Post by Sediba on May 22, 2016 23:28:56 GMT 10
BROKEN HILL MINER'S MONUMENT
BROKEN HILL
Broken Hill is nestled amongst a low treeless range. The Barrier Range. The Barrier range was once the east coast of Australia and waves lapped on its shoreline. But the continental plate that Australia sits upon, buckled and lifted up what is now the eastern half of Australia 1500klm to the east, forming an inland sea, the sea-that-was. As the plate continued to lift, the sea-that-was eventually drained away too. The Barrier Range now sits in the middle of a desert, worn down, eroded away over millions of years. In the middle of the range is one odd hill, a broken black hill. Sturt, the first whitefella to venture into inland Australia noted it in his diary but paid it no further attention.
Arthur Upfield, a Pom, lover of the Australian Outback, and a who-dunnit-it Author (The Bony novels), had this to say about that broken black hill in his opening page to the murder mystery, 'The Bachelors of Broken Hill':
Arthur Upfield, The Bachelors of Broken Hill ...
Long, long ago the Aborigines came and called it Wilya-Wilya-Yong. It was a dark, barren hill formed like a schimitar, it's back broken, it's slopes serrated and pitted and scarred, naked, sunburned and wind seared. One day a white man talked with a black man and learned that Wilya-Wilya-Yong meant the place of youth.
White men bought their sheep and a poor german named Charles Rasp was employed to herd them. Rasp gazed at the place of youth, climbed the slopes, and found what he found, He knew nothing of precious metals, and so travelled to the nearest city and purchased a copy of 'The Prospecters Guide'. On his return he broke off a piece of the place of youth - it didn't matter where - and experts declared it to be loaded with silver-lead.
The fame of it sped across the surrounding sea-flat plains to the distant coasts of new-found Australia, and men came on horseback and on foot, in wagons and Buffalo Bill Coaches, and they sank holes and rigged machinery. others came and built a mining camp about the Place of Youth, which they called the Broken Hill. The camp became a shanty town named Broken Hill. Paupers became rich over nite, and rich men became paupers in a matter of minutes. Champagne was a flood; water but a trickle.
Rasp and his partners faded out. Men were buried hastily in shallow graves: those who were lucky. Yet more men came to Broken Hill, lingered, departed - generations of them - and the shanty town became the third city in NSW.
Long, long ago the Aborigines came and called it Wilya-Wilya-Yong. It was a dark, barren hill formed like a schimitar, it's back broken, it's slopes serrated and pitted and scarred, naked, sunburned and wind seared. One day a white man talked with a black man and learned that Wilya-Wilya-Yong meant the place of youth.
White men bought their sheep and a poor german named Charles Rasp was employed to herd them. Rasp gazed at the place of youth, climbed the slopes, and found what he found, He knew nothing of precious metals, and so travelled to the nearest city and purchased a copy of 'The Prospecters Guide'. On his return he broke off a piece of the place of youth - it didn't matter where - and experts declared it to be loaded with silver-lead.
The fame of it sped across the surrounding sea-flat plains to the distant coasts of new-found Australia, and men came on horseback and on foot, in wagons and Buffalo Bill Coaches, and they sank holes and rigged machinery. others came and built a mining camp about the Place of Youth, which they called the Broken Hill. The camp became a shanty town named Broken Hill. Paupers became rich over nite, and rich men became paupers in a matter of minutes. Champagne was a flood; water but a trickle.
Rasp and his partners faded out. Men were buried hastily in shallow graves: those who were lucky. Yet more men came to Broken Hill, lingered, departed - generations of them - and the shanty town became the third city in NSW.
This is some of his story:
Charles Rasp's Story:
My early career is shrouded in mystery .... this is what is known.
I was born into the German Aristocracy in the 1830s-1840s.
I was born of German and Portuguese ancestors.
I was trained in Chemistry.
I was an Officer in the Royal Saxon Army.
We laid siege to Paris in the deadly winter of 1870
We died in hecatombs of tuberculosis and disease.
When my best friend was killed, December, 1870, I deserted. I fled to the docks in Holland. I took passage overseas. Anxious that I would be found and tried I adopted an alias, in morbid honour of my best friend. I was poverty stricken and found employment as a shepherd. One day while gathering sheep, I made a 'strike'.
I made the biggest strike the world has ever known, bigger than the 'Californian Gold Rush' and all others combined. Others (Charles Sturt) had walked past it and ignored it. I had the brains to form a syndicate and take out all possible leases. There were 15 shares in the final division. One of my fellow shareholders lost his in a poker game. Another traded his to Kidman, the cattle Baron and Landowner for 100-200 head.
I became fabulously wealthy. I was still fearful of being arrested and tried for desertion. I stepped back from all publicity and let another take the honour. I married, traveled the world and lived a fine life for the rest of time in Adelaide (?)
The company I founded, and named, BHP (Broken Hill Propriety) is today the biggest global mining giant in the world. My mine, my lease, is still being operated today.
My mine helped found a Nation, significantly so. Australia.
My early career is shrouded in mystery .... this is what is known.
I was born into the German Aristocracy in the 1830s-1840s.
I was born of German and Portuguese ancestors.
I was trained in Chemistry.
I was an Officer in the Royal Saxon Army.
We laid siege to Paris in the deadly winter of 1870
We died in hecatombs of tuberculosis and disease.
When my best friend was killed, December, 1870, I deserted. I fled to the docks in Holland. I took passage overseas. Anxious that I would be found and tried I adopted an alias, in morbid honour of my best friend. I was poverty stricken and found employment as a shepherd. One day while gathering sheep, I made a 'strike'.
