After a hurried round of op shops and garage sales in the steamy north , this twitchy book and ephemera addicted blogger tottered home with several bags of books, old sheet music , some 45 records and a rusty saw, the latter only costing a buck and may be useful for something one day...carving up a turkey or slicing open grandma's Christmas pudding ? One book , bearing the title A Strange Bird On The Lagoon, by Margaret Reeves , Boolarong Publications , Brisbane , 1985 , dealing with the pioneering of Queensland's Barcoo region , centred around two families, the Camerons and Crombies , turned out to be a gem .
Sir Ewen, it seems , was clairvoyant and in an incident like something out of Macbeth, is said to have met a famous witch with the power of second sight who warned him against keeping a rendezvous over a boundary dispute. Heeding her advice, he went and got 65 of his Cameron warriors, who hid in the heather at the trysting spot, and probably averted his murder because the other party had a much smaller group hidden nearby and the discussion became very heated . A recurring dream saved him from English soldiers .
*White Bird paper sculpture photograph on cover by Tex Moeckel, Moss Vale , NSW.
One of the many fascinating tales tells how "Sir Ewen" Cameron was knighted for distinguished gallantry by Bonnie Prince Charles on the field of battle at Falkirk. The prince asked Ewen for his sword to perform the ceremony, but all that was left of the weapon was the bloodied hilt, the blade having been shattered in the fierce fighting.
The story goes that Prince Charles used his own walking stick to perform the honours in place of a sword and presented it to Sir Ewen as a souvenir. Passed down as a family treasure , it was brought to Australia by a Cameron descendant . While he was away pioneering in Queensland , he left the walking stick in a packing case of books stored under a tarpaulin . Opened months later, it was found that white ants had riddled the lot .
Author Reeves was brought up as a child on Caledonia, a cattle station near Aramac, Queensland. She cites instances of "second sight"... Sir Ewen, for example, a fierce fighter who ,"wolf-like", tore out the throat of an English officer in mortal combat and remarked:" The sweetest mou'ful I ever tasted!"
Sir Ewen, it seems , was clairvoyant and in an incident like something out of Macbeth, is said to have met a famous witch with the power of second sight who warned him against keeping a rendezvous over a boundary dispute. Heeding her advice, he went and got 65 of his Cameron warriors, who hid in the heather at the trysting spot, and probably averted his murder because the other party had a much smaller group hidden nearby and the discussion became very heated . A recurring dream saved him from English soldiers .
Reeves wrote that because of a premonition , a grandfather cancelled his booking on the S.S. Gothenburg which, on the Darwin to Adelaide run , hit the Great Barrier Reef in February 1875 with the loss of 102 lives , a brother and a family he knew with four children were among those who perished .
One of the worst maritime disasters on the Australian east coat, the dead included Captain R.G.A.Pearce ; a South Australian judge, Mr Justice Wearing;the Acting South Australian Crown Solicitor, J.J.Whitby ; former South Australian Premier ,Thomas Reynolds and his wife ; Judge's Associate, Lionel Pelham ; the wife and six children of a future Government Resident, E.W.Price ; the French vice consul , E.Durand ; Darwin newspaper editor , Richard Wells .
A number of honeymooners were aboard the ill fated vessel, the loss described as a terrible calamity. The book contains a wide range of additional information about Scottish history , Australian pioneering , Aborigines ( their skills , customs and one who could speak Latin ), the Palmer River Goldfields, trade with Java.
*White Bird paper sculpture photograph on cover by Tex Moeckel, Moss Vale , NSW.
