Book Club: “Many of them found their own slow deaths were lowering their morale”

An extract from Ben Pobjie’s Error Australis: The Reality Recap of Australian History.

Jun 25, 2025

Jonn here. I am still, just about, sunning myself in Malta. Actually, no: at the time I write this I am still very much in London, although the sun has finally deigned to come out after several days of hiding. By the time it’s published, though, I will be on the last day of my holiday. What a rubbish way to time travel.

Anyway, because I’ve taken the week off, no full newsletter from me this week. Instead here’s one of our occasional book club posts, in which I shamelessly cajole my mates into letting me run extracts of their books with vague talk of Amazon links and exposure. This week it’s the turn of the writer, comedian and poet Ben Pobjie, whose brilliant book Error Australis taught me everything I know about Australian history and also quite a lot that I don’t. It’s a brilliant book - a sort of 1066 and All That, with better weather and more spiders that can kill you. And I can’t recommend enough that you buy a copy right now.

I’ll be back next week. (Actually, I’ll be back tomorrow, boo.) But since I’m not back now, we join Ben, just as the British fleet makes landfall in Australia…

On the 20^th January, 1788, the Fleet arrived at Botany Bay, where the British immediately came into contact with the indigenous inhabitants of New South Wales. Many of the indigenous community saw their arrival as evidence of their government’s lax border protection policies. “If you’d had the ticker to introduce off-shore processing, these boats would have stopped coming,’”they declared, to which their opponents pointed out that the boats had only just started coming, making it difficult to foresee. “Besides,” they added, “these poor white idiots need our help, let us extend the hand of friendship.” But a sentiment grew strongly in the community that the First Fleet had behaved appallingly by attempting to sneak in through the back door rather than going through the proper channels. By coming on unauthorised boats, it was pointed out, the Englishmen had taken places away from those in genuine need. What’s more, the journey from England to Australia was long and dangerous, and many Aborigines stressed the need to discourage desperate Englishmen from getting on boats and risking their lives.

Also, there was a fear that the new arrivals would introduce a criminal element to the continent, which to be fair was a pretty accurate fear.

Of the meeting between Europeans and Aborigines at Botany Bay, Watkin Tench poignantly wrote, “I had at this time a little boy, of not more than seven years of age, in my hand”, which is pretty unsettling. He showed the little boy to the natives so they could see his white skin.

“Yes, we get it – you’re all white,” the natives replied. “Leave the little boy alone.” But Tench would not listen.

“I advanced with him towards them, at the same time baring his bosom and, shewing the whiteness of the skin,” he wrote.

“It’s spelt ‘showing’ you idiot,” the Aborigines replied, and the misunderstandings only got more problematic from there.

The First Fleeters did not have time to ponder the intricacies of modern race relations just at that moment, however: they were too busy noticing that Botany Bay sucked. Captain Cook had reported that the bay was a rich and fertile spot, but when the settlers arrived, they discovered it was actually a scruffy patch of sand and grass with poor soil, little fresh water, and a smell which contemporary accounts report as being “like your grandma’s wardrobe”. Captain Cook had lied to them, and Captain Phillip wondered whether he could ever trust a sailor again. Looking forlornly at the ugly shore, he famously announced, “This is crap,” and gave orders to explore other locations to determine their suitability for his hoodlum-zoo.

The answer lay in Port Jackson, to the north of Botany Bay. Cook had discovered this pleasant harbour in 1770 and named it after all the Port Jackson sharks he saw there. In contrast to Botany, Port Jackson had plentiful fresh water in the form of Tank Stream – so named for its ability to manoeuvre over rugged terrain on tracks – fertile soil, and a pleasant lemony fragrance. Phillip, overjoyed with the new site, called it Sydney Cove, in honour of Lord Sydney, with whom Phillip had spent many happy days in England planning voyages and Spaniard-massacres. On the 26^th January the First Fleet sailed to Sydney Cove and Phillip declared that from that day on, that date would be celebrated every year by angry and bitter arguments over whether it should be celebrated or not.

