 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
surveyed on his behalf for a fee of £7, and it is possible that the original form was filled in by the
surveyor involved. Certainly William's written name at the top is not the same as his signature
elsewhere.
His request was considered by a meeting of the Local Land Board in Echuca on 9 October
1873, and it was 'recommended that this application be granted, 2 months allowed to remove
fence.'
What fence? Had it been put up by a previous claimant? Possibly by a neighbouring farmer? Or
by William himself? Whatever the reason, William's original selection was soon reduced in size.
Early in December he received a printed reply, with relevant details written in, from the Office of
Lands and Survey in Melbourne. It was sent to the post office at Highton.
It said: 'Sir, referring to your application under Section 19 of The Land Act_1869,1 have to
notify to you that (subject to such alteration of boundaries and area as may be required, prior to
the issue of the license) the Honourable the Minister of Lands and Agriculture will recommend
the issue to you by the Governor of a License to occupy the land specified in the margin here' -
(320 acres). 'You are required to pay, within one month from the date hereof, to the Land
Officer at Echuca the following sums, viz: % Year's rent in advance commencing from the date
of this notice... £16. Fee for preparation of license... £1... The receipt of the officer to whom
such payment is made will be sufficient authority for you to enter upon occupation of the land
pending issue of the license, which will be dated 5th Deer 1873... If payment be not made as
above, your application will be deemed to be abandoned, and the land will be available for
other applicants.'
115
The new land they had all chosen to farm was at Torrumbarry, west of Echuca, close to
Victoria's irregular border with New South Wales, which followed the winding course of the
westward-flowing and muddy Murray River.
What did Lawrence Mountjoy, his nephew, brother-in-law and father-in-law find when they
and a farmhand or two drove out of Echuca by horse and cart to claim their selections? The
land here was flat, a plain. There were no rolling, agreeable hills. It was nothing like the
countryside around Geelong.
The early history of Echuca is an unusually romantic one for a Victorian outback town. Mining
was never a disfiguring part of its fame nor made its fortune, which was gleaned from the
Murray River, from the sheep that grazed and the wheat that grew on its banks, from the forests
of red gum trees thereabouts that were hewn for their timber, and from the commercial double
boon of railways and riverboats. The river drew the first white men into this wilderness, and at
Echuca, on the river's southernmost bend, the first huts that were homes were built. But the
process was slow, not a rush as in gold-mine towns.
It was Captain James Sturt and a boatload of men who first passed down the river in 1829. The
year before this, in November, he had set out down the Macquarie River to solve the mystery
of the inland sea that was supposed to exist somewhere in central Australia. For all the rivers so
far discovered in New South Wales beyond the Great Dividing Range flowed west or
northwest, away from the coast. On this expedition Sturt came across and named the minor
Bogan, Castlereagh and Darling Rivers, but not their eventual mighty outlet.
A year later he embarked on what became an epic journey, in a whaleboat rowed by soldiers
and convicts, that took him far down the Murrumbidgee River to its junction with another great
 |