Today's Stories from our Past
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Today's Stories from our Past
E05 –Bound for South Australia – Charles Nantes and the Tragic Trek
Embark on a remarkable journey with us as we navigate little-known events in early South Australian history. Picture young Charles Nantes, in early 1830’s England, a man pursuing a fresh start away from the shadows of his father's scandalous legacy. In 1836, Charles boards the Africaine, bound for South Australia, alongside other colonists like Captain John Finley Duff and businessman John Hallett. We uncover the rich mosaic of dreams and ambitions that propelled these pioneers towards uncharted lands. Through personal diaries and firsthand accounts, we breathe life into the stories of those who dared to pioneer a new world.
Our exploration widens as we step onto the rugged terrain of Kangaroo Island, first sighted by Matthew Flinders in 1802. Imagine a place teeming with kangaroos yet devoid of First Nations people, offering a new start for European settlers. Encouraged by Captain Sutherland's report of fertile expanses and bountiful wildlife, Charles Nantes and five other young men begin a trek across Kangaroo Island. Experience the gritty trials of survival in a land of scarce resources and formidable landscapes through their eyes.
We shine a light on the controversies shadowing Sutherland's report—tales of conspiracy and tragedy involving the trekkers, Slater and Osborne, that demand further exploration.
Join us in illuminating the indomitable spirit of early explorers in their quest for discovery and survival is brought to life. These captivating stories, where history blends seamlessly with personal accounts and unsolved mysteries, offer a richer understanding of Australia’s past.
Contact us at todaysstories101@gmail.com.
Up to the time I write, nothing, unfortunately, has been heard of Dr Slater or Mr Osborne, except that the islanders had observed their track and followed it some considerable distance. One black woman was out 16 days without being able to discover them, so that there is not much doubt they must have perished. And what has become of their bodies I cannot think of without feelings of deep regret. G'day I'm.
Speaker 2:Peter and g'day I'm Peter and g'day I'm Greg. Welcome to Today's Stories from Our Past, a podcast about a history of Australia from about 1800 onwards. The story is told through the experiences of those who lived it.
Speaker 3:We'll tell you stories about Australia that you probably haven't heard before.
Speaker 2:This is the fifth episode in a season that we've called Bound for South Australia. If you haven't listened to this season from episode one, we'd suggest you stop listening now and go back to the beginning. In the last episode we discussed young Charles Nanty's backstory, his early life in England, or, more correctly, the story of his father, Henry William Nanties.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we discovered a lot about your great-great-great-grandfather. He was an entrepreneur, a slave trader, owner of slave ships which doubled as pirate ships and had plantations in the Caribbean. He was a massive bankrupt and an embezzler and he was on the run from the law and a bit of a womaniser. He had three wives and a child with another woman, but apart from all of that he was an all-round nice guy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, not so sure about that Anyhow. So young Charles Netties was the 11th of 13 surviving children. He must have known that he wasn't going to inherit a fortune. He must have also known that he would not be able to use his father's good name to gain employment. So what options were left for young?
Speaker 3:Charles.
Speaker 2:Charles was living with his family near Biddeford this is a port town in North Devon. His family near Biddeford. This is a port town in North Devon. In 1830 alone, 5,000 people waved farewell from ships leaving Biddeford for North America. Young Charles must have seen those ships leaving and thought that immigration would be his best, or possibly his only way for a successful life.
Speaker 3:Sounds reasonable. He must have heard about the proposals for a new colony in South Australia, so how did he get them?
Speaker 2:I'm not sure how this happened, but Charles got himself a position as the clerk to the first colonial secretary of the colony. By early 1836, Charles was worn one of the first migrant ships bound for South Australia. He was just 19 years old.
Speaker 3:Okay, where do we begin telling Charles' story?