Phillip, now Governor of the new colony, set to work with all possible speed, issuing directives to all convicts, marines and officials to immediately begin failing to adapt to the new country, then move on to starving to death as soon as they could. Food was a constant issue in the early days, and many of the colonists suffered from eating disorders, inasmuch as they had nothing to eat, which in the eighteenth century was often fatal. With The Biggest Loser still more than two centuries away, the colonists had no way of knowing how to make malnutrition work for them, and many of them found their own slow deaths were lowering their morale.

The first problem was that the British had no idea how to farm in Australian conditions. The second problem was that most of them had no idea how to farm in any conditions, a result of the government’s farsighted “populate the settlement exclusively with those who have no useful life skills” policy. And so much of the early activity in the colony consisted of hungry men standing around staring at the corncobs they’d just stuck in the ground, waiting for them to flower. Governor Phillip’s correspondence during this time indicates the scale of the problem:

From the desk of Governor Arthur Phillip,

Sydney Cove, New South Wales 0001

Dear Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger,

How are you, sir? I am fine. I do not wish to trouble you, as I am sure you are extremely busy being Great Britain’s youngest ever prime minister and forming the Triple Alliance with Prussia and Holland in order to restrict French influence in Europe, but right now we’re having a bit of trouble “Down Under”, to use a term that I just made up. Basically we’re all a tad peckish, and we’d love it if you could send us some food and also, if possible, some sunscreen.

Yours,

Arthur Phillip (Governor)

Dear Governor Phillip,

The Prime Minister received your letter of August 5^th and has authorised me to tell you that he cannot at this moment send you any of the supplies you have requested as he is extremely preoccupied with the preparations for the French Revolution which will break out next year and be very troublesome for us all. He suggests you try going fishing or something.

Regards,

Elderfield Humberry-Deccleston The Fourth

Private Secretary to the Prime Minister

Dear King George III,

I hope this missive finds you in good health and that you have not yet gone insane. I write to request some assistance with my little colony here in New South Wales, which is a lovely spot ideal for weekends away and longer summer stays, but suffers the drawback of being hell on earth. I was wondering if you could send us some food rather urgently, as we’re having a bit of trouble growing our own. So far the best idea any of us have had is burying a cow and hoping it grows into a cow tree, which may give you some idea of our predicament.

Thank you for your time, sir. Give my regards to your son George IV, and my condolences on the extravagant profligacy and dissolute lifestyle which he will demonstrate in a couple of decades’ time. I imagine that will be a real nuisance.

Yours,

Arthur Phillip (Governor)

Dear Mr Phillip,

Thank you for your letter, which was passed on to me by my chief of staff, a small she-oak. I am afraid I must confess that I have never heard of this “New South Wales” of which you speak, but I take it that it is some kind of marvellous kingdom in the sky, and so I have taken immediate action, ordering my courtiers to stand in the gardens hurling beef and toast skywards until you are fully provisioned.

Yours,

King George III of Great Britain and Ireland (Mrs)

Dear Lord Sydney,

WTF have you got me into, you bastard?

Yours,

Arthur Phillip (Depressed)

But life in New South Wales wasn’t all inappropriate crops and floggings: tensions with the indigenous population also took up a lot of the settlers’ time. Much of this arose from simple misunderstandings: the English didn’t understand the Aborigines’ complex society and deep spiritual connection to the land; and the Aborigines didn’t understand why the English didn’t just piss off.

Watkin Tench wrote, of the Aborigines, that “our intercourse with them was neither frequent nor cordial”, and any fool can tell you how frustrating non-cordial intercourse can be. Tench was put out that the natives seemed to be avoiding the Englishmen, “either from fear, jealousy or hatred” – he never considered the possibility that maybe their avoidance was due to the fact that last time they’d seen him he’d dragged a seven-year-old boy along and forced them to examine his skin.

Tench just assumed that the Aborigines hated or feared the white man, which would have been pretty justifiable behaviour on their part anyway. The white man, after all, though arriving with what seemed like a friendly attitude, spent a large percentage of the first few months shooting them, stealing their possessions, and giving them fatal diseases. In the white man’s defence, he was at the time both near starvation, and extremely bored, but it was still behaviour of a sort that would at other times be considered “dirty pool’” and the early settlement at Sydney is not considered one of the highest points in the history of white people.

Although, just to emphasise what sort of history that is, it’s not all that low on the list, either.

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