History of Ripple Creek Mill and Plantation

When Robert Mitchell Boyd and John and Joseph Wood from NSW acquired Arnot’s 600 acre selection on Ripple Creek in 1882, their venture became the Ripple Creek Plantation and Mill. Installing machinery obtained from Mirrlees, Watson and Co., Glasgow, it first crushed in 1883. Despite its late start it operated the longest of the now defunct mills. Its strengths were that its owners were experienced sugar growers, it was a private concern, it was not overcapitalised, and it used a good proportion of the available plantation lands for growing sugar cane. It also took cane from independent and tenant growers. It had a large annual production of refined white sugar achieved by a sulphitation process, which gave it independence of those few companies that monopolised refining, the largest of which was CSR. By 1906 it had grown to 3 580 acres.

A ‘classic plantation’ and longest operating of the now defunct mills. Ripple Creek Mill, 1884. (Source: Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library Photographic Collection)

In every respect it was the epitome of the classic plantation, essentially a self-sufficient community. The substantial plantation house was surrounded by a luxurious tropical garden and featured a tennis court. Besides the sugar mill, there was also a saw mill and a manure ‘mill’. There were stores, a post and telephone office, a school, hospital, a blacksmith’s shop, implement shed, stock yard, slaughter yard and stables for over 100 horses. 

The 100 horse mill stables, Ripple Creek, n.d.  (Source: Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library Photographic Collection)

As well there were officers’ houses and workers’ cottages and barracks. It had its own tramway system and a wharf on the Seymour River. When Gairloch Plantation and Mill closed and went up for sale in 1887 Wood Bros. and Boyd of Ripple Creek acquired 500 acres of that plantation. Robert M. Boyd, of Ripple Creek Plantation, leased to tenants, and both he and the Neames would have liked to have purchased cane from more contractors but needed the divisional board to put in the infrastructure on the northern side of the river, as they could not afford to do it themselves. Unfortunately, it was not until the passing of the Railways Guarantee Act in 1895 that the divisional board could secure loans to lay a tramline on the northern side of the river. After that Boyd of Ripple Creek followed CSR, taking supplies from both tenant and independent farmers. By 1904 CSR records showed that land-owning farmers outnumbered tenant farmers. 

When Robert M. Boyd put his Ripple Creek Planation up for sale, CSR began construction on a bridge across the Anabranch to facilitate access to Ripple Creek land before the Ripple Creek management had managed to sell their property. This quick action is indicative of why CSR was a survivor and able to withstand the constraints others buckled under to. CSR had a broad business base, astute management, was opportunistic, protective of its own interests, and prioritised agricultural research and innovation. It, of all the planters on the Herbert, was in the position to put in the required infrastructure: bridges, rail, and rolling stock to source small growers’ cane as they became increasingly more numerous. R.M. Boyd felt unable to offer prospective suppliers the same price that CSR offered, nor was he willing to enter into long-term contracts. He argued that there was no way he could increase his mill’s output of raw sugar since it lacked the requisite amount of cane to run the mill in “double shifts”. Moreover, Boyd was only permitted to refine so much white sugar because CSR (as dominant refiner) controlled how much refined sugar produced by other millers could be put on the market. The only course left was to close down. Even CSR had clear reservations about the viability of taking the crop let alone purchasing the mill. In 1906 Wood Bros. and Boyd listed Ripple Creek Planation Mill plantation for sale, though with clear regret. They blamed the farmers for the position they were in, saying that the farmers were holding back on planting cane, trying to force the Ripple Creek management’s hand to pay the same prices as CSR offered its farmers. They hoped that the mill would continue as a cooperative mill. There had been some hope in the Valley that the government would step in to ensure the survival of the mill and the farmers had petitioned the government accordingly. CSR ended up purchasing the sugar mill machinery, tramlines and rolling stock. 

