The Burketown Tourist Information Centre is a single-storey timber building, located on the south-eastern corner of the intersection of Musgrave and Burke Streets, Burketown. Situated in the North-west of Queensland, Burketown lies on the northern fringe of the Gulf Savanna, about 30km. from the shores of the Gulf of Carpenteria.
The site is on the rim of the town's small commercial area, with the present Shire Offices adjacent, and further to the east the hotel and shops.
The building is positioned diagonally across the site, facing north-west towards the intersection of two of the town's typically wide streets. In front of the building, at this north-western corner of the site, is the concrete war memorial backed by three flagpoles. Plaques on this memorial commemorate those who served and died in the Boer War, World Wars I and II, Malaya, Korea, Vietnam and Malaysia.
The building has an 'L'-shaped plan form, with the former Post Office at the western end, and the remainder formerly the residence. The gabled roof, clad in corrugated iron, follows the form of the building and accentuates the projecting bay of the office. The building features three open verandahs, to the front and rear of the residence, and the side of the office. The external walls are clad in weatherboards, punctuated by vertical sliding sash windows, with timber-framed window hoods to those of the north-eastern elevation. The building is low set, now supported on steel posts, with timber steps to each verandah and the entry porch.
The principal entry is a slightly assymetrical gabled porch attached to the front of the projecting bay of the former office. Unlined internally, the porch retains the letter slot to the side of the panelled French entry doors.
The office is a rectangular room with a high boarded ceiling, horizontal beaded boards lining the walls and a boarded floor. To the public area at the front of the room is the timber counter and small timber side benches, constructed of similar beaded boards. On the rear wall is mounted several external signs from the former Post Office. Through a pair of glazed French doors is the south-western verandah, partly enclosed at the rear, and featuring arched valance boards between the posts. Behind the office is a small service room currently being fitted as a kitchen.
The north-western verandah provides entry to the former residence. Opening onto this verandah are the central four-panelled entry door, a pair of glazed French doors to one side and the same missing from the other.
The residence consists of four major rooms in an 'L'-shaped configuration, around the rear verandah. The largest of these, the former sitting room is entered through the central door, with two former bedrooms and the kitchen along the eastern wing. Generally these rooms have internal linings similar to that of the office, apart from the kitchen which has no lining boards to the walls. Doors are generally low-waisted four-panelled doors, apart from a boarded door now to the recently constructed ensuite in the second bedroom, which was apparently relocated from the kitchen. On the rear verandah is a small utility room, now a public toilet. Apart from the signs in the office, the building also retains a telephone exchange, now located in the former bedroom.
The site is level, well grassed and scattered with a few small trees. To the rear of the site are some machinery relics.
","history":"The Burketown Post Office, constructed in 1887 after a cyclone devastated the town on March 5, was built to a design prepared by the Queensland Government Architects office.
Pastoral settlement began in the Burke District in the 1860s after explorers such as Burke and Wills and William Landsborough reported on the good grazing land available in the region. To support the settlers in the remote district the Queensland Government established a supply depot on William Landsborough's 1862 camp site on the banks of the Albert River. This first settlement was abandoned in 1865 after Robert Towns established a store further downstream and closer to deep water anchorage.
The new site was surveyed soon after and the prosperity of the town seemed assured when a meatworks and boiling down works (QHR 600375) were built and a government judicial and administrative centre was located there. Unfortunately, a mystery disease caused great loss of life in February, 1866 and again in 1867 and 1868, forcing the population to virtually abandon the town.
After the threat of disease had passed Burketown re-established itself as a supply depot for the pastoral industry. However, the town did not come to prominence again until the early 1880s. when government services were re- established. The Post Office, closed in June 1871, was reopened on 1 January, 1883 with the post master also filling the role of police magistrate, customs officer and weather forecaster.
The district was further opened up when the domestic telegraph line reached Burketown in October, 1886. The Queensland Government had originally hoped that Burketown would be the terminus for an international telegraph line from Java to Australia. Inter colonial rivalry saw the contract for the overseas line go to South Australia in November, 1872. Although the Queensland Government was disappointed, the line was completed to Normanton. However, the link to Burketown was not completed until 1886 after the re establishment of government services to the district.
The present building, constructed as a post office, was built after the 5 March 1887 cyclone which destroyed most of Burketown. The building was designed in the office of the Colonial Architect, G Connolly. During this period, an expansion in the Post and Telegraph translated into Queensland Post Offices being designed with more of a public facade than its adjoining residence, and showed a development of climatic responses such as verandahs and wide eaves. The Burketown Post Office was an example of a post office style, popular from 1886 to 1896, featuring a triple-frontage with projecting office bay.
The new office was a combined Post and Telegraph Office with responsibility for the issuing of mail orders and the management of land based mail contractors plying between Burketown and Normanton, south to Hughenden and Townsville and west via Gregory Downs to Camooweal. This network was a vital link for people located on stations across the northern part of Queensland.
