Bloomfield & Wujal Wujal

These are the traditional lands of the Eastern Kuku (Goo-goo) Yalanji (Ya-lan-gee) people on both the northern and southern sides of the Bloomfield River.

The Lutheran Bloomfield River Mission was established in 1885. It was renamed Wujal Wujal in 1980, meaning ‘place of many waterfalls’. Close by is the magnificent Bloomfield Falls.

Bloomfield River District consists of the township of Ayton, South and North Bloomfield, Degarra and Wujal Wujal Aboriginal Council. The Bloomfield River is the boundary between the Douglas and Cook shires. Great Ayton was the boyhood home of James Cook. His house was shipped to Melbourne in 1934.

There is no township of Bloomfield, but there is the Bloomfield River State School in the town of Ayton which once had an active timber and tin-mining industry and a sugar mill. In the 2016 Census, Bloomfield had a population of 204 and Wujal Wujal had a population of 326.

Degarra, in Douglas Shire on the south side of the Bloomfield River on the floodplains, had plans drawn up for the township but there are only a few houses. In the 2016 Census, the population was 110.

1770

Jun 10 Lieut James Cook named and charted Weary Bay at the mouth of the Bloomfield River on his voyage on the bark Endeavour. Soon after, he struck the coral reef and spent 42 days in what is now Cooktown repairing his ship.

1819

Jun 25/26 Royal Navy Lieut Commander Frederick Bedwell and Capt Philip Parker King on HMS Mermaid sheltered in Weary Bay, and the river that ran into this bay King called Blomfield’s Rivulet. According to his great-great-grand-daughter, the area was named for crew member Lieut Thomas Valentine Blomfield.

1876

Captain Mackay it is said, was the first white man to really explore and open up the Bloomfield river. He took up a square mile of country on the northern bank, known as Mackay’s Paddock.

1880

Jun 3 / Douglas and Cairns were proclaimed to be separate Divisions. Douglas was bounded by the range northerly to the watershed separating the Bloomfield and Daintree rivers.

1882

Jun 7 / Frederick Bauer with second eldest son Louis Georg and eldest daughter Anniechen Pearson and George Hislop selected Portions on the northern side of the Bloomfield River. The cedar getters including Dan Hart had been there before.

Bauer convinced some friends with capital to join him to form the Bloomfield River Company. Others included Russell and Cadell. Frederick and wife Ann Pearson had nine children.

Bauer began the Company with Malay workers from Singapore and Chinese from the Palmer River and local aboriginals. The plantation was named Vilele. He imported steam ploughs, sawmills, agricultural implements and a complete sugar crushing mill. He had a wharf built on the north side of the Bloomfield River and a tramline from the wharf to the Mill site using a Fowler locomotive.

On Wyella estate owned by Hislop and Partners, the finest cigar tobacco leaf was also grown, producing their own cigars.

1884

The first crushing of two hundred tons of cane was very unsatisfactory as the cost of production far outweighed the revenue earned.

Jul 26 / Iver Osmundsen, (sometimes confused as Asmundsen) a Norwegian sea captain was granted Lot 277 (160 acres) on Bloomfield River. He grew cotton and sold his coffee in Cooktown and Port Douglas during the ‘80s and ‘90s and his cigars, in red cedar boxes, went south and to the Pacific Islands. He used his lugger for trading between Port Douglas, Bloomfield and Cooktown.

Sep / 400 acres had been cleared with Fowler steam ploughs but only 200 acres were under cane. A large mill built by Mirrlees, Tait and Watson of Glasgow was imported and erected. A small town named Ayton grew up also serving the tin mining and timber getting industries.

The Kuku Yalanji people continued to resist the invasion of their lands by the miners, pastoralists and timber getters.

1885

Jan 1 / The first mail service commenced from Cooktown to Vilele with the packer Mr A Caroll

The first full scale crushing at the mill.

Louis George Bauer formed an Aboriginal mission that transferred to the Lutheran church in 1887.

Japanese fishermen frequently came to the Bloomfield to secure local Indigenous to dive for shell and beche-de-mer and to get citrus fruit to prevent beri-beri.

