by Graham Seal
A day or two after Tonguin’s visit, Moiley Dibbin called at Parker’s with further information on the same subject, but derived from the same distant source; namely, the Weelmen. Moiley had been informed by some of the latter that there were several white men, represented to be of very large stature, ladies and ‘plenty piccaninnie’—that they were living in houses made of canvas and wood (pointing out these materials, among several shewn to him)—that there are five such houses, two large and three small—that they are not on a river but on the open sea (‘Gabby England come’)—that the sea coast, at the site of the wreck, takes a bend easterly into an apparent bay (as described by Moiley on the ground)—that the spot where the white money is strewed on the beach is some (indefinite) distance from the spot where the houses are and more within the bay—that the gabby (surf) breaks with very great noise where the money is, and as it runs back, the Weelmen run forward and pick it up—that the white men gave the Weelmen some gentlemen’s (white) biscuit, and the latter gave in return spears, shields, &c.—that they, Moiley, Tonguin, and Weenat, had never seen the wreck or the white men, and were afraid to go through the territories of the Weelmen, who are cannibals: but that they intend to go as far as the Waylo country, and then coo-ee to the Weelmen, who will come to meet them and give them some of the white money—and that the white men then could walk to the houses at the wreck in ten days—but though the word walk be used, there can be little doubt that Moiley alludes to a ‘walk—on horseback’.
The prospect of rescuing white people from the aftermath of shipwreck and perhaps the depredations of the ‘natives’, together with the lure of money, electrified the small settlement. A few months before, some other Aborigines from the north had brought a few British coins into Perth, claiming that they had received them from the fearsome ‘Wayl men’. This only increased people’s eagerness to find out more, and plans were made for a boat to sail north in search of the wreck.
At this point, a local Aboriginal leader named Weeip enters the story. He had recently been outlawed for his resistance to colonial rule, and his son had been taken as, in effect, a hostage by the administration of Governor James Stirling. Hoping to win his son back, Weeip volunteered to travel north to see what he could discover. He returned in early August, claiming he had been told by the northern people that there were definitely no survivors of the mysterious wreck, but that there was plenty of ‘white money’. The settlers were sceptical, but the Governor released Weeip’s son all the same in return for Weeip’s promise of good behaviour. The Monkey returned in October, having found nothing but some worm-eaten teak and fir wreckage on reefs off Dirk Hartog Island.
Meanwhile, however, other odd stories had begun to circulate. In July, soon after the Perth Gazette’s first story on the ‘wreck’, some Aborigines reported that they had contact with a party of whites living about eighty kilometres inland from the Perth colony. As there was no known settlement at that distance from the colony, this was astounding news. Who these people might have been, if they ever existed, is a mystery. Although highly unlikely, it is conceivable that a group had landed unnoticed and trekked inland to settle in the wilds.
It was eventually determined that the shipwreck stories were old. They had been passed from one generation to the next for perhaps a century or more. Stories passed on in this way tend to compress time spans. In this case, the ‘broke boat’ and the ‘white money’ did have a basis in fact, but that did not become clear until 1927, when the wreck of the Dutch East Indiaman Zuytdorp was first located. She had foundered in 1712, and perhaps thirty survivors had mysteriously disappeared into the continent’s vast emptiness. The only evidence of their coming was the wreckage of their craft and a sandy bottom carpeted in silver coins—a scene that bore out the Aboriginal story of 1834.
The stories of Lasseter’s Reef and the carpet of silver are local legends that have travelled far from their points of origin. Australia has many other tales of hidden, sunken, buried or otherwise ‘lost’ treasures that are little known outside their local regions and perhaps to a few enthusiastic treasure hunters.
The dead horse treasure
One frontier lost-treasure yarn has no map, but involves luck, human frailty and the skeleton of a horse.
