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Haslewood Island
HISTORY
Haslewood Island
Haslewood Island was named in 1879 by Staff Commander E. P. Bedwell, RN,
in SS Llewellyn after Sub Lieutenant Frank Haslewood, one of
Bedwell's survey team at that stage on SS Llewellyn and previously on QGS
Pearl during earlier surveys to the south.
Settlement
(The licences and leases mentioned below invariably included Lupton Island
which is tied to Haslewood Island by a drying reef.)
William John Branston Forster 1901- 1907
Forster, from Bowen, was granted occupation licence 245 from May 13 1901 at
which stage he already owned an occupation licence over the Molle Group
which see for further details. Whether he did anything with the island is not
known.
Charles Oscar Anderson and Michael Adlem 1907- 1910
OL245 passed to these two on 1 March 1907. Both had in earlier years been
involved in cutting timber in the Whitsundays (see Timber Industry) and
Anderson, from Bowen, was the owner of the Faith, a vessel well known
around the Whitsundays in those days and in which subsequent owners travelled to
the island.
Fred Maltby Shardlow and John Archibald Rowan 1910- 1911
Fred Maltby Shardlow 1911- 1914
The OL passed to Shardlow and Rowan on 14 February 1910 and to Shardlow
solely on 4 May 1911 to be opened again for occupation on 23 May 1914.
Rowan was previously manager of Emu Plains and Sonoma Stations near Collinsville and for a time was a councillor of the Wangaratta Shire Council at Bowen. In the 1930s he bought Urannah Station on the Broken River near Eungella and moved there. Shardlow and Rowan worked together as builders and according to Rowan's daughter, Mrs I. E. Bruce of Bowen, they built Strathmore Station homestead near Collinsville.
Of the period of ownership by Shardlow and Rowan, Grahame Shardlow, son of
Fred Shardlow said:
'My father and his mate Jack Rowan, who were both in the building trade, were
inspired by E. J. Banfield [of Dunk Island fame] and being tired of life in the
west and the current drought decided to try running sheep on an island. They
came to Bowen and got Charlie Anderson, who had the Faith to take them
with a load of iron and building materials to Haslewood Island. They built two
huts on the beach which I understand faced Whitsunday Island near a fresh water
source.
'On finishing the huts Jack Rowan went back to Hughenden to bring the sheep
which were nine pence a head but before he was able to buy any the drought broke
and the price went to twenty-three shillings and so no sheep were bought, which
was just as well as it is now well known spear grass on the island makes it
impossible.
While Jack was away my father took the families down to the island which was in
early 1910. My mother said it was the cyclone season but the sea was like
glass.
'After Jack came back it was decided they would stay on the island while the men would take it in turns to work on the mainland for income to buy provisions and in the meantime they would holiday. The plan was a good one as my mother was a school teacher and Mrs Rowan was a great home-maker at cooking and sewing etc. But after a while frictions between the families emerged and the plan was abandoned. So it was back to the bush, Hughenden, where Mrs Shardlow had lived before her marriage as Edith Harriett Anne Wilson, the daughter of a Hughenden publican'.
While they were on the island, which apparently was for about six months, Grahame was about four years of age and the foregoing is from his recollections of family tales about the venture. The Shardlows later went to Bowen to set up a plumbing, painting and sign writing business.
Vernon Mc. Culkin and Frederick Faithful 1918
OL430 was granted to these people on 6 November 1918 but they must have
changed their minds for it was surrendered on 23 December 1918 and their deposit
refunded.
Albert Frederick Emanuel (Boyd) Lee 1919- 1921
Lee, who later was to own the lease to Grassy Island, was granted
OL434 on 1 January 1919 and ran pigs on the island and had a dwelling in the
small bay opposite Teague Island, known as Pig Bay. Lee paid rent only
for 1919 and the licence was surrendered to
be again opened to occupation on 13 May 1921.
Albert Woller and Rupert Boland Smith 1921- 1923.
These two were from Bowen and obtained OL455 on 11 October 1921 but their
tenure was short and the islands again opened for occupation on 3 April 1923 as
OL471.
Woller was a well-known resident of Bowen, employed by the Department of
Agriculture as a food inspector. He was one of the earliest to take up land in
the Sinclair Bay/ Dryander Holding area in 1929.