The stability of the Gulf region was also enhanced by the growth in mercantile trade as shipping companies, such as Australian Steam Navigation Company, were awarded government subsidised mail contracts. As a result there was a monthly shipping service into and out of the region which was made more economically viable by the introduction of Parcel Post in 1892. The post office was proclaimed an official Post Office in 1893 with the post master assuming the role of land commissioner and land agent for the Department of Public Lands in 1897.
In March 1901, control of the postal system was transferred to the Commonwealth, with the post office continuing to operate until 1921 when it was reclassified. The Post Office was downgraded again in 1949 and in November, 1964 it was reclassified as a non-official post office. In 1985 Burketown Post Office became a Post Office Agency and ceased functioning altogether in 1988.
In 1988, as part of a Bi centennial project, the building was moved from its original site in Gregory Street to its present location. After the move it was used to house the office of the Gulf Air Company.
There has been an increase in interest in tourism since the Riversleigh Fossil Site was declared a world heritage area and since the Gulf region has become more accessible with improvement to roads and transport. Burketown is becoming a favourite destination particularly for people interested in fishing in Gulf waters and coastal rivers. A tourist information centre has been established in the former Post Office to assist visitors and tourists and to promote interest in the history and culture of the area.
","criteria":"The former Burketown Post Office is significant for its association with early government functions in the remote Gulf and North West regions of Queensland and as a base for the delivery of a range of government services to the people of the area for over a century. It represents the importance of community services such as postal services, telegraph and telephone communications and weather forecasting to a remote community.
|Built in 1887, the former Post Office is one of few early structures surviving in the town.
|The building demonstrates the quality of government buildings erected in remote locations, with design responses to the climate such as high ceilings, window hoods and three substantial verandahs. Representative of a Post Office building type, it features a triple-frontage with a projecting bay accentuating the office, yet retains its domestic form and scale. The majority of the layout remains intact.
It still contains some fittings from its Post Office function, such as timber counters and benches, signs and the telephone exchange.
|While the former Burketown Post Office has contributed to the townscape since its construction, relocation to a larger corner site, facing the war memorial, has given the building a new prominence in the townscape.
|The establishment of the Tourist Information Centre is allowing the building to continue providing an important community function through its contribution to the burgeoning tourist industry of the region.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D | Criterion E | Criterion G","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":15149,"place_ref":600374,"name":"Landsborough Tree (site of)","alternate_name":"Landsborough Tree / Site of Landsborough’s Blazed Tree, Albert River Depot","street_address":"Burketown","suburb":"BURKETOWN","lga":"BURKE SHIRE COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-08-21","description":"The tree remnant is located near a silted cut-off meander of the Albert River on black clay soil floodplains approximately 1.5km east of Burketown, accessed from Truganini Road. Grass grows sparsely in the vicinity. Low bushes and trees are lightly scattered across the site.
\nOnly a few pieces of the tree remained in situ in 2005. The largest was about one metre long. A welded mesh fence 1.2m high and approximately 2.5m square surrounded the remnants. The fence was supported by metal pipe posts at each corner. The fencing, which existed at the time of the destruction of the tree, was removed.
\nA timber post in the north-west corner of this enclosure may have been evidence of an earlier post-and-rail timber fence around the tree. What appeared to be the remains of a second post was visible in the north-east corner of the enclosure.
\nA new tree was planted on the site of the old tree, c.2009.
","history":"The site of the former tree stump which marked the Albert River Depot of the expedition of William Landsborough is located approximately two kilometres east of Burketown, near a silted cut-off meander of the Albert River. The original tree, thought to have been a Coolabah (Eucalyptus Microtheca), was blazed on 8 February 1862 by Lieutenant Charles Cecil Gascoyne, Second Lieutenant of HMCS Victoria, the support vessel for Landsborough’s expedition. The site was used as a base camp for Landsborough’s initial expedition towards Central Mount Stuart and his subsequent crossing of Australia from north to south in 1862, in an attempt to find cross-continent explorers Robert O’Hara Burke and William Wills.
