BATHURST IN THE 1830's

by an anonymous widow
From the Bathurst Times, 11 January 1902

THE GREAT DROUGHT

The cycle theory of the seasons, was of course, not known in Bathurst seventy years ago, but the same alternation of wet and dry spells, with runs of good seasons between was experienced then as now. The early thirties were in a rainy cycle, when grass flourished and man perished!

The prisoners working on the mountain road were housed in rough bark huts, very suitable for dry weather, but, as events proved, most disastrous to their inhabitants in long-continued rain. The protracted wet weather of the period of which we write, reduced the prisoners, especially in the Mount Victoria district, to great distress, and the mortality rate was very high. The Government doctor at Bathurst had a round, embracing the whole of the Cox River and Mount Victoria districts; and the Bathurst hospital was full to overflowing--as many as fifty patients being housed at a time; passages, wash-house, and the mortuary all being used as wards. The prevailing sickness gave a good many idle men the opportunity to sham sickness; and most amusing and ingenious were some of their devices. One man rolled up his trousers legs, and showed the medical officer a foot and ankle all the colours of the rainbow. The doctor said he should like tp see the leg above the knee, but the patient stoutly asserted that such was quite unnecessary, as his limb was perfectly healthy from the knee up. Eventually, force revealed a strap so tightly fitted round the leg as to be embedded in the flesh. It is needless to say he went to a less comfortable place than the hospital. so large was the death-rate that the making of coffins of the simplest sort was impossible, and mortal remains went to their last resting place between two sheets of bark.

The drought, which commenced in '37, stayed the unhealthy conditions caused by the wet seasons, but it brought its own troubles with it. One of the first of these was the breaking up of the Bathurst Carrying Company, an association of citizens and settlers who had purchased their own horses and drays, and organised a better system of carriage of goods from Sydney. At first the "Conveyance Company" thought to weather the drought, but the price and carriage of fodder, and the losses among the horses, necessitated its selling out. This was done, and the shareholders had to meet a considerable deficit. Many of them paid up with reluctance, looking upon the call as not only burdensome but unjust--ample evidence of their ignorance as to the responsibilities of public companies. The effect of the drought was to reduce the price of stock to almost nothing. Sheep went down from £2 to 4s. a head, and a number of settlers in the district, who had borrowed the money to buy large quantities at the former price, suffered greatly, may of them never being able to recover from the loss. Later, when most of the stock had died, prices rose--milch cows could not be had for money, and a resident gave £5 for a goat to provide milk for a young child. Food became scarce, and prices for all food stuffs went up to famine rates. Many of the settlers sought to send back their servants to the authorities, but were told that they had them in the times of plenty, and must keep them through the period of scarcity. Children suffered perhaps most of all, and it was the custom of people, visiting with their children, to carry their children's bread with them, knowing how small might be their friend's store. Most of the flour to be had was almost unfit for human use, and could not be baked into palatable bread. It was made from American wheat, which, thrown loosely into ship's holds, malted on the voyage, and at the end had to be washed before being sent to the mill. For three years not a shower of rain fell in Bathurst. Early in the '40s, however, the clouds, which had often gathered, but always dispersed without rain, brought copious torrents, which flooded the river, and turned the wilderness into a garden.