James Larmer

James Larmer (b. 1808 or 1809 – d. 1886) was a government surveyor in the colony of New South Wales.

James Larmer in the 1880s (cropped version of an image from the SLNSW).[1]

Between 1830 and 1859, he surveyed land, roads and settlements in New South Wales. He was an Assistant Surveyor to the Surveyor-General, Sir Thomas Mitchell, from 1835 to 1855. In 1835, he was second in command of Thomas Mitchell’s second expedition.

He is also noteworthy for his recording of Aboriginal words from various parts of New South Wales.

Early life

Larmer was born in Reigate, Surrey, England and arrived in Sydney in October 1829[2] to take up his appointment as a survey draftsman.[3]

Career

Between 1830 and early 1835, James Larmer surveyed land, roads, streets, coastlines, creeks, rivers, and ridges in what is now greater Sydney, in nearby areas including Broke and Branxton in the Hunter, Brooklyn, Mangrove Creek, Broken Bay and Pittwater around the Hawkesbury River, and in more distant parts including the Abercrombie, Campbells, Belubela, Bell, and Macquarie Rivers.[2]

During 1835, Larmer was second in command of Thomas Mitchell’s second expedition[4], which attempted to follow the Darling River downstream to its confluence with the Murray. Larmer, in command of the main party, left Parramatta and met Mitchell at 'Boree', west of modern-day Orange. The expedition first went overland, then followed the Bogan River, then the Darling from the location of modern-day Bourke. While near the Bogan, the expedition's botanist, Richard Cunningham, went off in search of plants and became lost. It was Larmer who led a party that searched for him for a number of days, finding his dead horse and other evidence of his likely demise.[5][6] Larmer produced a map sketch showing Cunningham's probable route.[7]

The expedition stopped to the north of the Menindee Lakes, due to the risk of attack by hostile Aborigines, falling short of their objective—but in no doubt that the Darling continued to the Murray—and then retracing their route to return. The connection of the Murray and the Darling, would be confirmed for settler colonists, in 1844, when Charles Sturt's third expedition, following a river upstream from its confluence with the Murray, reached the site of Mitchell's last camp.[8]

In 1837, Larmer laid out the town plan of Bungendore[9], in 1838 Queanbeyan[10], and, in 1839, the town plans of Broulee[11] and Braidwood.

In 1840, he surveyed the route of The Wool Road.[12] By this time, he had settled in the Braidwood area,[13] where he was to live for the rest of his life. Larmer bought land in Braidwood, in 1843, on which he built the Royal Hotel building but was not the licensee of the hotel.[2]

An economic depression in the early 1840s led to government cost cutting, with surveyors’ salaries being reduced by a third. In recognition of this sacrifice, these government surveyors were allowed to do some private work.[2] In 1844, Larmer was appointed as the Licenced Surveyor for the County of Murray and Commissioner for Crown Lands for the same area.[14]

The town of Gundagai was gazetted, in 1838, but it was soon obvious—after the floods of 1844 and 1852—that much of the original town site was subject to inundation.[15] In 1850, Larmer laid out plans for the separate settlement areas of 'South Gundagai' and 'North Gundagai', to allow residents to be relocated and overcome the problem of flooding on the river flats.[16][17]

In 1858, Larmer laid out the plan of the gold-mining village of Majors Creek.[18] His last field notes date from 1859, and it appears that he retired from surveying around that time.[2]

Larmer became a Justice of the Peace at Braidwood in 1859.[19] With other JPs, he presided over cases in the town's Police Court, [20][21] until 1885.[22] His cases included some involving relatives and associates of the notorious Clarke brothers and other bushrangers, who were members of the Clarke-Connell extended family.[23][24] In May 1867, Thomas and John Clarke, the surviving members of their gang, were remanded, at the Police Court in Braidwood, for trial in Sydney.[25]

Aboriginal languages vocabulary

The Surveyor-General, Thomas Mitchell, had directed that, where possible, the existing names, in the local Aboriginal language, should be used as the official names of localities and landforms in New South Wales, which then also included what is now Victoria and Queensland. This was for pragmatic reasons, rather than stemming from any wish to preserve native cultures; in his journal, Mitchell wrote that, "‘The great convenience of using native names is obvious … so long as any of the Aborigines can be found in the neighbourhood … future travellers may verify my map. Whereas new names are of no use in this respect". [26] Consequently, the surveyors of the colony were among those few settlers who took an interest in local languages. They were also working in places where the local people were still living on their traditional lands and speaking their own languages and dialects.