Speaker 2:Well, just a quick recap of earlier episodes. Robert Goudia and others had lobbied for years to set up a new colony based on Edward Gibbon Wakefield's systematic colonisation principle. By early 1836, everything was ready for the various parties, the surveyors, the government officials, the company officials and the excited migrants to leave for South Australia. South Australia's first fleet consisted of nine ships. They set forth from England in staggered departures over a period of about five months. The earlier ships carried the surveyors who were to set out the new capital city, Adelaide. Other earlier ships carried government officials and the staff of the South Australian Company. Okay, which ship did Charles live on? Charles left on the Africaine, which was the seventh ship to leave. It left on 30 June 1836 from Gravesend in London. They were bound for Nepean Bay on the eastern end of KI, where it had been agreed that all of the first fleet ships would initially meet up.
Speaker 3:And who else was on the Afrikaan with Charles Nantes?
Speaker 2:Those on board included crew, landholders and their families and employees of those landholders. In total, there were 99 souls on board when they departed 20 officers and crew and 79 passengers. There were 49 passengers in steerage, including eight children and two babies. Steerage is below decks in a crowded, open bunk area. There were 17 in the intermediate cabins and 12 in the best cabins.
Speaker 3:I assume that you know who the passengers were.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of course I do. Some of those aboard included John Finley Duff. He was the ship's captain and later a businessman in the young colony. This voyage to KAI on the Africaine was his second voyage to Australia. Then there's John Hallett, a businessman, and his wife and four children. There were agricultural labourers that Hallett had employed, including John Bagg, richard Warren and others. There was Dr Everett, the ship's surgeon. Also, of course, there was Robert Gugia and his wife Harriet, who was in child, as they called being pregnant at the time. In addition to his clerk Charles Natties, gugia had employed several other servants who were also on board.
Speaker 2:As a bit of an aside, I found a book that had been written about the voyage of the Afrikaan. I don't know whether the author has any specific evidence or is just speculating, but she writes about those on board. She says there were boys like JM Skipper, nantes, osborne and Glidden, whose families sent them to the colonies to make their own fortunes. I don't know whether Charles Nantes was sent by his family or he made the decision to go himself. Either way, he was bound for South Australia.
Speaker 2:Another businessman on board was Robert Thomas. He was a Welsh newspaper proprietor. With Thomas was his wife, mary, three daughters and two sons. He also brought a printing press. His wife, mary, kept a detailed diary of the voyage to Australia and her later life in South Australia. It is a valuable source of information for this story. Several of Robert Thomas's staff were also on board. They included Robert Fisher, a journeyman printer Journeyman means that he was fully qualified and EW Osborne, as well as five others. Osborne was an apprentice printer who was brought out by Mr Thomas, under whose special care he was placed by his father. In a later section of Mary Thomas's diary, osborne is described as an East Indian half-caste.
Speaker 3:Well, that's quite a crowd. Anyway, did anything much happen on the journey to Australia?
Speaker 2:Well, not much, but there was another surgeon on board, an Irishman called Slater, who occupied an intermediate cabin near the Thomases and Dr Everards. Early in the voyage, Dr Slater was asked to consult with Dr Everard in the case of Mrs Gooja, who, in addition to being pregnant, had been seasick for 18 days straight. His suggestion was a swinging cot, and it worked like magic. So then in a couple of days the patient was enjoying herself on the deck. However, this professional interference apparently put Dr Everett's nose out of joint a bit Later, on 24 August, Dr Everett seems to have been of considerable help to the passengers when a suggestion was made by the captain that their allowance of water was to be reduced from three quarts a day to just one pint.
Speaker 2:Dr Everett believed that this was a scheme to avoid calling in at Cape Town. He stirred up the passengers to demand the full amount. Their process was successful, and on 21 September the ship put into Cape Town and stayed there for four days. On 5 September Dr Everett attended a passenger giving birth and thus brought the number on board to around 100. Now to come back to Dr Slater.
Speaker 4:Mary Thomas later said he was kind-hearted, of gentlemanly manners and sociable with his fellows, though prone to outbursts of temper. One day, in a fit of anger the cause of which is not stated, he shut himself up in his cabin with a loaded pistol, offering to shoot anyone who ventured to disturb him. A young man named Osborne, however, managed to calm the wild Irishman down and induced him to lay aside the weapon. Nor was this the only occasion on which Osborne was similarly successful in humouring him. The two soon became sworn friends. Osborne himself was an apprentice who was being brought out by Mr Thomas, under whose special care he was placed by his friends. He was not a pauper, as he had some 30 pounds with him when he left England, though, only a small sum was found in his desk later.
