Western Mail – Perth – 7 November 1940, page 9
OLD PEAK HILL.
The Men Who Passed Through.
By Suter Abis, Inglewood.
At the Peak Hill Co’s battery was a young Englishman employed as amalgamator. Many of the old ‘Peakites’ would remember him. He was a most likable fellow, a free spender, a good cricketer, and a footballer, and always willing to take his share in anything going. He wasn’t too slow with the girls either as he had “expectations.” An elderly aunt in England was very wealthy and he was her favorite. When she went he would be right for life. Often he got cables telling of her health – which was failing. Twice he gave it out that he expected to hear of her death at any time and was ready to pack up for the trip. One fly in the ointment was that he could not leave his service without giving a month’s notice, and he could not very well anticipate the date of his aunt’s death so he hung on. Word came at last that she had passed over and he gave the necessary notice. He was so very popular that a big send-off was arranged for him. It took place at Dinny Donoghue’s pub. Big Jim McCaffrey and Tom Donoghue (no relation of Dinny’s) were the barmen, and Jack Downey was the waiter.
First gold escort, Meekatharra to Nannine, 15 miles, in 1903. Standing (left to right): H. E. Wilhams, J.P., Trooper J. McDonald, Escorting Constable J. Doody, Foster (bank clerk), R. R. Lord (bank manager). Sitting: C. M.Roberts and J. A. Roberts, owners.
It was a glorious spread. Jack Murphy had brought up a couple of bronzewing turkeys on his last trip in the “Slopers” express” (otherwise his “shanghai” coach) and the fowl yards were raided and the best young roosters taken in their prime. Fizz was plentiful; the show lasted from about 9 p.m. until nearly five in the morning; the coach on which the amalgamator was to leave went at six so the time was nicely arranged.
I had no invite to the spread — but about 11 o’clock I was issued with a huge helping passed through the window; also a bottle of fizz. Clarence Brown brought it along. We sat on some boxes while I fed myself. We had not long been there when a man with a bag in one hand and his boots in the other passed close to a window on the side of and near the back of the building. There was rather a tasty young girl somewhere handy and I took it that he was going to pay his respects. What the bag was for was another thing — perhaps a helping similar to my own. He saw us and got away as quickly as he could, but not before I had recognised him. He wasn’t the sort to go girl hunting, so we put it down to something else. About midnight I went home and left them to it. Most of them were the worse for liquor and a bit noisy, but they were the cream of the place and wouldn’t come to any harm.
The coach left on time with the guest of the evening on it, but never did a man leave with such a bad taste in his mouth. He had paid his fare to Cue, which was then the railhead, but it would cost him the best part of a tenner to get from there to Perth; and it was doubtful if he had much cash left, and no chance of getting it either. He had insisted on treating the whole of the party several times during the evening — he couldn’t possibly accept hospitality without returning it, the last two rounds were paid for by cheque.
What he was so sore about was the disappearance during the evening of his aunt’s “legacy”. It had been placed in a bag in the backroom of the hotel in charge of a lady friend, who had tipped the wink to the man without the boots. He was on his way to collect when he saw us, but he got it later. It consisted of about 400oz. of gold which the very unworthy guest had collected from the battery plates over a period of a couple of years.
His aunt was quite an imaginary person.
No wonder he was sore; he had lost his job, about £1,600 worth of bullion, and his good name; he was stone broke and had to go and look for another job. His cheques to Dinny were never paid, and the barefooted man forgot to go to the pay office and collect his time. Some years later he was blown to bits in Youanmi — so the old hands can have another guess.
Alex Gray, the smithy, used to shoe the police horses as far back as 1897. He made a good job of them too; he is still in the old town but not half as sprightly as of old. His one delight is a trip to Perth every Cup time; he isn’t bad at picking winners, either. Another of the old school was Bis Palmer. He could handle himself above a bit, later he spent a lot of time with the Darlot’s and others on the Lower Murchison stations; he is somewhere about Wiluna, where Tom Wardle once of the Palace Hotel in the Peak is also located. Morgan, the surveyor, who used to drive a four-in-hand, had a house in the Peak. The Benstead’s (Bill, late of Coolgardie), and his daughter the singer Lulu, lived there for some time.
The Fitzpatricks, father and sons, had a show on the Kaolin hills east of the town; the Radford Bros. (Frank is now a landed proprietor near Katanning) also worked there, and Don Munro of the famous clothes. Don was right from the heather hills; he had a rigout which was about the most unsuitable for the climate that anyone could devise—but he thought it splendid. He had a topee, riding breeches, and boots, with a shooting jacket — and this in the middle of summer. He stuck it for a few weeks until the boys laughed him out of it, when he got used to dungarees a five-pound note wouldn’t have got Don back into his old rig-out.
Billy Minter “Half-a-Waggon” was another of the old gang, and so was the “Thrush” (a great grass fighter) and another chap whose name I forget, hut when he got outside a few he always called out, “Let her go, Professor, she’s only half-full.” And then there was old “Tender First.” He had been a railwayman in Albany and ran his train tender first through the good shed doors. The name stuck. “Squeaker Mulligan” who had spent a lot of time on the Geraldton jetty lumping wheat was another of the crowd. Warden Geary gave him a government job that lasted a fortnight and he helped to make the first footpath in the Peak: It is still in good repair in front of the police station. Squeaker passed out many years ago.
