PROSPEROUS book afterword: The lost history of Evandale 1821-1848: A pivotal time and place not just of VDL but of early Australia?

After researching, writing up, and also going to a lot of editing and formatting trouble to get this book published, I realised more clearly two related points. One was how ‘the forgotten story of Kennedy Murray’ was closely linked to and explained by the related sagas of: (a) the VDL government’s failure before 1848 to ‘gazette’ the evidently large town that had emerged over previous decades in the district known at that time as Morven [and to provide a formal town grid plan (as required policy at the time) for the emerging town that included a plan of allotments that could be bought and sold by the many local residents], and (b) how in the 1830s a significant emancipist village developed on Murray’s Prosperous farmland that grew even larger at the time of the similarly ‘covered-up’ and largely forgotten or ignored Evandale-Launceston Water Scheme (despite how this was in many ways – as has been recently ‘re-discovered’ -one of the great early projects of Colonial Australia.

The second related point that occurred to me (further discussed below) was that the ‘lost history of Evandale’ was not just a pivotal and foundational as well as exemplary part of early Tasmania history that has largely been lost until now. The VDL history of the ‘Arthurite period’ (including some years after Governor Arthur’s 1836 recall when ‘Arthurites’ such as John Montagu still dominated VDL governance) arguably includes other elements beyond the repressive Port Arthur-focused Convict Colony and the sad tale of the general ‘extinction’ of the indigenous Tasmanians (‘assisted’ also beyond the so-called ‘Black Wars’). Long before the end of convict transportation to NSW in 1840, the mantle of early Colonial Australia as ‘penal colony’ had generally shifted from Sydney to Hobart. This coincided with the appointment of Arthur to replace Sorell as the lieutenant-Governor of VDL with a related brief from the London Colonial Office in the wake of the Bigge Commission of Inquiry. That Inquiry had seen the 1821 recall of Governor Macquarie and an attempt to reverse many of his fair and enlightened policies (especially those relating to both the emancipists and what in chapter 11 we have referred to as the ‘Bunyip aristocracy’ in subsequent Australian history). Even the transition in NSW in the 1820s and 1830s to a ‘main focus’ rather on the pastoralist industries of a ‘wool-based economy’ was largely replicated in VDL over those two key decades. How this happened was pivotal to all that followed – especially in the northern VDL settlements centred largely on the emerging future Evandale district as well as the adjoining Norfolk Plains towns such as Longford and ‘central midlands’ towns such as Campbell Town to the South.

In other words, there is a case we think can be made that the ‘lost history of Evandale’ was also a pivotal time and place in early Australia generally – as well as more specifically in relation to early VDL history. Not just this, but it’s ‘lost history’ that can and should (we also think) be celebrated as well as remembered as an exemplary foundation of many later developments in largely ‘native-born’ modern Australian history and society. Kennedy Murray’s vision of a potential, sharable and fairer future ‘prosperity’ based on a meritocracy rather of ‘universal birthright’ as well as ‘hard work’ was largely built in those ‘lost decades’ on the potential of the emancipists that was earlier recognised and initially encouraged by Macquarie. This was before that ‘vision’ was then repressed, obstructed, and denied by the British Colonial office as well as a further emerging ‘bunyip aristocracy’ of entitled elites of mainly ‘English gentleman landowners’ given privileged treatment and benefits and other settler incentives (largely denied to the emancipists and other settlers as well as the indigenous inhabitants of the land). In VDL this elite continued to have the benefit of free convict labour as well as other privileged ‘settler incentives’ well after such benefits were increasingly ‘reined in’ by NSW governments from the mid 1820s.

Was the ‘lost history of Evandale’ (also known as the ‘town they forgot to gazette’ ) lost by design?

