Book description
In 1860 the Australian outback remained all but unknown to the
European settlers. A prize of £2,000 was offered by the Exploration
Committee of the Royal Society of Victoria for the first expedition
successfully to cross the country from Melbourne to the north coast.
The Burke & Wills Expedition, led by Robert O'Hara Burke and
William John Wills, a Totnes-born surveyor who had emigrated to
Australia at the age of 18 and worked as a shepherd, a gold-digger and
an assistant surgeon, set out in August 1860. The journey was arduous
and slow, so much so that, once they reached Cooper's Creek, Burke,
Wills and two others made a dash for the coast with only three months'
food; they made it, but on the way back, after killing and eating
their camels when their supplies ran out, they discovered that the men
who stayed at Cooper's Creek had left only 9 hours earlier. Unable to
reach civilisation, Wills died of exhaustion and malnourishment in
June 1861; only one member of the expedition made it back to Melbourne
alive. John Van der Kiste's biography of Wills is the first full
account of his life, including his upbringing in Devon as well as the
expedition itself.
