Eighty-two years in Western Australia.
It is hard to realise what that means; yet it is the record to which Mr. John Henry Gregory can lay claim. Observing him in his comfortable Northam home, snugly ensconced in a modern easy chair or pacing up and down on a well-carpeted floor, it is difficult to realise that the events of which he is speaking so familiarly happened, many of them, three-quarters of a century ago, and that this still agile and mentally alert man has weathered nearly all the storms that the Cinderella State has known since the white people took up their heritage.
At the age of 84 Mr. Gregory has a clear memory of the most striking incidents in the history of the State and of his own life, which has been made up of hard struggles, a few of the sweets of success and never-failing attention to whatever duties came his way. He has lead a strenuous life and kept faith with himself, with his family and with the State, of which he was for many years a servant. Since reaching manhood's estate he has had the help of a good wife, who is still hale and hearty and bestowing on him that womanly care which means so much in the building of a man's character.
John Henry Gregory was little more than a bouncing baby when in the declining days of 1829 - the days when George the Fourth was King - his parents took him aboard the good ship "Warrior", which, in charge of Captain Stone, was bound for the almost unknown land of Australia. There were four other members of the family, two sons and two daughters, and they arrived on the coast of Western Australia in March, 1830. In those days the old "wind-jammers" used to take about six months to accomplish the voyage from England.
On the 12th of March the passengers were landed at South Beach, Fremantle, and there tents were pitched. Just then there were five or six vessels at the beach, and the camp was occupied by a considerable number of immigrants. The "Marquis of Anglesey," which preceded the "Warrior," was wrecked on this beach.
The first Governor, Captain James Stirling, and his staff, came to Western Australia about nine months ahead of the Gregory family, arriving on June 1, 1829. Captain Stirling returned to England two years later when he was knighted.
Food supplies were often very short at the South Beach camp, and many women and children died there from exposure. The authorities established a commissariat department, and from this supplies were dealt out on a none too liberal scale.
Leaving the South Beach Mr. Gregory's parents went to live between Perth and Guildford, at a point on the Swan River, afterwards known as Pineapple Bay.
"My father brought a pineapple plant out with him, and succeeded in growing by the river, hence the name," remarked Mr. Gregory.
It was in this pleasant spot on the old Swan that Mr. Gregory's of early boyhood were spent, and he remembers the river well when it was yet unsullied by the ruthless desecrators who cared more for the spoils of trade than for nature's beautiful handiwork.
School days followed, and the year 1836 found the boy Gregory attending the first educational institution established in Perth. The teacher was Mr. Spencer, father of the ex-Auditor-General. Later on this school was amalgamated with one established by the Rev. J. B. Wittenoom, and Mr. Spencer continued on the teaching staff.
The Rev. J. B. Wittenoom was the first Colonial chaplain, and among the scholars were his sons, Henry, Charles and William. In later life Henry married Miss Hardy, the daughter of the Harbour-Master at Fremantle. Charles also married, and his wife was killed on the York road, by being thrown from a buggy. His son is now Sir Edward Wittenoom.
There were not many children in Perth in those days, as most of the immigrants had gone inland.
Mr. Gregory remembers Henry Stirling (son of the Governor), who subsequently became a naval officer, and sons of Mr. Turner and Dr. Littleton, amongst others.
The natives of that period were very troublesome. What is now Perth was nearly all bush, and several murders were committed.
"On one occasion," said Mr Gregory, "my father went to Perth for stores, leaving the rest of the family out at Guildford, where we were then living. The natives surrounded the house and pushed their spears between the logs used in building the walls. My mother first menaced them with a gun, and then gave them food, after which they left. It appeared to us almost a miraculous escape, for this tribe were particularly bloodthirsty."
The Pinjarra district was the scene of the first murder by the blacks in the State. Mr McKenzie, the victim, was speared.
"I remember once the blacks attacked a house between Guildford and Perth, belonging to Mr. Entwistle. Mr. Entwistle's boy Ralph rushed under the bed, and the natives proceeded to rob the house. While engaged in this occupation they ferociously jabbed their spears underneath the bed, but fortunately missed the boy, who remained in hiding till the blacks had disappeared with their booty."