Speaker 3:Hang on. What's this about? Mary Thomas later stating something Subsequent to what.
Speaker 2:We'll get on to that soon enough. Now back to my ancestor. There is only one reference that I can find to Charles Nandy's during the trip. Arthur Glidden was just 15 when he set off alone for South Australia on the Africaine. Arthur left one letter written to his brother as the ship approached Cape Town. This long letter described some of his fellow passengers and also referred to his journal that had quote slipped down in the hold and was destroyed. It's a pity that journal hadn't survived as well.
Speaker 5:Young Arthur wrote at the end of his long letter this blot you see underneath was done by Mr Nantes, coming down from the deck very cold and beginning to take a little exercise by knocking his arms about, so that he hit my pen and made this said blot. We are beginning to rock so that I am hardly able to keep my seat and therefore shall conclude again with love to all dear friends. Believe me, dear brother yours ever affectionately, Arthur W Glidden.
Speaker 3:That's lovely, isn't? It Gives a picture of life on board the ship and you can just imagine the people there rocking around.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you often just get the cold hard facts of history. But here they're in the roaring forties, the ship's tossing about, it's freezing cold and Charles comes down from the deck. They're in a confined cabin and he bumps young Artie's pen as he's riding away.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's great. So how is the voyage progressing?
Speaker 2:They had an uneventful 133-day voyage and on 1 November 1836, they were off the northwest corner of KI, near Cape Border. Their destination was the eastern end of the island, just a short day sailing away. They had almost reached the end of their voyage. Mary Thomas made a detailed diary entry about this day.
Speaker 4:Here's what she wrote At about two o'clock this day, a party of six, including two of our young men engaged as printers, set off in a boat for the shore furnished with four days' provisions to walk across the island about 50 miles and meet the ship on the other side, whither we were going. At four o'clock we came within a mile of the shore and soundings were taken 26 fathoms and a fine gravelly bottom. The day was fine and the sea calm. The boat did not return till nearly nine o'clock in consequence of the passengers not being able for a long time to find a landing place on that side of the island.
Speaker 4:But when it began to grow dark, their prolonged stay excited alarm, especially as there were five gentlemen in the boat, three of them married, besides the mate of the vessel who went to see them safely on shore. At about eight o'clock, therefore, the captain ordered a gun to be fired and a light in the shrouds was hoisted as a signal and guide. The crew also gave three cheers, and the echo of the cannon and the cheers of the men resounded from the opposite shore and gave additional effect to the beauty of the scene, for although the moon had not risen, the evening was remarkably clear and serene and the stars glittered over our heads in millions At length, our fears were relieved by the flash and a report of a gun, and soon after another, and at last we discovered the boat approaching the vessel, with all those safe who meant to return and one of the adventurers whose heart failed him when they reached the unknown shore.
Speaker 3:So who were the one whose heart failed him and who were those that went ashore?
Speaker 2:The one who originally went onshore but then decided better of it and returned to the Afro-Ghane was Robert Gugia. Those who stayed there, the Trekkers, the young men mentioned by Mary Thomas, were my great-great-granddad Charles Nandies, just 19 years old, John Bagg, who was 18 years old, Richard Warren, age 32, Robert Fisher, age 21, and EW Osborne, age 19,. Mary's diary entry continues good.
Speaker 4:Their names were Slater, a surgeon. Osborne, a well-educated young man, apprenticed to Mr Thomas, as a printer. Fisher, engaged as a journeyman printer. Nantes, attached to Mr Gooja, the colonial secretary, and Warren and Biggs, engaged by Mr Hallett.