1893. Ripple Creek Estate Mill Docket, small farmer Daniel Pearson. Source: Pearson family, Brooklands.

In 1908 the Ripple Creek Mill conducted its last crush and the plantation was again offered for sale, this time with the land offered as discrete blocks. It had been arranged that CSR’s Macknade Mill would take the purchasers’ cane. With the Ripple Creek Plantation and Mill closed down, CSR became the sole miller in the district, and its monopoly of the sugar industry there and dominance of the wider Australian sugar industry was commented on with censure, even at the time. Boyd did not sever all contact with the district even after selling out to CSR. His son Archie, with his wife and their children, continued to reside at ‘The Palms’ Ripple Creek; Boyd Snr. would visit and maintained his connections in the Valley. Archie and his family moved to Sydney in October 1913 following his father’s death there on December 4, 1912. With the sale of Macknade to CSR and the closure of Ripple Creek mill, CSR became the dominant miller on the Herbert, operating both of its mills as central mills.

SOURCES:“The Ripple Creek Mill,” Townsville Daily Bulletin, August 28, 1907, 4.“Ripple Creek Plantation,” Queenslander, June 8, 1901, 1110.“Ripple Creek Sugar Plantation, Herbert River, Ingham,” Queenslander, May 12, 1906, 24; “Advertising,” Macleay Chronicle, July 23, 1908, 8.Queensland Government, “Railways Guarantee Act 1895.”Census of White Persons directly connected with C.S.R. Coy’s Mills in Queensland, November 15, 1904, Deposit N305-D.1.0 6 2, CSR Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra.“The Northern Miner,” Northern Miner, April 24, 1908, 4;“Ingham News,” Northern Miner, May 7 1908, 9. JAB Diary,“Robert Mitchell Boyd (1849-1912),” quoting “Ripple Creek Plantation,” Brisbane Courier, May 11, 1901, 15.Correspondence from R. Boyd to E.W. Knox, November 22, 1905, Deposit 142/1560, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra; and handwritten notes, October 24, 1903, Deposit 142/1559, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra.Correspondence from R. Boyd to E.W. Knox, November 22, 1905, Deposit 142/1560, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra; and handwritten notes, October 24, 1903, Deposit 142/1559, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra; correspondence from R. Boyd, to E.W. Knox, January 9, 1906, Deposit N305-D 3.0 F4 1, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra; and “Ripple Creek,” handwritten notes, October 24, 1905, N305-D 3.0 F4 1, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra.  “Display Advertising. Ripple Creek Plantation, Herbert River, N.Q.,” Queenslander, September 8, 1906, 12.  “The Ripple Creek Mill: Premier’s Reply to Petition,” Townsville Daily Bulletin, August 28, 1907, 4 as quoted in JAB Diary, “Robert Mitchell Boyd (1849-1912).”Memorandum of agreement between CSR and Wood Bros. and Boyd, April 14, 1908, N305-D 3.0 4 1, CSR, Noel Butlin Archives, Australian National University, Canberra.“The Queenslander: Ripple Creek Sugar Plantation,” Brisbane Courier, May 10, 1906, 4; “Farms, Land etc.: Ripple Creek Plantation, Herbert River, N.Q.,” Queenslander, June 16, 1906, 16; “Local and General,” Johnstone River Advocate, June 27 1907, 2; “Telegrams,” Evening Telegraph, June 20, 1907, 3; “World of Labour,” Worker, May 30, 1908, 7; “Notes and Comments,” Queenslander, May 2 1908, 36; “Advertising,” Macleay Chronicle, July 23 1908, 8.“Northern Sugar Industry,” Queenslander, August 11, 1906, 40; “MALEFICENT MONOPOLY The Colonial Sugar Refining Co.,” Sunday Times, December 1, 1907, 1; “Colonial Sugar Refining Company,” Daily Mercury, August 9. 1910, 7; Commonwealth Parliament, “House of Representatives,” [Hansard], Sugar Bounty Bill (No.2) Second Reading, September 21, 1910 and Constitution Alteration (Legislative Powers) Bill Second Reading, October 20, 1910; and Griggs, “The Decline of Competition,” for his discussion of CSR’s monopoly of the factors of the Australian sugar industry.“Herbert River Notes,” Townsville Daily Bulletin, October 11, 1913, 11; “Personal,” Townsville Daily Bulletin, December 12, 1912, 4; JAB Diary, “Robert Mitchell Boyd (1849-1912),” December 2-4, 1912.  

