The Man Shot By His Camel | Tony Robinson

In the middle of the 18th century, exploration of Australia's vast interior was all the go

Explorers were heroic figures. The astronauts of their age. a lot of the brave explorers who crisscrossed this vast land are now justifiably famous here

in australia but there's one man who opened up huge tracts of south australia including what's

now its most successful wine growing area but that's not what made him famous at all

He celebrated for something entirely different. He was the first man in history to be shot by his own cannon

John Horrocks arrived in Australia on his 21st birthday, carrying a burning desire to make his mark on the colony

The young gent made a good fist of farming, but soon decided exploring was more to his nature

For that purpose, he imported Harry. The very first camel to arrive in Australia

Now, I know a lot of camels are really sweet-tempered, but Harry was a bit of a monster

The first thing he did was bite the head of the chief tent man, called Garlic

and there were two huge gashes in Garlic's forehead and one down his cheek

Then Harry bit one of the goats, shook him by the scruff of its neck

and apparently tried to eat it, and then finally he took a bite out of the flour bag

And, of course, that caused a great big trail of white all the way behind them and used up a lot of valuable supplies

Now, all that might sound like a bit of comedy, but then things got much darker

Horrocks, up ahead, saw a sweet little bird and thought, oh, this is going to look great for my stuffed bird collection

So he went to get his gun. And at that moment, Harry lurched or something

and the gun went off and it went right through Horrocks' hand

knocking off all his right fingers, then through his cheek, and knocked all his teeth out

When he was shot, young Horrocks was just three days into his grand adventure

A week after that he dictated what would be his final recorded words They read It is with the greatest regret I have to inform the committee and my fellow colonists who subscribe towards the expenses of the expedition

of its untimely and unfortunate termination. Very polite, dare I say typically British way of saying

I've been shot, so the trip's off. Horrocks contracted gangrene and died 23 days later

but before he passed away he ordered that the camel should be shot

It took two bullets to kill Harry and only after he'd managed to take one final bite out of a stockman's head

The vast interior of Australia was still a mystery when Horrocks' luck ran out

In fact, no European laid eyes on the red centre of Australia

until more than 50 years after the British set up their little settlement in Sydney

The reason was these, the Blue Mountains. For decades, Sydney was landlocked

What lay beyond these rock escarpments was just speculation and guesswork. There was an insatiable demand for wool in the early 1800s

Anyone in the colony who could get wool to England's great textile mills

was virtually guaranteed instant wealth, so the motivation to find more farming land was pretty strong

The mountains were finally crossed in 1813 by explorers who followed Aboriginal trails along the ridges

They were a hardy bunch, the early explorers, but some of them stood out

Thomas Mitchell arrived 15 years after the Blue Mountains were crossed he believed all the good farming land had already been discovered

more than anything he wanted to make his mark as an explorer

and felt frustrated to be put on surveying duty but ironically it was his surveying skills that led him to finally achieve his goal

Apollo and I are going to give you a bit of a demonstration of surveying

because Mitchell had this really curious way of working out how far he'd travelled during the course of the day

And he did it using these things, broad beans. He'd stick them in his pocket

and then he'd count the steps that his horse made, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, till he got to 100

When he got to 100, he'd put a bean into his pocket. Then he start again 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 till he got to another 100 pop another bean into his pocket and he reckoned that his horse took 950 steps to go one mile So at the end of the day if he got 100 beans in his pocket

then he knew that his horse had travelled about ten and a half miles

Now, that may not be as accurate as GPS, but, quite frankly, Mitchell is the most famous surveyor in Australia

so who am I to argue? Who are you to argue, either? How small beans

He doesn't want any more beans. Mitchell was asked to use his surveying skills

to chart the Darling River in the west of New South Wales. But his ambition got the better of him

He saw there was much more promising land to the south of the Murray River

and decided to set off into uncharted territory. And he hit the jackpot, open pasture land as far as the eye could see

He called it Australia Felix. Lucky Australia. And it was lucky for him too

As one of the very few explorers to discover rich pasture land

Mitchell's place in Australian history was assured. Mitchell and his team had crossed mountains

navigated rivers and slept rough in the bush. By the time they got to Portland on the south coast of Victoria

they'd been on the move for five months. They were miles away from civilisation in previously uncharted territory

Except, actually, they weren't. Imagine Mitchell's surprise. He'd stumbled onto an established settlement

that no-one else in the colony knew existed. A farming family from West Sussex called the Hentys

had slipped through the back door with a land grant from the King of England

Tony, hi. Come on in. Thank you. How long had the Henters been in Australia

They'd been in Portland for 18 months before Major Mitchell arrived. So they had their huts built and their veggie garden and their trees

and they had a very good establishment. They had their cattle, they had their horses, they had a lot of stock over here

So what happened when Mitchell showed up at the Hentis Place? Well, they thought they were bushrangers

because they didn't know there was no white men for miles around. Yeah

And all of a sudden this white man was coming through the bush at them you know with guns and feathers and their caps and all sorts of things and they went well you know this must be a bushranger so we load the gun So the meeting is on record Yes it is This is a document written by Edward Henty And what he goes on to say is that

the appearance of Major Mitchell in his band of five with emu feathers in their caps, as

well as the red tail feathers of the black cockatoo, blue and red serge shirts, and much

tattered, patched and worn, and certainly very fierce and formidable looking. It just looked absolutely terrifying

It would have been horrible. An explanation and reconciliation followed. So that's when they went, oh, we won't shoot him yet

We'll find out what he's about. Mitchell arrived without anything because they'd run out of flour

and all those sorts of things. So the henties said, well, we've got a supply ship turning up in a day

We'll wait until that comes and then we can load you up. So they gave them flour and gin and whole heaps of grog and stuff

so they set them off their way after about three or four days. Now, Major Mitchell must have been grateful

because he tipped off the Henties about the fertile lands that he'd found to the north, and that helped make them rich

But when he got back to Sydney, he reported the presence of the squatter clan

to his boss, the new governor of New South Wales, and it didn't do well for the Henties

So what did Governor Gibbs do? Well, he set down a team, because he went right off the rocker, apparently

and went, oh, what's everybody, what are they doing down there? Big landowners in my land

What's happening, that damn king? What's he doing? I'm trying to run this show

So he sat down to surveyor and stuff. And, of course, the Hentys had laid out their houses

and their gardens and everything else. And just to really make the point to the Hentys

that Gips was actually the boss, they actually put a road right through Edward Hentys' middle of his house

You know what? Which was very nice. I think the Hentys would have been much better off if they'd shot Mitchell

now we're very british at that stage actually you're a henty i think i'll just put that down

and move to the other side of the room when i first heard the story about mitchell meeting the henty brothers i assumed that the

henties were a pair of ragamuffins trading with whalers and making a hand-to-mouth living

i now realize that they were landowners they were favored by the king of england

and were very, very respectable. Look, this is Francis Henty's own top hat

I'll better give it back before I go