Born on this day
Tuesday, December 11, 1792. : Josef Mohr, who wrote the lyrics to ‘Silent Night’, is born.
Josef Mohr was born on 11 December 1792 in Salzburg, Austria, the illegitimate son of a seamstress and a military deserter. Mohr championed the cause of the poverty-stricken, the disadvantaged, the young and the elderly, and was a generous man who willingly gave his time and money to charity.
It was while serving as parish priest at St Nikolas Church in Oberndorf that Mohr penned “Silent Night”, one of the world’s most enduring Christmas carols. Two days before Christmas 1818, the bellows in the church organ were found to be rotted through. Mohr wrote a poem and asked the church organist and choirmaster, Franz-Xaver Gruber, if he could set it to music which the two men could sing, accompanied by Mohr on the guitar. Late on Christmas Eve, the men practised the song for the first time, and performed it for Mass. “Silent Night” still endures today as a much-loved Christmas carol.
Australian Explorers
Monday, December 11, 1848. : Edmund Kennedy is killed by Aborigines just short of his destination of Cape York.
Edmund Kennedy was born in 1818 on Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands of the English channel. As a surveyor, he arrived in Sydney in 1840 where he joined the Surveyor-General’s Department as assistant to Sir Thomas Mitchell. In 1845, he accompanied Mitchell on an expedition into the interior of Queensland (then still part of New South Wales), and two years later led another expedition through central Queensland, tracing the course of the Victoria River, later renamed the Barcoo.
In 1848 Kennedy left Rockingham Bay, north of Townsville, with 12 other men to travel to Cape York, intending to map the eastern coast of north Queensland. A ship, the ‘Ariel’, was to meet him at the Cape at the conclusion of his journey. Dense rainforest and the barrier of the Great Dividing Range made the journey extremely difficult. By the time Kennedy’s party reached Weymouth Bay in November, they were starving and exhausted. Kennedy left eight sick men and two horses at Weymouth Bay before continuing his journey with three white men and a loyal Aborigine named Jackey-Jackey.
Kennedy chose to leave the three white men near the Shelburne River when one of them accidentally shot himself in the shoulder. Continuing on with Jackey-Jackey, Kennedy was close to reaching his rendezvous with the ‘Ariel’ when he found himself surrounded by hostile aborigines. Their spears quickly found their mark with Kennedy, whilst Jackey-Jackey tried to hold off the Aborigines with gunfire. On 11 December 1848, Kennedy died in Jackey-Jackey’s arms, signifying the tragic loss of a promising young explorer.
Australian History
Tuesday, December 11, 1792. : Captain Arthur Phillip, first Governor of the New South Wales colony, returns to England.
Arthur Phillip was born in London on 11 October 1738. He joined the Royal Navy when he was fifteen, and alternately earned a living as a navy officer and as a farmer. In October 1786, Phillip was appointed Governor-designate of the proposed British penal colony of New South Wales. He was a practical man who suggested that convicts with experience in farming, building and crafts be included in the First Fleet, but his proposal was rejected. The First Fleet left Portsmouth, England, on 13 May 1787, and arrived in Botany Bay on 18 January 1788. Phillip immediately determined that there was insufficient fresh water, an absence of usable timber, poor quality soil and no safe harbour at Botany Bay. Thus, the fleet was moved to Port Jackson, arriving on 26 January 1788.
Phillip faced many obstacles in his attempts to establish the new colony. British farming methods, seeds and implements were unsuitable for use in the different climate and soil, and the colony faced near-starvation in its first two years. Phillip also worked to improve understanding with the local Aborigines. The colony finally succeeded in developing a solid foundation, agriculturally and economically, thanks to the perseverance of Captain Arthur Phillip.
Poor health forced Phillip to return to England in 1792. He departed for his homeland on 11 December 1792, sailing in the ship “Atlantic”. Phillip resigned his commission soon after arriving back in England, and died on 31 August 1814.
Australian History
Friday, December 11, 1931. : The Statute of Westminster gives complete legislative independence to countries of the British Commonwealth.
Whilst the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Australia came into effect on 1 January 1901, this did not mean that Australia had achieved independence from Britain. Under colonial federation approved by the United Kingdom, the six self-governing states of Australia merely allocated some functions to a federal authority. Australia was given the status of a Dominion, remaining a self-governing colony within the British Empire, with the Head of State being the British monarch. The Governor-General and State Governors were appointed by the British government, and answered completely to the British government.
At the Imperial Conference of 1926, it was decreed that all Dominions within the British Empire were “equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown, and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations.” The Statute of Westminster 1931 ratified the discussions of the Imperial Conference. It meant that Australia and other Dominions such as South Africa, New Zealand and Canada could now conduct treaties and agreements with foreign powers, and manage their own military strategies. Ultimately, the British monarch could only act on the advice of the Australian Government, and the Governor-General was no longer appointed by and answerable to the British monarch.
