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Murrumba Homestead Grounds
Murrumba Homestead Grounds is a heritage-listed site at 38 Armstrong Street, Petrie, City of Moreton Bay, Queensland, Australia. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 16 February 2009.
The Murrumba Homestead Grounds, established by Tom Petrie in the 1860s, are situated at Petrie (earlier North Pine) on a low rise known locally as Murrumba Hill, and currently within the grounds of Our Lady of the Way Primary School and Parish Church. Murrumba Homestead was demolished in the early 1950s, but many early plantings associated with the occupation of this site by Tom Petrie and his family, survive – principally Bunya (Araucaria bidwillii), Hoop (Araucaria cunninghamii) and Kauri (Agathis robusta) pines and a large Weeping fig (Ficus benjamina) at the crest of the rise. These constitute one of the most extensive early (mid-nineteenth century) private garden plantings in Queensland.
The Murrumba run was established in late 1859 by Thomas Petrie (1831–1910), third son of Andrew Petrie – the first non-convict, non-military European settler in Queensland, who arrived at the Moreton Bay penal colony with his family in 1837 when Tom was six years old. As a child, Tom was allowed to mix freely with children of the local Turrbal people and learned their customs and languages, making many friends among them. He travelled widely with the Turrbal, and in the mid-1840s attended a triennial Bunya festival in the Blackall Range. His ability to converse with Aboriginal people made Tom extremely well known in Brisbane, where he was sought out by explorers (including Ludwig Leichhardt), local business men, government bureaucrats and Queensland governors alike, for his knowledge of the area and its indigenous inhabitants and to assist in locating commercially exploitable timbers and in marking roads.
Tom did not follow his father and older brother John Petrie into the construction business, but chose a life on the land. In 1857 he married Elizabeth Campbell, sister of Brisbane timber and hardware merchant James Campbell. Looking for good grazing land in the vicinity of Brisbane, Petrie sought advice on a suitable area from his friend Dalaipi, a distinguished elder of the North Pine clan. Dalaipi recommended land at the mouth of the Pine River and promised to protect Petrie, his household and his cattle. The assistance offered to Petrie was a mark of the regard in which he was held by Aboriginal people and made it possible for him to live in a place generally considered unsafe for European settlers. Several violent incidents had occurred in the district, including spearings of Europeans and Aboriginal deaths at the hands of the Native Police.
The area recommended by Dalaipi had been taken up in the 1840s by Captain Griffin as the Redbank section of the Whiteside pastoral run. Mrs Jane Griffin was willing to sell Petrie the lease to ten square-mile sections, reputedly because the frontier violence made it impossible for her to work the land effectively. The area she ceded to Petrie extended from Sideling Creek in the west to Redcliffe Point in the east, and was bounded on the south by the North Pine and Pine rivers. Petrie named his run Murrumba, meaning "a good place". Most of the land was open woodland of gum, ironbark, oak and bloodwood – the product of centuries of regular firing by Aborigines – with vine scrub restricted to small pockets in low-lying areas. With the help of a small group of Dalaipi's people Petrie cleared two acres and built a hut and stockyard near Yebri Creek, below Murrumba Hill.
From 1860 Tom Petrie became heavily involved in the timber industry. Since the 1840s his family had exploited the Hoop pine (Araucaria cunninghamii) that gave the Pine River its name, and at Murrumba Creek a rafting ground was established, where pines cut from the Pine River district were rafted to Brisbane via Sandgate. In 1860, with the assistance of Aboriginal friends, Tom Petrie accompanied Brisbane sawmill proprietor William Pettigrew to Tin Can Bay, the Mary River and Fraser Island in search of commercially exploitable timbers, paving the way for the exploitation of the giant Kauri pine (Agathis robusta). Petrie also explored the North Coast between the Blackall Range and the sea, looking for stands of valuable red cedar (Toona australis) and reporting on the commercial value of other indigenous timbers. Working with William Pettigrew and employing Aboriginal labour, he extracted considerable quantities of cedar and hardwoods from the Maroochy area to build up capital to develop Murrumba. The bunya pine (Araucaria bidwillii) of the Blackall Ranges he did not exploit, even after the new Queensland colonial government in 1860 rescinded New South Wales Governor George Gipps' 1842 legislation prohibiting the issuing of occupation or timber licenses on Bunya lands in the North Coast district as far as the Maroochy River and west to the Great Dividing Range. Like his father Andrew, who had been instrumental in the declaration of this reserve, Tom Petrie understood that the bunya pines and the ranges in which they were found were sacred to Aboriginal people.
