Australian Explorers

John Oxley died on 26 May 1828.

John McDouall Stuart was a Scottish-born explorer who arrived in South Australia in 1839. His first experience in exploration was when he was employed as a draughtsman by Captain Charles Sturt on an expedition into the desert interior. After this, Stuart led a number of expeditions west of Lake Eyre.

Stuart is most famous for being the first recorded explorer to successfully cross Australia from south to north, and back again, returning alive. Stuart led a total of five expeditions in the attempt to be the first to cross the continent from south to north. He finally succeeded on his fifth attempt, reaching the northern waters at Chambers Bay in July 1862.

Because of Stuart's success, South Australia (represented by Stuart) was given control of the area of Australia now known as the Northern Territory. Australia's famous Overland Telegraph Line was built from Adelaide to Darwin, roughly following the path Stuart took.

Edward found gold

Yes, in an Australian traditional sense they were, two blokes going against the odds but seeking adventure and fame. From a historian's perspective they were heroic to attempt the task but ill prepared for what lay ahead of them. They were Australia's Scott of the Antarctica.

Another opinion:

It is not strictly accurate to say Burke and Wills were ill prepared. Their expedition was the largest and most well-equipped of any Australian exploration party. Burke could hardly be considered a hero of exploration: he was ill-tempered and impatient, traits which had a great deal of influence on the tragic outcome of the exploration. Also, he did not seek adventure and fame. His motivation was primarily to impress the girl he wished to marry, who promised she would marry him if he went on the journey.

Wills, on the other hand, could be regarded as a hero of exploration. He did not have Burke's arrogance or impatience. He had more of a scientific interest in the exploration and sought to follow the orders of the colonial government in Victoria. He sought to hold the exploration party together where Burke's interest was to complete the task as quickly as possible, at the expense of good judgement.

• 1788: Governor Arthur Phillip traced the Parramatta River as far as Rose Hill, assisting the expansion of the new colony
• 1799: Bass and Flinders circumnavigated Van Diemen's land (now Tasmania)
• 1801-2: Flinders circumnavigated the Australian continent
• 1813: Lawson, Blaxland and Wentworth became the first Europeans to cross the Blue Mountains, opening the way for expansion to the west
• 1813: George Evans discovered the fertile Macquarie Plains and Macquarie River
• 1817: John Oxley charted the Macquarie and Lachlan Rivers
• 1818: George Evans discovered the Castlereagh River
• 1823: Allan Cunningham broke through the Warrambungle Ranges, discovering Pandora's Pass
• 1823: John Oxley sailed north along the coastline, entering Moreton Bay and being led to the Brisbane River by three ticket-of-leave convicts
• 1824-5: Hamilton Hume and William Hovell made the first overland journey from Lake George(near where Canberra now stands) to Corio Bay (they were supposed to reach Westernport Bay), crossing the Murray River (then called the Hume) for the first time
• 1829-30: Charles Sturt charted the Murray River all the way to the southern coast, discovering that the Darling River joined the Murray
• 1836: Major Thomas Mitchell discovered "Australia Felix", the rich, fertile western part of Victoria, and the Grampian Mountain Range
• 1840: Paul de Strzelecki explored the Australian Alps and climbed and named Mt Kosciuszko
• 1840-41: Edward Eyre crossed the Nullarbor Plain, going from Streaky Bay to Albany in the first east-west crossing
• 1844-45: Ludwig Leichhardt made the first overland crossing from the Darling Downs in Queensland to Port Essington in the Top End - he was gone for so long that people thought he had died
• 1860-61: Robert O'Hara Burke and William Wills left Melbourne to try to be the first explorers to reach the north coast at the Gulf of Carpentaria - they reached the Gulf but did not return alive
• Between 1858 and 1863, John MacDouall Stuart made several attempts to cross the centre of Australia from Adelaide to the Top End: he succeeded, and returned alive
• 1873: Colonel Peter Warburton explored between central Australia and Perth
• 1873: William Gosse sighted and named Ayers Rock as he travelled through Australia's interior
• 1874-5: Ernest Giles made several expeditions from central Australia to the west coast and back
• 1874: the Forrest brothers, John and Alexander, explored east of Geraldton
• 1879: Alexander Forrest explored around the Kimberley area of Western Australia and the Fitzroy River
• Between 1909 and 1911, Douglas Mawson explored the Antarctic

Ernest Giles made several expeditions in the Australian desert. The first, lasting four months, commenced in August 1872 and resulted in discoveries such as Palm Valley, Gosse's Bluff, Lake Amadeus, and the first sighting of Mount Olga.

Giles's next expedition departed in August 1873. On this expedition, Giles was able to approach closer to the Olgas, but his attempts to continue further west were thwarted by interminable sand, dust, biting ants, Aboriginal attack and lack of water. The loss of one of Giles's companions, Gibson, in April 1874 ended this second expedition, and the party arrived back at Charlotte Waters in July.

Giles was determined to explore the unknown country south of where Warburton and Forrest had explored, reaching Perth in the attempt. On 13 March 1875, Giles departed from Fowlers Bay, heading north first before crossing the western deserts. Although a short expedition, it was a difficult one, initially marked by severe water shortages until the discovery of permanent water holes.

