MACARTHURS OF PORT ESSINGTON.
A FORGOTTEN SETTLEMENT.
(From A Special Correspondent.) Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), Saturday 16 May 1931, page 6
LONDON, April 2 - The settlement at Port Essington, on the north coast of Australia, to the northeast of where Darwin stands, which lasted from 1838 till 1849 was in experiment made with high hopes. It was expected that the city of Victoria, founded on the shores of an excellent harbour, would be a port of call for traders between Sydney and India and in time would rival Singapore in importance. But the fates were against it. Torres Strait, notwithstanding the discovery by Admiral P. P. King of the "inner passage ," was dangerous for sailing ships, and they refused either to call at Port Essington or to be wrecked in trying to do so. The port did not pay, but it was retained for a while as a precaution against occupation by the French. Sir Gordon Bremer R.N. of the Alligator was its first commandant and the leader of the expedition of settlement. But his office soon passed to John MacArthur - nephew of his namesake of Camden - who was captain of marines at that time, and who had under him a half company of Royal Marine Light Infantry which formed the garrison of the port. Captain MacArthur, who in after years was advanced to the rank of major general, was a man of many attainments, and in culture considerably superior to most service men of his day. He was an accomplished painter in water-colour, and a good musician, and he was entrusted during his long career with work more ordinarily done by engineers than marines. It is opportune to recall these facts at the present time, for by the generosity of his grandson, the Rev Donald Mac-Arthur of Bristol, the National Library at Canberra has lately been enriched by two water-colour drawings made by Captain MacArthur during his command at Port Essington.
A FORGOTTEN SETTLEMENT.
(From A Special Correspondent.) Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), Saturday 16 May 1931, page 6
LONDON, April 2 - The settlement at Port Essington, on the north coast of Australia, to the northeast of where Darwin stands, which lasted from 1838 till 1849 was in experiment made with high hopes. It was expected that the city of Victoria, founded on the shores of an excellent harbour, would be a port of call for traders between Sydney and India and in time would rival Singapore in importance. But the fates were against it. Torres Strait, notwithstanding the discovery by Admiral P. P. King of the "inner passage ," was dangerous for sailing ships, and they refused either to call at Port Essington or to be wrecked in trying to do so. The port did not pay, but it was retained for a while as a precaution against occupation by the French. Sir Gordon Bremer R.N. of the Alligator was its first commandant and the leader of the expedition of settlement. But his office soon passed to John MacArthur - nephew of his namesake of Camden - who was captain of marines at that time, and who had under him a half company of Royal Marine Light Infantry which formed the garrison of the port. Captain MacArthur, who in after years was advanced to the rank of major general, was a man of many attainments, and in culture considerably superior to most service men of his day. He was an accomplished painter in water-colour, and a good musician, and he was entrusted during his long career with work more ordinarily done by engineers than marines. It is opportune to recall these facts at the present time, for by the generosity of his grandson, the Rev Donald Mac-Arthur of Bristol, the National Library at Canberra has lately been enriched by two water-colour drawings made by Captain MacArthur during his command at Port Essington.
The largest of the two presents a panoramic view of the settlement with the waters of the port in which ships are anchored, seen through trees on the right, and a long clearing flanked by buildings on the left. In the middle distance the marines are on parade and the artist has depicted himself in the fore-ground, sitting on a log with his sketching block on his knee, under a canopy of gum trees very faithfully represented. In this sketch the church, the stores the bar-racks, the officers' quarters, and the Governor's house are easily distinguishable by reference to the report upon the buildings of the settlement reprinted in the Historical Records published by the Commonwealth Government. The fact that the church, provided by the Bishop of Australia at a cost of £300, is shown as still standing, proves that the sketch was made at an early date in the history of the settlement, as it was shortly afterwards blown down by a hurricane.
