. The southwestern area of Western Australia was first discovered by George Vancouver in 1791 when he was sent to explore the southern coastline of Australia. Vancouver discovered an excellent harbour which he named “King George the Third’s Sound”, later shortened to King George’s Sound or, as it is now, King George Sound. Standing at Possession Point, Vancouver formally claimed this land as British territory in September 1791.
The next step in Great Britain’s formal possession of the entire continent came in the 1820s. Edmund Lockyer, who arrived as a British soldier in New South Wales in 1825, was sent by Governor Darling to establish a military base at King George’s Sound. Lockyer initially named the settlement Frederickstown after His Royal Highness, Duke of York & Albany, Frederick Augustus, second son of King George III. It was later renamed Albany. The whole of Australia was claimed as British territory when Major Edmund Lockyer formally annexed the remaining western third in a ceremony at King George Sound on 21 January 1827.
World History
Monday, January 21, 1793. : Louis XVI, last King of France before the French Revolution, is executed.
Louis XVI of France was born on 23 August 1754. He was King of France and Navarre from 1774 until 1791, and then King of the French in 1791-1792. As King, he was initially popular as he tried to implement practical reforms to counter France’s enormous debts. His indecisiveness and insipid personality, however, turned the people against him during the French Revolution. The people’s hatred was compounded by the actions of Louis XVI’s wife, Austrian archduchess Marie Antoinette, whom he had married in 1770. Marie Antoinette embraced a lavish lifestyle enthusiastically. She had little regard for the poor and struggling peasants, and spent money frivolously. For her attitude, she became the symbol of the people’s hatred for the old regime during the French Revolution.
When the National Convention established the French Republic in 1792, Louis XVI and his wife were imprisoned. The King was found guilty of treason with the enemy, and guillotined on 21 January 1793. Antoinette was beheaded on 16 October 1793. Modern historians regard Louis XVI as an honest man with good intentions but who, through no fault other than an indecisive and dull character, was made a scapegoat by the Revolutionaries.
World History
Monday, January 21, 1878. : Cleopatra’s Needle, an ancient Egyptian obelisk, arrives in England
Cleopatra’s Needle is an ancient Egyptian obelisk of red granite, about 20m high, and inscribed with hieroglyphics. The obelisk actually has no connection with Cleopatra, being 3,500 years old and therefore well-established long before Cleopatra’s reign. The obelisk was originally erected in the Egyptian city of Heliopolis on the orders of Thutmose III. Rameses II added further inscriptions commemorating his military victories some 200 years later. There are in fact two Cleopatra’s needles; one in London, the other in New York.
Cleopatra’s needle in London was presented to England in 1819 by Mehemet Ali, viceroy of Egypt, in recognition of the victories of Lord Nelson at the Battle of the Nile and Sir Ralph Abercromby at the Battle of Alexandria in 1801. Transporting the obelisk was to prove too costly for the British government. It was not until 1877 that anatomist and dermatologist Sir William James Erasmus Wilson, sponsored its transportation to London at a cost of around £10,000. Engineer John Dixon designed a special iron cylinder, 28m long and 5m in diameter for transporting the obelisk. However, the obelisk was nearly lost at sea when it became separated from the ship towing it during a gale in the Bay of Biscay. After drifting for many days, it was rescued by an English ship and taken to Spain for repairs. The obelisk arrived in Gravesend on 21 January 1878, and was erected on the Embankment on 12 September 1878.