Page 17 - eMuse Vol.9 No.02_Classical

Invaders came via Cooktown — Canton of the South —
Nickname for the port, on Endeavour River’s mouth.
Chinese outnumbered “fun goi” by ‘round two to one.
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All sought the “golden fish” beneath the tropic sun.
Cooktown’s sly grog shops, and, “Palmer Kate’s dozen” knew,
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how to fleece the unwary always passing through,
going to, or returning from that dreamed of lode
some travelled the long way, others used Hell’s Gate Road.
Whichever way they went, going or coming back,
from behind any bush one must expect attack.
Unwary, luckless victims suffered worst fate feared,
Eaten by cannibals when clubbed to death or speared.
Rice fed Chinese, became cannibals favoured fare. Above: Vintage photo of Mary Street Gympie.
Victims were hung in trees, and, tied by their own hair — Below: Vintage photo Nash’s Gully Gympie . Both photos believed
suspended by their pigtails like live slabs of meat — to be from around the early 1870s.
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waiting there to die, when their captors want to eat. From the early pages of the “Nashville Times”, come these verses,
Knowing what fate had in store, added to ordeal. written by a miner to the ‘Goddess Gympie’ expressing his feelings
Fear that raced through heart and mind, was so very real. and thoughts during the four or five weeks he had been ‘a votary
They died without a marker, headstone or a grave. at her shrine’.
So began the legend of the Chinaman’s’ Cave. Your narrow street and verdant mud
Hell’s Gate is a narrow pass where old bushmen say I must admire young Gympie
Chinaman’s’ cave is nearby — not too far away. While eyebrow deep I wade your flood
Yellow men were eaten there — so the story’s told — To reach my fire-quenched humpy.
And the ones who ate them all, had no use for gold. At last I find the wretched spot

And gold just had to be with some of those who died In darkness gloom and rain,
in a cave no one’s found, though many men have tried. A dreary homeless lonely cot
Through the years since then, many searches were in vain Pitched somewhere on the plain.
But where there’s hope there’ll be, those who will search again. . . No hope of sleep, in dripping clothes,
Is it fact or legend — like Lassiter’s lost reef ? I lay me down to mourn,
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Is it truth or fantasy that defies belief? And think in heartfelt grief of those
The jury is still out. No one can really say. Who’d welcome my return.
Is it just a legend not talked about today? My wayward fortune brought me here

© Wally (The Bear) Finch 25/8/2011 In damp and cold to suffer
The mush and slush up to my ear,
Glossary And each hole I sink a duffer.

1. Chinese for “White man”. What wretched spot to build a town,
And then to call it Nashville;
2. A name for gold found in the Palmer River. When on the flat it was laid down,
3. One of many of Cooktown’s houses of ill-repute. Its name was plainly Slushville.
4. The characteristic pigtail once worn by Chinese men is called The hills around are high and dry,
a “queue”. Under a threat of being beheaded, this hated hair- The Township in a gully
style was imposed upon them by the Manchus. Using the That can’t be seen by human eye
queue, Palmer River cannibals suspended live Chinese victims Till you come upon it fully.
in trees until they were ready to be eaten. May the Fates in mercy take me
5. A huge, legendry reef of gold in Central Australia. Said to have Gympie from thy mud and puff,
been discovered by Harold Bell Lassiter in 1897. Like China- Or if my stars don’t all forsake me,
man’s Cave, if it exists its location is unknown and the cause of Send, oh soon, some golden stuff.
much speculation . . . Miner, 26 February 1868.

February 2020 eMuse 17