There were practically no roads in the thirties; most of the tracks were sandy, and horse teams were exceedingly scarce. The principal method of carriage was by the river between Fremantle and the Upper Swan. Inland a small amount of produce was grown, and this was sent down by the water to Perth and Fremantle. The river was navigable for the most part, but the barges, which were towed by small rowing boats, had generally to wait at what is now called the Causeway for the river to rise, in order to get over the oyster beds there. The bed of the river at this point was nothing but oyster shells, but from the earliest days no oysters have been found, some epidemic having apparently killed them all off.
On the edge of the oyster beds was "Brown's Landing," and from this point heavy goods were carted in to Perth. At flood time these goods could be boated right along to a point near the bottom of William Street.
"There were no jetties," remarked Mr. Gregory, "and as I was engaged in boating timber down the river I used to throw it into the water, and the carts would come into the stream and cart it away. I was carting for some people engaged in timber-cutting at Belmont, and this timber (jarrah) was used in many of the earliest buildings in Perth.
In the thirties and a good many years afterwards, the agriculture of Western Australia was not of great consequence. A certain amount of corn was grown in close proximity to the Swan River. This consisted mainly of wheat, oats, and barley, but there was little use for hay, horses being very scarce.
A windmill was erected at Point Belches, South Perth, by Mr. W. K. Shenton, and the corn was brought down the river by boat.
Mr. W. K. Shenton was a cousin to Messrs. George and Arthur Shenton. George Shenton was in business in Perth as a merchant, and Arthur Shenton was editor of the "Perth Gazette."
Later on a watermill was erected in what is now Mill Street, by Mr Beverley.
"The water was brought to this mill from a lake in open trenches, and many a time I, with other boys, clambered up and down these trenches. The city has now, of course, obliterated them all," remarked Mr. Gregory.
Shenton's mill continued to do the most business, as the cost of cartage from the waterside had to be borne in the case of Beverley's mill. The latter was not a success, and the proprietor afterwards entered the Government service.
In regard to the old Colonial Office, administration, Mr. Gregory has nothing but praise. Mr Peter Brown was Colonial Secretary, and the Rev. J. B. Roe, father of Mr. A. S. Roe, P.M., occupied the office of Surveyor General. Mr. Roe had come to Western Australia with Sir James Stirling before the Swan River Settlement was founded.
"So far as I know," says Mr. Gregory, "all the officials were of the highest character, and endeavoured to further the interests of the poor as well as the rich."
The first Advocate-General was Mr. Geo. Moore, and Mr. Sam Moore was one of the earliest merchants. He was the father of Mr. W. D. Moore, of Fremantle.
Mr. Gregory has pleasant memories associated with the name of Brockman. "At one time I worked for Mr W.L. Brockman, who lived on the Swan above Guildford. He was a good employer, and justly deserved his reputation for hospitality. His brother, Robert, was a farmer in the south and also took up land along the Avon River.
When the time came for Gregory the youth to take up a trade, he was apprenticed to a wheelwright and blacksmith at Guildford. In course of his calling, he was engaged in the construction of the pioneer flour mill and timber mill, of which the proprietor was Mr. Walkenshaw Cowen, R.M., at Northam.
The first steam plant imported into the colony was erected by Messrs. Scoles and Nash, at the spot where the Old Men's Home was subsequently built, in Mounts Bay Road. The machinery was bought and erected in the new mills of Mr. Cowan. Mr Gregory assisted his employer, Mr. Byrne, who was an engineer, in the erection of the engines and plant.
Timber for the mill was brought from Greenmount, in the Darling Ranges, and some of the first cutting was put into the Anglican Church, now St. George's Cathedral. Some of this old church still remains, having been built on to in the construction of the cathedral.
Saw-milling in those days had its disadvantages. For instance, on one occasion the circular saws went all wrong, and there was only one saw sharpener in the State. this gentleman (whose name, by the way, is particularly well-known in the West) had to brought down from York to set matters right.
A tremendous flood occurred in the Swan in 1829, before Mr. Gregory came to the State. Many signs of this great flood remained for years afterwards. At the angle of Redcliffe Beach and Long Beach the remains of a kangaroo could be seen in a high tree, to which point the flood waters had evidently risen. this was then known as Kangaroo Point, and was midway between Perth and Guildford. Settlers on the Swan flats were flooded out, amongst the victims being Messrs. Burges, Walcott and Ridley.