The burial ground, Port Essington, between 1839-1849 by John McArthur NLA PIC R245 LOC1981. {Emma Lambrick DoD Oct. 1846}
The smaller and more highly finished picture is a view of the burial ground, and it was probably drawn at a considerably later date. "In that earth," says the Rev. Donald MacArthur, "lies the body of Richard Tilston and the picture probably was painted for that reason. " Richard Tilston was the doctor at Port Essington, a brilliant man who had gained a medal at Guy's Hospital, and who seems to have been one of the first men to realise that the aborigines were worthy of anthropological study. His sister married Captain MacArthur's son - also named John - who had a post at the settlement as Admiralty storekeeper during the time his father was in command. John, junior, father of the Rev. D. Mac-Arthur, had gone to Australia at the instance of his uncle Hannibal Mac-Arthur, in or about 1838, to be "placed." Finding that this meant relegation to the back blocks on a pastoral property, with no company but a couple of convict servants, he asked to be sent to his father at Port Essington. Thus he came to be appointed to the situation mentioned above. The half company of marines which was stationed at the port seems, from the information in the possession of the Rev. Donald Mac-Arthur, supplied by his father's and grandfather's letters, to have been borne on the books of H.M.S. Pelorus, the commander of which in 1841 had dumped all his victualling stuff ashore, and sailed away never to return. Re-victualling was done from Sydney, though the marines remained on the ship's books. Naturally, a storekeeper for perishable provisions stored in sheds in a climate of a mean temperature of 82deg was a necessity, and in this capacity John MacArthur, jun., was employed, his duties including also the re-victualling of the survey vessels on the coast. He was nominally superseded in 1844 by Lieutenant Lambrick R.M.L.I, but he continued to do the work until the closing of the station, when he returned to England and in recognition of his services was drafted into the civil service as an Admiralty clerk, in which position he remained until his retirement in 1879. In the smaller of the two pictures, the most conspicuous tomb is a large white pyramid of stone erected to the wife of Lieutenant Lambrick, the materials having been sent from England after her death. It is so solid that probably it still remains as one of the few relics of the settlement which was abandoned and is now but a memory.
In December, 1845, Ludwig Leichhardt arrived at Port Essington after a journey of 14 months from Darling Downs, and on his departure he presented John Mac-Arthur, junior, with the telescope which he had used during his long journey overland. This interesting memento of the lost leader's fine exploration has been included by the Rev. Donald MacArthur in his donation to the Commonwealth, and it has been sent to Canberra for preservation in the
national collection.
It may be well to put on record a few facts concerning the relation of these Mac-Arthurs - for so they write the name - with the Macarthurs of Camden. Captain (afterwards Major-General) John Mac-Arthur was a nephew of John Macarthur, of Elizabeth Farm and Camden Park, New South Wales, and his family preserves the story of its ancestor, who, as a "refugee from Culloden" had an adventurous career in the West Indies before returning to England and establishing himself in business in Plymouth. John MacArthur, senior, of Port Essington, married a Mary Elizabeth McArthur who belonged to the branch of the clan Campbell who once held the chieftainship of that clan, and whose recorded history goes back to A.D. 1200.
national collection.
It may be well to put on record a few facts concerning the relation of these Mac-Arthurs - for so they write the name - with the Macarthurs of Camden. Captain (afterwards Major-General) John Mac-Arthur was a nephew of John Macarthur, of Elizabeth Farm and Camden Park, New South Wales, and his family preserves the story of its ancestor, who, as a "refugee from Culloden" had an adventurous career in the West Indies before returning to England and establishing himself in business in Plymouth. John MacArthur, senior, of Port Essington, married a Mary Elizabeth McArthur who belonged to the branch of the clan Campbell who once held the chieftainship of that clan, and whose recorded history goes back to A.D. 1200.
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Colonist (Sydney, NSW : 1835 - 1840), Saturday 25 August 1838, page 3
PORT ESSINGTON. The following Address from the principal Merchants and Gentlemen of Sydney, was presented on Thursday to Captain Sir J. J. Gordon Bremer, K. C. B., &c, of H. M. S. Alligator, now in Sydney, on his way to establish the proposed new settlement at Port Essington. Sir John,, then Captain Bremer, C.B, was the officer en-trusted by the British Government in 1824, to form the settlement at Melville Island, which was some years afterwards most injudiciously abandoned. It must be highly gratifying to Sir John to be thus a second time entrusted with the responsibility of carrying into effect so important an undertaking. We heartily join with the ad-dressers in wishing that Sir John's health, and that of the officers and men under his command, may be preserved amid the trials and deprivations necessarily attendant upon the formation of a new settlement, as well as in hoping that he may be eventually rewarded with success in an undertaking which cannot fail to prove of very great benefit to this, and the other settled portions of this immense territory. ADDRESS. To SIR J. J. GORDON BREMER, CAPTAIN R. N., K. C. B., C.B., &c. Sydney, August 22, 1838. We, the undersigned Merchants and Gentlemen residing in this colony, take leave to congratulate you on your second visit to our shores, and to offer you our sincere good wishes for the success and prosperity of the new settlement at Port Essington, for the purpose of founding which you have been again selected by Her Majesty's Government, and to ex-press our admiration of the zeal and enterprise which have induced you, under many trying circumstances, to undertake this arduous adventure.
