GEORGE WICKHAM WHO?

Few readers would recognise the name George Wickham, but he is somewhat important to the history of the Herbert River district, though not as important as his wife.

George hailed from Novia Scotia, British America, arriving in Cardwell in 1870. He was a carpenter and worked for the Mackenzie family, which established Gairloch Plantation. Scottish widow Isabella Campbell (nee Morrison) and her children travelled out from Scotland to Australia with the Mackenzie family and lived and worked on the Plantation.

George was an early selector, who along with others, selected land in the Gairloch Plantation area. Wickham established his property, Cudmore, in 1872 and in 1875, the Planters Retreat Hotel. Its auspicious location, at the landing where passengers alighted for the two-mile road journey from Gairloch to the Camping Reserve (later Ingham township), meant that the hotel did a roaring trade.

George married Isabella on 25 January 1871 in Cardwell, in a marriage celebrated by Reverend William Mackenzie. During the seven years that George was licensee of the Planters Retreat Hotel, the hotel flourished with Isabella building up its reputation for ‘good pure spirits and delicious Scotch scones’. A hotel was guaranteed success if the publican did not water down the spirits and the food was hearty and plentiful.

Isabella hosted Scotch gatherings and balls, offered food, drink, lodging, stabling and fodder for horses and bullocks, entertainment and meeting rooms (before the construction of shire halls or community or church halls). It was at this hotel that prominent citizens met for a historic meeting to decide on a name for the Camping Reserve, with the decision made to name it Ingham after William Bairstow Ingham, a failed but charismatic planter, and Reverend Mackenzie held the first religious service conducted on the Herbert.

In 1881, the hotel license reverted to Isabella. Did George die? There is no burial record for him in the Hinchinbrook district. Is he the George Wickham who, along with others, attempted to rescue, unsuccessfully, A.H. Cummins and the Buchanan family from flood waters in the Ingham township area in the 1894 flood?

Isabella held the Planters Retreat Hotel license from 1882 to 1892. Her son-in-law George Hunter, took on the license in 1893 and then her daughter, Isabella Alexandrina Hunter (nee Campbell), in 1904.

In her daughter’s published recollections, Isabella was very instrumental in the development of the district. It was she who produced the first sugar in a kitchen saucepan from cane crushed by the new Gairloch Mill. This milestone event is not mentioned in contemporary men’s accounts. Her daughter’s recollections are full of praise for the ingenuity and work of her mother, with little reference, if any, to her stepfather, George Wickham.

Contributed with thanks by Dr Bianka Vidonja Balanzategui