In the first VDL Census undertaken in 1842, ‘Morven’ was one of the larger towns in VDL. This was almost five years after the end of the ‘magnificent’ Evandale-Launceston Water Scheme (see chapter 6). This had been one of the great projects of early Colonial Australia (and indeed the British empire to that time) that also for perhaps related reasons became ‘lost VDL/Tasmanian history’ – likely not just by design but related reasons perhaps? In 1837 the future Evandale may well have been briefly bigger than Launceston in population with bustling local farming and government project activity that attracted many ‘roaming emancipists’ (plus ‘ticket-of-leave’ convicts) to the town. They had been drawn by opportunities linked to the Water Scheme as well as the servicing of one of the Colony’s most prominent agricultural as well as pastoralist areas at that time. Despite it being announced policy in 1834 to provide survey town plans and related ‘allotment grids’ to all emerging towns in VDL, this never happened at Evandale before or after the verifiable accelerated growth of the town in the mid-1830s.

So, unlike other emerging 19^th Century VDL towns at the time, Evandale never got a formal grid plan – and only partially did so much later on, long after it was ‘gazetted’ in retrospect in 1848. From 1821-1848 it (initially the emergent ‘Prosperous village’) really was the ‘town with no name’ by apparent ‘Arthurite’ design. [Ironically this is evidently one of the reasons that generally the original ‘historic Evandale village’ has largely and charmingly survived intact until today]. In 1834 it had been the center of both the ‘new Evandale Parish’ and the ‘new Morven police district’ – both linked to apparent efforts by Arthur to make the town and the wider Launceston districts (Cornwall County) related networked models of his Anglican Parish’ vestry plans for the 1836 VDL County system. The importance of Evandale in this scheme apparently lay in being a planned model to make ‘invisible’ any other emerging ‘emancipist towns’ in the future Tasmania. The impending 1837 VDL ‘Church Act’ (replicating that in NSW the previous year) made these related models largely redundant.

In this way there were a number of related historical controversies demonstrably as part of an apparent ‘coverup’ by the then VDL government – or at least by what some have called the ‘cabal’ of self-interested Arthurites dominating local as well as Colony-wide governance at the time that demonstrably involved the local ‘Morven magistracy’ (e.g. see chapters 6 and 11). This apparent cover-up  included (a) the ‘sham’ 1843 Evandale village plan at Blanchfield in the ‘middle of nowhere’ (one of the demonstrably inaccurate or even ‘false’ LIST maps still up on Tasmanian government websites still today), and (b) the 1843 ‘give away’ of the existing town centre ‘land lots’ (on which a number of businesses and land sales can be verified as being in existence before this)  to a new religious minister from the UK just ‘off the boat’ (i.e. the ‘Russell Street scandal’).

This book has thus retraced the missing local history before Evandale was ‘retrospectively gazetted in 1848’ with earlier scant histories of the town falsely suggesting that there was little or nothing really there before that time. As reported in this book, new evidence found has helped correct many other inaccurate historical accounts. In addition to how the town largely emerged mostly on Kennedy Murray’s Prosperous farmland (and partly on the adjoining farm hamlet also of his brother—in-law as well as neighbour George Collins) after 1821, this includes (a) how Kennedy Murray built one of the first rural schools in VDL c1830 (which Arthur is on record as having visited in 1834 and lauded then as a model for the colony), and (b) how the celebrated ‘Evandale Subscription Library’ of the 1840s was mainly a Murray family affair from the start (run from the Murray Anjou Villa School by his daughter Annie and son-in-law John Saffery Martin). Evidence was found to also correct a number of other historical controversies and lost ‘scandals’ including those involving surveyor explorer G.W. Evans, VDL Governor Arthur, the Launceston Water Scheme and a host of other characters including Church of Scotland minister Robert Russell,  the long-term leader of the ‘Morven magistracy’ James Cox of Clarendon, and the Scott brothers (Thomas and James) who were government surveyors for Northern VDL for almost half a century.

The book reported also on other relevant findings. Above all it tells the story of how Murray was invited to become the main long-term district policeman and Anglican foundation Warden to help deal with the ‘roaming emancipist’ problem in the colony that so worried the government, the Northern settlement magistrates, and many local communities. This was a big problem linked to the threat of lawlessness earlier associated with a spate of bushrangers in the late 1820s. As discussed earlier, Murray’s successful solution (which allowed Launceston to evade this ‘problem and also  the wealthier settlers to return from Launceston to live in a more peaceful northern midlands) involved the plan to allow the ‘roaming emancipists’ (and also many ticket of leave convicts) to live locally on his own lands whilst they found work, built cottages and raised families in a district with vibrant local pastoralism and farming.