Sep 21 / The mail service was extended to Bloomfield River Falls Mission which was designated as a Post Office.

In a report from F A H Hagenauer of the Aboriginal Committee of Victoria and the Presbyterian church, who visited Bloomfield : ‘There is a possibility of coming to a kind of conciliation or a peaceful understanding between the white settler and the wild savage. This has been quite effectively proved through the wise, kind and firm management of the Vilele Sugar Plantation.’

1886

An optimistic reporter said Bauer’s workers had 500 acres under cane. 200 local Indigenous people worked there as well as Singalese, Chinese and Malays growing rice, coffee and tropical fruit. Extra white men were hired during the crushing. Ayton had a hotel, store and police station.

Australasian Sketcher 13 January 1886: At Vilele and at Messrs. Hislop and Cadell's plantation, on the same side of the river, the only other settlement, there is a white population of nearly 100. At the mouth of the river is a Chinese fishing establishment, where fish is cured and sent to Cooktown, there being always a good market amongst the Mongolian population on the Palmer.

A schooner, the Wairril, belonging to the Bloomfield Company, makes periodical trips to Cooktown on the north, or Port Douglas on the south. No white labourer will tackle work here.

Mar 18 / A telegram from Sir Samuel Griffith advised that Louis G. Bauer had been appointed as superintendent of Bloomfield Mission for a year at a salary of £300 and provisions. This was liberal funding.

Apr / The Bloomfield Company was forced into liquidation and its assets taken over by the Weary Bay Sugar Company, financed by Melbourne merchants. Work continued without profits. The majority of its directors came from the Bloomfield River Sugar Company. The new manager replacing Fred Bauer was Mr R. MacDougall. When Bauer went bankrupt, he left Bloomfield to live in Cooktown.

Aug / The Government gazetted one square mile of land between the Bloomfield River and Granite Creek for an Aboriginal mission. Until a missionary could be appointed, Louis George Bauer was employed as superintendent. Louis had considerable knowledge of the local aboriginal dialects.

The land was called Wodall Wodall Mission Station, the Bauer’s spelling of the local name for the area and the nearby Bloomfield Falls. (now it is Wujal Wujal).

Aug / The Court House opened, and the Post Office near the Bloomfield River Falls, referred to today as the Mission Falls, closed and was moved to Ayton where it operated from the Court House. The resident police and their wives acted as Post Masters.

1887

Jan 30 / Louis George Bauer died of typhoid fever in Cooktown aged 30 years. Oldest brother Fritz took over as superintendent of the Aboriginal mission until May 1887 when Government appointed Lutheran missionary Carl A Meyer took over on June 1 with his wife Emma and Johannes Pingilina, a Dieri-speaking aboriginal from South Australia.

Aug 27 / Ernest Jesnowski arrived to teach at the Mission with his wife and child. They brought with them 114 blouses for the women. The Queensland Government insisted he teach in English.

1888

The crush of 314 acres yielded 525 tons of sugar, only a quarter of the mill’s capacity. It was hopelessly uneconomic, employing 30 Europeans, 110 Chinese and 132 Malays and Javanese.

Manager MacDougall was relieved by Archie Tarill who advised that white labour had been unable to work in the heat.

J.H. Koch from the Immanuel Synod mission in Central Australia arrived at the mission as a builder with his wife and child and later H.G. Steike. They built the school and grew bananas, coffee, tea, maize and tobacco as rations for Aborigines.

(http://missionaries.griffith.edu.au/biography/pingilina-johannes?q=/qld-mission/bloomfield-wujal-wujal) GOOD PIX HERE

1890

McLeary built a small timber mill on the banks of the Bloomfield River in Ayton Village.

Erik Gustav Olufsen (or Olafson) acquired land previously held by Mr Clark and grew fruit, tobacco, rice, coffee, citrus, potatoes, cotton, maize and honey. He also ran cattle and had a slaughtering licence.

Mar / The Weary Bay Sugar Company went into liquidation even though in that year, the mill won prizes for its fine quality sugar. The company was finally wound up in 1894. The plantation land was used for cattle raising.