The Mysteries of Rooney's Pinch

Joan and Jerry Allingham of Stoneleigh, talked about in my last blog, would have passed a small outcrop called Rooney’s Pinch on their way to and from their property. Unlike the Allinghams whose story we know, who was ‘Rooney’ and why did he have a hill named after him?

Being an historian is like being a detective. You spend most of your time looking for clues and following leads. Many will be false leads even though they may sound possible. Some will be heading in the right direction and then peter out.  Sometimes you might build a convincing ‘case’ or story and stick by it only to find later that you have it all wrong. Other times you strike gold and solve the mystery.

Recently I was asked about Rooney’s Pinch, west of Ingham, adjacent to the Stone River Road in the upper Stone area. Did I know anything about it? I did a little cursory digging and what I have come up with is purely speculative but possible. See what you think.

Rooney’s Pinch is a small hill. Why was is called Pinch and not Hill?

Now that word is a bit of a semantic mystery.

‘Pinch’ can be applied to small hills and hamlets:

English place name books suggest that similar names with the pinch element could either be the Old English pinca which means finch or Later English pink meaning minnow. http://www.legendarydartmoor.co.uk/ephraim.htm) 

Another theory suggests that the stinginess of the owner of the land could be why an area was called a ‘pinch’:

There is also one opinion that considers that field names with the pinch element refer to “derogatory names, ambiguously referring to parsimony and torture.” (Paraphrased from: http://www.legendarydartmoor.co.uk/ephraim.htm)  

The Macquarie dictionary suggests that ‘Pinch’ means: a hill, a rise as in - This hill is a bit of a pinch; a slatey pinch, a rocky rise. (https://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/resources/aus/word/map/search/word/pinch/Western%20District/ )

From that can be suggested then, is that Rooney’s Pinch was so named because it is a ‘small hill’ or on the other hand it could be referring to the thriftiness or meanness of the mystery ‘Rooney’.

So who was Rooney? That too, remains a mystery without further extensive research. However, I have a theory. I speculate that Rooney was Matthew Rooney of Rooney Bros. (a firm of architects, builders and contractors) established in Townsville by Matthew and his brother John in 1882. They went into partnership with James Harvey, establishing a timber-milling arm of their business.

Now M. Rooney was not a rare moniker in Ingham and Townsville as a search of old newspapers into the twentieth century show. There are M. Rooneys (including Matthew Rooneys getting up to all sorts of good as well as criminal behaviour).

So why do I speculate that Rooney’s Pinch could be taken from Matthew Rooney, respected Townsville builder?

In 1882, in the same year that Matthew and Harvey paired to go into business, a M Rooney and a J. Harvey take up neighbouring blocks in the Parish of Berwick (aka Stone River) as attested by this newspaper reference from the Queenslander, Saturday 30 September 1882, page 2 and consequent Parish of Berwick maps.

INGHAM. Before Commissioner Berwick, on the 30th August. SELECTIONS.—Accepted: W. G. Ewan, 1280a.,

Newton, 1280 a., Lannercost; J. Cassady. 1280 a., Berwick; W. C. Miller, 80a., Trebonne; H. B. Heaphy, 1000 a.. Trebonne; J. E. Palmer. 1000 a., Waterview; J. Harvey, 200 a., Berwick ; M. Rooney, 200 a., Berwick; A. Camp bell. 200 a., Cordelia; A. E. Cummins, 158 a., Berwick ; H. Stone. D. M'Auslan, J. Olson, A. S. B. Sutton, R. Hutchinson, T. Gibson, W. Harvey. J. Bonning. C. Bonning, each 160 a., Berwick. Re jected : J. M. Parkes, 1280 a., Garrawalt; B. Lynn, 1280 a., Marathon; K. A. Goldring, 1280a., Garra walt. Adjourned: W. L. Lynn, 160 a., Marathon.