\nPrior to the arrival of Europeans, the gulf country of northwest Queensland was occupied by the Garawa, Gangalidda and Mingginda Peoples. The area around Burketown was occupied by the Minggindda people.[1]
\nBurke and Wills, who had set out from Melbourne on 20 August 1860 to cross the continent from south to north, were reported missing in June 1861. Four official relief expeditions were organised to search for them: Alfred William Howitt’s party formed in Melbourne; John McKinlay’s party formed in Adelaide; Frederick Walker’s party formed in Rockhampton; and William Landsborough’s party formed in Brisbane (appointed by the Victorian and Queensland governments). The Victorian government appointed Captain Norman of HMCS Victoria as Commander-in-Chief of the Northern Expedition Parties (the Walker and Landsborough expeditions). Howitt received information on the fate of Burke and Wills in September 1861, but the other expeditions had left before news could reach them.[2]
\nWilliam Landsborough, the son of a Scottish clergyman, was an experienced bushman, explorer and pastoralist. He arrived in Queensland in the mid-1850 and entered into partnership in a station on the Kolan River in the Burnett district. From 1856 he undertook private exploration in search of new pastoral land, exploring and naming Mount Nebo in 1856, the Broadsound district in 1857, the Comet and Nogoa Rivers in 1858, and the Bonar (Bowen) River in 1859. From Rockhampton he and Nat Buchanan traced Aramac Creek and the Thomson River to the Plains of Promise. In 1861 he applied for 15 runs of 100 square miles (259 km²) each on the Plains of Promise. He, Buchanan, and Edward Cornish formed the Landsborough River Company to stock these runs, which Landsborough named ‘Bowen Downs’.[3]
\nIn 1861, Queensland Surveyor-General Augustus Charles Gregory recommended that Landsborough lead the Brisbane expedition in search of Burke and Wills. Landsborough’s party left Brisbane in the brig Firefly on 26 August 1861. The party made for the Albert River, where it was set to rendezvous with Walker’s party, who had proceeded overland from Rockhampton, and Lieutenant Norman, who was provisioning the exploration parties. The Firefly reached the east coast of Cape York, but was wrecked off Sir Charles Hardy Islands (east of Cape Grenville) on 4 September 1861. The expedition was rescued by Norman three days later.[4] The Firefly was refloated and taken under tow by the Victoria to Sweers Island, in the Gulf of Carpentaria.
\nLandsborough explored the Albert River during the first week of October 1861 and recommended that a depot be established at the confluence of the Albert and Barkly Rivers, about 26 miles (42km) in a straight line from the mouth of the Albert. Above this junction the Albert River was not navigable, even for small boats.[5] The Firefly was towed by the Victoria to the mouth of the Albert River and commenced a slow journey upstream on 14 October 1861. Twelve days later the Firefly had reached about 15 miles (24km) in a straight line from the mouth of the river, but had difficulty proceeding further. On 8 November the decision was taken to establish the depot where the Firefly was anchored, midway between the mouth of the Albert and the juncture with the Barkly, on the west bank of the river.[6]
\nFrom 16 November 1861 to mid-February 1862 Landsborough explored southwest towards Central Mount Stuart. During his travels he marked numerous trees with a distinctive broad arrow before an L. His second in command, George Bourne, stayed at the Albert River depot. Captain Norman of the Victoria also camped at the Albert River depot for much of this period, waiting for Walker’s party which was yet to reach the rendezvous point.[7] During this time Norman had one of the iron ship’s water tanks sunk into the ground at the depot and filled with provisions. If the exploratory parties were delayed and he had to leave the Albert River before either returned, the supplies would be protected from Aboriginal raiding parties. One large tree near the sunken tank and other nearby trees were marked to identify the buried provisions.[8]
\nOn 19 January 1862 Landsborough and his party returned from the expedition to the southwest. He had followed the Gregory River and named the Barkly Tableland but near the site of Camooweal found desert with a network of dry channels. Realising that rain could flood the country and isolate his starving party, Landsborough struggled back to the Albert River depot, having found no trace of Burke and Wills. In the meantime Walker’s party had reached the Albert and reported finding tracks on the Flinders River. Replenishing supplies from the Victoria, Walker resumed his search. On hearing this news Landsborough was eager to search to the southeast. Despite insufficient supplies and against Commander Norman’s advice, he made preparations to leave.
\nOn 7 February 1862 Norman sent 2nd Lieutenant CC Gascoyne of the Victoria to disband the Albert River depot and assist Landsborough’s preparations. In the eventuality that Landsborough was forced to return to the depot after the Victoria had left, Gascoyne placed a small quantity of provisions and ammunition (20 pounds of biscuits, 250 pounds of flour, nine half pound canisters FG powder, and two boxes percussion caps) in another ship’s tank. The tank was then sealed, pitched and covered over with earth. Gascoyne placed details of their location in a bottle marked ‘DIG 2 FT N’. The bottle was buried near a tree close to a waterhole and to the camp. In the evening, Gascoyne and his men returned to the Victoria.
\nAt 4pm on 10 February 1862 Landsborough’s party commenced their overland journey south.[9] They did not return to the Albert River depot. They reached an occupied station on 21 May and learned that Burke and Wills had perished. Continuing south, they arrived in Melbourne in August 1862. The journey made Landsborough the first European explorer to cross the Australian continent north to south, and his reports on the valuable pastoral land he had encountered sparked a rush for land in the Gulf country.
\nThe success of Landsborough’s 1862 expedition was due largely to his reliance on indigenous knowledge of the terrain he traversed. His journal reveals that he rarely travelled without Aboriginal guides. On this trip, his guides included Jemmy, Jacky and Fisherman, and local Aboriginal people were reported leading Landsborough’s party to water or to showing them the best route. When he lost access to this local knowledge, in his attempt to head south-south-east from the Warrego in May 1862 (Camp 67 – QHR 602716 and Camp 69 – QHR 602715), his party came close to perishing.