Initially ‘everyone’ (from Arthur through to Launceston Police Magistrate Lyttleton and then on to local magistrates like Cox) seemed to be pretty happy about this solution. But they then appeared to baulk at how this had entailed giving hope, opportunity and recognition to emancipated convicts (and a place for them in the future colony) – the very elements encouraged by Macquarie recommended against by the Bigge inquiry. Hence the apparent cover up of the ‘lost history of Evandale’ along the lines of the related suppression of knowledge about the convict-built Water Scheme. As noted above, multi-disciplinary engineers recently investigating this have said it was a ‘magnificent’ effort which was on track for success that would have survived and transformed the area until the present day and well beyond.

As further discussed, a large Irish contingent of emancipists found refuge there under Murray’s supportive watch including (for several years) John ‘Red’ Kelly (Ned’s father) – who was personally assigned to Kennedy Murray in 1843. On the other hand, many other settlers came under Murray’s influence including close family friend painter John Glover who usually stayed at Murray’s Prosperous House on his regular trips to Evandale from Patterdale farm. As noted, it is believed by many (including local historian Karl Von Stieglitz) that he actually died in the original 1820 Prosperous cottage still hiding away today behind the 1836 mansion house version of Prosperous House (now known as Fallgrove) still standing today at 1 Logan Road, Evandale.

Evandale 1821-1848 – a pivotal time and place also in early Australia

Some of the later significance of the Norfolk Plains area of the early Northern VDL settlement(s) were anticipated by Governor Lachlan Macquarie on his ‘1811 VDL tour’ – which included a well-known stop at the Honeysuckle Banks military camp (close to the future Evandale town). With the NSW colony still to venture across the Blue Mountains at that point (and still struggling with food security because of the challenges of farming around Sydney at the time), Macquarie described the ‘very fine extensive rich Plains’ near the Honeysuckle Banks camp (12/12/1811 journal entry). He evidently thought this could be a key future ‘food bowl’ for an emerging larger and later Australia. He was perhaps mainly referring to the challenge of finding suitable cropping and horticulture rather than pastoral farmlands on which to grow foodstuffs as well as the crops (wheat, etc.) also used for brewing legal or even illegal alcohol.

Like other members of the early colonial government (and UK Colonial Office in London), Macquarie also underestimated both the farming limitations of the Australian soil (or ‘conditions’) and the future economic sustainability of the initially generous ‘30 acre grants’ (etc) which Macquarie (and also VDL governor Sorell) had made a better attempt to also make available to other emancipists (and not just the privileged elite at the time). This was as well as the remaining Norfolk Islanders when in c1811 he was trying to entice them to move to a new ‘Norfolk Plains’ home so that the first Norfolk Island settlement could be finally closed down completely. Meanwhile, to ensure the basic food security of the colony (i.e. meat, food and other supplies also distributed by the Commissary stores in NSW and VDL) Macquarie had to practice ‘realpolitik’ by offering potential settlers (from the UK and elsewhere in the British empire as well as the local ‘NSW Corps’) ‘larger than the regulation’ free land grants for pastoralist (i.e. for wool as well as meat production from sheep and cattle mainly) as well as possible cropping or horticultural purposes.

So it was that Norfolk Plains and adjoining areas were prime spots used by  Macquarie to entice and further reward such settlers with the (administrative and/or farming) knowledge and/or financial resources to ensure other Colony (as well as Launceston) commissary stores had adequate food supplies to distribute to emancipist and incoming free settlers as well as convicts. Two early Norfolk Plains beneficiaries of this who initially worked in the Sydney commissary (becoming close friends there) were Thomas Acher and James Cox – with Cox later becoming an influential ‘Morven magistrate’ and wealthy pastoralist in the future Evandale).

