William Robert Dickinson (Bill) was one of Bermagui’s great benefactors over the fifteen years he resided in the town. He hailed from the NSW Southern Highlands where his

father, S Dickinson, built a country estate and residence in 1886.

Bill Dickinson was a regular visitor to Narooma and in 1934, because of poor weather, and seeking a change from fishing, visited Bermagui for the first time. It was love at first sight.

On that one day here, he is supposed to have noted that the cemetery contained an unusually high proportion of very elderly people, so Bermagui must be a healthy place to live. The following year, 1935, he installed himself in the Horshoe Bay Hotel which became his home for the next 15 years until his death in 1950.

Bill Dickinson was a refined gentleman of obviously independent means, was a Batchelor and philanthropist and owned several prime lots of land in Bermagui.

Two such blocks in the names of his nephews, Sam and Pat Osborne, were donated to erect the Horshoe Bay Retirement units at 5 Montague Street. In the crowded 15 years, he funded wholly or partially a number of civil projects to beautify Bermagui and to provide facilities for the residents.

His use of local labour in depressed times is still recognised and applauded by the older residents.

Bermagui Historical Society

His projects included:

• Dickinson Avenue
• Dickinson Memorial Cup. It was competed for at the annual gymkhana held on the Dickinson oval on Easter Monday.
• Blue Pool. 1937-1939. Bill initiated the project to develop the Blue Hole into a good -sized saltwater pool.

He personally paid for concrete steps to replace the steep dirt track leading down to the pool, concreting the floor of the wading pool and the back wall of the pool and for two water tanks for use by picnickers at the Blue Pool. His total contribution to the pool project was at least 300 pounds.

Instigated planting marram grass on the dunes, where scrub near the beaches had been cleared or covered by sand Empire Cracker night-held 24 th May each year. A6-7 metre pyramid of saplings was built for the bonfire topped by a flag.

The revellers would gather around to watch the show. Children would save their pennies to buy bungers and rockets to let off. Using earth-fill to raise the level of Dickinson Park and Oval to minimise damage due to high tide, plus fencing, sheds, water tanks, children’s swings and trees.

• Construction of 4 tennis courts, now at Bermagui Country Club.
• Fencing of the cemetery area
• Provision of a ceiling and supper room for King’s Hall

Bill died in Bermagui, Boxing Day 1950 and was cremated elsewhere but there are many reminders of his presence within Bermagui.

This is to advise you of the upcoming AGM of the members of

BERMAGUI HISTORICAL SOCIETY INC.

We need your support after the bushfires and now the COVID-19 pandemic

The details of this meeting are as follows:

• Date: Wednesday 4th November

• Time: 2pm

• Place: CWA Meeting Room, Corunna St, Bermagui

• COVID Safe Restrictions will be in place

NEW MEMBERS ARE NEEDED AND VERY WELCOME

Become a Bermagui Historical Society member for only $10 per year.

• connect with local history

• opportunities to interact with others interested in history

• the satisfaction of helping explore local history

• access to news and information about local activities on the Far South Coast, NSW

To join,

• Attend the AGM

• Contact via our website www.bermaguihistoricalsociety.org.au

• Phone the Secretary-Wendy 02 64934722

Appropriate safety measures are in place to allow us to reopen. If you are feeling unwell we ask you stay at home.

On entry to the Museum visitors are required to sign a record for contact tracing-details and are only kept for 28 days.

Hand sanitiser is available on entry.

There is a limit of 4 visitors in the Museum and please adhere to the Social distancing rule of 1.5 metres or 1 person per 4 sq metres. There is a seperate exit door at the Museum. EFTPOS facilities are not available at this stage however cash will be handled in a safe manner.

Look forward to seeing you at the Museum.🙂

Stay safe!

Cheers,

Wendy

The night of Friday 20 April was spent off Gabo Island, and the following day Saturday 21 April at 5 or 6 Leagues from shore (27.5 to 30 Kms) in cloudy unsettled weather, the men were called on deck. Joseph Banks’ journal tells us, “We witnessed three water spouts, which at the same time made their appearance in different places but all between the ship and land.

One spout which was about a League (5.5 Kms) from the ship lasted fully a quarter of an hour.

It was a column which appeared to be of about the thickness of a mast or a middling tree, and reached down from a smoke coloured cloud about two thirds of the way to the surface of the sea; under it the sea appeared to be much troubled for a considerable space and from the whole of that space arose a dark coloured thick mist which reached to the bottom of the pipe.

When it was at its greatest distance from the water the pipe itself was perfectly transparent and much resembled a tube of glass or a Column of water, if such a thing could be supposed to be suspended in the air; it very frequently contracted and dilated, lengthened and shortened itself and that by very quick motions; it very seldom remained in a perpendicular direction but generally inclined either one way or the other in a curve as a light body acted upon by wind is observed to do.

During the whole time that it lasted smaller ones seemed to attempt to form in its neighbourhood; at last one did about as thick as a rope close by it and became longer than the old one which at that time was in its shortest state; upon this they joined together in an instant and gradually contracting into the Cloud disappeared.”

Waterspout

By the afternoon of that Saturday they had been at sea for 604 Days as they passed Permagua, the first people’s pronunciation of Bermaguey, Bermaguee, or later Bermagui of the white man. Again Banks records, “The country rose in gentle sloping hills which had the appearance of the highest fertility, every hill seemed to be clothed with trees of no mean size.