I made the biggest strike the world has ever known, bigger than the 'Californian Gold Rush' and all others combined. Others (Charles Sturt) had walked past it and ignored it. I had the brains to form a syndicate and take out all possible leases. There were 15 shares in the final division. One of my fellow shareholders lost his in a poker game. Another traded his to Kidman, the cattle Baron and Landowner for 100-200 head.
I became fabulously wealthy. I was still fearful of being arrested and tried for desertion. I stepped back from all publicity and let another take the honour. I married, traveled the world and lived a fine life for the rest of time in Adelaide (?)
The company I founded, and named, BHP (Broken Hill Propriety) is today the biggest global mining giant in the world. My mine, my lease, is still being operated today.
My mine helped found a Nation, significantly so. Australia.
To sum up here, when Rasp, who was employed as a low-paid boundary/fence rider told his boss that he was quitting and was going to take a mining claim out on a remote, old, black hill on the further edges of the property, his boss objected. He said that while he didn't mind if Rasp died of thirst and exhaustion, he wasn't having other idiots following in his footsteps and wandering all over the property and dying like flies.
The Boss proposed an alternative. There were 15 hands (7 ?) employed on the property including the Boss. If they took out fifteen claims they could cover the whole hill, and this would prevent any others from staking other claims.
So it was done, 15 claims were issued, and, as you know, or perhaps you don't, BHP was born (Broken Hill Proprierty) - The Biggest mining company in the world today, trading as BHP-Billiton. This alone is enough to secure the Hill's place in the history books, but this is only one of the Hill's numerous claims to fame.
Think of it, once there was only 15 shares in BHP, one of these was lost in a poker game, another was traded for a few hundred head of worthless starving, thirsty cattle. The entire history of the Hill has been one of typical Aussie understatement. It was the biggest strike ever in the history of the planet, bigger than the Calfornian gold rush. It is the only controlled strike ever. When thousands of prospectors arrived in the rush, they found there were no claims to take out, so they had to remain as employees of BHP.
It is the only strike that has produced continuously to this day. Hundreds and hundreds died in this shanty tent town before the city was forged from the suffering. There was no water, thyphus and dysentry were rife. There were hundreds of grog shops and prostitutes abounded. A city emerged. But not any city, a city with only one purpose, to bring the bowels of the earth to the surface. It still does so to this day, but the end is near, and only new technology has prolonged it this far.
A strange city. The Hill itself, now an enormous pile of rubble, still retains a massive brooding presence, and runs beside the main street of the central CBD, Argent St. The city and burbs sprawl out over the surrounding hills. There are 3 main suburbs, The Hill, South Broken Hill and Railway town. Despite the deep rumblings of the mine machinery, the ore trains, and all the heavy industry, cafe society is on every corner. Art galleries outnumber Pubs, and pubs outnumber cafes, and cafes are numerous. Qantas (and others) land at the airport daily.
The Hill has always been fought over. Its in NSW, but only just, by 30klms on the eastern side of the South Australian/New South Wales border. Adelaide, the capital of South Australia, is the closest city, 6 hrs by car. The first railway was built to there from Adelaide, to transport the ore, and so remove the wealth. NSW retaliated by forbidding South Australian trains from crossing the border. This forced NSW to build its own rail system to the border, and so the Silverton railway was born, now one of the largest rail systems in Australia, but it no longer operates those 30 klms.
South Australia has a history of poaching, and is suspect by both Victoria and New South Wales alike, tho these three tribes no longer know the causes of the feud, engendered in them with their mothers milk. But that is another story, the story of Australia's Inland River system which I will save for another day.
During the second world war, when the Japanese invasion seemed imminent, and plans for the controversial 'Brisbane Line' were drawn up, Australia's mint, and all our gold was transported to the Hill, and locked in the Police Headquarters cells. You can visit these cells today.
The first Islamic terrorist attack ever in the world, occurred in Broken Hill, 7 people were killed, others wounded in the attack. Both terrorists were shot down as they fought a desperate rear guard action in the hills to the west of the city. Two against hundreds. I have some sympathy for these two, strange as it may appear. Whatever qualities they lacked, courage was not one of them. History is showing a more sympathetic view of these two, bought out to work the camel trains, treated like dogs, and no passage home. I have stood on the quartz outcrop where they made their final stand. I dug up an old man salt bush plant from this spot and bought it home, it lived for many years, eventually dying from too much rain.
Famous people, too numerous to name, have both lived in, and visited Broken Hill. The Mad Max movies were filmed there. Priscilla, Queen of the Desert was filmed there. Plus many many others.
All country towns throughout Australia have an 'inferiority complex' engendered by their big city cousins. This leads them to vote conservative, on the 'keep the bastards honest' platform.
There is no such thing in Broken Hill, far from feeling inferior, they know they provided the Nations wealth when the young federation was struggling. The Trades Hall is a magnificent piece of Architecture, paid for and constructed by the miners themselves. The Barrier Miners Club is huge. There is an openess about the city that is pleasure to experience. To the west is Silverton, once the main town, now almost derelict, but the pub is still open, and Mad Max's car is still parked outside. Further west on this road is a dead end at one of the Dams that supply the Hill. Further west across a desolation is the dry Lake Frome, where Perenties roam, large monitors that almost no australian has ever seen.
To the North, Packsaddle, Milparinka, and Tibboobura, alien landscapes. To the North east, the Incredible Mutawintji National Park, and a bit further, Whitecliffs, where everyone lives underground in Dugouts to hide from the Police, and dig Opals.
To the east Wilcannia, not a real nice place at all, at all, at all, and worth a visit for that reason alone. But much improved on my last visit.
To the south, Lake Mungo. All of these places within a days drive of the Hill.
more ....