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| red sky in the morning |
Sunday 23
rd June 2013
A Lady in the
Wilderness – Sheep Island, Camden Harbour, Kimberley
I had woken up very early, before 0400 to go to the loo as I
had become cold during the wee hours. MrJ had been feeling the freshness of the
early morning too and we were fighting over the bed covers. Not literally fighting
just figurative speaking. I don’t think we have ever had a real ding dong fight
just a few grumbly words now and again. Too late we were both wide awake and
the full moon was shinning its light right through our cabin’s top hatch. It
was time to make a move, time to get underway. 0430 we were leaving Hanover Bay
after pulling the anchor up in the semidarkness.
Our efforts did not go unrewarded. As we were entering
Camden Harbour MrJ and I were greeted with a fantastic red sunrise. Strong
winds coming! (So they say)
AR sailed into Camden Harbour with both sails up we were
flying down the passage between the mainland and Augustus Islands and then into
the notorious Roger’s Strait at the southern end of Augustus Island. The Australian
Pilot Guide describes this as a treacherous passage
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| sunrise in Port George IV |
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| Augustus Island |
This area of the Kimberley’s is very scenic with lush green
high hill with red rock cliffs against blue, blue sky dotted with white cloud
and a green sea that weaved around a dimpled shoreline, dimpled with many
inlets and bays and dotted with small islands and outcrops of rock. I was very
impressed with the sheer rock faces, white beaches and the many Boab trees. All
looked so beautiful by I did know how dangerous these beautiful waters could be
if we were too lax in our concentration of the passage. Outcrops of rock and
small islands meant that there were many shallow areas to be watchful of, only
some of the reef areas where marked on the charts and then there were all the
whirlpools swirling AR through the strong currents. Accompanied by the big
tides a boat could easily come to grief in these waters!
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| on passage I spent some time printing out some chartlets of the area |
Camden Harbour is located in the south east corner of
the much larger Brecknock Harbour, south of Augustus Island. It is where the
first white settlement was attempted in the Kimberley’s in the mid to late
1860’s.
Some History Story on
the Camden Harbour Settlement
Three men are credited with the energy and
forethought to spark the first attempt at European settlement in the western
Kimberley at Camden Harbour. The W.A. Governor, John William Hampton,
contributed men and money to a settlement scheme promoted by a slick Melbourne
agent, William Harvey, based on glowing reports of Explorer George Grey. About 70 potential settlers,
principally from the mining and pastoral areas around Ballarat and Bendigo,
bought shares in the Camden Harbour Association and were assembled in Melbourne
in late 1864. The settlers were about to sail to W.A. in ships, the
"Stag", the "Helvetia" and the "Calliance". After 3 weeks of sailing across the
Great Australian Bight and up the W.A. coast, the "Calliance" struck
hard on a reef near Adele Island. Unloading ballast, water and stockfeed
lightened the ship. She drifted free and continued on to anchor in Camden
Harbour on Xmas Day 1864. That evening one of the settlers died of sun stroke
and was buried on Sheep Island. The "Stag" and "Helvetia"
had arrived 12 days earlier, and some of the settlers already had their doubts
about the viability of the venture.
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| paperwork found in a capsule on Sheep Island |
While being brought close in to Camden Head
for careening, the "Calliance" was caught in a violent wet season
storm and washed onto the rocks. As the tide dropped, the ship broke up on the
rocks. Today, the "Calliance" wreck site is marked by a pile of black
basalt stones and a number of white fire bricks near low water mark at Camden
Head. A
lesser known
reminder of the wreck is a lone boab tree on the eastern shoreline of Camden
Harbour inscribed with "JAN 1865 - SHIP - CALLIANCE". The W.A.
Government sent a magistrate, a surgeon, policemen and surveyors to the
settlement on the "Tien Tsin" from Perth in February 1865. When they
arrived the scene was one of utter chaos and misery. Such was the plight of
settlers in the harsh Kimberley stormy wet season that many left on the
"Stag" and the "Tien Tsin" with the skipper and crew of the
ill-fated "Calliance".
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| this emotional note to Mary was also in the sealed capsule |
Sheep Island
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One lady, Mary Jane Pascoe, was brave enough to remain with the hardy
settlers. However, she became a victim of the harsh outback when she died on 4
June 1865 while giving birth to her child. The headstone and grave is clearly
visible today beside the large boab tree on the south-eastern tip of Sheep Is.
The
Association Camp was established by the settlers on the western side of a
small fresh water stream at the head of Camden Harbour. Access to this area
through the mangrove thicket is difficult, even at high water and very little
trace remains of the camp today.