Speaker 4:We were naturally anxious and could not help feeling somewhat uneasy at their setting out on such a romantic expedition, especially on account of osborne, who was an amiable young man and a general favourite and whose father, residing in london, had consigned him to our care. They had agreed to take their guns, expecting to find some gain, and Osborne, having a double barrelled gun which was rather heavy, asked me to exchange it for the time for our single barrelled one, and I did so accordingly. He and Slater were sworn friends, and the latter having the gun in his hand just as they were going to step into the boat. I said to him, half in jest don't you lose that gun, mr Slater. Ah, madam, said he in his hasty way. He was an Irishman, I will lose my life first. Oh, I said I laughing. I did not mean that. I only intended to caution you against laying it down under bushes, where you might not find it again.
Speaker 3:Okay, it's interesting that you say they were fairly young, but I wonder who's the leader of the group? It doesn't seem obvious to me.
Speaker 2:We'll see in the next episode that Charles Netties claims that he was the leader of the group, but I really doubt that. Perhaps they really didn't need a leader. I mean, they'd been on the ship for 133 days, by which time they would have known each other well. They thought they were only a couple of days' walk away from their final destination. They were keen to get on with it, keen to get off the ship and go for a stroll, stretch their legs.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but how come they only thought it was a couple of days' walk to the eastern end of KI? What was KI like at that time?
Speaker 2:Well. Ki was first officially discovered by Europeans by Matthew Flinders in March 1802. Flinders later named the island Kangaroo Island due to the large number of kangaroos he encountered and eight. We'll discuss more about Flinders and his opinion of the island in a later episode. Prior to that, the island had had no recent human population. There were no First Nations people on KI. When the Europeans arrived after Flinders Importantly for this story, because there were no First Nations people there over a long period there'd been no cultural burning undertaken. This meant that the scrub was only occasionally reduced by lightning strike bushfires. By the mid-1820s the sealing, whale hunting and salt collection trades had begun and were at their height. Captain Sutherland's ship was one of those. We met Captain Sutherland in episode one.
Speaker 5:There she blows the white whale. We met Captain Sutherland in episode one.
Speaker 2:At the time that Captain Sutherland was on KI, the community living permanently there, known as Islanders, included about 30 European men, about 40 First Nations women and many children. The women had been abducted for lack of a better word from Van Diemen's Land or from the South Australian southern coast. This community was mainly based at the eastern end of KI. By the time that the Afrikaan arrived, that population had declined to about 10 men, including two young First Nations men and 16 First Nations women. Presumably the six trekkers were well and truly sick of being on board ship. They wanted to feel land beneath their feet again. Their decision to cross KI was largely based on the report done by Captain Sutherland, as we described in episode one.
Speaker 6:They had a copy of his report and the relevant section is as follows I had an opportunity of seeing much of the interior of the island, having crossed the country in company with two sealers who had been residents on the island for several years. The land wears every appearance of being fertile a deep loam with coarse grass abounding with kangaroos and emus. Where these animals feed, the grass is much better for pasture. Occasional ponds of rainwater are seen and a plentiful supply of pure spring water is always attainable by digging for it. The land here is as good as any I have seen in Van Diemen's Land In the neighbourhood of Sydney. I have not observed any equal to it.
Speaker 6:Trees are scattered everywhere over the plains. The swamp oak or beef wood and the wattle, both of which indicate good land, are growing in abundance here, close on the shore, within from a quarter to half a mile from the sea. The wood is very thick, but when this belt of wood is passed you come on to an open country covered with grass where there are often hundreds of acres without a tree. I calculated by comparison with New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land, there might be on this plain on the average three or four trees to an acre.
Speaker 6:I once crossed the island a distance of about sixty miles in two days. Once past the belt of wood which surrounds the island, we walked straight on and over the plains, found plenty of water in ponds, saw abundance of kangaroos and emus and met with no difficulty or trouble as we crossed the island. I looked to the right and left and saw everywhere the same open plains, now and then changed in appearance by close timber of great height on high points and ridges of land. In some places we found the grass very high and coarse in patches, but where the greatest number of kangaroos and emus were found the grass was short and close. In the other places, close, short grass was found between the coarse, high patches.