\nLandsborough’s explorations also contributed to the extension of Queensland’s western boundary. At the time of separation from New South Wales in 1859, this had been set at longitude 141˚ east (just west of Normanton). In September 1860 AC Gregory had recommended to the Queensland Government that the border, which passed through the Plains of Promise, be moved to 138˚ east, to provide the district with access to a port in the Gulf. A year later, realising that the northern relief expeditions in search of Burke and Wills would increase knowledge of the area, Governor Bowen wrote to the Secretary of State for the Colonies advising that Queensland legislature would protect any settlers who moved into the area, provided the western boundary of Queensland was extended to 138˚ east to include access to the Gulf.[10] This was agreed to, and the boundary was altered on 12 April 1862, placing the Albert, Gregory and Herbert (Georgina) rivers and much of the Barkly Tableland within Queensland.
\nOn 1 January 1864 the new pastoral district of Burke was opened for settlement. A syndicate took up 1,000,000 acres (404,685.64ha) in August, which later became the stations of Floraville, Beames Brook and Gregory Downs. In 1864 a township was established on the Albert River to service the newly established Gulf runs. With pastoral occupation underway, the schooner Jacmel Packet set out in May 1865 for the Albert River, with cargo to provision the new settlement. The square mile town reserve was surveyed as Burketown in 1866-7 and formally gazetted in August 1868. The town site was not far from the wreck of the Firefly, and glimpses of the ship’s remains in the Albert River were mentioned into the early 20th century.[11]
\nIn September 1865, William Landsborough returned to the Albert River as Police Magistrate and Commissioner of Crown Lands in Carpentaria, based at the town of Burke. He appointed controversial sub-inspector Wentworth Uhr to lead a local band of Native Police. Relations between the European settlers and Aboriginal people were fraught, with conflicts and deaths reported throughout the 1860s. Disease also impacted on the isolated township. Europeans deserted Burketown for some years after a mystery illness swept the fledgling township in the mid-1860s, returning in the mid-1870s. It is believed that this disease, as well as conflict, contributed to the demise of the Mingginda people. They were succeeded by the Ganggalida people.[12]
\nIn 1892, a 22 acre site which included the former Albert River depot site and Landsborough tree was leased to the Carpentaria Meat Works Company. The company set up a Boiling Down Works near the wharf on the southern part of the site, within eyesight of the blazed tree. The former Boiling Down Works (QHR 600375) was designed by Messrs Burns and Twigg of Rockhampton and the first mobs of cattle were processed in Burketown in May 1892. The tree was noted as ‘Landsborough’s Tree’ on the plan of the leased site.[13]
\nBy the late 19th century the blazed tree near Burketown had become a tourist attraction. Around 1900 the tree was photographed by Alphonse Chargois, a photographer based at Croydon. At this time the inscription was still visible on the trunk of the tree and tallied with Lieutenant Gascoyne’s description of the markings made on 8 February 1862.
\nIn 1917 the tree featured in the Queenslander’s pictorial section, and by 1926 visitors regularly picnicked near the tree, according to the Townsville Daily Bulletin:
\nA Landsborough tree advises people to ‘dig 2ft’., but visitors, judging by the number of bottles surrounding the tree, appear to have been satisfied to drink each other’s health, taking it for granted that the vicinity had been well prospected years ago. The old “coolibah” [sic] has a wealth of mistletoe, and is flourishing, notwithstanding its great age. [14]
\nIn May 1926, the site was gazetted as a pound for the Burke Shire Council.
\nIn August 1984 the blazed tree, or dig tree, at Burketown was placed on the National Trust of Queensland’s Register of Significant Trees.
\nThe blazed tree was vandalised in December 2002. The tree was chopped down and the remaining trunk set on fire. The interpretation sign and its concrete foundations were pulled from the ground. The tree did not recover, and no charges were laid in relation to its destruction. In November 2003, a local wood turner used remnants of the tree to create two new gavels for the Burke Shire Council; one to be used at its meetings and the other to be displayed with an interpretive sign, indicating the significance site of the tree. A new tree was planted on the site of the old tree, c.2009.
\nIn 2015 the Federal Court recognised non-exclusive native title of the Gangalidda people on the site, successors to the Mingginda people. The site remains in the trusteeship of the Burke Shire Council.
\n
The site of Landsborough or Albert River Depot Blazed Tree is an important location in the history of non-indigenous exploration and occupation of the Gulf country and western Queensland. The tree, marking the site of the northernmost depot established by the Landsborough expedition in its search of missing cross-continental explorers Burke and Wills in 1862, is important in demonstrating the difficulties encountered in the early exploration of Queensland and the contingencies adopted to ensure survival. Despite the destruction of the tree, the site retains its symbolic significance as the location of Landsborough’s base camp.
|The site of Landsborough’s Blazed Tree has a special association with the exploration work of William Landsborough, the first European to make a successful north to south crossing of the Australian continent in 1862. Although a number of blazed trees were marked for or by Landsborough on his expeditions, this was one of the few ‘DIG’ trees, which provided direction to instructions for retrieving a small buried cache of food and ammunition.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion H","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":15150,"place_ref":600375,"name":"Burketown Boiling Down Works (former)","alternate_name":"Boiling Down Works","street_address":"Truganinni Road","suburb":"BURKETOWN","lga":"BURKE SHIRE COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-08-21","description":"The Boiling Down Works (former) is situated near a silted, cut-off meander of the Albert River on black clay soil floodplains, approximately two kilometres to the east of Burketown, accessed from Truganini Road via a loop access road. Grass grows sparsely in the vicinity interspersed with low bushes and trees.
