April 3

Into Thin Air: Ludwig Leichhardt

Ludwig Leichhardt, via Wikipedia

One of the occupational hazards of early explorers was to vanish without trace, or nearly so. It happened to Percy Fawcett. It happened to John Franklin. And it happened to Ludwig Leichhardt. In most cases, we have a good idea of what occurred. Not so much with Leichhardt.

Ludwig Leichhardt was a Prussian scientist and early explorer of the Australian interior. He was well regarded as Australia's most daring naturalist after two expeditions into uncharted territory, one of which was over 4800 km (3000 miles) on foot and horseback.

No stranger, then, to hardship, Leichhardt did not hesitate in planning his most ambitious expedition yet- a crossing of the continent from east to west, more or less through the center. It was intended to take two to three years, through territory completely unknown to Europeans.

He set out from the Condamine river in March of 1848 with four other Europeans, two Aboriginal guides, seven horses, twenty mules and fifty bullocks, eventually arriving at McPherson's Station, Coogon, on the Darling Downs. He was last seen on April 3 as his expedition moved inland. Any evidence of what happened next is extremely sketchy. Through the years several trees carved with an 'L' (a known habit of Leichhardt's) were located, and around 1900 a tiny brass plate engraved 'Ludwig Leichhardt 1848' was found by an Aboriginal stockman. When found, the plate was attached to a partially burnt shotgun set in a boab tree marked with an 'L'.

The Leichhardt brass plate via National Museum Australia

This discovery was located near Sturt Creek around two-thirds of the way across the continent from the Condamine river. Aside from indicating that he made it that far, it also shows Leichhardt was following a more northerly route in his attempted crossing, rather than cutting straight through the desert interior. There the trail ends.

There are plenty of theories- the party was murdered, they became lost and died of thirst and exposure in the desert, they drowned assaying a river crossing, Leichhardt lived out his life as the prisoner of a remote Aboriginal tribe. All pure speculation, so far. Where did Ludwig Leicchardt wind up and how did he finish? Nobody knows.