The inspecting Auditor for the Queensland Govt reported in the 3½ years the Mission existed it had cost the Government 1600 pounds and the Lutheran Church 1900 pounds and the only income was 159 pounds from the sale of corn in Cooktown.

Aug / Meyer was dismissed after an investigation into misconduct.

Aug 12 / Fred Bauer died and is buried in Cooktown cemetery with his son Louis.

Dec / Iver Osmundsen’s Lot 277 was registered with the name Bannabilla, the aboriginal name for the area. Other spellings are Banabilla, Bonnabilla and Bunabila.

1891

Sep / Pastor Johann Sebastion Hoerlein replaced Meyer as Missionary-in-Charge of the Bloomfield Mission.

Curt Maximillian George Schultz was sent out from Germany by the Lutheran Church to replace Jesnowski as teacher. Against government policy, Pastor Hoerlein instructed Schulz to teach the school in ‘Wodjall’ (Kuku Yalanji)

Dec / Johann Matthias Bogner arrived as an assistant missionary. So now there were no families among the mission staff,

1892

The Weary Bay sugar mill, tramway and machinery was bought by Buss, Williams and Penny of Bundaberg, and Tom Penny went to Bloomfield to supervise the dismantling of the plant. It was shipped to Knock Row (Knockroe) outside Bundaberg. Afterwards it ended up at Hambledon mill.

The saw mill was taken over by Johnson and Shaw of Charters Towers with Shaw (jun.) acting as manager. Young Shaw, who was an ardent sailor, was lost with his boat in a squall off Cooktown, no trace ever having been' found. This mill closed down about 1898.

1893

May 20 / A week after daughter Annie’s wedding, Mrs Ann Bauer with son Fritz and youngest daughter Maud left for Vancouver.

1895

Jan / Johann Bogner with his ill wife of two years, departed. His replacement was Johann Christian Mack teaching up to 25 children in English.

The Ayton community built their own school house on Crown Land and spent 46 pounds. Mr George Bathe, engineer of Ayton Steam Sawmill was Secretary. There were ten children and parents combined to support the female teacher.

1897

The Chief Protector of Aboriginals, Sir Archibald Meston, recommended that the Bloomfield Mission grant be cut from 250 pounds to 150 pounds as the money spent had given the poorest results of any locality.

The Ayton State School was gazetted. It closed in 1924. Arthur Breese Spencer Jnr was appointed teacher at ninety pounds a year, His father A B Spencer Snr was a constable in the Police Force, stationed in the Ayton Court House. The first headmaster was 16 years of age and had trained as a Pupil Teacher in Brisbane.

1898

Feb Report by Walter E Roth of Cooktown to Commissioner of Police: “In the Bloomfield River District i.e Ayton Police District, there were about 122 aboriginals ‘owned’ by Young, Hislop, Collins, Osmundsen, Johnson, Nunn, Olafson and Baird (selectors) and 165 living in mining camps including children.

1899

A B Spenser was relieved by D Whelan as Officer-in-Charge of the Court House. With the Spensers transferred, Miss Bathe took over as Post Mistress. She lived in her father’s Hotel Ayton that doubled as a shop as well as their living quarters.

Aug 1 / James Blair relieved Arthur Spenser Jnr as Principal of Ayton State School and also relieved Miss Bathe of her postal duties still operating from the Court House.

1900

Weary Bay Sugar Company went into liquidation and closed. The beautiful house on the top of Mt Annie was later sold by the bank and dismantled and moved to Cooktown by Dr Kortum

Aug / The Immanuel Synod decided to wind down the mission as the government subsidy for 1900 was withdrawn. Pastor Hörlein took some of the Bloomfield mission children to the Anglican mission at Yarrabah when he had finally run of food.

1901

The Bloomfield Mission wound down. In the 16 years of the mission, not one local Indigenous person was baptised.

The Cooktown Police transported the buildings to the Hope Valley mission at Cape Bedford. Later it was moved to a new site and is the Hopevale mission of today.