\nThe site contains a range of steam equipment, some boiling down machinery and substantial footings, foundations and floors. There is at least one depression within the overall core site, which may have been a water storage area, but is now heavily silted.
\nThe larger machinery – boilers, tanks and engines appear to be largely in situ, although the colonial boiler is on its side. One of the larger engines has a large tubular flywheel. There are some items clearly associated with the actual processing of the animals for tallow, blood and bone and hides. These include several tanks and a small roller crusher. Items include:
\n· Engine 1: Flywheel 2.03m diameter; belt drive wheel 0.91m diameter; concrete mount 0.6m x 2.64m;
\n· Engine 2: Top valve manufactured by Jo Evans and Sons, Wolverhampton (UK);
\n· Flywheel 1.52 diameter; concrete mount 0.68m x 2.13m; concrete aggregate is a dense mix of small river pebbles; one piece has broken clay brick aggregate;
\n· Two Lancashire Boilers: under-fired boilers, with two quarter doors to firebox in each boiler, manufactured by Burns and Twigg, Rockhampton; 7.31m long x 1.75 diameters;
\n· Colonial Boiler: manufacturer unknown, 3.65 m long x 1.37m diameter;
\n· Tubular flywheel engine: manufacturer unknown, 2.58 diameter wheel; tube is 0.017 outside diameter; adjacent drive belt is 1.21 diameter; single cylinder engine;
\n· Ship’s tank: remains, 1.21m x 1.21m x 1.21m;
\n· Vertical boiler and tank: Vertical boiler (lying on side) 2.58m long x 1.21m diameter, 2.29m long x 1.52m diameter;
\n· Roller/crusher: Manufactured Savage; rollers are 0.020m x 0.45m long; and
\n· Other machinery and deposits: various pieces of equipment are scattered around the site which includes a domestic artefact deposit near the north-west corner of the site with a range of 19th century glass ware and ceramics.
","history":"The site of the former boiling down works, about 1.5 km to the east of Burketown, comprises the remnant machinery of the works and a ship’s tank, scattered across a site on a silted-up meander of the Albert River. The ship’s tank may be a remnant of William Landsborough’s exploration of the region in search of Burke and Wills in 1861. An earlier boiling down works had stood operated just south of Burketown from 1866 to the early 1870s, producing cured beef and tallow. A new operation was established on this site, east of Burketown, by the Carpentaria Meat Export Company in 1892 and extended in 1893. The works was abandoned around 1904.
\nThe grazing potential of the Gulf of Carpentaria region was identified by John Lort Stokes during his 1841 exploration in the Beagle.[1] At the time, the area was occupied by the Mingginda People. Stokes referred to the country between the Albert and Flinders Rivers as the ‘Plains of Promise’. William Landsborough, leader of an expedition to find lost explorers Robert Burke and William Wills, also found the area promising for pastoralism. On his arrival at the ‘Plains of Promise’ in August 1861 in the brig-turned-hulk Firefly, Landsborough noted sufficient saline herbage he considered suitable for sheep. Landsborough’s party established a depot on the banks of the Albert River, where surplus provisions were buried in a ship’s tank near a marked tree (Site of Landsborough’s Blazed Tree, Albert River Depot, QHR 600374) in case the party needed to return to the depot. Returning to Melbourne in 1862, Landsborough promoted the region through the publication of his journals and a series of lectures.[2]
\nThe new pastoral district of Burke was opened for settlement on 1 January 1864. The fledgling town of Burke (later Burketown) was established beside a port on the Albert River as squatters, wool agents and storekeepers made for the Gulf.[3] Pastoralists took up substantial landholdings and stocked their runs with sheep, converting to cattle when sheep proved susceptible to disease. However, the isolation of the ‘Plains of Promise’ restricted graziers’ opportunities to market their cattle. Without refrigerated transport, cattle could only be sold to other graziers or driven to southern markets. Failing these options, cattle could be boiled down for tallow.[4]
\nIn the 19th century tallow was a product with a wide range of applications, including use in cooking, soap and candle making, and machinery lubrication. Queensland’s boiling down industry began in 1843 when Mackenzie and Co’s works opened in Kangaroo Point, Brisbane.[5] Similar establishments were opened at Ipswich (c.1848), Maryborough (c.1850), Townsville and Toowoomba (both c.1866). As cattle holdings spread into the Kennedy and Gulf districts in the 1860s, a number of small-scale boiling down works were established on pastoral properties in the region. Many of these works were private operations which provided remote landholders with access to otherwise unattainable cattle disposal facilities.