Tom Geddins was a billiard marker at Dinny Donoghue’s pub. He had once been the champion billiard player of W.A. and would take on anyone and give them a 30 or 40 break, and there were some good players. Solomon, of “Solomon’s Solution” fame, played him for a big stake, but couldn’t hold him. Watty Davis used to play most men on a 15 break, but he was no good to Tom. A chap who called himself “The Yank” and followed up station and droving work, paid periodical visits to town: He was a good thing for the barbers. As soon as he arrived he got a haircut and whisker trim. After a few beers, he went through the performance again. He kept getting a little off at a time until at last, he had the beard shaved clean off, then the mo, and finally had his hair cut to the scalp. It cost him about £1 to get to the final stage. He called his mare “Schooner Kate,” and galloped her up and down the street barebacked, and fought anyone who refused to drink with him. He had plenty of friends while his money lasted, then he hadn’t any.
Ned Purcell is another who can be looked upon as something of an old-timer. I was in Nannine the day he got caught in the wire rope at the cyanide vats at the Champion mine and lost his foot. It was a close thing that day. A dip in the vat would have made all the difference. He probably knows as much about treating tailings dumps as any other man alive. A man named ???, who wrote an excellent hand and was always on the lookout for blank cheque forms on which to try his skill, fell foul of a local tradesman. Before he “went south” he presented me with “Bully,” a 40lb. weight bull foxy dog, which, he said he had pinched from Hanlon’s Victoria Hotel in Geraldton. This pup was quite an identity and was always on the relief squad; those who knew him never made any fuss; he was loyalty itself, yet he was almost my undoing.
A couple of very enterprising smart young women, one with hair as black as a crow and the other red as fire, established a house on the old road to Woolhouse’s battery. They called themselves “The Doves” (and weren’t some of the lads pleased). They could afford to buy better food than we had at the camp, and Bully must have discovered that the handout there was better than at home and more generous. He went off his tucker so far as we were concerned, yet he put on weight. Unknown to us the “Doves’ were filling him up. One night as I sat in a barber’s chair at Teddy (“Shadow”) Davis’s shop and had just been well lathered by Alf Walker, a very disgruntled fellow came in and aired his grievance after seeing me sitting there. He had been waiting outside at the “Doves” for two hours, and it was useless to wait longer. Bully was sitting on the back doorstep and ‘HE’ wouldn’t be there unless his boss was inside (eg me). He thought he’d have a shave and return later. He was almost speechless when he saw me but managed to blurt out that never again would believe in circumstantial evidence, “even if he saw it with his own eyes.” Bully got a dose of the chain for the night for that slip-up.
Denis ‘Dinny’ Donoghue’s Club Hotel, Peak Hill
There are wonderful big plains between the town and the range, and during the heavy rains, water rose several feet high across them. To the surprise of everyone who saw the high water marks on trees, the water seemed to have run uphill. That country is so flat in places that it would take a spirit level to find out which way the trickle goes.
The Horseshoe Mine, known to the natives as “Barlowerie,” or Black Mountain, which is situated about 16 miles west of the town, came into prominence about ’92 or ’93 as an alluvial patch, but it was some years before it was tried as a going proposition. A company with Mr. Uren as manager, spent a lot of money there; and the side of the hill was honeycombed with tunnels, but they got nothing? They went the wrong way about it, and spent money like water. Hugh Boyd had a pub there for a while, and lt was the best money-spinner in the place.
Going along that way just after the flood, a tall aboriginal girl dressed in little other than her birthday suit was seen going bush with a bag of something balanced on her head. It looked like flour, it was flour. It was such a scarce item those days that it appeared remarkable that she could have a supply, inquiries elicited the information that she got it from “Popwood”, Bob Woods, an old prospector who had come with the first rush and never left. Bob verified her statement. He said he couldn’t very well spare the flour, about 251b. of it, but he hadn’t the heart to refuse the good lady when she offered him an 18oz. slug worth about £70 for it. The few pounds of flour were more use to ber than all the gold in the Horseshoe so both were satisfied.
It wouldn’t be fair to bid goodbye to Old Peak Hill without mention of “The Wild Rose,” who was probably one of the best-known women from Magnet to Nullagine. And was she wild! She was a buxom old girl well up in years, never too far away from a bar, had a face as tanned as a man’s, but the kindest heart on earth, no one ever wanted for a bit of assistance if the “Wild Rose” was about. She could hold her own in any ballroom so far as dancing was concerned, but it was safe to bet she would never see the program out.
Like all good things the Peak had a limit, and after a few hectic years, it fell from grace. From being a leading gold producer it went to the bottom of the list. It still lives, however, a shadow of its former self. Some of the tough old survivors have hopes of it coming again. It might-and again it mightn’t. It would be a good thing if it did!
Moya Sharp
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