Then there were the retiring naval and military officers that were seeking a semi-retirement option (away from the cold climate and other challenges of the UK) of ‘farming’ on fertile productive lands thought to resemble ‘English conditions’ in the new emerging Australian colony. One of the first of these was the Kennedy Murray mentor and neighbour Captain Andrew Barclay. In similar fashion to Archer and Cox, Barclay was a very capable ‘semi-retired’ Scottish seafarer (formerly a British navy captain) who became one of the wealthiest and larger VDL farming landowners after demonstrating he had the organisational and farming skills to single-handedly make an important contribution to the Launceston commissary. Within a few years (partly due to G.W. Evans’ 1822 book with a key focus on the attractions of farming land in VDL) the then Morven districts of the future Evandale and adjoining areas had attracted an influx of wealthy and/or experienced settlers with past links to the UK or East India Company military forces (etc) typically given generous free land grants at that point. Some other such settlers to the district included Major MacLeod, Captain MacDonald, Captain Crear and Lt. Rose.

This is background to help explain why the Evandale districts in particular (as well as other adjacent Norfolk Plains areas such as Longford) tended to attract a ‘better quality’ (i.e. often more industrious and educated as well ‘influential’) settler to the Northern VDL settlements before and after the 1820s (e.g. the Ralstons and Camerons as well as MacLeods). Not only this, but many of these settlers quickly became influential in the early Australian Colony more widely in setting new standards of quality homestead and cottage construction as well as of ‘fine wool production’ from the merino flocks that had come from NSW. It was a number of the settlers in the early ‘Morven and adjoining districts’ who made up the core group of the Port Philip Association famed for ‘founding’ Melbourne – John Batman, Anthony Cottrell, John Helder Wedge and John Sinclair in particular.

After MacArthur sent some of his merino sheep to VDL in 1820, by the 1830s the very key VDL landowners (especially in the Evandale and adjoining districts) who continued to personally benefit from other generous ‘assistance’ (such as free convict labour) were able to directly benefit financially also from the growing wool exports to the UK. It is known that by 1828 there were around 700,000 sheep in VDL. From that time until the present day, Tasmanian midland wool-growers have been known not just for the quality of their ‘fine wool’ production – but their further related breeding innovations which saw VDL an earlier exporter of sheep to the emerging settlements of Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia.

But for present purposes, perhaps the main reason why the ‘lost history of Evandale 1821-1848’ was a pivotal time and place in the emerging Colonies (i.e. that has been a ‘lost history’ forgotten, largely repressed and partially ‘covered up’ in the history of early Australia) relates to the growing ‘roaming emancipist’ problem faced by the VDL. This was not just somewhat exemplary and unique at the time because of Governor Arthur’s repressive penal colony policies. It was also exemplary because of the particular restraints of both VDL as an emerging economy and society on one hand, and as a small island. VDL compared to a ‘post 1813 NSW’ which did provide for the same kind of work and dispersal opportunities for the convicts after they had served or had been otherwise released from their initial transportation sentences.

As discussed earlier, the central background to the problem is that VDL emancipists in the late 1820s onwards typically wanted to get as far away from Arthur’s Hobart as possible whilst also seeking out the limited work and living opportunities on the island colony. Few had the means to leave the Colony if they could even get the approval to do so. And those that made it up North as ‘homeless itinerants’ were generally ‘discouraged’ from entering the emerging Launceston or any other established town settlements (e.g. they were being pushed out of Norfolk Plains at the time Murray was persuaded to become a police constable of the then Morven district).

No wonder then that there was a related ‘bushranger’ problem particularly bad in these areas at that time – the main reason why many influential ‘Northern’ pastoralist magistrates (especially those owning land at Evandale at that time including Barclay and Cox) were keen for Kennedy Murray to help solve ‘the problem’. The related story of the Kennedy Murray solution to the roaming emancipist problem did not just involve (a) his several decades as ‘the’ main District Constable of the district from c1831 until mid-1854 and (b) and his solution to allow the roaming emancipists coming into the district at the time to live and settle on his own farmland whilst they looked for and worked in local farming and other jobs (after being turned away from the Norfolk Plains town as well as Launceston).

