Edward Armitage

I was assisted in this by the study of vocabularies compiled by a[illegible] Curr, John Mathews, Rev. W. Ridley Constance Petrie, John Allen, [illegible] Enid Bell, E. Armitage , and E.M. Hanlon. - USC11_0001
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Apart for my own experiences, which include a two-month stay
on the island eight months ago, I am indebted to many source for
data for these notes, including Captain Cook's and Matthew Flinder's
journals. "Tom Petrie's Reminiscenes" by Constance Petrie (1904),
"Genesis of Queensland" by John Stuart Russell (1888), the Oxley
Library and that at Newstead House, Dr. J. H. Bendich, Foresters Allom,
Markwell and Whale and others, including that grand old nona genarian
pioneer, the late Captain Ned Armitage of Maryborough and his son,
Norman. -USC60_0001
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A few additional notes given to Forester Whale by Bill Seelke
in July 1994, about timber men and their operations are worth quoting
here. Bill Seelke went to the island in 1902, when 22 years of age,
and claimed he was the first to haul Tallowwood to Urang dump. Royalty
was then 5d. and 6. per 100 super feet mill measure. Puntmen were
Armitage, Hans Hansen, Jack Blue, Mat and Christie Mathiesen, Bertle
Sudstrupt and C. A. Berthlesen. -USC60_0012
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Early in this century Ned Armitage landed iron telephone poles
at Wathumba and replaced the old wooden ones which had carried an
eight guage plain wire to the lighthouse. -USC60_0016
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My own father started punting timber
from Fraser Island around about 1908 or 1910. He used to punt [two words crossed out and handwritten words inserted above them: timber for]
Edward Armitage. Mr. Armitage had a little steamer called the "GERALDINE".
He used to tow a barge and a pontoon. The pontoon was very flat, like a
ferry punt. They used to put the logs into the barge and they used to tow
it up the river, four or five times a month. Sometimes they did five trips
a month. He would take one trip to Harts and one trip to Hynes. -USC179_0003
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John He used to punt timber for ...
S.J. xxxxxx Armitage?
John Edward Armitage?
S.J. Yes. Armitage had a little steamer called the "Geraldine".
-USC184_0001
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My own father started punting timber from Fraser Island
around about 1908 or 1910. He used to punt timber for
Edward Armitage.

Mr. Armitage had a little steamer called the "GERALDINE".
He used to tow a barge and a pontoon. The pontoon was very
flat, like a ferry punt. They used to put the logs into the
barge and they used to tow it up the river, four or five times a
month.
-USC295_0005
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SKIPPER ARMITAGE - AN ISLAND LEGEND

In this first part of a two part feature on Edward E. Armitage MOONBI endeavours to provide the background
to one of the more articulate Fraser Island pioneers - a man with almost fifty years of association with Fraser
Island.

MOONBI is indebted to Gerrald Patterson of Brisbane who has provided F.I.D.O. with copies of the papers of
this remarkable character. Most of the biographical background in MOONBI is drawn from "Reminiscences of
a Queensland Pioneer" - a 32 page biography by the "Skipper" published in 1926. The other recollections and
anecdotes come from Rollo Petrie who knew the "Skipper" well and whose family relied on "Skipper"
Armitage to bring them fresh meat whenever he could.

[left column]
Edward E. Armitage was born in Dublin 9th June
1848 and moved with his family to Melbourne in the
Gold Rush arriving in 1852 as a four year old.

In his early teens he saw a meteor fall in
Dandenong Road, Melbourne, which "was a lump
of nearly pure iron, weight 6 tons...3 1/2 feet long and
2 1/2 feet in diameter."

In 1864 (then 16) he followed his brother to
Maryborough "where there were 200-300 people
comprising timbergetters."

"Reminiscences of a Queensland Pioneer"
His biography records:

TIMBER GETTING
"On arriving in Maryborough I joined a party of
timber getters of whom my brother was now
the leading spirit. The timber then grew in the
virgin scrubs and forests on the banks of the
rivers and creeks, the haulage being so short
that only snigging chains and block-wheel
trollies were needed. I once cut a pine tree
mast for a vessel not far from where Walkers
Ltd. stands now. It was all scrub then. No one
dreamed even of roads or bridges, let alone
railways. The wild primeval bush was
everywhere, and we went where we liked,
camped where we liked, worked at anything
that would give a living. Lonely pioneers
generally welcomed a new face as a sign of
growing and improving settlement."

