William John Wills

William John Wills

William John Wills (born January 5, 1834 in Totnes , Devon , England , † end of June, probably June 28 or 29, 1861 in Breerily Waterhole , Coopers Creek , South Australia ) was an English surveyor. He became known as the deputy leader of the Burke and Wills expedition . This expedition represented the first attempt to cross Australia from south to north and to find a route between the populated areas around the Gulf of Carpentaria in the north and Victoria in the south.

Early years

Wills was born in Totnes, Devon, and taught at St. Andrews Grammar School in Ashburton . In 1852 he emigrated to Australia with his younger brother Thomas . They found work as shepherds in Deniliquin , New South Wales . Their father, William Wills Sr., followed his sons, and upon his arrival in October 1853 they moved to Ballarat together . William John Wills worked as a miner and buyer for a bank. In 1855 he began to study land surveying and moved to Melbourne to work under Georg von Neumayer at the Flagstaff Observatory for geophysics, magnetism and nautical science.

Burke and Wills expedition

→ Main article: Burke and Wills expedition

In September 1858, the explorer John McDouall Stuart reached the center of the Australian continent, and in July 1859 the Australian government offered a £ 2,000 award to support an expedition that would cross Australia from south to north. Robert O'Hara Burke was appointed head of this expedition in May 1860. In July, Wills was appointed land surveyor, astronomical observer and third in the internal chain of command.

Route of the expedition

The expedition left Melbourne on August 20 with a total of 19 participants, 27 Australian camels and 23 horses. They reached Menindee on September 23rd. Several men stayed there initially, including the deputy head George James Landell, whereupon Wills was promoted to his post.

The group with Burke and Wills reached Cooper Creek, 400 miles away , on November 11 and wanted to wait there for the following group. During this hiatus, Burke decided to make a detour to the Gulf of Carpentaria and left with Wills, John King and Charley Gray. He left the rest of the men under the command of William Brahe. Burke, Wills and their companions reached the mangroves at the mouth of the Flinders River on February 9, 1861 . However, pouring rain and swamps prevented them from seeing the ocean.

The return proved to be a long and difficult undertaking. The men were already weakened by hunger and exhaustion and were additionally hampered by the tropical monsoons of the onset of the rainy season. Gray died four days from the meeting point on Cooper Creek . The remaining three men took a day off to bury Gray. They finally arrived at the meeting point on April 21, 1861, nine hours after the rest of the group had given up waiting and left Cooper Creek, leaving only a note and some food. The group that was left in Menindee and should have taken over had never arrived.

Burke, Wills, and King tried to reach Mount Hopeless , the outermost inhabited outpost in South Australia, closer than Menindee. They failed, however, and returned to Cooper Creek to await rescue. Wills could not go on from exhaustion and asked the others to leave him with food, water and shelter. Burke and King then continued their march without him. Wills died alone in a place called Breerily Waterhole on Cooper Creek. The exact time of death is unknown, but it was almost certainly June 28 or 29, 1861.

Burke also died a short time after Wills. Only John King survived with the help of Aborigines . He was saved on September 15th by the naturalist Alfred William Howitt . Howitt buried Wills and Burke before returning to Melbourne. In 1862 he returned to Cooper Creek and exhumed the bodies. They were brought to Melbourne via Adelaide , where they were laid out in public for two weeks. On January 23, 1863, Burke and Wills received a state funeral and were interred in Melbourne General Cemetery .

literature

• The [Melbourne] Argus , 1861. "The Burke and Wills exploring expedition: An account of the crossing the continent of Australia from Cooper Creek to Carpentaria, with biographical sketches of Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills". Melbourne: Wilson and Mackinnon.
• Bonyhady, Tim, 1991. Burke and Wills: From Melbourne to myth . Balmain: David Ell Press. ISBN 0908197918 .
• Burke and Wills Outback Conference 2003, 2005. The Inaugural Burke & Wills Outback Conference: Cloncurry 2003: a collation of presentations . Dave Phoenix, Cairns Qld. ISBN 0646447025
• Clune, Frank, 1937. Dig: A drama of central Australia . Sydney: Angus and Robertson.
• Corke, David G, 1996. The Burke and Wills Expedition: A study in evidence . Melbourne: Educational Media International. ISBN 090917816X
• Murgatroyd, Sarah, 2002. The Dig Tree . Melbourne: Text Publishing. ISBN 1877008087
• Victoria: Parliament, 1862. Burke and Wills Commission. Report of the Commissioners appointed to inquire into and report upon the circumstances connected with the sufferings and death of Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills, the Victorian Explorers . Melbourne: John Ferres Government Printer.
• Wills, William John, & Wills, Dr William, 1863. A successful exploration through the interior of Australia, from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria: from the journals and letters of William John Wills . London: Richard Bentley.

See also

• Robert O'Hara Burke

Web links

• The Burke & Wills Historical Society (English)
• The Diary of Wills (English)