Tales From Along the Wallaby Track No. 1104, Monday November 15, 2010
Mudgee is a thriving satellite town with a distinctive heritage. It is often forgotten.
Discovered in 1821 by William Lawson, a surveyor and army officer and sheep breeder it was settled long before Melbourne. It is the second oldest town west of the Great Dividing Range.
In those early days there was more to Mudgee than vineyards and gourmet food. They were to come later. At first there were rich lucerne crops and fertile grazing country. Mudgee was the centre of a great wool growing district. Sometimes there was a smattering of snow and the occasional flood. By the time the individual states became a federation in 1901 the Mudgee parks, churches and many well designed buildings reflected an age of solidarity.
Records show that Gulgong, during the gold rush period with a population of some 30,000 souls, has survived the march of time. Then there were other satellites, once important, like Home Rule, Canadian Lead, Ulan, Eurunderee and Hill End. Each village with their own heritage often now forgotten. The gold fever drained Mudgee of people and at one time only six adults were left. It has been recorded over £10,000,000 in gold was discovered in the region.
The local, Henry Lawson’s childhood was spent in an environment of primitive mining camps, of gold and bushrangers and poverty. These coloured his writings throughout his career. The chimney
Mudgee was first populated by way of the Bathurst convict settlement. The officers and men of the 102nd Regiment whose time had expired elected to take advantage of the terms of their enlistment by which they could receive grants of land if they elected to settle in the colony. These early settlers included the Cox brothers, William Lawson, James Blackman, who discovered the Cudgegong River, Tom Frome and others.
Mount Frome is named after Tom Frome an overseer and a free man who worked for George Cox on his Mudgee property. A rumour reached Bathurst that Frome had been killed and George Cox accompanied by Richard Lewis returned to his property at Menah. When they arrived they discovered Tom Frome had not been murdered but had merely joined the local Aborigines on a spree. The huts had remained untouched having been guarded by a native named Friday and an Aboriginal boy named Aaron who was killed by Aborigines at the long-water hole at Dabee.
Convicts
The early settlers were soon pressured to employ as many convicts as possible so Lawson and the Cox brothers brought with them from Bathurst all the appendages of the jail and prison farm for dealing with offenders.
Mounted police patrolled the region. They were splendidly mounted, a number of the horses being sired by Skeleton, a Government horse. Their uniform consisted of a cabbage tree hat, dark blue breeches, with a red stripe down each side, a dark blue tunic, and Wellington boots. Each trooper was supplied with a heavy overcoat which served as a blanket at night.
In Mudgee there was a stump of an old tree to which offenders were chained until the erection of the first jail known as the Logs. It was at this stump many were given strokes of the lash for the most trivial offence.
The Government paid Henry Cox £33.6.8d rent per year for the use of the Logs in the early 1830s. It consisted of one room, constructed of huge logs, set perpendicular into the ground. The flooring was rough hewn sleepers. There were no windows. The space between each log was thought sufficient to allow light and ventilation. The roof was large shingles. There was a large heavy door studded with spikes. It was only one room, twelve feet square. For security reasons prisoners were chained to the wall. Female prisoners were also chained up and herded together with the male offenders.
In 1840 the Chief constable was paid £75 a year, a constable 2s9d per day; the watch-house keeper 3 shillings a day; the scourger (the man who wielded the lash) 2s6d a day. Clothing was rated at 3d a day.
Sheep
Today, because of the recent drought, the sheep and wool industry is sometimes regarded as being old and sometimes feeble, but this is far from the truth. The sheep industry is still able to demand respect. At one time Mudgee region was famous for its merino bloodlines.
It all began with Captain Phillip and the First Fleet. On his way to Botany Bay he called at the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa and took on board, cattle, horses, sheep, goats and pigs. The first statistics taken after arrival record as being held 5 cows, 12 bulls, 1 stallion, 3 mares, 3 colts, 29 sheep, 19 goats, 25 pigs and 3 rabbits.
In 1797 the stock census showed a total of 3902 sheep and in this year the first merinos were introduced. Captain Waterhouse of the Reliance and Captain Kent of the Supply were sent to South Africa to purchase more stock. They made the acquaintance of a Mrs Gordon, a widow with a flock of 32 pure Spanish merinos, the progeny of 4 ewes and 2 rams presented by the King of Spain to the Dutch Government of the Cape. They purchased 26 and loaded 13 on each ship. What remained after arrival was sold and later through various channels some arrived in Mudgee. These animals became the basis of local stud flocks.
Diamonds
In 1851, Edward Hargraves, found a small diamond. It was the same year he reported the discovery of gold. That lone diamond was not even remembered in the great gold rushes that followed. The years passed and similar reports of the precious stone being found went unnoticed.
In 1867 diamonds were found by miners washing for alluvial gold along the banks of the Cudgegong River near Mudgee. They were located amongst the gravels in the river bed and although in payable quantities were not worked until two years later using the primitive methods of the time.
One diamond of over five carats and another of three carats are the largest recorded. Two thousand five hundred were recovered in five months and probably more. Later on another three thousand were found averaging less than half a carat each though the quality was good. In a touch of irony a huge flood washed away the diamond recovery equipment and the site was abandoned.
Diamonds were found on the Cudgegong River at Horseshoe Bend, Bend, Reedy Creek, Two Mile Flat, Hassel’s Hill, Rocky Ridge and Cooyal. Finds were also made at Narrangarie Range and River and Pyramul Creek.
In the Tambaroora Area diamonds were found at Bald Hill (Hill End), Monkey Hill and Sally’s Flat. In the Turon at Burrandong Creek, Muckerwa Creek and Turon River diamonds were also found.
Diamonds might still be considered a girl’s best friend, but they meant little to the early pioneers, along with the value of gold, except as a means of subsistence.
In 1837 Queen Victoria had ascended the throne. On January 12, 1838 the village of Mudgee came officially into existence. In Sydney the first sale of Mudgee Crown land took place. Eighteen blocks were sold. By 1847 there were five pubs with colourful names. Four years later there was a population of 200 in the village of Mudgee.
William Lawson might have been the first to arrive in Mudgee but to James Blackman is attached the credit of the original discovery of the Mudgee site in 1821. William Lawson in his expedition in November of the same year merely followed up Blackman’s route. On January 12, 1822 Lawson wrote: ‘This is a delightful place. It has everything a man can desire”. The first steps in writing a local history had begun.
Norman McVicker's Budgee Budgee site 
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