Larmer recorded Aboriginal words and the areas in which these words were used. His work, collated as “James Larmer’s Vocabulary of Native Names” (1853), is one source for fragments of the vocabulary of lost and endangered Aboriginal languages.[27] It is based on his earlier hand-written notes, some dating back to the early 1830s. His lists include words from the Darkinyung, Awabakal, Wiradjuri and Eora languages, and the Dhurga language dialects spoken by the Yuin peoples around Batemans Bay and Ulladulla. There is a list of the Aboriginal language names for the land features and localities of Port Jackson.[28]

Legacy

Although Larmer recorded and thus preserved something of Aboriginal culture, his work as a surveyor was essential in furthering the colonisation of Aboriginal lands. Most significantly, by marking boundaries—defining leasehold and freehold landholdings—and officially assigning titles to settlers, Larmer and the other surveyors were legitimising—at least under the colonial laws of his time—the dispossessing of the land's Aboriginal inhabitants; it was the first step in the process of extinguishing what would much later—in 1992—be recognised as Native Title over those pieces of land.

The best land for agriculture, grazing, and other purposes was also the most bountiful land for Aboriginal food sources. The alienation and clearing of their traditional lands and the loss of natural flora and fauna had an enormous impact on the original inhabitants; it effectively forced them onto Crown Lands, Aboriginal reserves, the lands of other Aboriginal peoples, or to the margins of the new settlements, and so caused the disruption or end of their culture and traditional way of life.

The Georgian-influenced grid-type town plans, of Bungendore, Queanbeyan, and Braidwood, are Larmer's work. He is commemorated in the various 'Larmer' street names, in places in New South Wales such as Bungendore, Howlong, Majors Creek, Narraweena, Nerrandera, and Sanctuary Point.

The road to Jervis Bay that he surveyed in 1840, The Wool Road, was a failure and rapidly fell into disuse,[29][30] until it was realigned and rerouted to Nowra in 1856; much of the modern Braidwood Road still follows Larmer's survey.[31]

His hotel building in Braidwood is now used as the Braidwood Museum.[32]

Family

James Larmer married, Martha Stoyles, widow of the licencee of the Royal Hotel, Braidwood, in 1861. They had two daughters, as well as the five daughters and three sons of Martha's first marriage.[2] [33]

His younger brother, William Larmer, migrated to Australia in 1853. William was an early pharmacist in Sydney, president of the Pharmaceutical Society, and member of the Pharmacy Board of New South Wales, who after 1865 also became involved in homeopathy.[34][35][36]

Larmer's nephew, W.E. Larmer, was also a surveyor in New South Wales from 1854,[37][38] leading on occasion to confusion about the two surveyors.[39][40]

Death

James Larmer died on 5 June 1886, aged 77 years. At the time of his death, Larmer was believed to be the last surviving member of Mitchell's second expedition. His grave lies in the Braidwood cemetery.[41][2][5] His wife Martha died in 1899.[33]

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References
  1. "Adlib Internet Server 5 | Details - James Larmer, surveyor, early 1900's copy of a ca. 1880's photograph by The Johnson Studios, Pitt & Market Streets, Sydney". archival.sl.nsw.gov.au. Retrieved 26 July 2020.
  2. "James Larmer". stgeorgesbasin.info. Retrieved 14 July 2020.
  3. "Classified Advertising". Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1803 - 1842). 25 July 1829. p. 1. Retrieved 26 July 2020.
  4. Bourke, Richard (26 March 1835). "Government Gazette Notices - Appendix A". New South Wales Government Gazette (Sydney, NSW : 1832 - 1900) - 21 January 1837. p. 62. Retrieved 26 July 2020.
  5. "THE PIONEERS OF THE DARLING". Daily Telegraph (Sydney, NSW : 1883 - 1930). 28 September 1885. p. 3. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
  6. "MURDER OF MR. CUNNINGHAM". Leader (Orange, NSW : 1899 - 1945). 31 July 1912. p. 1. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
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  8. "Thomas Mitchell". gutenberg.net.au. Retrieved 26 July 2020.
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  10. "Queanbeyan's Timeline". Queanbeyan Museum. 1 July 2013. Retrieved 14 July 2020.
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  24. "BRAIDWOOD". Queanbeyan Age and General Advertiser (NSW : 1864 - 1867). 11 October 1866. p. 2. Retrieved 4 August 2020.
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  38. "SOUTHERN DISTRICT". Empire (Sydney, NSW : 1850 - 1875). 26 October 1854. p. 6. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
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  40. "BRAIDWOOD". Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954). 29 August 1857. p. 5. Retrieved 5 August 2020.
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