Sixth expedition: Adelaide to the northern sea

John McDouall Stuart · 1861 CE – 1862 CE · Earth

Cross the continent through its centre and find a practicable line for an overland telegraph to the north coast.

Historical context

South Australia wanted the Australian terminus of the telegraph from Britain, and the telegraph needed a line of water from Adelaide to the north coast. Stuart had already been driven back five times, twice within reach of the sea, and the government funded the sixth attempt grudgingly and at the last minute. He travelled with ten men and seventy-one horses, no baggage train, and a method that amounted to sending scouts out in every direction until one of them found water.

The voyage, step by step

1. North Adelaide, October 1861

   October 1861

   Ten men and seventy-one horses set out on Stuart’s sixth attempt at the continent.

2. Past the salt of Lake Torrens

   1861 CE

   The horseshoe of salt pans that had defeated Eyre is skirted on its western side.

3. The Finke River

   1862 CE

   A wide sandy bed of red gums carries the party north-west into the ranges.

4. The centre of the continent

   1862 CE

   The party passes the hill where Stuart had raised a flag and a cone of stones in 1860.

5. Past Attack Creek

   1862 CE

   The creek where the Warumungu turned him back in 1860 is crossed without a challenge.

6. Newcastle Waters, April 1862

   April 1862

   Five scouting parties fail to find a route north-west before he simply turns due north.

7. Into the rivers of the Top End

   4 July 1862

   Running water, palms and paperbarks replace the spinifex after fifteen hundred kilometres.

8. Chambers Bay, 24 July 1862

   24 July 1862

   Stuart washes his hands in the Indian Ocean and marks a tree on the beach.

Outcome

Reached the sea on Van Diemen Gulf on 24 July 1862 and returned to Adelaide with every man alive; the telegraph followed the route ten years later.

John McDouall Stuart

Scottish surveyor who crossed Australia from Adelaide to the northern sea at his sixth attempt, and brought every one of his men home alive.

Read on Wikipedia

Sources

• John McDouall Stuart — Wikipedia
• The Journals of John McDouall Stuart during the Years 1858, 1859, 1860, 1861 & 1862John McDouall Stuart, edited by William Hardman · Saunders, Otley and Co., London · 1864

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