Brock’s Creek is about 160 kilometres southwest of Darwin. A group of men made a lucky strike on a very rich find there in 1880. Swearing off the grog, they worked hard to get as much of the gold into the saddle-packs of one of their horses, before the wet season and lack of food overcame them. Within a week they had the horses saddled and ready to go with a fortune in the saddle-packs. They decided to have one drink to celebrate their good fortune. The one became two and then too many. Their drunken merrymaking frightened the horses away, including the one carrying the gold. Despite months of desperate searching, the men never found the horses which would have perished fairly quickly.
It is said that prospectors in the Northern Territory still look closely at any bones they find in the hope that they may stumble again across the dead horse treasure.
The silver reef
The silver reef is a fabulously rich lode said to be located somewhere in the remote north between Wyndham and King Sound in Western Australia’s Kimberley region.
According to one version of the tale, the reef was discovered by a Malay merchant called Hadji Ibrahim some time before European colonisation took place in the area in 1829. After selling a load of silver ore from the trove in Macassar, in what is now Indonesia, Ibrahim returned for more, only to be shipwrecked and drowned. But the merchant had kept a journal of his voyages and recorded all the details of his find—minus its location.
But the story continues. A colourfully named local—‘Mad Jack’—was found dead in his cutter in 1909 near Yampi Sound. Several spear wounds had pierced his body and his head had been split open with a tomahawk. The discoverers of the body found a few ounces of gold in the cabin as well as a kerosene tin full of silver ore.
Some years later, an employee of Ibrahim’s great grandson became obsessed with the legend of the silver reef and made many visits to the area to find it. He was last seen in 1939 travelling through the Kimberley with a group of Aborigines. As far as anyone knows, the reef is still lost.
Black Jack’s booty
Another story in the lost-treasure vein has elements of the classic buccaneer’s trove, a staple element of pirate lore.
Long before the permanent European settlement of Western Australia’s Swan River Colony in 1829, the southern coasts of Australia attracted mainly American whalers and sealers. The whalers usually based themselves on islands where there were supplies of fresh water, establishing semi-permanent settlements and stocking the islands with livestock, including rabbits. They were often, at least in part, responsible for the subsequent hostilities between the indigenous inhabitants and the settlers who arrived later as they terrorised many of the coastal Aboriginal groups. The oral traditions of these communities still hold tales of narrow escapes from one such identity known as Black Jack.
An African-American, Jack was leader of a gang of sealers and whalers operating during the 1830s. He and his crew of cutthroats were based on Middle Island in the Recherche Archipelago, off what is now Esperance. Piracy was also part of Jack’s repertoire and he and his gang were rumoured to have carefully hidden away a horde of treasure for future use. Despite the softening influence of an English lover named Dorothea, Jack was almost as brutal towards his own men as he was to his victims. Eventually, the gang members became sufficiently aggravated by this ill treatment and to shoot Jack in the head while he slept.
But despite frantic searching, the murderers were unable to find where Jack had stashed his loot, and so another lost treasure tradition began, attracting at least one modern day hunt for Black Jack’s booty.
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MORE PEOPLE BELIEVE in ghosts than don’t, according to researchers. Certainly, stories of hauntings an
d other ghostly visitations are no less widely told in Australia than anywhere else, and they appear in both European and indigenous traditions.
In Aboriginal lore, as in European, spirits caught between this world and the next are said to trouble the living. Some groups believe ghosts can move between worlds for a time, but must finally separate from the living. Some believe that ghosts have certain places where they await the right moment to leave the living and join their ancestors. Aboriginal people often treat ghosts as everyday realities rather than as unusual or frightening ones.
Stories of European-style ghosts also tend to be associated with particular places. Famous apparitions include the headless ghost of Berrima, New South Wales, and a blue nun who is said to disturb locals from time to time in the monastic town of New Norcia, Western Australia. Haunted houses can be found at Bungaribee, New South Wales; Drysdale, Victoria; and on the River Esk, near Fingal, Tasmania.
