Talk:Burke and Wills expedition

Currency conversion
Conversion from 1860 pounds to 2003 dollars was made by using http://www.eh.net to convert from 1860 pounds to 2002 pounds (they don't have 2003 data), then converting to AUD using the current exchange rate (2.46) -- Tim Starling 12:50, Aug 11, 2003 (UTC)

Fix links
Link to Charles Grey is not correct. Need to fix, not sure how to do it. Jimc 22:19, 21 Aug 2003 (UTC)


 * See Disambiguation. The disambiguation section of Boilerplate text is also useful. If you want to write the biographies not just move them around, you should read Manual of Style (biographies) if you haven't already done so. -- Tim Starling 01:40, 22 Aug 2003 (UTC)

THANKS! Jimc 02:33, 22 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Dig Tree Vandalised
As I recall, the Dig Tree was vandalised early this year or late last year, and burned to the ground. It was on the news, but I don't have a ref for it and this will need to be checked. Tannin 13:32, 20 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Tanin, the tree that was destroyed in December 2002 was not Burke & Wills' Dig Tree at Coopers Creek, it was the one blazed by Landsborough at the Albert River near Burketown, Queensland. Landsborough was leading one of the search parties out looking for Burke and Wills. Rocketfrog 00:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Information about the tree from Burke Shire Council
 * Report of damage from the Sydney Morning Herald
 * Report of damage from ABC Rural News

Return to Coopers Creek - different sources
Im confused about how many times they returned to Coopers creek.. obviously there was 1) when they camped there on their way north, and 2) when they returned and found the dig sign.. but I'm not sure if they came back a 3rd time - they headed south west through the desert but did they turn back? the state library of victoria says that only Wills returned to the camp: "Burke later sent Wills back to Camp LXV for another 'last look'." whereas here it says that all three of them went back: "Meanwhile Burke, Wills and King realised they could not make the long trip. Their supplies were running out and the last camel had died so they returned to Coopers Creek." , while a number of other sources dont mention a 3rd arrival at Coopers creek by Burke & Wills at all. Cfitzart 13:34, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Cooper Creek timeline; B&W returned to the Cooper on 21 April 1861 to find Brahe had left. Burke decided to head for Mt Hopeless and they followed the Cooper downstream as A C Gregory had done in 1858. They left the Cooper on 17 May 1861 and headed into the Strzelecki Desert. They returned to the Cooper on 22 May 1861, having been unsuccesful in their attempt to reach Mt Hopeless. They then remained on the creek untill their deaths, although they did move camp several times. Rocketfrog 00:52, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Miles and kilometres
The article has miles in some places and kilometres in other places. Somebody should standardise these (my brain won't function well enough to do the conversions). Australia is metric now, but we used miles back then. We should probably go with miles. JackofOz 06:47, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

Mount Hopeless "police outpost"
I've removed mention of the "police outpost" at Mt Hopeless from here and the biographies of Burke and Wills, because I've been doing some research into the history of the Flinders Ranges, and it's clear there was no such thing. A police outpost was briefly established at Angepena station (some 100 km southeast of Mt Hopeless) in 1857. Only in 1869 was a more permanent station was opened at Mount Freeling, some 40km east of Mt Hopeless. Since I had also always known the Burke and Wills story as setting out for a police station at Mt Hopeless, I checked Alan Moorehead's Cooper's Creek, and found that he indeed only refers to "the homesteads which they believed existed near Mount Hopeless" (p 110). As John Baker had established a station on the extreme frontier at Blanchewater in 1858 (very near Mount Hopeless), it's undoubtedly that station which Burke had heard of before they left, and what they were heading for. Itsonlyme 15:14, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Mind you, I note Moorehead does write on page 94: "Mount Hopeless, where they knew there was a police-station". Perhaps it all has to do with the fact that the police-station at Angepena was on Baker's chief property, Blanchewater/Mount Hopeless was an outstation of Baker's, and so it all got confused, and perhaps even Burke was confused. Itsonlyme 18:07, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

- - - - -

Burke's instructions from the Royal Society required him to keep open communications with the Expedition Committee either via Menindee, or if he saw fit, by way of the South Australian Police Station at Mount Serle (Angepena). In 1858, A C Gregory had travelled down the Cooper and Strzelecki Creeks and, near the hill named Mount Hopeless by Eyre, had found a cattle station. A C Gregory - 26th June 1858 "As we approached the range of hills tracks of cattle and horses were observed, and eight miles beyond Mount Hopeless came to a cattle station which had been lately established by Mr. Baker."

