Explorations in Australia: 1.-Explorations in search of Dr. Leichardt and party. 2.-From Perth to Adelaide, around the great Australian bight. 3.-From Champion Bay, across the desert to the telegraph and to Adelaide. With an appendix on the condition of Western Australia

In Short

This book presents the firsthand journals of surveyor John Forrest during three distinct nineteenth-century expeditions into the Australian interior: the search for lost explorer Dr. Ludwig Leichhardt, the trek along the Great Australian Bight from Perth to Adelaide, and the desert crossing from Champion Bay to the transcontinental telegraph line. Forrest records the day-to-day realities of navigating uncharted landscapes, managing vital horse transport, and tracking elusive water sources. The work endures as a primary historical record of imperial exploration, combining precise geographical fieldwork with the practical logistics of Australian overland travel.

The Story

The narrative opens in 1869 with John Forrest leading a government-backed party eastward from Perth to investigate indigenous reports regarding the fate of Dr. Ludwig Leichhardt’s lost expedition. Taking white companions George Monger and Malcolm Hamersley, convict shoeing smith David Morgan, and native guides Tommy Windich and Jemmy Mungaro, Forrest drives sixteen horses through the settlement of Newcastle and into the arid interior. The group navigates barren quartz ranges and salt plains, naming geographical features like Mount Lenora and Mount George. Though Forrest finds no trace of Leichhardt, he methodically maps the region to the 123rd meridian before returning safely, proving the immediate country unsuited for agriculture while providing valuable geographic coordinates.

Building on this success, Forrest organizes a second journey in 1870 to traverse the southern coastline along the Great Australian Bight to Adelaide, charting a overland connection between Western and South Australia. Supported by the schooner Adur, which meets the shore party at Israelite Bay and Port Eucla to replenish supplies, the expedition braves hundreds of miles of waterless terrain. Forrest observes that the country north of the cliffs offers extraordinary grazing land, yet notes the total absence of surface streams over a four-hundred-mile stretch. By careful management and reliance on Windich’s tracking, the party completes the trek without losing a single horse, reaching South Australia to receive high-profile public receptions, banquets, and civic accolades in Adelaide before returning to Perth.

The final and most grueling section covers the 1874 expedition from Champion Bay straight through the central spinifex desert to the overland telegraph line. Traveling with his brother Alexander Forrest as second in command, Forrest faces extreme heat, dense thickets, and long stretches without water that severely exhaust their horses. The expedition experiences a sharp violent encounter with local indigenous inhabitants at Weld Springs, where the party erects a defensive position. Navigating past rugged ranges and relying on rock water-holes and brief rainfalls, the party perseveres through intense physical exhaustion, abandoning spent horses along the route. Upon striking the transcontinental telegraph line and reaching Adelaide, Forrest concludes his journal with celebratory speeches, government reports, and statistical appendices documenting the economic and physical development of Western Australia.

How It Unfolds

Setting out for Leichhardt Equipped with navigational instruments and essential rations, Forrest leaves the settled colonial districts to verify rumors of murdered white men. The party establishes its routine, measuring latitude and longitude nightly while native guides search ahead for daily water supplies.

Reaching the interior limit After exhaustive searches around dry lake beds, granite outcrops, and quartz ridges, Forrest realizes Leichhardt cannot be found in the region. He pushes as far east as possible, naming local landmarks, before turning back to present a detailed geographic report to the Surveyor-General.

Mapping the Great Bight The party marches along the southern coast toward Port Eucla, relying on scheduled supply rendezvous with the schooner Adur. Forrest surveys massive tracts of waterless, elevated pasture land, surviving long stretches of arid terrain through strict discipline and careful horse management.

Civic honors in Adelaide Upon successfully crossing into South Australia without casualties, Forrest and his men enter Adelaide to formal welcomes, formal dinners, and public praise. Colonists celebrate the party's achievement in proving a viable, albeit difficult, land connection between the western and southern colonies.

Into the spinifex desert Launching a third journey from Champion Bay, the party strikes directly east through severe red sand-hills and spiky spinifex grass. Water becomes drastically scarce, forcing the men to walk on foot in extreme temperatures while searching for temporary clay-pan pools.

Conflict at Weld Springs While camped at a vital water source, the expedition is attacked by indigenous warriors, forcing Forrest and his men to fire upon them to secure their camp. The party remains at the springs to repair pack-saddles and rest their weakened livestock.

Striking the telegraph line Pushing past the dry Marryatt River and broken ranges, the exhausted men abandon knocked-up horses to conserve their remaining strength. They finally reach the overland telegraph line, completing the transcontinental journey and securing another round of public celebrations and colonial development reports.

The People

• John Forrest: The lead surveyor and expedition leader who seeks to map uncharted territory and locate vital water sources. Driven by duty to the colonial government, he manages logistics, astronomical observations, and party discipline, emerging as a prominent colonial hero.
• Alexander Forrest: John's brother and second in command on the final expedition. He seeks to support the journey's scientific and geographic goals, taking on dangerous advance scouting trips to find water in the desert.
• Tommy Windich: A skilled native guide and huntsman whose primary aim is to track water and collect missing horses. Confronted by life-threatening droughts, his bushcraft proves essential to the survival of the entire expedition.
• Jemmy Mungaro: A native guide employed on the early search for Leichhardt. He provides essential local knowledge and water-finding skills, though Forrest noted his tendency to exaggerate native reports.
• David Morgan: A probation prisoner and shoeing smith who serves as camp cook. He seeks his freedom and redemption through hard labor, fulfilling essential practical tasks across months of desert travel.

In Its Own Voice

"A knowledge of at least the leading principles of the art of navigation is as necessary to the explorer as to the mariner on the ocean."

Forrest reflects on the practical scientific skills required to guide an expedition safely across featureless inland landscapes.

"Since leaving Cape Arid I have not seen a gully or watercourse of any description--a distance of 400 miles."

During the coastal journey along the Great Australian Bight, Forrest notes the total absence of surface water across immense stretches of territory.

"A horse requires water at least once in twelve hours, and suffers greatly if that period of abstinence is exceeded."

Contrasting his team's pack animals with camels, Forrest details the constant, grueling struggle to keep his livestock alive in the central desert.

What It's Really About

Underneath the daily log of miles traveled and water-holes found, the book is an explicit argument for imperial expansion and colonial infrastructure. Forrest approaches the landscape through the lens of utilitarian surveying, continuously assessing whether soil, timber, and water can support livestock, telegraph lines, or future settlements. The text presents exploration not as a romantic quest, but as a systematic, state-funded effort to measure the unknown and bring it under institutional control. It addresses Victorian questions regarding human endurance, the practical value of scientific geographical data, and the relentless drive to map interior lands despite severe natural obstacles and existing indigenous ownership.

Why Read It Today

This text appeals directly to readers interested in historical exploration, Australian colonial history, and field surveying. Reading Forrest’s journals offers an unadorned, un-romanticized look into nineteenth-century field conditions. The prose is functional, direct, and stripped of dramatic flourishes, deriving its tension entirely from the very real threats of dehydration, lost stock, and isolation.

Modern readers must navigate period attitudes that reflect nineteenth-century colonial biases, particularly regarding indigenous populations and the unquestioned assumption of imperial expansion. Furthermore, the narrative structure can feel repetitive, filled as it is with daily weather logs, latitude calculations, and routine camp chores. Yet this precise, unvarnished detail is exactly what makes the book valuable. The persistent, quiet tension of watching men count their remaining gallons of water or search for a single missing horse in a vast desert creates a compelling document of human endurance and historical surveying.