To facilitate his timber operations Tom Petrie marked out several early northern roads, including a track between the Pine River and Bald Hills and a trail from Murrumba to Maroochydore, which later became the Gympie Road. He also blazed a track from North Pine to Humpybong (Redcliffe).
Petrie held the ten square miles (6,400 acres) Murrumba leasehold for less than three years. Early in 1861 the government survey office identified an area of 28,000 acres (11,000 ha) bounded on the south by the North Pine and Pine rivers, to the east by Moreton Bay (Redcliffe Point), and to the north by Deception Bay, as potential farming land. This was proclaimed on 31 May 1862 as the Redcliffe Agricultural Reserve. The square-mile pastoral leases over this area – including Murrumba – were withdrawn and the land re-surveyed as small farm allotments available for purchase or rent-purchase. To secure his improvements on Murrumba, at the first sale of Redcliffe Agricultural Reserve land held in Brisbane in July 1862 Petrie purchased portion 23 (70 acres (28 ha) – the homestead block) and leased the adjacent portions 24 (40 acres (16 ha)), 25 (43 acres (17 ha)), 29 (62 acres (25 ha)) and 30 (49 acres (20 ha)), to which eventually the family obtained title. Each of these parcels fronted Yebri Creek to the north. The track to Humpybong (Redcliffe) and later to Gympie passed through portion 23.
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Murrumba Homestead Grounds
Murrumba Homestead Grounds is a heritage-listed site at 38 Armstrong Street, Petrie, City of Moreton Bay, Queensland, Australia. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 16 February 2009.
The Murrumba Homestead Grounds, established by Tom Petrie in the 1860s, are situated at Petrie (earlier North Pine) on a low rise known locally as Murrumba Hill, and currently within the grounds of Our Lady of the Way Primary School and Parish Church. Murrumba Homestead was demolished in the early 1950s, but many early plantings associated with the occupation of this site by Tom Petrie and his family, survive – principally Bunya (Araucaria bidwillii), Hoop (Araucaria cunninghamii) and Kauri (Agathis robusta) pines and a large Weeping fig (Ficus benjamina) at the crest of the rise. These constitute one of the most extensive early (mid-nineteenth century) private garden plantings in Queensland.
The Murrumba run was established in late 1859 by Thomas Petrie (1831–1910), third son of Andrew Petrie – the first non-convict, non-military European settler in Queensland, who arrived at the Moreton Bay penal colony with his family in 1837 when Tom was six years old. As a child, Tom was allowed to mix freely with children of the local Turrbal people and learned their customs and languages, making many friends among them. He travelled widely with the Turrbal, and in the mid-1840s attended a triennial Bunya festival in the Blackall Range. His ability to converse with Aboriginal people made Tom extremely well known in Brisbane, where he was sought out by explorers (including Ludwig Leichhardt), local business men, government bureaucrats and Queensland governors alike, for his knowledge of the area and its indigenous inhabitants and to assist in locating commercially exploitable timbers and in marking roads.