The blacks in the York district often told of this great flood, which they said extended from Mt. Bakewell to Mt. Brown, all the York district being under water. Of course, no whites saw it in these parts. Everything points to the conclusion that the floods of 1829 were the greatest in the history of the State.
Mails were few and far between in those days. There was not much need of them, except when a boat arrived, and it can be easily be imagined that this event did not happen very frequently. A road mail used to leave Guildford for the Eastern Districts, taking some days on the journey to York, Toodyay, and back to Perth. If anything happened to the regular mailman, Mr. Gregory's services were sometimes requisitioned. He generally left Guildford at midday and reached the halfway house on the old York road between eight and nine in the evening. Next morning start would be made at three o'clock, reaching York at eight. On one occasion Mr. Gregory had the doubtful privilege of spending an evening at the half-way house with a wayfarer, who subsequently turned out to be the murderer of Gordon, the basket-maker, which tragedy took place near the Causeway. The murderer was afterwards arrested at Seabrook for the crime.
"Over the hills," said Mr. Gregory, "was a phrase which in the old days meant a long journey. All the country beyond the Darling Ranges was regarded as a wild man's land, and for a person to go there was to undertake a long task, beset with many hardships. York, Northam and Toodyay were all remote localities, and considered very far removed from the settlement. To go "over the hills" was an undertaking that only the stout-hearted would enter upon readily. It was in 1841 that Mr. Gregory made his first journey across the ranges. He was then a boy of fourteen, but with a knowledge of bushcraft and the treachery of the aboriginals that had developed through the constant safe-guards maintained throughout his boyhood on the then inhospitable banks of the Swan. Starting from Guildford with a team in charge of a pioneer, Elijah Cook, York was reached four days later. But the boy and man were fully armed, so savage were the natives in the country traversed, while in the night camps it was necessary for one to keep watch while the other rested. The team was loaded with materials for Grindle's hotel, which was the second public house opened in York, the first being Monger's owned by the founder of the well-known family of that name. this new hostelry was built in what was known as Blandstown, called after Mr. Bland, who owned what is to-day half of the town of York. The owner divided his property into small holdings, and named the subdivision in honour of his family name. It was in Blandstown that the first Anglican Church in the York district was opened. Grindle's hotel was in after years succeeded by the King Head Inn. As the years passed the dividing line between York and Blandstown disappeared, and in the sixties the identity of the latter was lost by being absorbed in the former.
Mr. Gregory made many other trips "over the hills" on the track which was blazed in 1833 by Lieut. Dale, whom it is interesting to know had in his party Messrs. Hardy and Clarkson, whose families have played such an important part in settling the State. In those days York was sometimes called by the native name Billalong, which was pronounced in a musical way by the aborigines.
Asked if he saw much sport in his boyish days, Mr. Gregory said that marbles were sometimes played, and occasionally a game something like cricket was indulged in after a fashion. In the early years of the settlement, and, in fact for some decades after, football was not even heard of.
In 1842, when fifteen years of age, our pioneer friend commenced work on Mr. Hewson's farm in the Toodyay district, and there obtained a knowledge of agriculture which enabled him to become a successful farmer. The primitive methods of ploughing, sowing, harvesting and threshing, are all vividly remembered by Mr. Gregory. "There was," he remarked, "none of your new-fangled mechanical inventions then; it was from four in the morning till nine at night we worked. No one heard of eight hours a day. Why the farmers of today are gentlemen - they just harness up a horse and a machine does the rest." He described the first plough he used; it was made entirely of wood, the only metal part being the share, and the contrivance run on skids, for wheels on a plough were up to that time unheard of. Sowing was all done by hand, on the broad-casting plan, as illustrated in the pictures of the sowers in ancient Biblical prints. With a bag suspended from the neck, the worker would advance over the field with a measured stride, scattering a handful with each step, the right hand throwing with the advance of the left foot, and the left hand working with each movement of the right. That it, the feet stepped and the hands worked in rhythmical motion with the movements of the sower. After years of practice, an expert could sow 18 acres a day. Many workers could only sow with one hand - two handed sowing was a gift that only a few farmers possessed. An expert could gauge the amount of wheat to the acre with almost complete accuracy. The general average was from one and a half to two bushels. Artificial manures were then unheard of, and only one variety of wheat was known.