It was not uncommon for people at that time to speculate on sugar land in the Herbert as in 1881 the Colonial Sugar Refining Company (CSR) had arrived in the Valley and had started to build its mill (Victoria Mill) while the Melbourne firm of Edward Fanning, Thomas NanKivell and Sons had also arrived and was building the second Gairloch Mill (1881) and had bought other defunct plantations. People had hopes of getting rich on sugar. While CSR, which had the money to lay an extensive rail system and used steam locomotives, would be anticipated to extend its line from Victoria Mill to the outlying areas such as Stone River.

And indeed, that is just what the Company did, and the line became an important one for the transport of not only sugar cane but goods and people. An article in the Northern Miner 3 September 1908, page 6 entitled “On the Stone River: ‘Along the line’” mentions M. Rooney’s landholding at the terminus of the CSR line. The area was described as “magnificent pockets of the richest land” where you can “grow anything on earth”. Even beyond the need for a terminus with storage shed, Rooney’s Pinch remained a designated siding on the Mt. Fox CSR line.

Matthew Rooney. Source: https://www.historicyongala.com.au/about-us/

Map. Parish of Berwick, County of Cardwell, September 1923

Whether M. Rooney and J. Harvey ever made good of that rich land I am not able to say. We do know however, that, unfortunately, Matthew's life ended prematurely and under tragic circumstances.

Matthew, his wife and daughter were among the 122 people, passengers and crew on board the SS Yongala when it sank, on 23 March 1911. En route from Melbourne to Cairns the Yongala encountered a cyclone and sank without a trace south of Townsville, just off Cape Bowling Green. There were no survivors.

Besides the mystery of the naming of Rooney’s Pinch is the tale of an Afghan trader or hawker who is rumored to have been buried somewhere on or around Rooney’s Pinch. FACT or FICTION?  Look out for the next blog!

SOURCES:

Paraphrased from: http://www.legendarydartmoor.co.uk/ephraim.htm

https://www.macquariedictionary.com.au/resources/aus/word/map/search/word/pinch/Western%20District/

“Ingham,” Queenslander, Saturday 30 September 1882, 2.

“On the Stone River: ‘Along the line’,” Northern Miner 3 September 1908, 6.

PUB WITH NO BEER

“The Herbert is also a first-rate place for teamsters to spell their bullocks. There is one public-house and another promised, where good entertainment for man and beast is guaranteed.”

Much of Ingham’s story is that it is on a path to somewhere: to pasture lands for stock, to the gold fields, to urban centres and battlefields north. The Telegraph Hotel was established in 1874 on the Camping Reserve, later Town Reserve, to take advantage of the Palmer gold rush trade. It only traded for a year and then reopened later as the Day Dawn Hotel, today known as Lee’s Hotel.

The hotel is deservedly famous as the birthplace of the poem “A Pub without Beer” penned by bush poet, Dan Sheahan, adapted by Gordon Parsons to become “A Pub with no Beer’ sung by Slim Dusty. But the story of the Day Dawn Hotel and it’s reincarnation as Lee’s Hotel is equally an intriguing tale. At its centre are the intrepid Chinese men and women who came to work the northern gold fields and an architect whose “design philosophy was very much about honest expression of structure and response to climate”. 

Rupert Lee (Snr)’s father toiled on the Palmer gold fields, married a woman of mixed Irish and Chinese descent and together they had eight children. She returned to China with the children and later at only 12 years of age Rupert Lee (Snr) returned to Australia and to Ingham. He worked the steam trains at Victoria Mill, borrowed money and opened a baker shop and then a grocery store. When he purchased the Day Dawn Hotel in 1958 it was so far gone restoration was impossible and it had to be demolished, though local folklore has long had it that it was burnt down.  Rupert then engaged a young fledgling architect, Ian Ferrier, to design a modern hotel, Lee's Hotel, which opened in 1960.

Ian Ferrier became renowned for his designs which incorporated innovative adaptions to the tropical climate like completely openable walls of doors to allow cross ventilation. While countless schools, commercial buildings and homes across Queensland and northern Australia bear his inimitable imprint, cathedrals, churches and chapels became a speciality amongst them the Cairns and Darwin Cathedrals. His notable, local achievements are St. Peters Church in Halifax and St. Patrick’s Church in Ingham.  