It arguably involved something even more exemplary – an extension of Murray’s inclusive and shared vision of ‘prosperity’ that evoked the repressed and lost memory of Macquarie’s related vision of a future Australia built on the hopes and efforts (as well as work) of the early emancipists of Australia as ‘penal colony’.  As mentioned earlier, Russel Ward has influentially written of how what he called the ‘Australian legend’ (i.e. the ‘fair, egalitarian and emerging middle class values’ as well as ironic ethos of the ‘archetypal Australian’) developed outside ‘the colonial capitals’ in the goldfields of Victoria and also NSW from the 1850s onwards. However, the key ingredients of this distinctive ethos had begun to form, to emerge, and to further develop (across diverse situations and changing times right up until the present day) much earlier in many rural communities in NSW and VDL) (that also included less wealth incoming settlers as well as emancipists). But this was perhaps nowhere so in early Australia in more pivotal, foundational and exemplary terms than in the emerging Evandale town and its extended and adjoining districts.

There are two relevant points about this that help reinforce our argument that Kennedy Murray’s Prosperous town (later retrospectively named Evandale in 1848) – largely consisting of an emancipist village ‘covered-up’ as well as ‘obstructed’ by the 1830s ‘Arthurite’ VDL governments – can be seen as an at least exemplary (and in some ways pivotal) time and place of ‘lost history’ from early Australia. One is that on top of the critical factor of the Prosperous/Evandale solution to the ‘roaming emancipist’ problem in VDL at the time, the Morven and adjacent districts (of the Launceston ‘emancipist wall’ on the road up from Hobart) were at this time perhaps the most concentrated locations and related communities  in all of early Australia in terms of both ‘intense farming’ (including both pastoralism and horticulture/cropping) as well as related rural communities largely made up of emancipist workers. The second (on top of the first) is that in c1853 Evandale was also an epicentre of the ‘great departure’ (of mainly emancipist VDL settlers) from the soon-to-be Tasmania to the Victorian goldfields especially.

It is generally recognised but often forgotten (within related discussions about the end of convict transportation to VDL and the name change to ‘Tasmania’) that around a third of the VDL population ‘decamped’ from the Colony around that time. The fact that the VDL government had generally ‘refused’ to recognise, gazette and basically allow the local emancipists to formally settle in the town until that time (although many did so ‘informally’) also served to ‘decimate’ the town of Evandale at this time. As discussed in chapter 9, this had particular implications for Kennedy Murray and his family as well as the town and district more generally.

In sum then, we think that readers of this book should have no problem recognising that Karl Von Stieglitz’’s 1967 book History of Evandale (which basically starts from 1848 [or really c1853] and generally ignores or is blind to most of what really happened around that time as well as before) has generally left out the ‘lost history of Evandale 1821-1848’. This is on par also with many early histories of VDL that were similarly unaware of the town’s early size and pivotal roles in the Northern settlements, or the significance and scale of the Evandale-Launceston Water Scheme in particular. Recovering the lost story of Kennedy Murray in the founding and early development of the town has also helped us (and the book) generally ‘recover’ the main outlines and related details of the lost history of the early town and its initial origins. This has been a project which should also be recognised as significant because of how Tasmanian tourism rightfully promotes Evandale as a significant historic town – as well as impressive ‘Georgian village’ of early Australia

In some ways then, the 1830s were a golden age in Tasmania that was in  significant ways also pivotal, foundational and exemplary in the early emerging ‘Australia’. This was a ‘lost’ or rather forgotten time that has never been adequately recognised or (more to the point) appropriately celebrated. Any relevant recognition of the lost early history of Evandale would of course need to effectively recognise also the forgotten story of Kennedy Murray (as well as those of others like his brother-in-law George Collins and his own other brother-in-law David Gibson). Murray was not just the town’s main founder but also the main ‘community-builder’ up until and after the 1850s (especially 1853 – when so many Evandale residents also departed for the Victorian goldfields). In this way, then, the recovered early history of Evandale (along with the related ‘story of Kennedy Murray’) together as well as distinctly represent great ‘untold stories’ of early Australia. We have hopefully played our part in helping to recover and remember these well beyond the initial ‘family history’ focus of our related inquiries – also in terms of their exemplary connections to a pivotal time and place in the emerging Australian history and society.