The gold fever was irresistible, and helped to lift the town into prominence at once, drawing people from all parts of Australia. Four months after the landing of Mr. St. George, J. V. Mulligan, arriving from the Palmer field, described Cooktown as a large progressing township, about half a mile long, with stores, public houses, and shops of all sorts, with steamers and other boats coming in and going out every few days, and containing not less than two thousand people, though some estimated the numbers at a much higher figure. Cooktown dates its existence from the landing of the passengers by the steamer "Leichhardt" in 1873. The first Police Magistrate appointed was Mr. Thomas Hamilton, who also acted as Sub-Collector of Customs. Mr. James Pryde was the first Clerk of Petty Sessions. When the first court was held on December 27th, 1873, it was to deal with the charge of stealing a goat from Townsville. Mr. Gold, Commissioner St. George, and Mr. A. C. MacMillan, soon started on their expedition after landing at Cooktown, accompanied by eighty-six diggers, the command being one hundred and eight strong. They reported finding a good track to the Palmer. One reminiscence of their journey remains in the name of the original track, which is now known as Battle Camp, because the natives came down from the adjoining hills to dispute the right of the white men to travel through their country. Things in Cooktown kept booming along, and in April, 1874, there were from three to four thousand people camped between Grassy Hill and the outside boundary of Cooktown. During that month, sixty-five publicans' licenses were issued, and thirty more applied for; there were also twenty eating houses, twelve large stores, twenty small ones, six butchers, five bakers, three tinsmiths, four tent makers, six hairdressers, seven blacksmiths, besides doctors, chemists, fancy shops, watchmakers, bootmakers, saddlers, etc., in proportion, and all going full speed ahead. Until the discovery of the Palmer field, and the opening of Cooktown, Cardwell was the most northern port of call on the Queensland eastern coast, and was the telegraphic centre of news from the Etheridge and Gilbert goldfields. The golden news from these far northern diggings was of a most glittering nature, but there was a reverse side of the picture in the hardships and privations endured.