Charters Towers

Thursday 22nd and Friday 23rd April 2021

Thursday

We woke up to a rainy day in Townsville after another good night sleep.

We packed up our bags , the car and set off for Charters Towers.

Charters Towers is a small rural town situated 134km southwest of Townsville.

We drove in the pouring rain with the sound of ‘In the night garden’ coming from the backseat. We drove all the way with one pit stop in the squelching mud, when Madeline refused to pee…because it’s “too dangerous.” Another new favourite word. Everything from her breakfast to her shoes can be too dangerous.

We stopped in Charters Towers for lunch and then headed to the information centre.

By 130pm we checked into our hotel room and relaxed for a bit with a cuppa tea.

Too wet to do anything productive today we played together as a family until dinner time. we then had cake and Eva was able to blow out her candles.

Tomorrow we plan to do some fossicking.

History

Ludwig Leichhardt camped in the area in 1845.

In 1861 Edward Cunningham took up Burdekin Downs Station – first pastoral holding north of the Bowen River.

The town was founded in the 1870s when gold was discovered by chance at Towers Hill on Christmas Eve 1871 by 12-year-old Aboriginal boy, Jupiter Mosman. Jupiter was with a small group of prospectors including Hugh Mosman, James Fraser and George Clarke. Their horses bolted after a flash of lightning. While he was searching Jupiter found both the horses and a nugget of gold in a creek at the base of Towers Hill.

Charters originated from the Gold Commissioner, W.S.E.M. Charters. A total of ten major gold reefs were eventually mined.

Such were the boom years, between 1872 and 1899, that Charters Towers hosted its own stock exchange.

A 20 head of stamps mill began ore crushing operations on 16 July 1872. The Venus Battery continued to be used by small mine in the region until 1971.

In 1884 ‘Breaker’ Morant married Daisy May O’Dwyer (later Daisy Bates) in Charters Towers. He abandoned his wife shortly afterwards when a number of his cheques were dishonoured.

By 1900 the town had 92 hotels. The town started to decline in 1912 when the production of gold dropped from a high of 319,572 ounces in 1899 to a mere 96,046.

1920 saw the regions biggest nugget found, it was named ‘Prince of Wales.’

During World War II a total of 15,000 US servicemen were stationed in the city.

Friday

We woke up to yet another rainy day today. We had breakfast and packed up our car from the motel.

We went to visit Towers Hill today. at the base of this hill, was the site that gold was first discovered. A monument commemorating the discovery is at this site.

World War II

In July 1942, the RAAF established the No 3 Replenishing Centre on Towers Hill to store bombs, detonators and ammunition, for use by the Townsville based RAAF.

There are more than 30 concrete bunkers scattered across Towers Hill.