The Diary of Richard Glascott has been an invaluable
resource for me and other researchers of the early lives of cedar cutters and
the settlement of the North Coast of NSW.
Few other sources provide greater insights into the work and lifestyle
history of cedar cutters and their families in the region and are significant
in that they provide an extremely rare day- to-day account of families living
in the Newrybar and Tintenbar areas in the 1860s. Glascott himself worked in these localities
cutting cedar and in mixed farming and, as his diaries reveal, supporting a
wife and children, as did other cedar men. Importantly Glascott’s diaries
debunk the stereotype that all cedar cutters were single, and engaged in
constant drunkard behaviour.
Richard Donovan Glascott was born in New Ross, Wexford,
Ireland in 1833 and came to Australia on board the “Alnwick Castle” in 1857. He had been at sea for many years, but he
deserted his ship in Sydney and appears to have gone first in search of gold,
and then of “red gold “(cedar). By 1863 he
was living in Tintenbar and, four months short of his 30th birthday,
he married 16 year old Maria King, daughter of a cedar cutter called Richard
King.
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| Australian Red Cedar - Toona ciliata |
His diary exists in three ledgers. The first, begun in 1860, records only timber
measurements and transactions. The
second begins on 1 July 1864, as “a memorandum of the weather and how employed”
and runs until 1869, and the third is an intermittent account of the 1870s,
finishing on 13 February 1878.
There is no great literary merit in this diary. It is simply a record of each day – the
weather, the passing traffic on the river, work activity and family
events. What makes it so invaluable is
that it seems to be the only contemporary record of the everyday lives of these
early settlers, and in recording the names of each person who passed by,
Glascott has given the best account yet of who these cedar cutters were.
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| Cedar cutters on North Creek, near Teven |
It is also an early account of their relationship with the
local indigenous population and in all the years of his record there is no
record of hostility between them and the newcomers. They are often part of the timber
felling teams, and are included in other activities (“Black Jim and another lad
had their dinner here then returned to Tintenbar)*1. Often they are not named, but recorded as
“six blacks employed road cutting” for example.
(They are paid at half the rate of the white road cutters)
The early pages in July 1864 are simple.
6 July – Weather light showers At home.
8 July. Fine. At home. Wife confined. *2
By the end of that year, there is some more detail:
29 Dec – Fine and very hot all day. Went down to Election at Ballina and came
back evening. Voted for Laycock. For Laycock 39, for Bligh 1 at Ballina.
By the following year, there is more about the people around
him.
2 Mar 1865 “John Smith and his wife had a quarrel, Smith
broke all the crocker-ware and hammered his wife. Afterwards they shook hands and consented to
part. He stopped in the camp and she
left for Ballina at 5 pm.
13 Sept 1865 “went out to work with John Williams, James
Ryan, Pat Gallagher, Tom McCann*3, John Johnson, Tom Brennan and a Blackfellow,
last three and the Black parted company with us at beach road came on with me
to my hut at Skinners Creek. Killed a
large carpet snake at hut.*4 Fine”
We learn (October 1865) that they have formed a committee
and are building a schoolhouse. It
opened on 2 Jan 1866, with “10 scholars”
There are feuds and disagreements, babies being born and
people dying. The Rev Mr Shaw comes from
Casino and holds a service at the schoolhouse.
He marries one couple and baptises Glascott’s second child.
It is from Glascott that we learned of theft of oars which I
mentioned in an earlier post.
14 May 1874 “Saw Constable Bassman and another Constable and
two other men going through camp today, going up the river, they were all in
company together. Some dog got into my
barn last night and took a corned leg of pork away. I can’t say whether it was my dog or not. Fine.
Westerly”
And then
15 May 1874 “Met George Lewis coming out this morning and he
told me that it was Constables Bassman and Hogan and the two prisoners McCann
and Johnson that I saw passing through the camp yesterday” *5
And the death of Paul’s 2 x great grandfather is noted thus:
29 July 1876.
“Fencing. Joe McGuire called here
today. Heard old Charles McCann of Teven
Creek died this morning. Killed one
brown snake today. Fine. North
westerly.” *6
Dick’s diary ended in February 1878. He died 10 years later at the age of 54. His wife Maria outlived him by more than 50
years, dying in Ballina on her 92nd birthday in 1939.
The lives of the early settlers are not well
documented. Many of them couldn’t write
and even if they could, most were too busy trying to earn a living to spend
time writing. We are grateful to Richard Glascott for this simple record which
tells us so much about the cedar cutters and their everyday existence.
Footnotes:
*1 16 Feb 1873.
*2 Dick and Maria’s
first child was born that day. There is
no further mention of this event. We learn only later that it was a girl
*3 We have never been
able to work out who “Tom” McCann is – there is no “Thomas” of the right
vintage in the family tree. It might be
a nickname
*4 Glascott records
the killing of a snake at least once a week – brown snakes, black snakes, whip
snakes, “Bandy bandys”, as well as the (harmless) carpet snakes.
*5 See #52 Ancestors –
Week 5, “At the Library”
*6 “Old” Charles
McCann was 49
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