Walter John Milne, a forgotten Ingham identity

Have you ever given much thought to the building occupied by ROCKMANS? If you look up at the rather nondescript façade you will read WM Walter Milne Estd 1929. I always think it is a pity that current business owners feel it necessary to paint over or cover over the history of their buildings, rather than proudly displaying the rich heritage that tells Ingham’s unique history.

Who was Walter Milne? Walter John Milne was born on 9 April, 1891 to Jessie Sewell and Ernest Milne.  He was married to Bessie Crossman Clements on 8 December 1919. He served with 41^st Australian Infantry Battalion as a corporal and used that experience as a banner to advertise his business on Stokes Street, Townsville in 1920. Amongst the many roles he advertised was Auctioneer.  He then moved his business in December 1921 to the Bank of Queensland Chambers next door to Lennons Limited on Flinders Street. By 1929 he had moved to Ingham and had established his business at 65 Lannercost Street, while living with Bessie in Selby Estate.

In Ingham he acted as an auctioneer and commission agent. He also acted as an agent for firstly, the Australian Cooperative Fertilisers Ltd. (during his time in Townsville) and later for sulphate of ammonia for Fertilizer Distributors Pty. Ltd. He was also an agent for the insurance company, AMP. Other well-known auctioneers at the time in Ingham were George Groundwater and Felix Reitano (whose business survives to this day). Milne moved briefly away from Ingham during WW2 to Townsville to do contract work.

Like most businessmen he was public minded, holding positions on sporting bodies and the Ambulance committee. After the war when he auctioned ex-military horses and donkeys he donated his fee to the Red Cross.

In the early hours of Friday 29 May, 1942 he nearly lost his building to a fire which not only threatened his building, but the Hotel Central. Unfortunately, the fire destroyed Houng Yuen’s which was extensively stocked at the time, and the building occupied by F. J. Blackman, saddler. While Milne’s building was damaged by fire, the contents were saved. Significant to the saving of the other buildings in the main street, including not only the Hotel Central but the Shire Hall was a celotex (insulation) wall in Milne’s office. A hose was trained on the inside on it and as a result the fire would not ignite it. As well, several off-duty policemen came to the fire brigade’s assistance. Constable Blackford took the hose as a fireman ascended the balcony of the Central Hotel, training it against the encroaching fire. Fortunately, insurances covered the buildings and their stock.

While watching a cricket match in Townsville on Wednesday 31 October, 1951 Walter Milne collapsed as a result of a heart attack. He was rushed to hospital but could not to be saved. He was only 60 years of age. Bessie passed away on 16 June, 1960.

WM WALTER MILNE ESTD 1929

WALTER MILNE BUILDING, now ROCKMANS

 Group portrait of the NCOs of the 41st Battalion at Kemmel Hill. Walter John Milne: Corporal Of the 41^st Battalion AIF (second from end, right, back row)

 Source: https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/E01521

Australian War Memorial Australian 41^st Australian Infantry Battalion Image number: E01521

Date 22 January 1918.

Maker:Unknown Australian Official Photographer

Place made: Belgium: Flanders, West-Vlaanderen, Heuvelland, Kemmel, Kemmel Hill

Conflict First World War, 1914-1918

MERCER LANE

Was Mercer Lane, like Mount Mercer now known as Warren’s Hill, named for John Mercer who is recorded as being the district’s first overland mail contractor? He was a pioneering homesteader who together with his wife Rebecca took up land on the south bank of the Herbert River.  Their first child, John, was born in 1870 and was the first European child born in the Lower Herbert, now Ingham area. 

It is possible that Mercer Lane was also named after John Mercer. Mercer Lane was once a laneway accessible for vehicles to the off street car park which is situated between Palm Creek and Lannercost Street. In 2009 a substantial amount of money was approved by Government to upgrade and improve Lannercost Street. The improvement included a closing of Mercer Land to vehicular traffic and construction of a 60 metre covered walkway the length of the Lane.

Today the laneway houses 42 metres of mosaic art panels depicting the history of the sugar cane industry of the Herbert River district. The concept was the brain child of local business woman Karen Venables and conceived by artist Kate Carr as an Artslink Queensland community public art project.  Community enthusiasm for the project is reflected in the funding provided by individuals, clubs, council and local businesses and the contribution of labour by over 2 000 locals and visitors. The medium of mosaics was used because it is an artistic form that can be quickly learned, and also because it is associated with the artwork of ancient Italy and Italians who to this day, make up a significant percentage of the local population.