After broad-casting the ground was harrowed, the implement being constructed of wood with iron tines. Some years later harrows made entirely of iron were introduced and regarded at first as a great novelty.
Slow as this was, the process of sowing, harvesting and cleaning the grain was still slower. Encircling an armful of the standing crop the lot was cut with a reaping hook or toothed sickle, each armful was tied with a rope made of hay to form sheaves. The sheaves as they were cut were stood upright or "shocked" to use the term then is used. One acre was considered a good day's cutting. After standing for a few days the shocks were carted off, and pigs turned into the paddocks to take up the fallen grain.
The work of threshing was one of the best muscle-making jobs on the farm, as all grain was beaten from the heads by hand labour. For this a flail was used, and as the appliance is now obsolete, Mr. Gregory's description of the old-time tool may be of interest. A stout wattle handle about four feet six inches long had affixed to the end another piece of hard wood called a swinzle. This was usually attached with a piece of green hide lashing so arranged as to allow the swinzle to work loosely at the joint with each swinging over-arm motion. A well-made flail had a purely wooden swivel joint, the wattle being slotted out at the end, and steamed after the manner employed by boat builders; the ends were passed through the swinzle and brought together, this forming a swinging joint.
A necessary part of the furnishings on an old-fashioned farm was a threshing floor; often these were built of wood with the timber inverted in the centre. The sheaves on being brought in were laid in double rows, heads to heads. The thresher then commenced beating the heads vigorously with the flail, first walking along one side of the lines and then returning on the reverse row. After being beaten sufficiently, the straw was forked over a hurdle to shake out what grain was not already on the floor. The wheat was then raked into heaps ready for separation from the chaff and husks.
This separation or winnowing treatment was performed with the aid of the wind. With a large milk-can filled with grain and chaff, the worker would stand at right angles to the breeze, and as he tilted the dish empty the contents and the weight of the grain would carry it on to a tarpaulin or stretched-out sacks, while the lighter and useless by-products were taken away by the wind. Later on a genius who grew tired of waiting for infrequent breezes, invented what was known as a "wind-maker." This was made up of a windlass set in sockets and having affixed to it four gabs. by vigorously turning the handle the rapid rotatory motion produced a strong current of air. With one operator on the "wind-maker" and another manipulating the dish with grain could be cleared regardless of the weather. this was thought to be the limit in wheat cleaning inventions and was the favourite method for many seasons. Years after, another invention - marvellous in its day, known as the winnower - was brought over from South Australia. "A machine to clean wheat without a dish! No; impossible!" said the most conservative farmers. But the new notion, as they called it, was taken from farm to farm by the owner, and the products of several crops dealt with, after which the incredulous became believers. In these days of cultivators, seed drills, harvesters and binders, wheat of many varieties, artificial manures and chemically-treated soils, it is instructive to contrast the methods of the first three-fourths of the century with those of today.
In 1849, Mr. Gregory left the Toodyay district and took a farm seven miles on the Northam side of York, and remained there until 1856, when he transferred to Thomson's Head a then uncleared grant in the Northam district. During his stay at the York farm, Mr. Gregory recorded an average crop one season of 37 bushels. Thompson's Head took its name from the fact that prominent on the grant was a big outcrop of rock which was shaped like a head, and the name Thompson was after the original owner, a young Englishman, who obtained a grant of six thousand acres, but before he had time to develop it he was drowned in the Swan near Guildford through a dingy upsetting. The rents were remitted to the relatives of the owner through the Colonial Secretary, Mr. A. O'Grady Lefroy.
