Fourteen
Beneath the Veil

‘Haste ye, Stuart, do not sleep: in
Settled districts never lurk.
Onward! Or you’re surely beaten
By the great O’Hara Burke.’
Melbourne Punch

Beyond the Corella River, the land stretched out into a dreary two-tone vista of swaying yellow grasses under gloomy grey skies. Crossing the Selwyn Ranges had banished the dry heat of the desert and plunged the countryside into the oppressive heat of the tropics. Somehow the sky is lower here. The leaden ceiling pushes down, compressing the steamy atmosphere until it squeezes behind the eyes. People have been known to ‘go troppo’ in the unrelenting heat; everything from bar-room brawls to murders are blamed on the pressure-cooker environment of Australia’s Top End.

The expedition was in what is now known as the Gulf country, an area of flat terrain governed by a tropical climate of two seasons: the ‘dry’ between May and November and the ‘wet’ between December and April.

Burke and Wills hit the Gulf country at the worst possible time of year. The monsoon was late, so they were travelling in what is known as the ‘build-up’. This is a period of a few weeks just before the rainy season, when the humidity climbs and the air thickens until it is almost difficult to breathe. With the atmosphere at bursting point, spectacular electrical storms dance along the horizon and everyone prays for rain.

The dry air down by the Cooper had sucked liquid from the explorers’ bodies, allowing them to perspire freely and perform relatively well despite the very high temperatures. Now the air was at saturation point. They continued to sweat, but the liquid didn’t evaporate to keep them cool. It poured from their bodies, running into their eyes and carving salty trails through the grime on their skin. The men suffered from lethargy, headaches and irritability. Even sleeping was difficult. The temperature no longer fell at night and they lay on their bedrolls, tossing and turning under their damp, woollen blankets, used in a vain attempt to ward off the mosquitoes. In the muggy atmosphere, food rotted and the leather harnesses grew furry with mould. The camels were fretful and listless. Struggling over the ranges had taken its toll, Burke was pushing the animals too hard and, at the beginning of February, disaster struck.

Camels have large feet like soup plates with horny pads. These are designed to provide grip in sandy terrain but they are hopeless in boggy country because they are so difficult to extract from the mud. Riverbanks presented a particular hazard, sometimes forcing them to make long detours to find an easy approach to the water. On this occasion Golah, a large bull, clambered down into a creek but couldn’t get back out. After pushing the exhausted beast for five kilometres along the creek bed without success, the explorers were forced to abandon him.

Burke, Wills and King had no choice but to redistribute the loads and continue with their remaining five camels. Soon afterwards they found a new waterway heading north. It was the beginnings of the Flinders River. The silty sluggish waters were broken every now and then by turtles poking their heads through the algae and occasionally by a crocodile floating just under the surface.

There are two species of crocodile in Australia—the saltwater and the freshwater. ‘Freshies’ are smaller with narrower snouts; they do not normally attack humans. ‘Salties’ are a different matter. They grow up to seven metres long and, with one twist of their powerful torso, they can propel themselves right out of the water and take down a fully-grown cow. These primeval creatures are aggressive, territorial and numerous throughout the Gulf country. It is difficult to know whether the explorers realised the danger they were in camping alongside these rivers and each day going down to the crocodile’s favourite hunting ground along the water’s edge. It seems, however, that they were lucky enough to pass unmolested through crocodile country.

After Golah’s accident, Wills diary is once again silent until 9 February. Since leaving Melbourne, Burke, Wills, Gray and King had marched in tough conditions for more than five months with hardly a rest day. They had endured a journey of more than 2500 kilometres through bogs, deserts and mountain ranges in frost, hail, rain, windstorms, sandstorms, heat and overpowering humidity. Now, as they followed the Flinders River, their goal was close.

It is tempting to imagine the explorers scenting the salt in the air, climbing a small rise and seeing a white sandy beach falling away into the sparkling ocean. How quickly their hardships would have melted away as they shouted with delight and flung themselves into the waves. How overwhelming their sense of achievement would have been as they sat on the northern edge of Australia under the Union Jack, celebrating with three cheers, a double serving of bread and sugar and an extra cup of tea. The reality was so different.

As Burke and Wills neared the north coast, the countryside seemed to close in around them. The thickets of small trees grew so dense it was difficult to force a way through. As the ground became wetter, the depressing reality dawned—the camels could go no further. The men unloaded their gear and made camp at a small waterhole on the junction of the Bynoe and Flinders rivers.

Camp 119 is still there today. It is a mournful, drab clearing, surrounded by spindly box trees and infested with clouds of mosquitoes. The cloying atmosphere is made worse by the scrub, which clutches at your clothes and rips at your hair. The air is filled with the rotten smell of festering mud. The water from the creek is cloudy and unpleasantly warm. It is also salty.

