GERMANY’S HISTORIC EXPLORATION OF CENTRAL AUSTRALIA
Do you sometimes wonder, why a person is famous in another country for something, but not in their own?
I did today when a presenter here at Eastside told me about the German explorer Ludwig Leichhardt.
He is well known in Australia for his exploration of northern and central Australia. Unfortunately, I have never heard about him, even though I am from Germany. But the exploration he did is really interesting and as I have learned today, also a big part of the Australian history.
Leichhardt was born in the village Trebatsch in the Prussian Province of Brandenburg, Germany, in 1813. Between 1831 and 1836 Leichhardt studied philosophy, language and natural sciences at the Universities of Goettingen and Berlin but never received a university degree.
On 14 February 1842 Leichhardt arrived in Sydney, Australia. His aim was to explore inland Australia and he was hopeful of a government appointment in his fields of interest. In September 1842 Leichhardt went to the Hunter River valley north of Sydney to study the geology, flora and fauna of the region and to observe farming methods.
After returning to Sydney early in 1844, Leichhardt hoped to take part in a proposed government-sponsored expedition from Moreton Bay to Port Essington (300 km north of Darwin, Northern Territory). When plans for this expedition fell through Leichhardt decided to mount the expedition himself, accompanied by volunteers and supported by private funding. His party left Sydney in August 1844 to sail to Moreton Bay, where four more joined the group. The expedition departed on 1 October 1844 from Jimbour, the farthest outpost of settlement on the Queensland Darling Downs.
After a nearly 4,800 km (3,000 mi) overland journey, and having long been given up for dead, Leichhardt arrived in Port Essington on 17 December 1845. He returned to Sydney by boat, arriving on 25 March 1846 to a hero’s welcome. The Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia, from Moreton Bay to Port Essington, a Distance of Upwards of 3000 km, During the Years 1844 and 1845 by Leichhardt describes this expedition.
Leichhardt’s second expedition, undertaken with a government grant and substantial private subscriptions, started in December 1846. It was supposed to take him from the Darling Downs to the west coast of Australia and ultimately to the Swan River and Perth. However, after covering only 800 km the expedition team was forced to return in June 1847 due to heavy rain, malarial fever and famine.
In 1848 Leichhardt again set out from the Condamine River to reach the Swan River. He was last seen on 3 April 1848 at McPherson’s Station, Coogoon, on the Darling Downs. His disappearance after moving inland remains a mystery until today! After no sign or word was received from him and his party, it was assumed that they had died somewhere in the Great Sandy Desert of the Australian interior.
Four years after Leichhardt’s disappearance the Government of New South Wales sent out a search expedition. The expedition found nothing but a single campsite with a tree marked “L” in Taroom, Queensland.
Leichhardt’s contribution to science, especially his successful expedition to Port Essington in 1845, was officially recognised. In 1847 the Geographical Society, Paris awarded its annual prize for geographic discovery to Leichhardt. Also in 1847, the Royal Geographical Society in London awarded Leichhardt its Patron´s Medal Prussian and Germany published a “Leichhardt stamp”.
Australia has commemorated Ludwig Leichhardt through the use of his name in several places: Leichhardt, a suburb in the Inner West of Sydney and the surrounding Municipality of Leichhardt; Leichhardt, a suburb of Ipswich; the Leichhardt Highway and the Leichhardt River in Queensland and the Division of Leichhardt in the Australian Parliament.
The Port Essington expedition was one of the longest land exploration journeys in Australia, and a useful one in the discovery of excellent pastoral country!