Mr. Gregory's experience serves to illustrate the absentee rent system which drew so much wealth to England from the struggling colony. During the first seven years the rent paid was �50 per year. At the end of this time the tenant had considerably improved the holding, so the agents rewarded him for enhancing the value of the owner's property by advancing the annual toll to �60, which operated for a further septennial period. When that expired, still more additions had been made, and this time �80 per year was demanded and paid, while during the final six years �90 per annum was enacted. It is interesting to figure out the relationship of the owners and tenant. The latter rented from the former six thousand acres of virgin country, and if he improved the land he did not own, his rents were raised. During the rent-paying period the tenant paid to the absentee owner �1870, and gave up years of constant labour only to have to hand over without compensation large assets created by that long struggle of nearly three decades. The rent system, which, Mr. Gregory states, was not uncommon in the earlier days perhaps explains the tardy progress of land settlement here for many years.
While working the Thompson's Head land, the tenant found time to improve an adjoining grant, now held by the Dempster family, and known as Corra Lynn. this he gradually extended to two thousand acres fee simple and two thousand acres leasehold, and in 1887 he vacated the older grant to devote his whole time to the newer property at Burlong Pool, where he lived and worked till 1892, when at the age of 66 he joined the Government service and filled a position as a State forest ranger on the Great Southern line, until 1909, when he voluntarily retired on a pension.
Noticing Mr. Gregory's erect figure and active physical and mental capacities, it was natural to enquire regarding his habits of living. He attributes his many decades of good health and his present activity to a boyhood and youth spent in hard but healthy work in the open air, together with the practice of abstentious habits of living. Up to the age of thirty-nine the subject of these memories was a moderate drinker, but in 1865 he became associated with the Good Templar movement, which was in that year introduced by officers of the South Australian lodges. In the first years of the temperance crusade Mr. Gregory was prominently associated with the work, and up to the present day he has taken a keen interest in its extension. One of the earliest monuments to the efforts of those early lodge-workers is the Temperance Hotel erected in Northam by the I.O.G.T. in the seventies, and on the foundation stone of which Mr. Gregory's name figures today. In addition to helping in local work, he found time in propagating the principles of Good Templary and was present at the foundation of the York lodge in 1870 and Newcastle in 1873.
Mr. Gregory's memory of the early difficulties with the aboriginals is specially vivid; doubtless the stressful times produced by the constant safeguards and precautions against treachery left their indelible impression on his recollections. To the early pioneers the "Battle of Pinjarra" was the greatest event recorded. The Murray tribe was the most formidable, and with that of the Upper Swan formed the two strongest aboriginal communities in the southern parts of the colony. In one camp alone near Pinjarra as many as 800 aborigines were seen. The abundance of fish and game, for which the Murray River and Mandurah Inlet were famed, provided ample means for supplying large numbers of "niggers," to use the popular term of the day. The Murray tribe had been noted for a succession of attacks on the settlers, but its warlike career was ended at the "Battle of Pinjarra," which seems to have been a kind of miniature Waterloo, for it settled finally the power of the tribe. A detachment of soldiers had been despatched to the Murray, and were attacked by large numbers of dusky warriors, who, it is stated, fought bravely with their inferior arms, but were overwhelmed by the muskets, bayonets, and swords of the soldiers. The fight was of a very sanguinary nature, and by sheer force of numbers it was thought for a few minutes that the dark men would overpower the whites, but they were soon in full retreat across the Murray River. And, as Mr. Gregory stated, the story of the settlers is not creditable to the defenders, for report has it, he said, "that the soldiers pursued the fleeing attackers, shooting, bayonetting, and mercilessly putting to the sword, men women and children." The carnage of the day cowed the blacks in the district, destroyed their leaders, and left them subject to the white men, under whose onward march the once-populous Murray district was cleared of its black denizens. In the encounter Captain Ellis, Sergeant Barron, Private Heffron, and other soldiers of the 63rd Regiment, lost their lives.