John Baker had established this station in 1857 on a lease of 518 km². Baker expanded the property to over 3000 km² and upon his death in 1872 it was aquired by Thomas Elder. Elder had his homestead at Manuwalkaninna and turned Baker's Station into a horse breeding enterprise known as Blanchewater Horse Stations which covered around 10,000 km². In 1890 the property was turned over to sheep and the homestead moved to Murnpeowie (Mumpy) and Baker's Station became an outstation (Blanchewater)which was damaged by floods in 1944.

So in 1860 when Burke left Melbourne, he would have been aware of the small hill named Mount Hopeless by Eyre, the station established by Baker near Mount Hopeless (which is now called Blanchewater) and the police outpost at Angepena, near Mount Serle. When Burke left the Cooper on 17 May 1861 he was attempting to follow Gregory's track and therefore would have been heading for Baker's Station and then presumably Angepena and the settled districts of South Australia. There was no police station at Baker's Station, there was no police station at Mount Hopeless, and the station that later became known as Blanchewater, and which is now a ruin, was not an outstation of Baker's in 1858 but his main run. While Moorehead wrote an excellent novel on the subject, his research has been questioned and he often does add to the layers of myth attached to the expedition and maybe he should really be regarded as a secondary source. Rocketfrog 12:35, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for clearing that up! Itsonlyme 19:22, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Burke's death
According to this article: http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200607/s1679742.htm in 1875 a credible account was published that Burke was killed by King. It deserves a mention here. McKay 12:07, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

SMH has also picked up the story. They refer to a paper published in the latest issue of Aboriginal History magazine, which could be worth checking out. John Dalton (talk) 23:34, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Re Date of Burke's death, the para about his death has generally accepted as on 28 June while under the next para with the probable dates of all their deaths, it had for Burke 1 July - so have amended to 28 June or 1 July', though perhaps it could be in between! Hugo999 (talk) 13:41, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

ACOTF nomination
I nominated this article for Australian collaboration of the fortnight. Please go to the WP page bluelinked in the header to add your support.SauliH 14:41, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Statue
If there is not going to be an entirely separate article for the Statue crafted by Charles Summers, then surely this article must have a section on the funding for, and the construction of, the statue. And, as well, it should contain an account of the different locations this poor statue has been forced to occupy, and the reasons for each of its moves. Also, it would seem rather important that the account also refers to the fact that the statue, in its correct and original location, comes in for a mention Fergus Hume's Mystery of a Hansom Cab.129.94.30.6 (talk) 02:29, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Robert O'Hara Burke by Andrew Jackson
An audio version of Robert O'Hara Burke by Andrew Jackson is available at http://librivox.org/robert-ohara-burke-by-andrew-jackson/

Grey or Gray?
The name of Charles Grey in this article is sometimes spelled with "a" and sometimes with "e". I don't know which is correct, so if someone who knows the answer would make the changes. 75.69.0.58 (talk) 10:53, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Wills' diary has him as Gray and Wills' map show the creek thay named after him as 'Gray's Creek', so I have changed all the Greys to Grays. Rocketfrog (talk) 22:34, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

Broken weblink
This weblink is dead. I was going to replace it with this one but it doesn't seem appropriate to the context. --Northernhenge (talk) 13:33, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I have updated the dead weblink to the following page and also added an additional reference to. Rocketfrog (talk) 20:26, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Not in order?
Any reason the "departure section" is not in chronological order?LRT24 (talk) 00:08, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

The "departure section" is written in a chronological order and it is placed on the page in chronological order as well - why do you think it is not in chronological order? Rocketfrog (talk) 22:11, 14 February 2011 (UTC) hay why is berke such a bully mean i would like to bash him — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.122.236.3 (talk) 03:36, 4 March 2014 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 10:32, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Australian Expedition?
It seems entirely inappropriate to describe this as an "Australian expedition". This was the Victoria Exploration Expedition; the states were not federated into Australia and were in fierce competition. State rivalry between South Australia and Victoria was particularly important. This was not an "Australian" expedition but an expedition funded by the state of Victoria and the Philosophical Institute of Victoria.MargaretRDonald (talk) 22:03, 15 October 2018 (UTC)