“Chinkie's Flat,” In its decadence, was generally spoken of, by the
passing traveller, as a “God-forsaken hole,” and it certainly did
present a repellent appearance when seen for the first time, gasping
under the torrid rays of a North Queensland sun, which had dried up
every green thing except the silver-leaved ironbarks, and the long,
sinuous line of she-oaks which denoted the course of Connolly's Creek on
which it stood.
“The township” was one of the usual Queensland mining type, a dozen
or so of bark-roofed humpies, a public-house with the title of “The
Digger's Best,” a blacksmith's forge, and a quartz-crushing battery.
The battery at Chinkie's Flat stood apart from the “township” on a
little rise overlooking the yellow sands of Connolly's Creek, from
whence it derived its water supply--when there happened to be any water
in that part of the creek. The building which covered the antiquated
five-stamper battery, boiler, engine, and tanks, was merely a huge roof
of bark supported on untrimmed posts of brigalow and swamp gum, but rude
as was the structure, the miners at Chinkie's Flat, and other camps in
the vicinity, had once been distinctly proud of their battery, which
possessed the high-sounding title of “The Ever Victorious,” and had
achieved fame by having in the “good times” of the Flat yielded a
certain Peter Finnerty two thousand ounces of gold from a hundred tons
of alluvial. The then owner of the battery was an intelligent, but
bibulous ex-marine engineer, who had served with Gordon in China,
and when he erected the structure he formally christened it “The Ever
Victorious,” in memory of Gordon's army, which stamped out the Taeping
rebellion.
The first crushing put through was Finnerty's, and when the “clean-up”
was over, and the hundreds of silvery balls of amalgam placed in the
retorts turned out over one hundred and sixty-six pounds' weight
of bright yellow gold, Chinkie's Flat went wild with excitement and
spirituous refreshment.
In less than three months there were over five hundred diggers on the
field, and the “Ever Victorious” banged and pounded away night and day,
the rattle and clang of the stamps only ceasing at midnight on Saturday,
and remaining silent till midnight on Sunday, the Sabbath being devoted
“to cleaning-up,” retorting the amalgam, and overhauling and repairing
the machinery, and for relaxation, organising riding parties of twenty
or thirty, and chasing Chinamen, of whom there were over three hundred
within a radius of twenty miles.
The rich alluvial of Chinkie's Flat had, as a matter of fact, been first
discovered by a number of Chinese diggers, who were each getting from
five to ten ounces of gold per day, when they were discovered by the
aforesaid Peter Finnerty, who was out prospecting with a couple of
mates. Their indignation that a lot of heathen “Chows” should be
scooping up gold so easily, while they, Christians and legitimate
miners, should be toiling over the barren ridges day after day without
striking anything, was so great that for the moment, as they sat on
their horses and viewed the swarming Chinese working their cradles
on the bank of the creek, the power of speech deserted them. Hastily
turning their tired horses' heads, they rode as hard as they could to
the nearest mining camp, and on the following day thirty hairy-faced
foreign-devils came charging into the Chinese camp, uttering fearful
threats, and shooting right and left (with blank cartridges). The
Chinese broke and fled, and in half an hour each of the thirty men
had pegged out a claim, and Chinkie's Flat became famous as one of the
richest, though smallest, alluvial diggings in the Far North.
Three months after the “discovery” of the field by Mr. Peter Finnerty,
old “Taeping,” as Gordon's ex-marine engineer had been promptly
nicknamed, arrived with his crushing battery, and then indeed were
halcyon days for the Flat. From early morn till long past midnight, the
little bar of the “Digger's Best” was crowded with diggers, packhorsemen
and teamsters; a police trooper arrived and fixed his tent on the ridge
overlooking the creek, and then--the very zenith of prosperity--a bank
official followed, and a stately building, composed of a dozen sheets of
bark for a roof, and floor sacks for the sides, was erected and opened
for business on the same day, amid much rejoicing and a large amount
of liquid refreshment dispensed by the landlord of the “hotel” at a
shilling per nobbler.