Australian Parliament formally adopted the Statute of Westminster 1931 under the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act 1942, on 9 October 1942.
Australian History
Friday, December 11, 2015. : Australian naturalist and controversial conservationist Harry Butler dies.
William Henry (Harry) Butler was an Australian naturalist and conservationist. He was born in a railroad construction camp in the bush near Perth, Western Australia on 25 March 1930. As a child, he spent a great deal of time exploring the bush with his aboriginal friends, as his father worked on the railways and his mother died giving birth to Harry’s younger sister. He was a bright student who often pedalled 30km on his bike to the nearest primary school, and won a scholarship to attend high school. To supplement his scholarship, he hunted feral goats and wild rabbits for bounties. He was an early advocate of the release of targeted diseases into the bush to control introduced species.
Although Butler initially trained as a fitter and turner and then worked as a marine engineer, he completed a three year teaching course in a single year at Claremont Teachers’ College in Western Australia. Later, he attended the Western State College in the United States. He spent a decade lecturing in biology and natural science in Australia, the US and Canada. However, his first passion was conservation.
In his role as conservation consultant to the Barrow Island oilfield and numerous other projects, Butler introduced radical new strategies to help conserve and restore the Australian environment, yet at the same time maintained that development and conservation was not mutually exclusive. He once stated, “I’ve achieved more by working with mining companies and other developers than I ever would have lying down in front of bulldozers”. Although a controversial figure who was not seen as “green” enough by some conservation groups, his work with the Australian quarantine service was invaluable. A series of television advertisements featuring Butler were credited with reducing cases of illegally imported foodstuffs by 50%. Butler became a household name with the television series “In the Wild”, a tremendously popular documentary series in which he introduced the public to a variety of native animals which many Australians did not even know existed.
In 1970, Butler was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire, which was upgraded to a Commander level in 1980. In 1979 he was jointly awarded Australian of the Year, along with Neville Bonner, and in 1980, Citizen of the Year for Western Australia. In 2012 the National Trust of Australia appointed him a National Living Treasure. Numerous Australian fauna species were named for Harry Butler: among them were two fish; a marsupial mouse, the Carpentarian dunnart known as Sminthopsis butleri; six reptiles, including a species of Mulga snake, Pseudechis butleri; and the spider species Synothele butleri. Harry Butler died of cancer on 11 December 2015.
World History
Friday, December 11, 1903. : The world’s first wildlife preservation society is founded.
Fauna and Flora International, formerly the Fauna and Flora Preservation Society, was the world’s first conservation society. It was founded on 11 December 1903 as the Society for the Preservation of the Wild Fauna of the Empire. Launched by conservationist Edward North Buxton, its many supporters included both influential people and notable naturalists, but also hunters who were concerned about preserving species for their pastime of hunting for future years. Membership reached 100 within the first year.
The primary aim of the Society was the conservation of habitats and species, and to influence legislation towards this end. Today, the Society still works to improve public education in matters of conservation. It is involved in captive breeding programmes specifically for the release of vulnerable and threatened species back into the wild.
World History
Thursday, December 11, 1919. : A monument is dedicated to the destructive Boll Weevil in Enterprise, Alabama.
The boll weevil is a small beetle, highly destructive to cotton crops. Native to Mexico, it began to infest the cotton crops of Coffee County, Alabama in 1915, creating wholesale destruction by 1918. The loss of the main crop in the area threatened the city of Enterprise, the economy of which was based on cotton farming.
H M Sessions was an enterprising businessman who saw the opportunity to convert the region from cotton to peanut farming. Together with farmer C W Baston, who was heavily in debt following cotton crop losses, Sessions invested in a peanut crop. The first crop was enough to clear Baston’s debt, and attracted the interest of other farmers seeking rescue from their financial hole. The ensuing diversification of crops injected new financial prosperity to the farmers of Coffee County and the city of Enterprise.
Bon Fleming was a local businessman who suggested building a monument as a tribute to the beetle. Although the boll weevil wrought only destruction, its presence forced farmers to diversify. The monument was suggested to commemorate how something disastrous can bring about change for the better. The boll weevil monument featured a woman wearing a flowing gown, with her arms stretched above her head. Thirty years later, a boll weevil was added. The statue was dedicated on 11 December 1919.
Frequent theft and vandalism over the years saw the statue reduced to an irreparable state by 1998. The original statue was placed on display at Enterprise’s Depot Museum, while a polymer-resin replica was placed in the statue’s original position.