Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, Volume 2Grey, George
History
Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, Volume 2
Grey, George
Natural history -- Australia -- Western Australia; Western Australia -- Discovery and exploration
PARTY SENT IN SEARCH FROM PERTH.
I arrived at Perth on the 21st of April and not a moment was lost in
preparing a party to go in search of the men I had left with Mr. Walker,
and who, it will be recollected, were instructed to proceed along the
coast until they made the Moore River, where assistance was to be sent
out to them from Perth.
SEARCH FOR THE OTHER PARTY.
Accordingly on the 23rd of April Lieutenant Mortimer of the 21st regiment
and Mr. Spofforth, with four soldiers, left Perth and arrived on the
Moore River in two days; but after traversing its banks in vain for two
days more they abandoned all hope of finding those they were in search of
there, and pursued a straight course about 25 miles further north, when
they fell in with another river where they formed a depot, and detours
were made in various directions for several days without any avail.
RETURN WITH CHARLES WOODS.
At length, on one of these excursions, the seaman Charles Woods, one of
my party, was found by Mr. Spofforth, lying on the beach, wrapped in his
blanket and fast asleep. He soon awoke and was not a little delighted to
recognise Mr. Spofforth whom he had seen before at Fremantle. By the
account Woods gave it appears that from the period of my departure much
disorder and discontent at the direction of their course prevailed among
the men. They frequently left the beach and wandered inland to procure
water and food, not sufficiently exerting themselves to advance
southward. They had succeeded, he said, in procuring upon the whole about
a dozen birds, a crab, and eighteen fish. On the 21st of April Mr.
Walker, who had frequently exerted himself in procuring firewood and
water for the weaker of the party, divided two dough cakes still
remaining in his possession among them all. They were then upon the
beach, and though still at a great distance from the appointed place of
rendezvous the men were very unwilling to distress themselves to reach
it, being persuaded they should be tracked, wherever they might be, by
the natives whom I should send to their help. Woods, being dissatisfied
with their slow progress, now quitted them at a place where, he says,
they had to go round two very deep bays close together, which took him a
whole day; and it was owing to his having obeyed my instructions more
strictly than the others that he was found by Mr. Spofforth. Woods, who
seemed to have a singularly accurate idea of the distance he was from
Perth when found, added that he thought he could have walked to it had he
not been discovered, although he had nothing to eat but a few native
figs; and that he thought the whole of the party were getting more
accustomed to native food and were latterly better than they had been at
first; he said he felt so himself.
SECOND PARTY IN SEARCH, UNDER MR. ROE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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