Giles's fourth expedition departed from the homestead of his sponsor Thomas Elder at Beltana on 6 May 1875. On this journey, Giles was supplied with camels. From Ooldea on the northeastern edge of the Nullarbor Plain, he travelled west through the Great Victoria Desert, reaching Perth with no loss of life among his party. He then promptly turned around, re-crossing the desert back to the Overland Telegraph Line. Although he did not find good land, his main claim to fame was being the first to make the main western crossing from both directions.

No, he never married, but he had a son by an affair with an immigrant Irish girl, by the name of Margaret Murphy.

John Forrest's discoveries were not so much important lands or major rivers, but his explorations were still important as they opened up areas of Western Australia about which little had been previously known.

In 1869, Forrest led the search for Ludwig Leichhardt's expedition which had gone missing while travelling across Australia from east to west. This search was unsuccessful, but it gave Forrest the chance to do what he wished, which was to explore the uncharted areas of Western Australia.

In 1870, Forrest surveyed the route which Edward Eyre had taken in 1840-41 from Adelaide to Albany, across the Great Australian Bight. As the main route from eastern Australia overland to the west, he realised it needed to be surveyed so a road could be built, and later a railway.

William Lawson explored the Blue Mountains largely due to the influence of Gregory Blaxland. Blaxland was a wealthy grazier who had come to Australia in 1806. He stood to gain much by finding a route to new grasslands. Blaxland approached Governor Macquarie about funding an expedition to cross the Blue Mountains. Blaxland took along two other men: William Lawson, who was also a landholder, and magistrate with surveying experience; and William Wentworth, the first Australian-born explorer.

Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth reached the end-point of their journey across the Blue Mountains on 30 November 1813. It is not known how long it took them to return, but it would have been a much shorter journey than their 17 day journey out.

The Murray and Darling Rivers, which together make up the Murray-Darling system, is a large river system on the continent of Australia.

Like many of the English settlers of his time, Gregory Blaxland regarded Aborigines with a mixture of fear and condescension. Because so little was known about the aboriginal culture, Europeans were afraid of what they could not understand, yet tended to think they were better and "more civilised" than the Aborigines. Blaxland was no different in this regard.

Matthew Flinders died in London, England on 19 July 1814.

John Forrest spent most of his childhood in Bunbury,Western Australia.

Going by the information that Australian explorer William Wills left in his journal, it is believed that he died around the date of his final journal entry, 27 June 1861.

After the Burke and Wills expedition, a number of rescue parties were sent out to try and find the missing explorers. William Landsborough and John McKinlay both set out to try and determine the fate of Burke and Wills. Landsborough, travelling by ship to the Gulf of Carpentaria and also doing some overland expeditions, found no sign of the explorers. McKinlay was able to find quite a few traces, including the grave of Charlie Grey, who had died on the return journey from the Gulf. McKinlay is regarded as the uncredited winner of the race to the Gulf and back, because he covered the same ground in his search, and survived, beating even Stuart who was still in the midst of making his fifth attempt to cross to the north and back.

Alfred Howitt was also hired to lead a lightly equipped expedition to find and rescue the party, and he had more luck. Once he ascertained the fate of the party, and found the bodies of Burke and Wills which had both been partially eaten by dingoes, Howitt returned to Melbourne with the survivor, King. He also found Wills's journals near Wills's body, so a great deal of the expedition became known through these journals. Howitt was then sent back on a better equipped expedition to collect the bodies but was given strict orders that he was not to attempt to complete Burke's original mission. Howitt returned to Melbourne via Adelaide and the bones of Burke and Wills were buried at Royal Park with a State funeral. Ironically, the same day at Burke and Wills were given their State funeral, John McDouall Stuart was riding triumphantly into Adelaide, having made the crossing that would ensure the Overland Telegraph Line would be built between Adelaide (rather than Melbourne) and Port Essington.

Reverend William B Clark found gold near Lithgow in 1941, about ten years before the official goldrush. This was at a time when news of any discovery of gold was suppressed, for fear that the convicts would riot and escape. Clarke was ordered by Governor Gipps to keep quiet about it. Gipps is reported to have said, "Put it away, Mr Clarke, or we will all have our throats cut!"

The name "Australia" was first proposed by Matthew Flinders in the early 1800s, as part of the full name Terra Australis,meaning Southern land. The actual name "Australia" was then adopted in 1824.

They didn't.

Very little.

The South Australian government offered a reward of two thousand pounds to the first expedition to reach the northern coast. Due to the South Australian challenge, the Victorian Government decided to sponsor its own extremely well-funded and well-equipped expedition from south to north. This was the expedition led by Robert O'Hara Burke.

Burke had absolutely no experience in exploring, and it remains a mystery as to why he was even chosen to lead the expedition. He was a police superintendent on the goldfields, and had a tendency towards quick impatience (which was his undoing, in the end).

Burke and Wills did not actually find anything of value on their arduous trek across Australia's inland. They found no new rivers and no new pasture land, and honestly did not contribute anything to the discovery of Australia. Their greatest claim to fame is the unfortunate fact that they embarked upon the biggest, most expensive expedition in Australia's history, and due to Burke's impatience, it ended up the most disastrous, with the loss of three lives.