Speaker 3:So close to the shore, within from a quarter to half a mile from the sea. The wood is very thick, but when this belt of wood is passed you come onto open country covered in grass, where there are often hundreds of acres without a tree. This sounds like a trek to the other end of KO. It should be a walk in the park. How did it go?
Speaker 2:About eight months after the event, one of the trekkers, Robert Fisher, published his account of the trek in a newspaper that was published by Mr Thomas. His employer, Fisher, said that when they landed they were equipped with provisions sufficient for two days only and a bottle of rum each. You might remember that Mary Thomas said they had provisions for four days. Anyhow, Fisher said they carried firearms as they thought they would be easily able to provide themselves with fresh food. They seem to have had a compass. The following is from Fisher's account. It is his description of the day they landed.
Speaker 1:He wrote Day one, about three o'clock in the afternoon, we were put ashore in a boat with provisions enough to last us two days and six bottles of rum. After considerable difficulty, we effected a landing about seven o'clock and bivouacked about a mile from the shore under a thick bush. We agreed to take precautionary measures for the journey. Our guns and pistols were to be kept loaded and kept a regular watch during each night we might be out.
Speaker 2:Fisher says that they had guns and pistols. Not sure what the pistols were intended to be used for. Next day two.
Speaker 1:Fisher says we breakfasted at five o'clock and commenced our journey about six with a firm determination to make a good day's march. We travelled about four miles northeast, up one hill and down another, experiencing much inconvenience and making our way through prickly shrubs with which the hills abounded. It was so bad occasionally that our hands bled a good deal. We now began to think of the difficulty of our undertaking, more especially as we could not find any fresh water. We were all very thirsty and the sun was oppressively hot. We now altered our course to due north in the hopes of finding water, and in about an hour we discovered a stagnant pool in a valley, apparently unfit to drink, but we drank of it heartily and felt no ill effects.
Speaker 1:Parrots with plumage of the most beautiful and lively colours abounded in this valley. We shot seven to take to the ship in the hope of preserving them. We filled our empty bottles with water and took our course along the valley for about a mile. Having a small volume with us containing Captain Sutherland's report of an excursion into the interior of Kangaroo Island in the year 1819, we sat down upon stones and read sections about open plains. I have no hesitation in declaring that nearly the whole of Captain Sutherland's report is one mass of falsehood. Had we not had confidence in Captain Sutherland's report, we should not have been induced to go further into the interior, but have returned to the coast and made our way along its shores to Nepean Bay.
Speaker 3:Clearly, fisher thinks that the Sutherland report was fake news, as we described in episode one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he continues his account of day two.
Speaker 1:After leaving the valley, we altered our course and went about northeast in hopes of finding the tract of beautiful level country described by Sutherland. But the further we went, the more impenetrable did the scrub and brushwood appear. We were obliged to chop our way through with a small hatchet, which we fortunately had with us. It was now 12 o'clock and we sat down to dinner, drank our water and set off again, the brush and scrub continuing as thick as ever. We began to despair.
Speaker 1:In the midst of all these troubles, mr Osborne was taken seriously ill, declaring he could not proceed any further and that we might go on without him, which we refused to do.
Speaker 1:We fortunately found water in a spring and, having lighted a large fire, we cooked a little pork, mixed him some rum and water, laid him under a bush close to the fire and covered him well over. In two hours Mr Osborne was sufficiently recovered to proceed a few miles further. We still continued southeast over ankles in mud. We also crossed three beautiful streams of water, each at least 20 feet wide, the banks of one of them having a cascade formed of large slabs of marble or freestone, the water falling about four feet. The banks of one of the others was almost unapproachable for the tea tree In the neighbourhood of each of the rivers. The soil appeared to be of a sandy loam and contiguous to the bogs. It was a vegetable mould. We bivouacked for the night in some scrub on the side of the marsh, thickly planted with tall trees, in which were a great number of parrots and wild pigeons.
Speaker 3:This doesn't sound like the walk in the park that they were expecting, and young Oldsburn is having trouble keeping up what happens next we don't have time to include all of Fisher's detailed account.
