Forget the history books that talk of Botany Bay or Sydney Cove, the beginnings of our Australian nation can actually be found in a park beside the New England Highway in the small New South Wales town of Wallabadah.
Set on the peaceful banks of Quirindi Creek, which runs through the town, a wonderful award-winning First and Second Fleet Memorial Garden has been established by stonemason Ray Collins as a tribute to the European settlers who began what is now modern Australia.
With extracts from logs written by Fleet passengers, describing their treacherous eight-month voyage to Australia back in 1788 and 1790 and their memories of the early settlement of the colony, the display at Wallabadah is factual and extremely informative.
As you wander through the gardens there is also plenty of information on a wide variety of subjects. This includes such things as the goods, supplies and livestock brought with them which curiously among other things (in the First Fleet) there is recorded:
“100 pairs of scissors, 12 ploughs, 40 camp kettles. … 4 cows, 1 bull, 5 rabbits, 35 ducks, 8000 fish hooks, 30 boxes of rulers, 504 saw files, 300 gallons of brandy and 589 women’s petticoats”.
Looking to the picnic area from the Second Fleet section of the Memorial Gardens
Throughout the Memorial Park there are garden bed sections dedicated to each of the individual ships which made up the fleets and painstakingly hand-carved tablets stand nearby showing the names of every known passenger aboard that particular ship. A meandering pathway links the main information boards with the memorials to each of the ships, a lovely picnic area under sails, an attractive fountain and a large, well maintained garden bed in the shape of Australia.
The picnic area within the Memorial Gardens
Why Wallabadah? The project here owes its existence to its creator, Master Stone Mason Ray Collins.
Born at Paddington, in Sydney, in 1936, Ray (one of 12 children) concedes that he was a bit of a larrikin in his early years and it seems there are quite a few incidents in his life he’d rather forget. “Nothing too serious, mind you”, says Ray. One thing that has stuck and never been forgotten, however, is a decision to take on a stone masonry apprenticeship to his older brother Harry, and now, more than 60 years later he still plies his craft in monumental restorations in cemeteries throughout the country.
Himself a fifth generation First Fleeter, Ray, in his early years, learnt very little of his background from his family, despite their close involvement with places like Windsor where his early ancestors had settled. Years later Ray found out that his real family name was not Collins but Cross – the name change was apparently made by the family to hide and deny that they had a convict ancestry. Ray on the other hand, has been proud to claim this part of his family background and his stone masonry business card now reads Ray Collins-Cross.
Rest area at Wallabadah beside the Memorial Gardens
Over the years Ray’s interest in his convict and First Fleet background became a real passion and he has spent many long hours researching and documenting this part of his family history.
In the First Fleet section of the Memorial Gardens
On a broader scale, during his research he discovered that nowhere around the country was there a memorial inscribed with the almost 2000 known names of those who voyaged to Australia in the First and Second Fleets. Ray became keen to fill this void. As he moved around the country following his stone masonry work, Ray began to approach local Shire Councils to see if they would be interested in such a memorial. Ray tells us that over almost a 20-year period he approached 10 councils, many of which indicated to him it was a good idea, but none went any further. Perhaps the problem was related to their lack of available finance at the time, but Ray, with his dry sense of humour, tells us that, as it would be a lengthy project, they might have felt he wouldn’t live long enough to finish the job.
Colin Kerr reading information signs about the First Fleet.
All this changed, however, at Wallabadah (55km south of Tamworth) when the Liverpool Plains Shire Council gave him the backing he needed. With the garden design laid out and thousands of hours’ work on paths, gardens, fences, information boards, sails, toilet facilities, and the painstaking work of carving thousands of names on 150 stone tablets, the first part of Ray’s long-time dream project (the First Fleet) was officially opened in 2005. It had taken more than two years to complete.
Since that time Ray continued to refine and improve the gardens and surrounds and at the same time he started work on an extension of his memorial garden to incorporate the Second Fleet garden in parkland adjacent to the First Fleeters.
Stone tablets recording names of passengers of the Second Fleet
Taking another three years to complete, the Second Fleet Memorial Section was finally opened in November 2008. This is a truly wonderful project that all came about because of Ray’s vision.
During all of those years and ongoing today, Ray (now well into his 70s) continues his research into the Fleeters and their history. As Ray says, “Behind every name here there is a real life story – some sad, some tragic, many success and failure stories, some really fascinating and some quite secretive, but they are all extremely interesting. I never tire of learning and finding out as much as I can about them all”.
The Second Fleet section of the Memorial Gardens
With the maintenance of the Memorial Park now taken over by the local Shire Council, Ray has continued to do local stone masonry restoration work and is about to embark on another of his dream projects. If he lives long enough, he plans to visit every cemetery in NSW (well, as many as he can) and with agreement of all parties concerned, to restore the oldest headstone in each cemetery. “That’ll keep me out of mischief for a while”, says Ray with a smile.
When next you travel the New England Highway, call in and have a look at this wonderful display – a memorial which Ray in his own words says has been set up as “a legacy for the people of Australia”.
Prue Kerr and Ray Collins - the stone mason - in the First Fleet section of the Memorial Gardens
With any luck during your visit, if he is not away working in some remote cemetery, you might even find Ray wandering around the gardens. Ray is also a real bundle of knowledge on general Australian history, and if you do catch up with him, it is sure to be an educational and enjoyable experience.