\nGraziers did not favour boiling down their stock, as the process wasted valuable meat and reduced profits, but the process was necessary in times of economic hardship, when graziers struggled to maintain their land and livestock. In 1866, with the colony in the midst of a depression, partners Morehead & Young established a public boiling down operation on the Albert River near the Burketown settlement. Boilers, vats and other equipment were shipped from Sydney to a site south of Burketown. The works, managed by the Edkins brothers, produced tallow, beef and sheep products between 1867 and the early 1870s. Flood, disease and a lack of demand appear to have contributed to its closure around 1872. Disease in particular had a dramatic impact: Europeans deserted Burketown after a mystery illness swept the fledgling township in the mid-1860s, and it is believed that this disease contributed to the demise of the Mingginda people. They were succeeded by the Ganggalida people.[6]
\nCattle numbers rose in Queensland during the 1870s and 1880s. By 1885 Queensland was the principal cattle producing colony in Australia, but export opportunities remained limited. Experimentation with freezing meat for export occurred over the next decade, but the first freezing works in Queensland, the Ross River Meatworks in Townsville (QHR 602719), did not open until 1892. In the interim, a glut of stock, a drought in 1884-6 and another economic depression in the 1890s left graziers with an oversupply of cattle and few outlets for their disposal. The final straw came in 1892 and 1893 when New South Wales introduced, and Victoria increased, taxes on stock crossing the border.[7]
\nAs a result, the early 1890s saw a number of enterprises formed to establish boiling down operations near grazing country in northwest Queensland. One such company was the Carpentaria Meat Export Company (CMEC), registered in June 1891 with the intention of setting up a new meatworks facility at Burketown. The town had begun to repopulate in the 1880s. As a location for a cattle processing plant Burketown had a number of advantages, including its proximity to both the ‘Plains of Promise’ grazing country and coastal shipping via the Albert River. Rather than taking up the site of Burketown’s first boiling down works, the CMEC leased 22 acres (8.9ha) near the former Albert River Depot, approximately two kilometres downstream of the town.[8]
\nThe CMEC engaged ironmongers Burns and Twigg to design and supply equipment for their new Burketown boiling down works. Twigg & Co, later Burns and Twigg, had operated a foundry in Rockhampton from around 1877, and supplied machinery to Lakes Creek, Alligator Creek in Townsville, and the Barcaldine boiling down works. In February 1892 Burns and Twigg shipped 25 tons of machinery to Burketown, comprising ‘a pair of thirty-horse power Cornish boilers’. While installation work was undertaken, Queensland Governor Sir Henry Wylie Norman was shown over the site in April 1892, a highlight of his northern Queensland tour. [9]
\nWith the boilers in place by May 1892, the Burketown boiling down works received 40 bullocks for its inaugural process. The stock reportedly came from Lawn Hill, a station run by former Burketown boiling down works manager ER Edkins. Burketown’s first process coincided with the opening of two other Gulf boiling down works, ‘Dalgonally’ in Normanton and the Torrens Creek works. Despite this competition, Burketown’s works had a successful first season. Cattle numbers were still rising in North Queensland, peaking at 1.3 million in 1894 but with cattle prices still low there was a market for numerous boiling works.[10]
\nMachinery upgrades were installed at Burketown before the processing season began afresh in March 1893. By April 1893 the works had its own train and wharf facilities. Though the works were closed briefly following an outbreak of tick fever, the works was processing over 100 bullocks per day by 1895, including stock from New South Wales, the Northern Territory and South Australia. In June 1894 Burketown was the third largest producer of both tallow and hides and skins in Queensland, out-produced only by Townsville and Rockhampton.[11]
\nIn 1898, the CMEC was replaced by the Burketown Meat Export Company. The works was leased to the Endeavour Meat Export and Agency Company, which commenced operations on 7 June 1898. Three days later, a steaming vat of tallow sparked a fire, and the boiling down works burnt down. Within a day, Burketown residents had raised £400 for rebuilding, and meatworks employees offered a month’s labour for rations only. The company also sought assistance from the Queensland Government under the Meat and Dairy Produce Encouragement Act (1893) to rebuild. Engineer WH Swales, a partner in the Burketown Meat Export Company, was engaged to install new machinery, while the construction work was contracted to William Brown of Townsville.[12]
\nRebuilding was completed for the 1899 meatworking season, and the North Queensland Register described the redesigned Burketown boiling down works in detail in February 1899. A new ‘imposing, substantial building’ housed the works. Equipment which had survived the fire, including the boilers, digesters and refiners, had been repaired and refitted, while new machines including an extract plant, mincing or shredding machine and a filter press and pump were added to the works. A 12 horsepower horizontal engine made by British company Tangye powered the mincing machine, dynamo and bone lift. The works also featured slaughtering pens and drying space for the hides, an engine and repair room next to the boilers, electric plant (powered by a small one horsepower engine), a manure grinding mill and a coopers’ shed where tallow barrels could be made.[13]