It is not recorded who first noticed the bitter saline taste or realised that twice a day, the murky liquid rose and fell a few centimetres, but these clues confirmed that Burke’s party had just about reached its objective. They were camped on the upper tidal reaches of an estuary and the ocean could not be far away. By this stage, not even Wills knew exactly where they were. He had plotted their route towards the Albert River, which was actually 100 kilometres away to the west and he had no idea they were, in fact, camped on the Flinders River.

This dank muddy campsite was as far as Gray and King ever reached. Leaving them to care for the camels, Burke and Wills set off together into the territory of the Yappar Aboriginal people to see if they could find the ocean. Perhaps rejuvenated by the discovery that they were so close to the coast, Wills wrote a full account:

After breakfast we accordingly started, taking with us the horse, and three days provisions. Our first difficulty was in crossing Billy’s Creek, which we had to do where it enters the river, a few hundred yards below the camp. In getting the horse in here, he got bogged in a quicksand so deeply as to be unable to stir, and we only succeeded in extricating him by undermining on the creek’s side and then lunging him into the water. Having got all the things in safety, we continued down the river bank, which bent about from east to west, but kept a general north course. A great deal of the land was so soft and rotten, a horse, with only a saddle and about twenty-five pounds on his back, could scarcely walk over it. At a distance of about five miles we again had him bogged in crossing a small creek, after which he seemed so weak that we had great doubts about getting him on. We, however, found some better ground close to the water’s edge, where the sandstone rock runs out, and we have stuck to it as far as possible. Finding that the river was bending about so much that we were making very little progress in a northerly direction, we struck off due north, and soon came on some table-land, where the soil is shallow and gravely, and clothed with box and swamp gums…

Camp 119—Burke’s dismal, most northern camp—lies next to a waterhole at the junction of the Bynoe and Flinders rivers on the edge of the mangrove swamps.

After floundering through this for several miles, we came to a path formed by the blacks, and there were distinct signs of a recent migration in a southerly direction. By making use of this path, we got on much better, for the ground was well trodden and hard. At rather more than a mile, the path entered a forest through which flowed a nice watercourse, and we had not gone far when we found places where the blacks had been camping. The forest was intersected by little pebbly rises, on which they had made their fires, and in the sandy ground adjoining some of the former had been digging yams, which seemed to be so numerous they could afford to leave lots of them about, probably having only selected the very best. We were not so particular but ate many of those they had rejected, and found them very good.

About half a mile further we came across a blackfellow, who was coiling by a campfire whilst his gin and his picaninny were yabbering alongside. We stopped for a short time to take out some of the pistols that were on the horse, and that they might see us before we were so near as to frighten them. Just after we stopped, the black got up to stretch his limbs, and after a few seconds looked in our direction. It was very amusing to see the way in which he stared, standing for some time as if he thought he must be dreaming, and then, having signalled to the others, they dropped on their haunches and shuffled off in the quietest manner possible.

Near their fire was a fine hut, the best I have ever seen, built on much the same principle as those at Cooper’s Creek, but much larger and more complete. I should say a dozen blacks might comfortably coil in it together. It is situated at the end of the forest, towards the north, and it looks out on an extensive marsh, which is at times flooded by seawater.

Hundreds of wild geese, plover and pelicans were enjoying themselves in the watercourses on the marsh, all the water on which was too brackish to be drinkable, except some holes that are filled by the stream that flows through the forest. The encampment is one of the prettiest we have seen during the journey. Proceeding on our course across the marsh, we came to a channel through which the sea water enters. Here we passed three blacks, who, as is universally their custom, pointed out to us, unasked, the best part down. This assisted us greatly, for the ground we were taking was very boggy. We moved slowly down, about three miles and then camped for the night; the horse, Billy, being completely baked. We started the next morning, leaving the horse Billy short hobbled.

Burke and Wills managed only a few kilometres more. The ground disintegrated into a tangle of impassable mangrove swamps and they had neither the energy nor the resources to look for another way through. The journey north was over. They did not see the ocean.

Burke wrote later in his notebook: ‘At the conclusion of the report, it would be well to say that we reached the sea, but we could not obtain a view of the open ocean although we made every endeavour to do so.’ Wills made no diary entry at all.

The explorers had made it to within twenty kilometres of the coast. It must have been deeply disappointing to turn around without looking north across the waves towards Asia. Charles Sturt knew what it was like to be denied by the fickle nature of the Australian landscape:

To that man who is really earnest in the performance of his duty to the last, and who has set his heart on the accomplishment of a great object, the attainment of which would place his name high up in the roll of fame; to him who had well nigh reached the top most step of the ladder, and whose hand has all but grasped the pinnacle, the necessity must be great, and the struggle of feeling severe, that forces him to bear back, and abandon his task.

Burke and Wills left no monument to mark their historic crossing. There was no moment of exhilaration, no time to sit and contemplate victory. Instead, exhausted and demoralised, they turned and waded back through swampy water towards Camp 119. Back in the small clearing, King and Gray had kept themselves busy catching a few fish and keeping watch over the camp. King spent several hours marking a circle of trees with the letter B. It was the only evidence that the expedition had ever reached this far north.