The next three years were lean years while young
Armitage humped his bluey from station to station
looking for work "at any wages" but then in 1867
the lad who arrived in Australia during the
Victorian gold rushes saw another Gold Rush at
Gympie. He resisted the temptations of the fields
and continued a series of outback adventures
incluing an encounter with Queensland's only
real bush ranger "The Wild Scotsman" and a duel
with a tribal aborigine at Graham's Creek (near
Maryborough). He survived the latter with a narrow
escape from death and was subsequently
honoured by being accepted as a "Bunda", white
member of the Wide Bay Tribe. It was this status as
a "Bunda" which enabled Armitage to establish
such a close bond with and understanding of
aboriginal culture in the Maryborough-Fraser Island area.

In 1874 after further wanderings including work in
Cardwel rain forests where he contracted Malaria,
Armitage returned to Maryborough to join in
Cedar and Pine logging on Mt. Bopple and along
the Mary River. He records -

[right column]
" A dry season prevented my getting any down
to market the first year (1874), but the next year
more than made up for it. A big flood came in
February. I had then over 2,000 logs in the river,
the flood carried many of them down the river
as far as the sea, but most of them were washed
up on to the farms and into the scrubs along
the river, and gave me five months' extra work
with a party of three men and a team of
bullocks to get them hauled back into the river
and down to the sawmills."

Then 26 years old, Armitage married. Although he
continued to travel he was based more
permanently in Maryborough. He became
manager of a sawmill at Mungar, at $3 per week
which employed 62 men. He reorganised the mill
but some of the re-organisation included
construction of a railway. This was several years
before the Queensland Government started the
railway line between Maryborough and Gympie in
1879 which ultimately led to the closure of the
Mungar sawmill.

Armitage noted:-

"Mr. William Sim, the local head of Pettigrew
and Coy's mills at Dundathu, had already
shown that a very cheap line of wooden rails
could be usefully employed for the carriage of
log-timber in places where team haulage was
too costly either by reason of distance or for
want of "grass to feed teams."

He built a wooden railway at Tin Can Bay. "The
Cooloola Tramway" about nine miles long, used a
light locomotive to haul the log timber trucks and
made a marked success of it. (Sims) was
unfortunately killed by an accident on his own
railway in 1874."

The success of Armitage's engineering was
acknowledged in 1928 when he wrote of the
locomotive steam engine he constructed:

"It is still running, though it is 43 years since it
was built. It has for many years past been
working as a winding engine in Hyne and Son's
sawmills in Maryborough, and does all the
hauling up and down between the mill and
shipping wharf. (hauling in the logs punted
from Fraser Island)."

Having left the sawmill he went into contracting
business whish led him to build a telephone line
from Bogimbah to Sandy Cape Lighthouse
1885. He comments on this chapter of his life
which brought him into contact with Fraser Island
as follows:

MOONBI 43 Pa
-USC295_0011
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hospital several days before regaining
consciousness. His first words were how sore
his legs were. "Its your head that is sore", he was
told.

However, on examination it was found that the
calves of both legs were badly burned. He had
been laid across a hot steam pipe on deck of the
boat which had brought him to hospital several
days earlier. It was not a very good
recommendation hospital staff!!

After his recovery Skipper had a stiff neck. His
head was permanently turned to one side. he had
to turn his body to look round one way.

Skipper would frequently go up to the scrub on the
tram to check on work there. On a previous trip he
had instructed "Alf Jarvis" the native (loco driver)
to remove a Banksia branch from over the track as
it was getting close to the chimney stack. About
two years after the accident which twisted his neck
the branch was still there. The quick tempered
Skipper grabbed an axe, called Jarvis to steady
down, climbed up on the tender and made a swipe
at the branch. However he lost his footing and he
speared head-first over the side, hitting his head
on the end of a railway sleeper. He had another trip
to Maryborough Hospital, stll unconscious, with
some people worried that the old warrior might
never recover. Some time later he was alright
again, but truth is stranger than fiction - his neck
returned to normal and remained so.

Skipper had all but one of his own teeth until death
in the late 90's; he never used a toothbrush, but
always rinsed his teeth after eating anything.

Another time in Maryborough, while Skipper was
walking down the street, he heard yells - looked
back to see a horse in sulky bolting down the
street, a woman and baby aboard. Skipper raced
out into the street and started running in the
direction the horse was travelling. As it passed him
he threw himself on to its head and neck, pulling
the horse to a standstill in the process. The sulky
shaft had pierced his coat from the side and was
poking out through his chest - or seemed to be.
One woman fainted. However the shaft had only
gone under his arm.

Skipper was helping or conducting, I am not sure
which, a survey of part of the Island. The usual set
up of those days was - camp, men, camp cook, e[??]
[??] no going home each night).
-USC295_0012
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