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| MrJ reseals the captule |
The Government
Camp was established outside the confines of Camden Harbour on the rocky
slopes of the mainland directly east of Sheep Island. An access track was
cleared through the rocks and mangroves to allow stores and building materials
to be brought ashore. This track is still clearly visible today and allows
visitors to land by dinghy on a small rocky beach at low tide and walk up the
hill to the Government Camp. The
track through the rocks leads up to a stone wall which now holds a collection
of crockery shards and nails and other small metal objects for tourists to
ponder. Further inland can be
found the ruins of stone buildings and what appear to be the remnants of animal
holding yards at the Government Camp. There seems no doubt that the Government
surveyor chose the best site for a camp; on a hill with cooling sea breezes and
with a view out over Sheep Island and beyond to Brecknock Harbour, Green and
Augustus Islands.
The settlers struggled on for six months under
intimidation by aborigines and lack of fresh water during the dry season. By
October 1865, all of the sheep had died; the remaining few settlers, together with
the government party and what few animals and possessions that could be carried
away, abandoned the camps and returned south on the brig "Kestrel". (Parts of this story were pieced together from
a number of sources: Kimberley Cruising, There Were Three Ships by Christopher
Richards, Kimberley - Dreaming to Diamonds by Hugh Edwards, A Guide to the
Kimberley Coast by Len Zell.)
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| Sheep Island |
MrJ and I headed down towards the bottom of Camden Harbour
to anchor off the southern side of Sheep Island (15’29.615S – 124’36.881E),
another deep anchorage, 12.5mt HW. Sheep Island was the site of the first
burial of a white woman (Mary Pascoe) in the Kimberley. Mary and John’s
daughter was the first child to have been born in the settlement.
I was not all that interested in trying to find whatever was
left of either of the old settlements but I was very keen to go ashore on Sheep
Island, to pay my respect and prayers to a young woman who had suffered a lot
of hardship and had died as a consequence of those hardships and heartache. A
woman who left behind not only her loving husband John but also a husband who
had to raise their only daughter on his own in that harsh environment, a baby
girl who was to follow her mother in death just two months later. It saddened
me!
MrJ and I found that Sheep Island was another high rocky
outcrop like most of the other islands nestled in Camden Sound. It had plenty
of lush vegetation to cover all those rocks, rows of mangrove trees around the
shoreline and a small brilliant white beach on the SE side which feel steeply
into the sea. Out from the beach and surround the island was all reef area that
would be uncovered or partial uncovered at a low tide. MrJ and I took the tinny
ashore while the tide was high giving us access to the top of the beach area.
The reason behind the beach looking so brilliantly white was that instead of
being a soft sandy beach this one was made up of small shells, shell grit and
coral pieces all reflecting the bright sunlight.
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I stood on the gritty beach
with my sandals off and let the grit prickle my feet. To walk around would hurt
your feet so the sandals went on. I looked up from the beach and there it was a
big old Boab tree majestically standing right where the vegetation meets the
beach. I wonder how long that old tree has been standing in its silence,
holding all the secrets of the island.
MrJ and I wander over to the Boab and find the headstone
that marks Mary Pascoe’s grave. The grave has been encircled with stones and is
nicely protected from the weather behind the Boab tree. The headstone has an
inscription that had been almost but worn away, the trunk of the old tree held
an inscription that was also well worn. Adorning Mary’s grave were many shells,
pieces of coral and other things that people had laid. I coiled some vinery
together to make a wreath which I placed on the grave in a moment of silent
prayer.
MrJ and I discover some information that tells us that there
are others buried on Sheep Island, all not too far from Mary’s grave; all
buried under the mounds of rock and were covered so well with the thick
vegetation that I was not able to find them. What an extremely hard life these
early settler must have endured!
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| day ends for us but time stands still for those souls left on Sheep Island |
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AR had not been much more than an hour into the passage when
we saw a large motor boat in the distance heading towards us. It had stopped
not too far ahead, lowered a small runabout and which was heading our way. Then
there was the familiar squawk of the VHF radio; someone was calling us. It was
the WV Dept of Fisheries. There were two very friendly people, a female and a
male, who gave MrJ and I a friendly chat about the rules etc (much stricter in
WA then on the eastern coast), asked to see our fishing licences (MrJ presented
his) and then we just chatted about boating life in general and my herb garden.
I gave the female officer some bits and pieces of the fresh herbs. My herb
garden gets them every time! ;o).jpg)
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