According to Mr. Gregory the most notable dusky warrior of the early days was Yagan, chief of the Upper Swan tribe. As a bot the old pioneer knew the chief and speaks of him as the most handsome black that he has ever seen. Possessed of a tall, well-proportioned figure, he presented a commanding appearance that impelled admiration. Says Mr. Gregory, "He had the muscular strength of a well-trained athlete, and as a black was a clever organiser. He planned several murderous attacks and gave instructions like a well-trained general to his followers, over whom he had a wonderful control." Time after time he outwitted the forces and parties which were sent out to capture him. On many occasions he was surrounded, but as the cordon closed in and found the centre of its circle, the elusive Yagan had vanished. "In fact," Mr. Gregory remarked, "when I used to read of De Wet evading the British, I often thought of Yagan - his methods of escape seemed so similar." It was left to a boy named Velwick to end the life of this remarkable chief. Young Velwick and his brother were two youths, between whom there was an unusually affectionate attachment, and when Yagan's tribe had killed the elder, the boy vowed vengeance. After the Government parties had grown disheartened and worn out in their fruitless excursions in quest of the murderous chief, Velwick, after many weeks spent in cunningly pursuing him, at last found his chance to avenge his brother's death. Fearing the devoted followers of Yagan would ultimately encompass the destruction of Velwick, the Government financed him to leave the colony.
Another chief remembered by Mr. Gregory was Midgegeroo, head of the Perth tribe, and a contemporary of Yagan. He was a short, nuggety man, remarkable for his unusually bushy hair. He was the instigator in a number of attacks resulting in the murder of white people. Without the cunning of the Upper Swan chief, he was an easier victim to the traps of the soldiers, and was captured and hanged in 1838. The execution took place on a gallows erected on the site covered by the present museum and art gallery.
In reply to a question as to who were the "fathers" of Northam, Mr. Gregory stated that as far as his memory could guide him, Messrs. W. Chidlow and John Morrell, founders of the well-known families of those names, were the two first pioneers, and settled here about 1834. The first hotel erected in Northam was at Carter's Pools, and was called "The Roadside Inn." The building was demolished many years ago. The second public house was built by Mr. J. Morrell; it also served for many years as a post-office, and was located near the present home of Mrs. McLarty.
Speaking of the foundation of Toodyay, Mr. Gregory said he remembered the establishment of the first settlement in 1840, when the old barracks was erected. An outpost consisting of one corporal and two men were stationed there as a safeguard against the natives. The first Toodyay victim of an attack by the latter was a boy named John Drummond seventeen years of age. In 1850 the first batch of convicts were sent to Newcastle in connection with the Guildford-Toodyay road, the first long distance highway to be properly constructed in the settlements.
Mr. Gregory remembers all of the early tragedies of the colony, and particularly the first murder in this district, when Messrs. Chidlow and Jones who, while clearing a selection, were attacked and murdered in broad daylight by natives. The first white murder took place in a house still standing near the old footbridge. The chief actors in the tragedy were two surveyors, who quarrelled, and one fired on his mate, killing him instantly.
To listen to Mr. Gregory recounting his early experiences, and to hear his wonderful story, is to cause one to feel with intensity a deep admiration for the early-makers of this State. There is an unusual feeling savouring of the sensational that comes over one when in the presence of a man whose memory retains recollection extending over seventy-five years. From that wonderful storehouse of memories come incidents of times before which not more than ten of the oldest living men in the State were born. In that rich fabric of reminiscences is inter-woven the history of this giant young State. It embraces the early wind that swept South Beach camp where the "Pilgrim Fathers" of the West landed travel-worn and muscle-cramped after their six months' confinement in the old timber-built craft that weathered the storm-rocked oceans. What a subject that old camp would make for an artist to catch its inspiration. Parents from the old lands for the first time feeling the soil, and breathing the air of the new nation that they were to build, they were parents of more than children, for were they not the fathers and mothers of the new State? Then come the scenes of the almost incessant conflicts with the blacks, the long bush excursions into the untrodden mysterious interior, then the slow years of unorganised agricultural work, and later the gold boom, and finally a true consciousness of the amazingly valuable agricultural heritage. In that period covered by the memory of one man, Perth from its barbaric blacks' camp has grown into a well-built city, throbbing with the life and pulsations of modern civilisation. We can look upon the figure who has seen it all, and it makes us refuse to accept without qualification the teaching contained in Gordon's phrase, "the longest life is but a span". It is with a feeling close to that of veneration that one sees and talks to Mr. J. H. Gregory, the sole representative of the brave band of old, and we feel gratified to know that the autumnal years of his life are being spent amid surroundings befitting one who has "fought the good fight" in hewing out the destinies of the State.