Curio

State Library of New South Wales
A journal of a tour of discovery across the Blue Mountains

A journal of a tour of discovery across the Blue Mountains

1823
82/61, pp36-37
Published book: BJ Holdsworth, London

As a free settler of upper class English roots, Gregory Blaxland (1778 – 1853) was eager to make his mark and capitalise on the agricultural potential of the new colony.

Like many graziers, Blaxland had an expanding flock of livestock, and suitable land along the coast was becoming scarce. He believed the answer was to find a passage over the Blue Mountains and search for more farming land. In 1813, Blaxland joined other wealthy land owners William Lawson and William Wentworth on a quest to cross the great divide.

In this journal, Blaxland gives a brief account of the explorers’ passage across the Blue Mountains. He discusses their success of adopting the novel method of traversing the mountains by the ridges instead of looking for a route through the valleys. Blaxland also details how the group found their way across by Mount York, and then went on past Cox's River to a sugar loaf hill (later named Mount Blaxland). From its summit, the trio could see 'enough grass to support the stock of the colony for thirty years.’ *

Footnotes

Australia Dictionary of Biography http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/blaxland-gregory-1795

A second life

Samuel Fairs received a death sentence for housebreaking, but it was overturned to transportation to the colony of New South Wales for life. Fairs arrived in Sydney in 1810, and in May 1813 he accompanied Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth on their journey across the Blue Mountains.

A document in the NSW State Archives was recently found to be a petition from Samuel Fairs dated 1817 seeking a conditional pardon. At the foot of the document William Charles Wentworth’s father Darcy wrote: ‘The petitioner accompanied Messrs Blaxland, Wentworth and Lawson on their expedition over the mountains and conducted himself much to their satisfaction.’


Christine Yeats, Royal Australian Historical Society


A road less travelled by..

Contrary to contemporary beliefs during the 1810s, the cocky Gregory Blaxland believed he could conquer the ‘impassable’ Blue Mountains by tracing over the hill tops, rather than taking the conventional and failed route of following the valleys.

His plan was to ascend a westward ridge on the northern side of what is now the Warragamba River. He used the streams of water on his left that emptied themselves into the river as a guide, being careful not to cross them in order to keep track of their journey.