We need hardly assure you of the deep interest we naturally feel in the formation and progress of another dependency in this vast continent––its welfare promoted by the auspices of our Parent State, and sup-ported by the industry and capital of Great Britain. But we desire to convey to you more especially, our hope that the settlement which you are about to re-establish may speedily emulate in prosperity this older appendage of the British Crown, and our conviction that she will also become a very important relation in the extension of commerce, and as an entrepôt for the products of trade with the islands of the Eastern Archipelago. That your health, and that of the officers and men under your command, may be preserved through the trials always attendant upon the formation of a new settlement, and that you may be eventually rewarded, by its complete and permanent success is the sincere wish of Your obedient and faithful Servants and friends, Richard Jones, M. C., Robert Campbell, M.C., Alexander McLeay, A. B. Spark, H. H. Macarthur, M. C., John Jamison, M. C., P. De Mestre, William Walker and Co., J. Blaxland, M. C., William Lithgow, M. C., Thomas McQuoid, S. A. Donaldson, Edward Aspinall, Alexander Berry, M. C., John Campbell, Lamb and Parbury, Edwards and Hunter, William C. Botts, Samuel Ashmore, G. L. P. Living, R. Duke and Co., R.R. Mackenzie, A. C. Innes, J. S. Ferriter, Thomas Gore and Co., John Lord and Co., William Gibbes, Geo. Cooper, C. Customs, J. Nicholson, H. Master, John Gilchrist, A. Mossman, Willis, Sandeman and Co., Brown and Co, Thomas Smith, A.B. Smith and Co., William Dawes, R. Campbell, jun. and Co., Thomas U. Ryder, W. S. Deloitte and Co., Robert How, Kenworthy and Lord, Ramsay and Young, P. W. Flower, George Weller, John Tooth, Cooper and Holt, Betts Brothers, George Miller, Alexander Fotheringham, Hughes and Hosking, John Edye Manning, Edye Manning.
REPLY. To RICHARD JONES, ESQ., M. C., AND OTHER MER-CHANTS AND GENTLEMEN, RESIDENTS IN THE COLONY OF NEW SOUTH WALES. H. M. S. Alligator, Sydney, August 23, 1838.
Gentlemen,--Permit me to offer you my best and warmest thanks for the kind and flattering address you have done me the honour to present to me, and let me assure you that I regard as most fortunate the circumstances which have led to my second visit to your hospitable shores, and to the renewal of several old and happy associations. Having long been of opinion that a British settlement on the north coast of this wonderful country had become an object of the utmost importance in every point of view, it was with peculiar gratification that I accepted the command of the little expedition Her Majesty's Government has entrusted to me. There are many difficulties and privations inseparable from a position so peculiar as ours will be—yet I entertain a hope that we shall conquer them ; and I feel a conviction that if the settlement receives the fostering care of the Parent Government for a few years only, the results will be beyond expectation beneficial. The field for the extension of British influence, the employment of capital and the exercise of industry, is indeed a rich and wide one—that it will be success-fully trodden I venture to prognosticate. Permit me, Gentlemen, again to offer you my heartfelt acknowledgements—to repeat the assurances that this proof of the interest you take in the expedition, and of the regard you are pleased to entertain for me personally, can never cease to be appreciated— and with feelings of the most grateful kind I seize on the privilege you have conferred on me—that of subscribing myself Your much obliged and most faithful Friend and servant, J.J. GORDON BREMER.