\nBy the turn of the 20th century, the boiling down works was Burketown’s major employer. The town’s population boomed from 164 to 300 during the six month meatworking season, with meatworkers, firewood getters and drovers flocking to the works. The works also provided a market for a local salt industry, as salt was used to tan hides and preserve meat. However, the Endeavour Meat Export and Agency Company succumbed to financial difficulties and was wound up in March 1901.[14]
\nThe Burketown works was taken over by the Queensland Meat Export and Agency Company (QMEA), which was expanding its operations into the Gulf. Considerable improvements, including canning and preserving facilities, allowed for the treatment of 10,000 cattle in 1901 and 1902. QMEA’s November 1901 export report indicated that Burketown was the second largest supplier to the London market, exporting 1,588 cases of canned meat and 212 casks of tallow compared to Townsville’s 7,275 cases of canned meat and 707 casks of tallow. Dalgonally, also operated by QMEA and formerly the larger of the Gulf meatworks, exported 801 cases of canned meat and 82 casks of tallow.[15]
\nDespite this apparent success, there were hints of the Burketown works’ uncertain future. Cattle numbers in North Queensland dropped to a record low in the wake of a significant drought, and large numbers of graziers walked off their runs rather than restocking. In November 1903, a QMEA director suggested that the meatworks would only operate in 1904 ‘if cattle became plentiful’, and noted that unlike freezing works, Burketown’s limited operations did not use every part of the processed animals. Operations at Burketown were discontinued around 1904. A 1912 enquiry into the meat industry blamed transport difficulties, high wages and lack of stock for the closure. Despite its eight year hiatus, the inquiry confirmed that the Burketown machinery was still in ‘good order’, though the meatworks buildings were reportedly being ‘eaten away by termites’.[16]
\nQMEA retained the Burketown property until 1914. Rumours circulated that the buildings would be restored or removed, but the new proprietors appear to have had little interaction with the site. The buildings were removed in the late 1910s or early 1920s, possibly for reuse at another meatworks. A range of machinery was left on site, including the Burns and Twigg Cornish boilers, a Colonial Boiler and a set of vertical boilers, three engines and other miscellany. No reference was made to the ship’s tank, though it was likely on the site at the time. Ships’ tanks were used all over Australia to store food and water. They were particularly useful in remote areas which lacked a guaranteed water supply. The tank on the site may have been left from Landsborough’s expedition: the Firefly sank in the river near the meatworks site, and an attempt to salvage two of her tanks was made some time in the 19th century. The tank has no other identification, such as a maker’s mark; these marks were usually on the tank lid, which has not survived.[17]
\nFrom June 1917 the Burketown lease (Special Lease 472) was divided in two and leased to local residents, although they seem to have undertaken little activity on the site. Both tenants forfeited their leases and left Burketown by the early 1920s. The land was resurveyed as Portion 78 and gazetted as a Pound Reserve in July 1926. The old meatworks equipment, machinery, bricks and other remnants remained on site, attracting sightseers who came to visit the nearby Landsborough tree.[18]
\nIn 2015 the Federal Court recognised the non-exclusive native title of the Gangalidda people over the site. The site remains in the trusteeship of the Burke Shire Council.[19]
","criteria":"The Burketown Boiling Down Works site is important in demonstrating the economic development of the Gulf of Carpentaria region and the development of the beef industry in Queensland. Built between 1892 and 1901 to process beef produced in the Gulf region for export, the site contains industrial remnants of a process that was once common but is now obsolete. Burketown was the third largest producer of tallow and hides in Queensland in 1894. Few other sites in Queensland are known to retain the range of remnant boiling down machinery found at this location.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":17155,"place_ref":602339,"name":"Old Westmoreland Homestead","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"150 km West-Northwest of Burketown","suburb":"BURKETOWN","lga":"BURKE SHIRE COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2008-07-31","description":"Old Westmoreland Homestead is located within the precinct of the present head station adjacent to dwellings, cold room, garages and workshops. It is set amongst lawns to the south of the main sheds and a dwelling, and east of the present homestead.
The original two-roomed homestead is constructed from hewn sandstone blocks using ant bed mortar and fill. It measures 10 metres by 14 metres, inclusive of the surrounding verandah, which is approximately 2.3 metres wide. The hipped roof of early corrugated galvanised iron is nailed with lead-head nails to bush timber roof rafters and purlins. It is secured to the external verandah posts with wire twitches. The roof is unlined.
Several of the round timber posts supporting the verandah roof have been replaced due to termite damage. The original posts appear to have been replicated in style if not in size or, possibly, timber species.
The original doors have been replaced with VJ plank doors, some half-height. Several have rim locks evident. The original timber door lintels are present but severely damaged by termites. The windows are voids with traces of the original joinery evident.
Internally, the building is divided into two rooms by a partition of hardwood framing and single-skin corrugated iron to ceiling height, the roof space open above this. Centrally positioned in this wall is the doorway connecting the two rooms. Above the door is a ventilation panel in-filled with metal lattice.
