Townsville

THE MAN WHO GAVE HIS NAME TO

And Introduced Native Labour to Australia

ALTHOUGH Benjamin Boyd brought the first South Sea Islanders to Aus tralia, it was Captain Robert Towns who introduced coloured labour to Queensland.

Boyd’s experiment was a failure — Monaro winters were too severe for his dusky stockmen and shepherds, and the “Masters and Servants Act” permitted them to run away without being dragged back by troopers. Kanaka labour, how ever, proved so successful in the north that it might be said that Towns was largely responsible for the development of tropical Queensland.

Towns was born at Long Horsley, Northumberland, in 1794. Like James Cook, who hailed from the same country, young Robert went to sea on a Tyneside collier, but the coastal trade did not appeal to the youngster, who then signed on for a voyage to the Mediterranean, and later became a smart seaman and a capable navigator.

At 33, he sailed into Port Jackson as master of “The Brothers” and the follow ing year, while in charge of the “Bona vista,” he was wrecked on Frederick Reef, near Torres Straits. Although the vessel broke up very quickly, all hands managed to scramble ashore and the skipper im mediately nut his men to work on a boat.

Moreton Bay, 1,300 miles away, was the nearest settlement, but the castaways were lucky; a Sydney-bound ship picked them ud at sea.

Captain Towns made history by taking “The Brothers” to Britain with the first

full cargo of wool ever to- leave Australia.

He then entered the bringing out free settlers under a bounty '“ss, he married Sophie Wentworth, of W. C. ; n^ Bm o wne? f the Legislative Council, and ownereditor of Nine years later, he founded a trading and shipping agency in Sydney. .. Wlincrrv -pwtips” WPrp VParQ of r V HE Hungry Forties were years of 1 r 9 l u and depression squatters boiled-down their livestock and sold

By A. G. Miller

hides and tallow at low prices. The shrewd Northumbrian, however, con tinued to harvest the sea. His whaler, the “Woodlark.” and his schooners landed oil, sandalwood, and beche-de-mer on his wharf.

Towns opened a trading station on the Isle of Pines, 30 miles south of New Caledonia, when these were dangerous waters. In October, 1842, the brig, “Star.” was attacked and her crew massacred.

Some months later, the “Catherine” caught fire during a brisk fight with naked cannibals. The attack was beaten off, and the vessel managed to reach Sydney.

South Sea trading, was at that time, enormously profitable: Chinese merchants paid up to £4O a ton for sandalwood.

Crews were never lacking either, because

all hands shared in the profits. Sixty pounds worth of pipes, tobacco, cloth, and similar items could be exchanged for pungent, yellow timber valued at £2,700!

TOWNS’S agent at the Isle of Pines, Captain John Lewis, later figured in a sensational trial. Fearing treach ery at Mare, in the Loyalty Group, he had shot dead three natives who had come aboard his cutter. Bishop Selwyn took up the case and nearly two years later, Lieutenant Pollard, of HMS “Bramble,” laid a complaint against the trader.

Lewis was arrested on his next visit to Sydney. At his trial, in July, 1851, he declared that he had been warned of a plot to capture the “Will o’ the Wisp,” and swore that he acted in self-defence.

The jury brought in a verdict of “not guilty.”

“Bobbie” Towns became a director of the Bank of New South Wales in 1853, which indicated that his ability and in tegrity were as sound as his credit and business methods; and he acquired a partner, Alexander Stuart, who became Premier of the Colony 30 years later.

Towns himself entered the Legislative Council in 1856. rE American Civil War was a wind fall for this man of many interests.

Australians were willing to pay stiff prices for Virginian tobacco, and Towns, who had bought heavy stocks at 1/71 per lb., saw prices rise to 7/- a lb.

Lancashire’s cotton mills were depend ing on cargoes run through the Federal blockade by fast steamers. Here was another opportunity.

Some of Towns’s “excess profits” on tobacco went into a cotton plantation on the Logan River, near Brisbane, but labour was hard to get. The Sydney mag

nate tried to import Indian coolies, but the Calcutta authorities gave him no en couragement, and then, as was natural, Towns turned to the South Seas.

The Mitchell Library has a copy of his instructions to his recruiter, Ross Lewin, and to the skipper of the schooner “Don Juan.” Since Lewin could not read, Cap tain Guerber was to instruct him not to use force or trickery. Natives were to be engaged for a period of 12 months.

Good workers could earn 10/- a month, while their rations included rice, meat, pumpkins, and yams.

On August 14, 1863, the “Don Juan” landed 67 Kanakas at Brisbane. There were angry protests from some quarters, but planters watched this experiment with great interest.

The “boys” proved hard workers and the Honourable Louis Hope brought 54 Islanders to his sugar plantation at

Ormiston. Within five years, 2,107 kinky headed natives were employed in Queens land, many as stockmen and station hands. rWNS grew coffee and sugar, planted cotton on Ross Island, in Cleveland Bay, and became a squatter. Part nered by Sir John Robertson and Sir Charles Cowper, he acquired large runs on the Burdekin River, and in the Gulf country, but labour recruiters did not follow Towns’s instructions: young men were lured on board schooners and clapped under hatches. * “Bully” Hayes and other ruffians be haved like Arab slave-raiders. Lewin came under fire, causing Captain Palmer, of HMS “Rosario,” to call him a pirate and a kidnapper. France protested against the stealing of natives from her posses sions, but the labour trade went on; some recruiters even dressed up as missionaries to entice natives aboard their vessels.

Innocent visitors suffered from such crimes—Bishop Patteson and Commodore Goodenough were murdered by natives whose kinsmen had been thus enticed into slavery. Despite Government control and naval patrols, “blackbirding” remained a sordid business until Federation put an end to Lie importation of coloured labour.

ROBERT TOWNS did not live to see Townsville grow into Queensland’s second largest port. He paid the town a visit in 1866, seven years before he died at his mansion overlooking Syd ney Harbour. The firm he founded over a century ago still bears his name, and Australians still remember the mariner merchant who gave his name to Towns ville.