The panels not only depict the sugar industry in all its phases, historically and industrially, but also the people who were affected by and contributed to the industry. The progression of the industry from hand held and horse drawn implements, to the mechanization of field work has been graphically detailed. The life style of a time long past when farmers could only attend meetings on a night when the full moon would light their way, to children dancing in a shower of cane fire ash or ‘black snow’, to a farmer’s wife carrying smoko to the paddock to a tired, dirty, hungry gang, all jump from the mosaic in life-like reality.

The representation of the historical events was drawn from research provided by historian, Bianka Vidonja Balanzategui and brought to life by the artistic interpretation rendered by Kate Carr. Interpretative story boards enable the viewer to appreciate the panels as both story and art work.    

Furthermore local families sponsored ‘tiles’ on which have been superimposed the story of their family’s contribution to the Herbert River sugar industry. In this way from cane cutter, to farmer, baker to shopkeeper, miller to inventor all those who have contributed to the industry that still sustains the Herbert River district are recalled.

 

Mercer Lane circa 1971. Source: http://www.cbcbank.com.au/images/Branches/QLD/QLD%20country%20I-L.htm

Mercer Lane 2019.

Dancing in the 'Black Snow'. Source: Photograph taken by Christopher Parry

Interpretative Plaque. Source: Photograph taken by Christopher Parry

Ingham In Summer

Inghamites, in  mid March 2016, swelter in humid heat.  Cyclones threaten as an unseasonably late rain season descends, sending down much needed rain on a parched landscape. All long for winter and cool relief.  In 1927 Jean Douglas Gordon waxed lyrical about Ingham in summer. This poem was published two months after a devastating flood, precipitated by a tropical cyclone which crossed the coast just north of Cairns on February 9, becoming a disastrous rain depression. The Herbert River swelled to such as extent that the river broke its banks sending flood waters coursing down onto the low-lying areas of the Herbert River Valley literally sweeping away everything in its path, A description of the time said the river “poured over the countryside like a drunken demon and bringing death and destruction in its wake.”  There was a tragic loss of life, in excess of 25 in Ingham, 15 in Cardwell and 1 in Townsville. 1 500 horses were calculated to have drowned in the Herbert River Valley, a terrible loss in a farming community that still depended heavily on horses for both field work and transport. Loss of crops, stock and property in the same area was estimated to have been in the vicinity of £300 000. Poet Dan Sheahan articulated the community’s reaction to this disaster in his own inimitable way when he wrote “But pigs will play pianos – and chooks will chew their cud – “Ere Ingham will forget about The ’27 Flood.”

INGHAM IN SUMMER

There is sunshine on the paddocks, there is glory on the hills.

There is beauty on the canefields sweeping west;

There are songs among the rain-trees, there is bustle round the mills,

And round the homestead peace, and love and rest.

There is shadow in the timber where the shy bush creatures hide,

There is quiet where the timber meets the shore;

There is golden wealth in plenty where the branches meet the tide,

And music where the lone sea-breakers roar.

There is sighing in the bamboos as the lost sea breezes wail,

And bleating from the sheepyard on the rise;

There is hurry round the crossroads where they’re sorting out the mail,

And sorrow where the lonely curlew cries.

There’s a cloudless sky above me of a deep and misty blue,

There is golden light and music in the air.

And the beauty of the summer blossoms in my heart anew,

As I see her wondrous beauty everywhere.

SOURCES:

“Hinchinbrook Shire Council Historical Library, River on a Rampage” (A selection of newspaper clippings and reports on the 1927 Flood October, 1968, 11).

Sheahan, D. “The ’27 Flood” in Songs from the Canefields (Ingham: Josephine R. Sheahan, 1972), 84.  

The Sydney Morning Herald, April 30, 1927, 11.

The Valley in flood becomes a veritable sea.  Outlying settlements and townships become isolated and residents flood bound in their homes.

Ingham in flood, 1927. Geo. C. Teitzel Butchers, Herbert Street (From the Hinchinbrook Shire Library Local History Collection)

Horses seeking shelter in flood, 1927. Hinchinbrook Hotel, Lannercost Street. (Shared by Terry Cooper on Lost Ingham and District)

Halifax in flood, 1927 Walton’s Hotel, Macrossan Street (From the Hinchinbrook Shire Library Local History Collection)