Sources:

“Herbert River,” The Queenslander, September 25, 1875, 7.

Ferrier Baudet Architechts, http://catherine-baudet.squarespace.com/history/.

 “Slim poured a Legend,” news.com.au, November 2, 2007, http://www.news.com.au/news/slim-poured-a-legend/story-fna7dq6e-1111114967360.

Day Dawn Hotel, 1919. Source: Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library Photograph Collection.

Postcard, circe 1970. Source: Centre for the Government of Queensland. Publisher: ACP.

Planters, farmers and Premiers

When Jonathan Pavetto went to personally petition government regarding the proposed bypass it was an easy trip by plane. In the days before farmers could travel to the southern capitals to petition Premiers or Prime Ministers the latter would travel by steamer to the north and farmers were invited on board to present their petitions. And just as today, candidates would come north to canvass for votes.

Samual Griffith (later Premier) came to the Herbert River Valley on an electioneering tour in 1883 it was a plantation stronghold though the small farmers had just formed the Herbert River Farmers’ Association (HRFA) and were hoping to supply the newly opened Victoria Mill. He had to convince the planters and small farmers that he would look after their interests. He met with businessmen, small farmers, planters and plantation managers. A photograph was taken to mark the event.

Samuel Griffith on an electioneering tour to the Herbert. Pictured with local landowners and businessmen including Lewis and Alfred Cowley, Frank Neame, Farrand Haig, and Charles Watson (a member of the HRFA), 1883. (Source: Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library Photographic Collection)

In 1890 when CSR threatened to close down Victoria Mill the HRFA wrote the Premier a ‘strong’ letter urging the continuance of Melanesian labour which the Association argued would keep CSR Company in the district. The Premier replied the he was planning a visit to the north and that the farmers would be advised when he was to visit Halifax. Sir Samuel Griffith sailed up the coast in the Government steamer, the Lucinda in December 1890. On the afternoon of the second day of his visit to the district, 25 December, the farmers presented to him the papers they had prepared. Griffith returned two weeks later, docked at Dungeness, and again invited farmer representatives to meet with him again on board the Lucinda. Those who met with him were August Anderssen, A. W. Carr, N. C. Rosendahl and John Alm, stalwarts of the HRFA.

In his memoirs, John Alm gave a first-hand account of that meeting. After general conversation, “the private Secretary, Mr Bell, appeared and informed the party that there were refreshments waiting below. They found a table neatly set in the saloon. The Premier sat down with the party, and the private Secretary acted as waiter. Sir Samuel was in excellent humour. He continually told the visitors not to be afraid of his whisky; stating it was good - no doubt it was, but it had the trick of mounting to the head; so they had to be careful, as they had a couple of hours work ahead of them, pulling their boat home.”

The Lucinda pictured on the city side of Brisbane River, opposite South Brisbane Wharves, n.d. (Source: State Library of Queensland. Lucinda (ship). (2004). Image number: 51548)

In May 1894 a farmers’ deputation again was brought to the steamer the Palmer when it docked at Dungeness where it was received by Premier, the Hon. H. Nelson. John Lely, Secretary of the HRFA, presented the farmers’ petition about the need for labour for the cane fields. A photograph of the steamer was taken by Harriett Pettifore Brim when she was a photographer in Ingham.

Steamboat the Palmer, Queensland, circa 1890-1900.(Source: Harriett Pettifore Brim, photographer on the Herbert River 1894-1902. State Library of Queensland. Image number: 31054 Harriett Brims collection 1890-1930)

Sources:

Bianka Vidonja Balanzategui, “The Herbert River Farmers’ Association:  'clique of insignificant cockies' or 'agents of change'?” (PhD manuscript, James Cook University).

John Alm, Early History of the Herbert River District: Being "The Memoirs of the Early Settlement of the Lower Herbert and the Start and Progress of the Sugar Industry in the District (Aitkenvale: Terry Lyons, 2002, original edition published in Herbert River Express, 11th October 1932 to 20th January 1934), 59.