The floor was originally dirt or ant bed (pers comm. G Gould, owner). At some stage prior to 1980 it was concreted inside. Antbed flooring remains on the north-east verandah and most of the south-east verandah. It was repaired in the period 1980 to 2004.
The building is currently used for storage and outdoor entertainment. A later kitchen, 3 metres by 4 metres, constructed of metal framing and cladding, is located on the south-western side of the homestead. It is not considered to be of cultural heritage significance. The original, separate kitchen, located to the north of the building, is no longer extant.
A photograph taken in 1963-1964 shows an added skillion on the northeast side extending the full length of the building. At some unknown date this has been truncated to its present size. There is no evidence to suggest whether this was part of the original homestead or, more likely, a later addition.
","history":"Westmoreland Station, near the border with the Northern Territory and close to the Gulf of Carpentaria, was taken up in 1881 by Thomas and Robert McIntosh, Robert Philp and William Kirk. It originally comprised 640 square miles (approximately 165,759.24 hectares). Thomas Brassey McIntosh managed the property for the partners, and c1882 constructed the two-roomed stone house now known as Old Westmoreland Homestead. It is believed by many local residents to be the oldest surviving home in the district.
When Westmoreland was taken up in the early 1880s, guerrilla warfare between the indigenous owners of the land and the occupying pastoralists was being waged throughout the Gulf country. There are many conflict sites in the area, including Hells Gate (about 20 miles (32 kilometres) south-east of Westmoreland), Massacre Inlet and Battle Creek. The c1882 homestead on Westmoreland station was constructed with thick stone walls, inward opening doors, and few windows, to provide security for persons and property during potential attacks by Aborigines.
By 1887 the South Australian Mortgage and Land Company had taken over the lease of Westmoreland, which by 1891 had been transferred to the Bank of Australasia.
When consolidated in 1895, the station comprised Westmoreland and Westmoreland Nos. 1 to 4, 7 and 11. The main homestead was located on Westmoreland No. 3, where improvements included an iron-roofed stone homestead, kitchen, and outbuildings, the whole valued at £200. The block comprised 100 square miles (25 899.881 103 hectares), with rich creek flats, steep stony ridges and open forests of box, bloodwood and tea-tree. Much of the land was thickly grassed and had permanent water, and was considered good cattle-fattening country in ordinary seasons.
In the late 1890s Queensland entered a period of severe and widespread drought. The Gulf country was affected and in 1897 the lease to the Westmoreland consolidated run was forfeited and the run remained unoccupied for about 15 years.
From 1 October 1912 Westmoreland was let on a 30 year lease to John Norman McIntyre. At this time the consolidated run was estimated to comprise over 655 square miles (169 644.221 22 hectares). In 1913 McIntyre complained that the valuations on the property were over 20 years old and many of the improvements no longer existed. On Westmoreland No.3 the roof structure to the stone homestead had been eaten by white ants and the kitchen had collapsed.
In 1916 the Westmoreland Pastoral Company took over the lease, and conducted the Westmoreland run in conjunction with its other properties: Cliffdale and Patterdale in Queensland and Wollogorang in the Northern Territory.
A valuation inspection of Westmoreland undertaken in 1932 valued the stone homestead and outbuildings at £300, the homestead stockyards at £200 and total improvements at £1,210. In 1937, a further appraisal noted that the stone homestead was the only extant residential structure on Westmoreland; there were no huts on any of the other blocks. At this period the Westmoreland Board of Directors comprised Sir William Charles Angliss and Walter Sidney Palethorpe Kidman, two well-known Australian pastoralists. The lease passed to John Allan Fennell in 1938 and Thomas Staines Bernard Terry in 1939.
A new residence was constructed adjacent to the stone house during the second half of the twentieth century. It is not considered to be of cultural heritage significance.
","criteria":"Although there has been some adaptation the building remains a rare example of vernacular nineteenth century stone pastoral homesteads in Queensland. The use of antbed mortar was once quite widespread, but few examples remain where this versatile material was put to use.
|Old Westmoreland Homestead exemplifies the simple dwellings established during nineteenth century colonial settlement in remote parts of Queensland. The simplistic form of the building, and the use of local materials, demonstrates the principal characteristics of this class of place: nineteenth century pastoral property homesteads.
|The place retains a high degree of aesthetic value generated by the picturesque qualities of the simple design and the rustic materials employed in the construction: sandstone for the walls; ant bed for mortar and flooring; corrugated galvanised iron to clad the roof; and rough-cut bush timbers for the verandah posts.
|Old Westmoreland Homestead, constructed c1882, is important for its association with, and as rare surviving evidence of, early efforts to establish the pastoral industry in north-west Queensland in the second half of the nineteenth century, during a period of frontier violence. The building shows clear evidence of being constructed with due consideration for possible conflict: thick walls (which would also have helped insulate the building), inward opening doors, and few windows.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion B | Criterion D | Criterion E | Criterion A","criteria_definitions":"The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history"} ]}