Other favoured ghost haunts include shipwrecks, hotels, theatres, jails and other old buildings. A headless diver is said to lurk beneath the Sydney Harbour Bridge—the ghost of a worker who died there. The explorer Robert O’Hara Burke, bushranger Johnny Gilbert and navigator William Dampier are all said to linger in ghostly form.
Fisher’s ghost
Australian ghost stories, like many others, often involve violent or unusual deaths. The first such death to produce a ghost in Australia seems to have been that of ex-convict Frederick Fisher, who was murdered and secretly buried at what is now Fishers Creek, New South Wales.
On 17 June 1826, Fred Fisher, the proprietor of the Horse and Groom Hotel near Campbelltown, west of Sydney, was released from prison. He had knifed a customer in a fight at the hotel and been jailed for six months. Fisher had been transported in 1816, at the age of twenty-two, for possessing forged banknotes. He had worked hard in the colony, obtained a ticket-of-leave, and now owned considerable property. After his release, Fisher returned to his hotel—and almost immediately disappeared.
Fisher’s neighbour, George Worrall, said he’d returned to England. Since Fisher had expressed no interest in leaving the colony where he was doing so well, locals found this unconvincing. Then Worrall, to whom Fisher had given power of attorney over his farm while serving his sentence, began selling the vanished man’s belongings. Documents he produced to prove ownership were shown to be forged, and Worrall was arrested on suspicion of murder. No body, however, was found.
At this point the legend begins. Here is one of its earliest versions, from 1863. The writer has mistakenly named a Mr Hurley as the sighter of the ghost; it was actually a man named Farley.
About six weeks after Fisher’s disappearance, Mr Hurley, a respectable settler in the vicinity of Campbelltown, was returning thence to his residence; he had long been acquainted with Fisher, and it is by no means improbable that his mind reverted to his sudden disappearance, when passing the place where he had so long resided; be that as it may, however, no doubt as to Worrall’s statement ever entered his mind.
It was about ten o’clock at night when he left Campbelltown; the moon had risen, but her brilliance was obscured by clouds. After he had passed the late residence of Fisher, about from five to eight hundred yards, he observed the figure of a man sitting on the top of the fence on the same side of the road as the house. On approaching nearer, what was his surprise to recognize distinctly, the features of Fisher, whom he had supposed then far on his way to England. He approached the figure with the intention of assuring himself that he had not been deceived by a fancied resemblance.
The ghastly appearance which the features presented to his view on his nearer approach, struck such a chill of terror to his heart, as chained him motionless to the spot. The figure, as he gazed, rose from the fence, and waving its arm pointed in the direction of a small creek, which crosses the paddock at the place, and disappeared gradually from his view, apparently following the windings of the creek. The terror which overpowered the faculties of Hurley at this sight, defies all powers of description; in a state of stupefaction he left the spot, and endeavoured to obtain an entrance into the nearest house. How he managed to find his way to the house he has no recollection, but just as he approached it, his senses totally forsook him. The noise caused by his head striking the door as he fell, alarmed the inmates, who on opening it found him lying in a death-like swoon; he was carried into the house, where he lay for a whole week in the delirium of a brain fever.
The frequent mention of the name of Fisher in his ravings, attracted the attention of those who attended him, and conjecture was soon busy at work to ascertain what had driven him into such a state; his known character for sobriety, as well as the testimony of those who had parted from him only a few minutes before, forbade the supposition that he had been caused by drunkenness; and rumour, with her thousand tongues, turned the villagers’ heads with vain conjectures as to its probable cause.
On the morning of the ninth day of Hurley’s illness, he awoke after a long and refreshing sleep, in full possession of his senses, and expressed a wish to those around him that the Police Magistrate should be sent for.