Speaker 2:For day three, he describes the journey as hard, going Up and down valleys and across rivers and across marshes. They were starting to get quite exhausted, particularly Osborne. This is getting worse, yep, but there's more trouble to come. For day four, fisher describes more harsh scrub and marshes. They shot a black cockatoo and had it for dinner with some parrots.
Speaker 3:That doesn't sound very nourishing.
Speaker 2:No, and it only gets worse. Fisher continues his story. It's now day five.
Speaker 1:Day five, starvation day no breakfast, no water.
Speaker 1:We commenced this morning steering due south and, after travelling a few miles through thicket after thicket of brushwood, we came to one which, at the distance of every two or three yards, the person at the head of the party was obliged to fall behind and let the second one go first.
Speaker 1:We continued pushing and forcing our way for some distance until we were exhausted and compelled to sit down and rest ourselves in the midst of it for some time. We again proceeded and at last made our way through it. We then sat down and shared the seventh parrot shot, the first day amongst us, and at the summit of one of the hills still before us, we observed the sea and made our way for it, continuing to pass through brushwood and scrub, and made the coast about seven o'clock in the evening, which proved to be at the entrance of a saltwater creek running into Vivonne Bay. On the beach, which was rocky, we picked up several pints of periwinkles, filled our bottles with saltwater, returned to some sand hills at the side of the creek, lighted a fire, cooked them in a pannikin we fortunately had with us and made a hearty supper.
Speaker 3:Things really seem to be getting dire. I assume that there is no help in sight.
Speaker 2:No, this is Fish's account of the next day.
Speaker 1:We could not partake of any breakfast on account of excessive thirst caused by the prairie wrinkles eaten the night previous. Our hardships had now fairly commenced. We again made our way to the beach and travelled along the coast in the hopes of terminating our journey without going into the interior of the country. But our hopes were soon blasted, for after travelling about two miles, our progress was impeded by a heavy surf striking against immense cliffs at four or five hundred feet high. We were obliged to ascend there and did it at the risk of our lives, which we did not then consider of much value to us.
Speaker 1:When we reached the summit, we went inland in a north-easterly direction and travelled as usual through brushwood, over sand and stony hills etc. About the distance of 15 miles and observed in the distance, at the summit of a very high hill thickly studded with tall trees and scrub, a lagoon known to the islanders by the name of Snake Lagoon. We endeavoured to make our way to it but could not in consequence of the scrub not allowing us to proceed in the direction we required. It afterwards proved to be fresh water. We had not quenched our thirst for the last two days, nor tasted anything to eat today, with the exception of a seagull killed on the beach in the morning. The sun becoming excessively hot, we sat down under some bushes that afforded a little shelter.
Speaker 3:They obviously had hoped to continue along the coastline where they might have encountered a seal or someone.
Speaker 2:now that they are forced back into the scrub again, yes, and if you can believe it, now things get even worse. Fisher continues his account of that day.
Speaker 1:After resting about two hours, we travelled a short distance further when Mr Osborne was again taken ill, sat down and proposed to divide the party and leave Dr Slater and myself with him. This arrangement was not agreed to and we induced him in a short time to proceed. When we had travelled about two miles, we observed another lagoon, called by the islanders Morel's Lagoon, which we reached about seven o'clock. We here observed the footsteps of two persons, one without shoes and a dog. We skirted its left bank and heard a gunfire, which we supposed to be from the africane. At this time I left some periwinkles, bottles and sponge on the beach of the lagoon. Mr Osborne and Dr Slater said they would not proceed any further but requested the remainder of the party to go on in an endeavour to get on board the Africaine that night and send them some assistance in the morning, which we promised to do. We had travelled about an hour when it became dark without our observing the sea, and that we were obliged to halt for the night.
Speaker 3:So Osborne and Slater have been left behind in a pretty poor state. This is certainly no walk in the park. Things are looking very bleak.
