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W.B. Clarke and Mount Kosciusko

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W.B. Clarke - Father of Australian Geology: Bibliography | Calendar of Correspondence | Illawarra & Shoalhaven diary 1839-40 | Lake Macquarie | Kosciusko | Introduction During January 2022 I was contacted by a fellow researcher who required a copy of a geological report by the Reverend W.B. Clarke, who, during 1851-2, carried out surveys for the New South Wales government in the southern and northern districts of the colony. This arose out of the discovery of gold at Sofir, near Bathurst, early in 1851. During these excursions, Clarke made records in the form of diary notes, letters, geological notes and the collection of geological specimens. Due to the often precarious nature of his travels, over areas that had not previously been mapped in any detail, it appears that he frequently sent some of this material back to Sydney for safe keeping with his friend Philip Parker King R.N., former captain of H.M.S. Beagle . King compiled some of this material into reports for the ...
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Illawarra and Shoalhaven 1839 - 1840: The Descriptive Diary of the Reverend W.B. Clarke

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W.B. Clarke - Father of Australian Geology: Bibliography | Calendar of Correspondence | Illawarra & Shoalhaven diary 1839-40 | Lake Macquarie | Kosciusko | Introduction Oh! How this Colony teaches one the depravity of human nature... In these almost despairing words the not-so-young Reverend William Branwhite Clarke addresed his diary for 8 March 1840. Admittedly, on their arrival in Sydney on 27 May 1839, the health of himself, his wife, and young family had been seriously impaired, a condition in no way relieved by finding things far below their expectations. Though he had fallen temporarily the attractive post of headmaster of The King’s School, Parramatta, he already had had occasion to write to his mother on 9 September 1839: I advise no one to come hither. Dirt, disease, bugs, fleas, flies, ants, centipedes, lizards, scorpions, snakes of all descriptions, together with the heat and dust, horrible roads, want of comfort in houses, honesty of servants, and th...
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