William Howe, Esq., of Glenlee, who then filled the situation of Superintendent of Police for Campbelltown and the surrounding districts, was sent for, and came immediately on being made aware of the circumstances. To him Hurley disclosed what he had seen, and the suspicion of Fisher’s having met with foul play, which that sight had impressed on his mind. As soon as Hurley was able to leave his bed, Mr. Howe, accompanied by a few constables, among whom was a native black man named Gilbert, went, conducted by Hurley, to the place where the apparition had been seen. On closely examining the panel of fencing pointed out, Mr Howe discovered spots of blood. An active search was commenced to discover further traces of the supposed murder, but nothing more was observed.
It was thought advisable to trace the course of the creek, in the direction to which the apparition had pointed, and in which it had disappeared. Some small ponds of water still remained in the creek, and these Black Gilbert was directed to explore with his spear; he carefully examined each as he approached it, but the shake of his head denoted his want of success. On approaching a larger pond than any of those he had before searched, the standers by observed his eyes sparkle, as he exclaimed in a tone of triumph, while yet at some distance from the pool, ‘white man’s fat sit down here’; as soon as he reached the bank of the pond he thrust his spear into the water, and after some search, he pointed to a particular spot in the water, saying ‘white man there’. The constables were immediately set to work to clear away the water, which was soon effected—and on digging among the sand the remains of a human being in advanced stage of decomposition were discovered.
It became now obvious to all that Fisher (if the remains which had been found were really his) had met with an untimely end. Suspicion alighted on Worrall, who was the only person who had reaped any benefit from Fisher’s death; and it was remembered also that he it was who had first propagated the story of Fisher’s return to England. Many circumstances, corroborative of this suspicion, flashed on the minds of the neighbours, which until now had escaped their notice. Mr Howe caused Worrall to be arrested, and the suspicion being confirmed by the body of circumstantial evidence, he was committed to take his trial before the Supreme Court for the murder.
The conviction that retributive justice was now about to overtake him, had such an effect on his mind that he confessed his guilt. His reason for so barbarous a proceeding arose from the transaction mentioned in the former part of the narrative. Fisher, overjoyed at the success of the scheme by which he had defrauded his creditors, forgot to regain possession of the deed of conveyance by which he had made over his property to Worrall. The thought occurred to Worrall, that if he could only get Fisher quietly out of the way, he would be able to claim possession of the property in right of that conveyance; this project had repeatedly occurred to him while Fisher was in jail: and h
e had resolved even then, either to regain possession of the private agreement which compelled him to restore the property whenever it might be required, or to get rid of him entirely. Foiled in his scheme to obtain possession of this document by Fisher’s unexpected liberation, he formed the diabolical scheme, which he ultimately accomplished.
Under the mask of friendship, he was Fisher’s companion during the day—and night after night he watched Fisher’s motions from the time of this return from jail, but had accidentally been foiled in every attempt he made, until the one on which the murder was committed. On that night he was as usual prowling about Fisher’s cottage, looking out for an opportunity to attain his ends, when Fisher, tempted by the beauty of the evening, left his house to take a walk, followed at some distance by Worrall. At the place where the blood was afterwards discovered, Fisher stopped and leant against the fence, apparently wrapped in deep thought. The assassin had now before him the opportunity he had so long waited for, and taking up a broken panel of fence, he stole quietly behind him, and with one blow of his weapon stretched him lifeless on the ground; he carried the body from the scene of the murder to the place where it was afterwards discovered, and buried it deep in the sand. A few weeks after he had made the confession he expiated his crime on the scaffold, imploring with his last breath the forgiveness of his Maker.
No mention of the ghost was made at Worrall’s trial, but the story had already gained its own momentum. While there was considerable speculation about whether the helpful ghost had really appeared, the story quickly escaped the confines of local gossip to become one of the nineteenth century’s best-known tales. An anonymous ballad version appeared as early as 1832 in a colonial guidebook, quickly followed by articles in colonial periodicals, and even an early history. The story soon made the British and French newspapers, and in 1879 a play based on it was performed at the Sydney School of Arts.