For six months longer all went well: more alluvial patches were
discovered in the surrounding country, and then several rich reefs were
found a mile away from the Flat, and every day new men arrived from
Cooktown to the north, and Brisbane, Sydney, and far New Zealand to the
south. Three new “hotels” sprang up; the police force was increased by
another trooper and two black trackers, who rode superciliously around
the camp, carbines on thighs, in their dark blue uniforms with scarlet
facings, and condescended to drink with even the humblest white man; and
then came the added glory of the “Chinkie's Flat Gold Escort”--when a
police van with an Irish sergeant, two white troopers, and eight black
police rattled through the camp, and pulled up at the bank, which now
had a corrugated iron roof, a proper door, and two windows, and (the
manager's own private property) a tin shower bath suspended by a cord
under the verandah, a seltzogene, and a hen with seven chickens. The
manager himself was a young sporting gentleman of parts, and his efforts
to provide Sunday recreation for his clients were duly appreciated--he
was secretary of the Chinkie's Flat Racing Club (meeting every alternate
Sunday), and he and old “Taeping” between them owned a dozen of kangaroo
dogs, which lived on the community generally, and afforded much exciting
sport every Saturday, either in hunting kangaroos or Chinamen, both of
which were plentiful in the vicinity.
For although Peter Finnerty and his party had succeeded in driving away
the heathen from the Flat itself, the continued further discoveries of
rich alluvial had brought them swarming into the district from all the
other gold-fields in the colony in such numbers that it was impossible
to keep the almond-eyed mining locusts out, especially as the Government
was disposed to give them a measure of protection--not from any
unnatural sentiment, but purely because they were revenue producers, and
the Government badly wanted money. Then, too, their camps were so large,
and so many of them were armed, and disposed to fight when in a corner,
that the breaking up of a “Chows' Camp” became more and more difficult,
and in the end the white diggers had to be content with surprising
outlying prospecting parties, chasing them with kangaroo dogs back to
their main camp, and burning their huts and mining gear, after first
making a careful search for gold, concealed under the earthen floor, or
among their ill-smelling personal effects. Sometimes they were rewarded,
sometimes not, but in either case they were satisfied that they were
doing their duty to Queensland and themselves by harrying the heathen
who raged so furiously, and were robbing the country of its gold.
Then, after old “Taeping” had succumbed to too much “Digger's Rest,” and
Finnerty--now Peter Grattan Finnerty, Esq., Member of the Legislative
Assembly of Queensland--had left the Flat and become the champion of the
“struggling white miner” in the House at a salary of £300 a year, came
bad times, for the alluvial became worked out; and in parties of twos
and threes the old hands began to leave, heading westward across the
arid desert towards the Gilbert and the Etheridge Rivers, dying of
thirst or under the spears of the blacks by the way, but ever heedless
of what was before when the allurements and potentialities of a new
field lay beyond the shimmering haze of the sandy horizon.
Then, as the miners left, the few “cockatoo” settlers followed them,
or shifted in nearer to the town on the sea-coast with their horse and
bullock teams, and an ominous silence began to fall upon the Flat when
the tinkle of the cattle bells no longer was heard among the dark fringe
of sighing she-oaks bordering the creek. As day by day the quietude
deepened, the parrots and pheasants and squatter pigeons flew in and
about the Leichhardt trees at the foot of the bluff, and wild duck at
dusk came splashing into the battery dam, for there was now no one who
cared to shoot them; the merry-faced, rollicking, horse-racing young
bank manager and his baying pack of gaunt kangaroo dogs had vanished
with the rest; and then came the day when but eight men remained--seven
being old hands, and the eighth a stranger, who, with a blackboy, had
arrived the previous evening.
And had it not been for the coming of the stranger, Chinkie's Flat
would, in a few weeks, have been left to solitude, and reported to the
Gold-fields Warden as “abandoned and duffered out.”