PORT ESSINGTON. The following Address from the principal Merchants and Gentlemen of Sydney, was presented on Thursday to Captain Sir J. J. Gordon Bremer, K. C. B., &c, of H. M. S. Alligator, now in Sydney, on his way to establish the proposed new settlement at Port Essington. Sir John,, then Captain Bremer, C.B, was the officer en-trusted by the British Government in 1824, to form the settlement at Melville Island, which was some years afterwards most injudiciously abandoned. It must be highly gratifying to Sir John to be thus a second time entrusted with the responsibility of carrying into effect so important an undertaking. We heartily join with the ad-dressers in wishing that Sir John's health, and that of the officers and men under his command, may be preserved amid the trials and deprivations necessarily attendant upon the formation of a new settlement, as well as in hoping that he may be eventually rewarded with success in an undertaking which cannot fail to prove of very great benefit to this, and the other settled portions of this immense territory. ADDRESS. To SIR J. J. GORDON BREMER, CAPTAIN R. N., K. C. B., C.B., &c. Sydney, August 22, 1838. We, the undersigned Merchants and Gentlemen residing in this colony, take leave to congratulate you on your second visit to our shores, and to offer you our sincere good wishes for the success and prosperity of the new settlement at Port Essington, for the purpose of founding which you have been again selected by Her Majesty's Government, and to ex-press our admiration of the zeal and enterprise which have induced you, under many trying circumstances, to undertake this arduous adventure.
We need hardly assure you of the deep interest we naturally feel in the formation and progress of another dependency in this vast continent––its welfare promoted by the auspices of our Parent State, and sup-ported by the industry and capital of Great Britain. But we desire to convey to you more especially, our hope that the settlement which you are about to re-establish may speedily emulate in prosperity this older appendage of the British Crown, and our conviction that she will also become a very important relation in the extension of commerce, and as an entrepôt for the products of trade with the islands of the Eastern Archipelago. That your health, and that of the officers and men under your command, may be preserved through the trials always attendant upon the formation of a new settlement, and that you may be eventually rewarded, by its complete and permanent success is the sincere wish of Your obedient and faithful Servants and friends, Richard Jones, M. C., Robert Campbell, M.C., Alexander McLeay, A. B. Spark, H. H. Macarthur, M. C., John Jamison, M. C., P. De Mestre, William Walker and Co., J. Blaxland, M. C., William Lithgow, M. C., Thomas McQuoid, S. A. Donaldson, Edward Aspinall, Alexander Berry, M. C., John Campbell, Lamb and Parbury, Edwards and Hunter, William C. Botts, Samuel Ashmore, G. L. P. Living, R. Duke and Co., R.R. Mackenzie, A. C. Innes, J. S. Ferriter, Thomas Gore and Co., John Lord and Co., William Gibbes, Geo. Cooper, C. Customs, J. Nicholson, H. Master, John Gilchrist, A. Mossman, Willis, Sandeman and Co., Brown and Co, Thomas Smith, A.B. Smith and Co., William Dawes, R. Campbell, jun. and Co., Thomas U. Ryder, W. S. Deloitte and Co., Robert How, Kenworthy and Lord, Ramsay and Young, P. W. Flower, George Weller, John Tooth, Cooper and Holt, Betts Brothers, George Miller, Alexander Fotheringham, Hughes and Hosking, John Edye Manning, Edye Manning.
REPLY. To RICHARD JONES, ESQ., M. C., AND OTHER MER-CHANTS AND GENTLEMEN, RESIDENTS IN THE COLONY OF NEW SOUTH WALES. H. M. S. Alligator, Sydney, August 23, 1838.
Gentlemen,--Permit me to offer you my best and warmest thanks for the kind and flattering address you have done me the honour to present to me, and let me assure you that I regard as most fortunate the circumstances which have led to my second visit to your hospitable shores, and to the renewal of several old and happy associations. Having long been of opinion that a British settlement on the north coast of this wonderful country had become an object of the utmost importance in every point of view, it was with peculiar gratification that I accepted the command of the little expedition Her Majesty's Government has entrusted to me. There are many difficulties and privations inseparable from a position so peculiar as ours will be—yet I entertain a hope that we shall conquer them ; and I feel a conviction that if the settlement receives the fostering care of the Parent Government for a few years only, the results will be beyond expectation beneficial. The field for the extension of British influence, the employment of capital and the exercise of industry, is indeed a rich and wide one—that it will be success-fully trodden I venture to prognosticate. Permit me, Gentlemen, again to offer you my heartfelt acknowledgements—to repeat the assurances that this proof of the interest you take in the expedition, and of the regard you are pleased to entertain for me personally, can never cease to be appreciated— and with feelings of the most grateful kind I seize on the privilege you have conferred on me—that of subscribing myself Your much obliged and most faithful Friend and servant, J.J. GORDON BREMER.