Tom did not follow his father and older brother John Petrie into the construction business, but chose a life on the land. In 1857 he married Elizabeth Campbell, sister of Brisbane timber and hardware merchant James Campbell. Looking for good grazing land in the vicinity of Brisbane, Petrie sought advice on a suitable area from his friend Dalaipi, a distinguished elder of the North Pine clan. Dalaipi recommended land at the mouth of the Pine River and promised to protect Petrie, his household and his cattle. The assistance offered to Petrie was a mark of the regard in which he was held by Aboriginal people and made it possible for him to live in a place generally considered unsafe for European settlers. Several violent incidents had occurred in the district, including spearings of Europeans and Aboriginal deaths at the hands of the Native Police.
The area recommended by Dalaipi had been taken up in the 1840s by Captain Griffin as the Redbank section of the Whiteside pastoral run. Mrs Jane Griffin was willing to sell Petrie the lease to ten square-mile sections, reputedly because the frontier violence made it impossible for her to work the land effectively. The area she ceded to Petrie extended from Sideling Creek in the west to Redcliffe Point in the east, and was bounded on the south by the North Pine and Pine rivers. Petrie named his run Murrumba, meaning "a good place". Most of the land was open woodland of gum, ironbark, oak and bloodwood – the product of centuries of regular firing by Aborigines – with vine scrub restricted to small pockets in low-lying areas. With the help of a small group of Dalaipi's people Petrie cleared two acres and built a hut and stockyard near Yebri Creek, below Murrumba Hill.
From 1860 Tom Petrie became heavily involved in the timber industry. Since the 1840s his family had exploited the Hoop pine (Araucaria cunninghamii) that gave the Pine River its name, and at Murrumba Creek a rafting ground was established, where pines cut from the Pine River district were rafted to Brisbane via Sandgate. In 1860, with the assistance of Aboriginal friends, Tom Petrie accompanied Brisbane sawmill proprietor William Pettigrew to Tin Can Bay, the Mary River and Fraser Island in search of commercially exploitable timbers, paving the way for the exploitation of the giant Kauri pine (Agathis robusta). Petrie also explored the North Coast between the Blackall Range and the sea, looking for stands of valuable red cedar (Toona australis) and reporting on the commercial value of other indigenous timbers. Working with William Pettigrew and employing Aboriginal labour, he extracted considerable quantities of cedar and hardwoods from the Maroochy area to build up capital to develop Murrumba. The bunya pine (Araucaria bidwillii) of the Blackall Ranges he did not exploit, even after the new Queensland colonial government in 1860 rescinded New South Wales Governor George Gipps' 1842 legislation prohibiting the issuing of occupation or timber licenses on Bunya lands in the North Coast district as far as the Maroochy River and west to the Great Dividing Range. Like his father Andrew, who had been instrumental in the declaration of this reserve, Tom Petrie understood that the bunya pines and the ranges in which they were found were sacred to Aboriginal people.
To facilitate his timber operations Tom Petrie marked out several early northern roads, including a track between the Pine River and Bald Hills and a trail from Murrumba to Maroochydore, which later became the Gympie Road. He also blazed a track from North Pine to Humpybong (Redcliffe).
Petrie held the ten square miles (6,400 acres) Murrumba leasehold for less than three years. Early in 1861 the government survey office identified an area of 28,000 acres (11,000 ha) bounded on the south by the North Pine and Pine rivers, to the east by Moreton Bay (Redcliffe Point), and to the north by Deception Bay, as potential farming land. This was proclaimed on 31 May 1862 as the Redcliffe Agricultural Reserve. The square-mile pastoral leases over this area – including Murrumba – were withdrawn and the land re-surveyed as small farm allotments available for purchase or rent-purchase. To secure his improvements on Murrumba, at the first sale of Redcliffe Agricultural Reserve land held in Brisbane in July 1862 Petrie purchased portion 23 (70 acres (28 ha) – the homestead block) and leased the adjacent portions 24 (40 acres (16 ha)), 25 (43 acres (17 ha)), 29 (62 acres (25 ha)) and 30 (49 acres (20 ha)), to which eventually the family obtained title. Each of these parcels fronted Yebri Creek to the north. The track to Humpybong (Redcliffe) and later to Gympie passed through portion 23.