Burke reassured himself that the committee would be ‘quite satisfied’ that he had completed his mission ‘as far as it was necessary’. And he could take some comfort in knowing that he had beaten John McDouall Stuart across the continent, even if the culmination of the journey had yielded little useful information about the north coast. Now he must face the unpleasant prospect of retracing his steps to the depot on the banks of the Cooper, 1500 kilometres to the south.

As the men contemplated their return, the weather deteriorated. So far the monsoon had been light but now the rain fell in torrents. The mood was grim. Even Gray and King must have realised the expedition was in a desperate situation. It had taken nearly two months to reach the Gulf from the depot camp, yet Burke had told William Brahe to wait just three months before considering them ‘perished’, or ‘on their way to Queensland’. Wills must have been remembering his whispered entreaty to Brahe to hang on for four months if he could. Suddenly the expedition was no longer a race for glory. It was a fight for survival.

At Menindee, William Wright was busy trying to break in ten horses. After receiving his money from Melbourne he set about purchasing pack animals and saddles, but knowing he was desperate, the station owners asked vastly inflated prices. Training the horses was a mammoth task and the expedition was delayed for a further two weeks as Wright struggled to knock his disorderly mob into shape. In the end it was more than three months after Burke’s departure from Menindee before the back-up party was ready to leave. It was 26 January 1861 when William Wright and his men finally set out.

In the meantime, William Brahe and his men had been stranded in the middle of the continent, sitting in the shade of the large coolibah tree on the banks of Cooper Creek. The men were finding it difficult to cope with the insidious effects of boredom and inactivity. Arctic adventurers like William Parry, trapped in the ice for months on end, devised a fixed daily schedule of exercise, maintenance, even cross-dressing theatre performances to stave off the harmful effects of doing nothing. Ernest Shackleton hid books, games and spare tobacco for times when morale was low.

Brahe and his three companions, Patten, McDonough and Dost Mohomet, had no such diversions. The first few weeks after Burke left were reasonably busy. They built a stockade next to the old coolibah to store their equipment and ammunition. They pitched their tents around a central cooking area and established a routine to take care of the animals. Each day, one man would take out the horses to graze, while another watched over the camels. It was a wearisome business, tramping as much as ten or fifteen kilometres up and down the creek looking for the best fodder, and then having to retrieve any optimistic beast that still entertained thoughts of home far away to the south.

The other two men stayed behind, one on guard and the other gathering firewood, collecting water and baking endless loaves of damper. Apart from their periodic encounters with the local people, each day was crushingly similar to the last—a dislocation from reality—trapped on the creek cut off on all sides by a desert that shimmered in the raging heat.

The Aboriginal tribes were fascinated but perplexed by their new neighbours. They attempted to make contact by bringing presents of fish and nets but they also had a tendency to take whatever they could find lying around the camp. Their ability to appear from nowhere and steal everything from tin cans to saddles made Brahe jumpy. Outnumbered, in hostile territory, he couldn’t afford to take risks. Under such stress, the cultural divide between the parties was just too great. No meaningful communication was ever established and relations swung between tolerance and hostility.

One day in January, frustrated by the constant pilfering, Brahe drew a circle in the dirt and indicated that no one should cross the line. The warriors retreated but returned later with spears, body paint and vigorous displays of anger. Brahe fired over their heads to reinforce his point. They scattered, running through the herd of horses and yelling until they caused a stampede. Brahe rode into the melee firing his gun into the air and once again the young men retreated. It was nightfall before the horses were recaptured.

The Aborigines could not understand why these unfriendly strangers wanted to stay so long at one of their best waterholes. A few braver souls from the tribe continued to approach the camp with gifts. Brahe continued to refuse them. These confrontations had a paralysing effect on Dost Mohomet. He had been the major supplier of ducks and fish from the creek, but he became so scared that he refused to go out hunting at all.

When Brahe wasn’t checking over his shoulder, he was scanning the horizon looking for William Wright. He remained convinced that the relief party would appear at any moment. But the sun rose and fell each day, and still no one came. Brahe was perplexed. By March, his thoughts began to turn north instead of south. He knew that Burke would go ‘all out’ for the coast, but he also knew that the party only had rations for three months. When April arrived, Brahe began to ride to the top of the surrounding hills each day to look out for any signs of Burke’s return. There was nothing.

The four castaways lapsed into a lethargic mechanical routine. Their food supplies were dwindling and as the days dragged by, fear began to penetrate the monotony. Patten was complaining that his gums were sore and that his legs ached. The fear turned to panic. Brahe’s party did not possess detailed knowledge of scurvy but they were familiar with ‘barcoo rot’, a scurvy-like disease that afflicted stockmen on an inadequate diet. They also knew that without fresh food barcoo rot could result in an agonising death.

All around them the sun melted the horizons and the ground throbbed in the heat. They huddled under the shade of the giant coolibah—and waited.