Speaker 2:Very bleak indeed. Now, day seven Fisher describes going along the beach at Bay Destra. They shot two seagulls, immediately cut their throats and suck their blood. This is another day of struggle, the same for day eight, more tired trekking along the beach.
Speaker 3:They seem to be really struggling, and walking in sand is more tiring than firm ground. What's next?
Speaker 2:Day nine is another day of struggle. Next day ten, things get unbelievably bad for Charles Nantys. Now Fisher records.
Speaker 1:We travelled along the beach without shoes or stockings, they being entirely worn out, a short distance where, in a gully running down from the mountains, we found some fresh water, being the first we had drunk for five days. We then proceeded about five miles further and observed the shipping in the Pean Bay, but were obliged to go inland again, the rocks being too bold for us to pass. At about 11 o'clock we again made the beach. When Mr Nantes was taken ill. He lay down on the beach and desired us to proceed and send him assistance.
Speaker 3:So Charles can't go on, and he's left on the beach by himself.
Speaker 2:Yes, I wonder what he was thinking. Perhaps it was something along these lines.
Speaker 7:If only I could go on with the others. I hope that they find help soon, as I just can't take another step. Is this how I'm going to die? I'm too young to die. How did I get myself into this situation? I know who is to blame. Did not Mr Guja particularly wish Mr Osborne to go, While his real friends advised him to the contrary, and thus one life he's almost certainly sacrificed? Will I be next? Did not Mr Guja himself urge us to the expedition because he wished some information about the soil of the island? Did not Mr Guja be the first to urge such a mad-headed project and be the first to decline going? What did he really know? Was it not Mr Guja whose heart failed him when we reached that unknown shore? How did I ever get myself into this situation?
Speaker 2:Can I survive this? Charles was exhausted ill, unable to move. For the past eight days the group had struggled through thick scrub.
Speaker 3:They had long since run out of food and water, and all because of the fake news report. You're referring to Gouge's use of Captain Sutherland's report, and that report certainly was rubbish and has led to a lot of trouble for Paul Charles and his fellow trekkers. So what?
Speaker 2:happened next? Fisher continues his account of the trek. He had said that they saw shipping in Nepean Bay from the point where Charles Nannies was too weak to keep going. They might have thought that they were close, but the three remaining members of the party had to struggle to get to the place where the first migrants had camped. They almost drowned, crossing a river. When they eventually reached the settlement, the people there dispatched a boat for Charles, who they didn't find until the next day.
Speaker 1:Fisher concludes his account thus Up to the time I write, nothing, unfortunately, has been heard of Dr Slater or Mr Osborne, except that the islanders had observed their track and followed it some considerable distance. One black woman was out 16 days without being able to discover them, so that there is not much doubt they must have perished. And what has become of their bodies I cannot think of without feelings of deep regret.
Speaker 2:Nothing would ever be heard of Slater and Osborne. They perished somewhere on KI.
Speaker 3:But Charles survives.
Speaker 2:Yes, thankfully for me, While Charles and co were sailing in the Africane and then trekking across KI. Here's a few things that happened around the world. On 2 October 1836, as the Africane approached KI, the second voyage of HMS Beagle, with Charles Darwin aboard, ended at Falmouth in Cornwall. This was after five years of wandering around the world looking at all sorts of rocks and wildlife. At the age of 22, charles Darwin hoped to see the tropics. Before becoming a parson, he went to sea, and we all know what came out of that voyage.
Speaker 3:So what's your take from?
Speaker 2:all of this, charles survives. That's all that matters to me, which is just as well, as he is my great-great-grandfather and I wouldn't exist if he hadn't been found in time. But all this confirms in my mind that Sutherland's report was fake news, and it was the use of this report as a marketing tool by Guja that caused the deaths of Slater and Osborne.
Speaker 3:Were there any repercussions following the deaths of Slater and Osborne?
Speaker 2:Yes, we'll discuss the accusations and conspiracy theories that followed the trick in our next episode.
Speaker 3:Okay, well, thanks for listening, so it's goodbye from me, and it's goodbye from me, and it's goodbye from me, thank you.