Arthur John Carden-Collins 1923- 1924
Carden-Collins was granted OL471 on 11 April 1923 at which stage he also had
a licence over the Molle Group. It must have been about this time that sheep
were taken to the island. Carden-Collins was an experienced grazier both in
inland Queensland and on South Molle Island and it seems likely he would have
set up the island for the sake of his daughter who was to take up residence
there with her husband, Stanley Polglass.
Stanley Eric Polglass 1924- 1926
Polglass took over OL471 on 30 September 1924. He was married to
Carden-Collins' daughter, Zuill, and possibly this was a wedding gift.
Old-timers say Polglass and his wife lived on Haslewood and this is borne out by
the fact that the transfer to Polglass showed his address as 'Haslewood Island'
(Ruth Carey [Abell]). On 1 January 1925 OL471 was surrendered for a special
lease 4534 for 14 years.
Stanley Eric Polglass and John Macdonald 1926- 1928
SL4534 was transferred on 1 November 1926 to Polglass and Macdonald as joint
tenants against a mortgage to Frank Percy Pougher. Pougher's connection is not
clear but in a report of a visit to the Haslewood Island in 1926, the geologist,
Stanley, noted it was occupied by Polglass and Pougher who ran sheep there.
Macdonald was a doctor from Ayr who later was to own a lease over Hamilton
Island.
Polglass apparently did not live on the island by 1927 as during that year
Carl Altmann, who owned an occupation licence over Long Island, lived
there as caretaker (Joe Altmann Ð son of Carl; Jim O'Hara).
Dr. John Macdonald, OBE 1928- 1940
The transfer of the lease to Macdonald was registered on 27 August 1928 and
at about the same time Macdonald obtained occupation licences over Hamilton
Island and Henning Island. Macdonald did not live on the islands but
employed managers, including Stanley Polglass, to look after his
interests.
When SL4534 was about to expire in 1938 an inspection was made by the Lands Department and the improvements on the island found to be in a very dilapidated state, fences down with posts rotting and wire rusted. Where there had been a building only the stumps remained with a rusted hand-pump and iron trough beside a boarded well about four feet deep. In connection with the review Macdonald said he had at one stage 3000 sheep on the island but theft, vandalism and the difficulty in getting people to caretake the island had led to its falling into dis-use and only a few horses and pigs remained. As a result of the review the lease was not renewed and both Haslewood and Lupton Islands were declared national parks in 1940.
The report of the inspection placed the improvements 'near a small bay on the north-west of the island' and this and reports by locals who can remember the presence of a house place it towards the northern end of the beach on the western side of the island, in the 1990s known by the local name 'Chalkies Beach' or 'Stockyard Beach'. Others recall a shearing shed on the flat behind the beach and a shed towards the northern end of Chalkie's Beach. The author has found at that end of the beach evidence of a residence by way of remnants of concrete blocks, cast-iron stove, old bottles, rusted iron and some coral and shells apparently placed around for ornamentation (Eric Soden; Arthur Busuttin; Jim O'Hara).
Mining
The presence in the Whitehaven Bay area of a large deposit of high-grade
silica sand attracted the interest of miners and in 1962 four mining leases over
the area were granted to the Bowen Mineral Company (see Whitehaven), one
of them over 6 acres of Haslewood Island along Chalkie's/ Stockyard Beach from
which it was proposed the stock-piled sand would be shipped. However the
proposal did not proceed.
Other developments
Over the years there were a string of applications for a lease of the island
ranging from grazing leases to tourist resorts. In 1972 the Australian and
British Investment Holdings Corporation Pty Ltd engaged Hawaiian consultants,
Hawaii Architects and Engineers Inc to survey the Whitsunday islands with a view
to recommending a site for a major tourist resort. In a report dated 29
January 1973 the consultants recommended two islands, Penrith and Haslewood,
but in the event nothing came of the proposal (James Cook University Library
Senator Ian Wood's papers).
In 1973 Neil Mountney from Happy Bay tentatively sought a resort lease over the western side of the island while in 1985 John De Vere of the Coral Sea Line (Golden Plover and Cygnus) applied for a lease for low-key tourist development (Proserpine Guardian 19 December 1985). In the same year the owner of Hamilton Island, Keith Williams, applied for a resort lease of an area covering all the western side of the island from the beach on the north-west tip to the bay opposite Teague Island. All applications however were refused in the interests of retaining the national park status of the island.
The Information on the Whitsunday Islands is reproduced by kind permission of Mr. Ray Blackwood from his book: " The Whitsunday Islands An Historical Dictionary ".
Please visit his site here. It is well worth the time!