WHO WHITE MEN.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 672, 27 May 1914, Page 6

WHO WHITE MEN.

LIFE AMONG TEE BLACKS. In the early day a of white settlement there occurred numerous instances of white men who vanished into the bash, only to later on reappear after having for years among- the aboriginals. Perhaps the best remembered instance is that of Buckley, in Victoria. Queensland was by no mesn3 without similar episodes in her history. In hia "Geographic History, "of Queensland " Mr A. Meaton collected a number of these at'orfeg' and they furnish interesting reading. In 1828 a convict escaped from the Morston liny penal settlement, and was passed on by the falacba northwards to tha Mary River, where he was adopted by a biackfellcw named "Fambie-pambie," who regarded him as a long, lost son returned from the dead, with tbe white skin which a dead body displayed when the' black surface was earned off at the cannibal feasts. Tins' convict's name was James Davies, son of a BroomieJaw blacksmith. He was only aisten years of age wa.su sent out with the somewhat sevele ssi:t«nca ox ten years for larceny. no escaped in Captain Logan's tims, 'when tbe merciless U39 of ths lash and rigorous penalties made life intolerable, snd many preferred to risk their fate among savages, or death in any shape, rather than remain subject to the horrors of the convict orison.

FOURTEEN YEABS IN THE BOSH.

Daviea remained fourteen, years with the Mary Bivae blacks,'^iefly.-in the vicinity cf Mount Bopple; and was brought in, by Andrew Petrie, in 1842. Among the Cafabaa blacks he boro the name of Thurrimble —the kangasoorat—arid Burramboi, in the Oondo dialect —the word for little. Among the blacks cf that date hs wes only a small- man. In the fourteen years'he had become wild as the wildest savage, coald ciimb a troe, throw a spaar or boomerang, or use ths shield and nulla effectively in peace or war. His back bore scara of many eats from the stone knives; a spear bad been driven through his .thigh, ani he bsd a boomerang cut cn one knee. He spoke the Gabbee dialect fluently. After returning to Brisbane hs adopted his father's trade of blacksmith, finally started a crockery shop in George street, and died there in May, 18S9, leaving proparty valnsd at £IO,OOO, nearly the whole being bequeaihed in his will' to a maiden lady, a native of Brisbane. Another convict, name' Baksr, escaped from the penal settlement in 1832, and was adopted by the Upper Brisbane River blacks, who called him Barallehoo. This man acted aa interpreter at. the Sydney trial of the two blacks who wera hanged in July, at Brisbane, for the murder of Stapyton, the surveyor, in May, 1840. He alEo acted as guide to Lieutenant Goraoan on a trip from Ipswich to Darling Down's in 1841. In 1832. a convict named Bracefell escaped from th' 3 penal settlement, and was adopted; by the Wide Bay blacks, who named him "Wandi," a wotd meaning "very wild," and used for the dingo. After ten years, life among the blacks he wag al3o rescued at the same time as Thurrimbie,. and brought in by Pstris in 1§42. He Was equally proficient in the language and the use of weapons, • Hs and Davies spoke the saine dialect, Cabbee. Bracefell was killed at Goodna, by a falling tree. In the year 1838 a convict named John Fahey came out, in tha ship Clyde, under a sentence cf life. He absconded from a New England road party in 1842, and was taken by the New England blacks to the Benya Mountains during tbo bunya season, and remained with th; Busya Mountain feribsa for twelve years, until brought into Br*abr:R3 in December, 1854, by Lieutenant Blight, of the

native police. Ke was taken to Sydney, identified by the superintendent of convicts, and actually sentenced to twnlvs months' hsr'j labour for absconding in 1842. When found he. had neariy forgotten his ovrn language, and required lime to recover a fluent expression of English, lis spoke ths Wacca dialect of ths Darling Downs, una his body w?g all ornamented with the raisan "msrigni'ra" sear of tJig tribes bv V/horr. he was adopted. Bis native name was "Gilburrie."