The Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage
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The Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage Place The Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage Place which tells the story of the ill-fated Burke and Wills Expedition, was included in the National Heritage List on 22 January 2016. The Burke and Wills Expedition 1860–1861 The Burke and Wills expedition is one of Australia’s best known stories of exploration. On 20 August 1860, at Royal Park in Melbourne, over 15 000 spectators watched the expedition depart on the first ever overland attempt to reach the Gulf of Carpentaria. With 22 men, 26 camels, 23 horses and several supply wagons, it was the best equipped exploration party in Australia’s history. Despite its high profile, the expedition was led by Made up of five sites and a narrow corridor along the Robert O’Hara Burke; a man with little experience in Cooper Creek, the Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha exploration. William John Wills was the surveyor and National Heritage Place is of outstanding heritage value to John King, a veteran of the British Army, was in charge of the nation as the setting for the key events associated with the cameleers. the Burke and Wills Expedition. On 11 November 1860 the party arrived at Fort Wills Located over 1000 kilometres northeast of Adelaide, the five on Cooper Creek—the furthest extent of previous inland expedition sites—the Dig Tree and Fort Wills Site, Howitt’s exploration. Burke established a depot and split the group Site, Burke’s Tree, King’s Site and Wills’ Site—are located in two. Burke, Wills, King and Charles Gray were to head along the course of Cooper Creek from Queensland to north on 16 December while William Brahe, William South Australia. Patton and Thomas McDonald were to remain at Fort Wills until Burke’s group returned or three months had passed. Images: (top) Dig Tree (© Department of the Environment) (bottom) The Burke and Wills Australian exploring expedition, Thomas Adams Hills, (© National Library of Australia) http://nla.gov.au/nla.pic-an8960212 HER138.0116 environment.gov.au In a few weeks it became apparent Burke, Wills and King were not able to go any further. With supplies now depleted they became increasingly dependent on the local Yandruwandha Aboriginal people for survival. The Yandruwandha provided them with fish, and processed nardoo—a native plant that is toxic in its unprocessed state. Despite the support of the Yandruwandha, the explorers’ health continued to deteriorate and by June 1861 both Wills and Burke had died. John King was the sole survivor from the journey north. His journal, buried at the Dig Tree, tells of the kindness of the Yandruwandha people and their treatment of him as ‘one of their own’ over the next three months until Alfred Howitt found him on 15 September 1861. Alfred Howitt and John King returned to Melbourne to a heroes’ welcome. Two years later Howitt returned to Cooper Creek to retrieve the bodies of Burke and Wills. An estimated 40 000 spectators saw their state funeral in Melbourne on 21 January 1863. National Heritage Listing National Heritage listing recognises the outstanding significance of the Burke and Wills expedition sites to Australia. The expedition was a defining moment in Australia’s cultural Burke and his party reached the tidal channels of the Gulf history and provides important insights into the nineteenth on 10 February 1861, technically fulfilling their objective century attitudes towards the Australian environment. of crossing the country from south to north. With supplies The Yandruwandha Aboriginal people, who provided vital running low, they quickly began their journey south. assistance to the expedition, are an essential part of the story of Monsoonal rains and flooding made the return journey the expedition. treacherous. Just days before they were to reach Fort Wills, Charles Grey died from dysentery on 17 April 1861. The maps and information from the Burke and Wills expedition, and those of the relief and rescue parties, made it possible for Meanwhile the group at Fort Wills had held on for four months. significant areas of grazing land to be opened up throughout Running out of supplies and suffering the effects of scurvy, inland Australia. The tragic story of the expedition has captured William Brahe decided to return south. They buried supplies by the imagination of Australians and has become part of our a tree now known as the Dig Tree and marked it to alert Burke’s nation’s story. party to the supplies buried below. William Brahe and his party set off for Melbourne on the morning of 21 April. The Burke, Wills, King and Yandruwandha National Heritage Place is the 104th place included in the National Heritage List. The arrival of Burke’s party just hours after Brahe’s departure www.environment.gov.au/ was the first in a series of fatal errors and near misses. On arrival For more information go to: heritage/places/national/burke-wills-king-yandruwandha Burke’s group dug up the supplies and deposited their field notes at the foot of the Dig Tree but failed to change the markings on the tree. With the supplies at Fort Wills exhausted, Burke © Commonwealth of Australia, 2016. headed south along Cooper Creek. They left a note buried This fact sheet is licensed by Commonwealth of Australia under a under the tree telling of their plans, but again failed to change Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. the markings. Having second thoughts about Burke’s possible The views and opinions expressed in this publication are those of return Brahe went back to the Dig Tree, on 8 May, but with the the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Australian markings unchanged he assumed Burke had not returned and he Government or the Minister for the Environment. left. Burke and his ill-fated party were just 35 miles away. Images: (top) John King sole survivor of the Burke & Wills expedition to Carpentaria, De Gruchy & Leigh (© State Library of Victoria) http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/74162 (bottom) Departure of the Burke and Wills Expedition, J.D.;A.H. Massina & Co (© State Library of Victoria) http://handle.slv.vic.gov.au/10381/155794 environment.gov.au.