Smoke from fires was seen a little way inland and in the evening several more.”

From Cooks log we can read, “By 6 o’clock we were abreast of a pretty high mountain laying near the shore, which on account of its figure I named Mount Dromedary”, (A one humped camel). Solander also claims to have named it in his journal. Cook continues, “The shore under the foot of this Mountain forms a point which I have named Cape Dromedary over which is a peaked hillick”. (The mountain was Gulaga and the peaked hillick Najanuga, later called Mount Little Dromedary.)

As can be seen from Cooks map compared to today’s satellite image, they mistook Baranguba (Later Montague Island) as part of Cape Dromedary, something never resolved on later maps as the “Cape” remains.

On Sunday 22nd April they sailed close enough to shore as to distinguish several people upon the sea beach. (Off Pigeon House, north of Batemans Bay).

Solander wrote, “They appeared to be of a very dark or black Colour but whether this was the real colour of their skins or the clothes they might have on, we knew not. The coast made a good view, being flat, level, and covered with verdure. We discovered five men through our glasses, who were quite naked.

It is probable they live upon the produce of the earth, as we did not see any canoes, and the coast seems to be unfavourable for fishing.” (Clearly an incorrect presumption on his part)

Contact with First People was eventually made at Botany Bay seven days later.

Cook was pleasantly impressed by the east coast of New Holland – it was not a barren and dismal country as reported by Dutch explorers who visited predominantly the western coast. He described

the land around Botany Bay in very positive terms as well-watered, fertile meadows. His reports influenced the British government decision to later establish a penal colony.

He sailed northward another four months and on 22 August 1770 at tiny Possession Island near the tip of the Cape York Peninsula, claimed the east coast of New Holland for Britain, naming it New South Wales.

In less than seven and a half years, the first fleet would arrive, thwarting the French who had also been making journeys similar to Cook’s in the South Pacific and New Holland.

• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three

David Cotton

Bermagui Historical Society.

The purpose of the epic three-year voyage was to observe the transit of Venus across the face of the Sun. These observations were expected to help calculate the size of the solar system, the distance of the Sun and improve maritime navigation.

The expedition left Plymouth in Devon, passing Rame Head on 26 August 1868.

Maps of the New Holland Coast before & after Cook

After the observations were completed at Tahiti in June 1769, Cook opened sealed instructions from the Admiralty. They instructed him to ‘seek a continent or land of great extent and to take possession of it in the name of the King of Great Britain’.

This great southern land or Terra Australis was a continent postulated to exist between Tahiti and New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean. There was a naïve belief that this land mass had to exist to balance up the continental mass of the northern hemisphere.

The expedition circumnavigated New Zealand and mapped the entire coastline.

Dutchman, Abel Tasman had planted the flag of the Dutch East India Company and named the islands some 127 years earlier, as he had done with Van Diemen’s Land, which would become Tasmania, and New Holland, which would become renamed Australia in 1824.

Cooks track along the south coast of New Holland. Map by Dave Cotton using Google Earth.

From New Zealand, they sailed west. “On Thursday 19 April 1770, in the morning we discovered the land of New Holland, extending a great way to the south and to the eastward”.

First sight of land was named Point Hicks, because Lieutenant Hicks was the first one on board to site it. Cook could not see Van Diemen’s Land, and decided to follow the coast north-eastwards. For another thirty years the myth was promulgated that Tasmania was part of the mainland, probably for fear of the French claiming it for France.

Whether Cook knew this is material for a whole new article.

• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three

David Cotton

Bermagui Historical Society.

James Cook (1728–1779) was born at Merton, Yorkshire, England and grew up on a farm at Ayton. In 1747 he moved to Whitby and joined the merchant navy, working on colliers and other ships in the coastal trade and later the Baltic Sea. In 1755 he joined the Royal Navy and two years later qualified as a master.

He served in North America during the seven years’ war, taking part in the capture of Louisburg and Quebec. As master of HMS Grenville he spent five years surveying the coast of Newfoundland. He married Elizabeth Batts in 1762, with whom he had 6 children.

Courtesy; Cook Museum, Whitby, Yorkshire, UK.

In his first 13 years at sea Cook had become a competent navigator and surveyor.

His astronomical observation and surveying skills brought him to the attention of the Royal Society, who were sponsoring an expedition in 1768 to observe the transit of Venus in Tahiti and explore the South Pacific. Cook had become a fellow of the Royal Society by then, promoted from Master to Lieutenant and given command of HMS Endeavour for the voyage.

The Endeavour was built by Thomas Fishburn of Whitby, and launched in June 1764. Her original purpose was as a collier for the coastal coal trade. A barque weighing 366 tons and only 30m long, her maximum speed was eight knots.

The ship Endeavour (Artists Impression) Courtesy APP

On 26 May 1768, she was commissioned by the British Royal Navy and fitted out especially for the three-year expedition. She carried a yawl, a pinnace, a longboat and two skiffs. Her armaments included 10 four pounders and 12 swivel guns.

At departure, the crew of 94 consisted of 71 ship’s company, 12 marines and 11 civilians. Several died during the mission.

Supernumerary passengers included Joseph Banks (born 1744 at Revesby Abbey, Lincolnshire) as official botanist, who funded the participation of seven other people consisting of two naturalists, an astronomer and his servant, two artists, two servants from his Revesby estate and two black servants. Seven of Banks’ complement would die on the voyage.

• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three

David Cotton

Bermagui Historical Society.