1902

Jan 1 / James Blair was transferred from Ayton school and John Rintoul took over and remained Principal for almost 8 years

1910

Apr 25 / John Rintoul, Principal of the Ayton State School, advised the Education Department that the original State School was in such a state of disrepair that he had moved all the pupils into the Court House that was under repair for school purposes.

May 25 / Thomas Dolan relieved Rintoul as Principal of the Ayton State School and James Blair as Post Master of Ayton. Dolan remained Post Master / Principal until he lost his life in a drowning incident at the Roaring Meg in May 1916, travelling to the Saturday school at China Camp.

1914

In a report regarding closing Ayton School: Ayton at present has only 4 white pupils, the other 4 being the progeny of Philippine fathers and aboriginal mothers

1916

Apr 7 / The Education Department declared China Camp a half time school or Saturday School to be worked in conjunction with the Ayton School.

Nov 12 / Richard Pearce (Peirce) reopened the Ayton State School. On the first day there were 6 children and on the following day 11 attended. Richard Pearce also undertook the duties of Post Master.

1918

The Ayton Post Office was moved to China Camp. The people of Ayton caused such a furore that they successfully petitioned to have it returned to the Bloomfield area but not to Ayton.

1919

The Post Office was relocated on the south side of the river at Degarra, a town that had been surveyed but never built. It was in one of the Olufson Brothers packing sheds owned by the Peirce Brothers at the Drovers’ Crossing also known as Horse Crossing. Young Alma Olufson acted as Post Mistress and, for the princely sum of £3 pa, rowed a 14 foot flattie from their property Riverview, upstream a few miles to the Post Office and home again every Friday

1920

Olufson lived on the north bank and Osmundsen and Peirce lived on the south bank. There were fourteen children on the Ayton School roll, eight white and six coloured. Most of the white children had from three and a half to four miles to walk.

1922

Jan 31 / Mr Pearce at 65, was finally retired from the Public Service and Gerald Collins assumed command as Head Teacher of the Ayton School on the same day.

Aug 12 / The enrolment was 9, consisting of 6 white and 3 coloured pupils.

1924

Jun 1 / The Ayton school closed due to small attendance. The building was finally demolished in 1978 by bower birds.

1936

The Banabilla property of 150 acres on the south side of the river, originally owned by William Collins was bought by William Biddle who ran a mission for aborigines between 1936 and c.1950

1938

Victor Cummins bought Bannabilla, known as the Collins block, for about 500 pounds. William Biddle had a small church built on it for the aboriginals.

J M Johnston sent Alf Hansen to Bloomfield to build a complete sawmill which was ready to cut timber by the end of 1939.

WWII

There was a settlement and radio link to Cairns.

1939

Lindsay McLelland wrote: There were five of us blokes going up there to work. The Olufsons had a store up the river about 2 miles over the mountain. You couldn’t buy much apart from chocolate as most of the stuff he had was for the timber camp up in the mountains.

1943

Aug 13 / The packhorse mailman, Edward Patrick Fein, lost his life while crossing the Bloomfield River at the Drovers’ Crossing while swimming his horses across, on his way home from his mail deliveries from Cooktown to Bloomfield. Some years later, Ernie Sim and Roy Haack were swimming their horses across the Bloomfield at the same place. Ernie drowned. His body was found three days later.

1950s

Iver Osmundsen’s grandsons and Erik’s sons, Herbie and Oscar Olufsen stayed in the area and Herbie rowed out from the mouth of the Bloomfield to the Merinda as it passed on its weekly run Cairns to Cooktown to collect mail, freight and passengers

Prior to 1952, Miss Jean Honeywell conducted correspondence schooling for the children of Bloomfield River District. There were 9 white children of the employees of the Bloomfield River Sawmilling Company and 10 Aboriginal children.

1950-51

John Phillips writes that he was employed at the timber mill: A young man contracted meningitis and the engine driver ‘lost’ his thumb one morning while lubricating the machinery. Both victims made the trip to Cooktown on the Mill launch, the travelling time taking at least four hours.

George Doughboy (he wore a brass plate upon which was inscribed ‘George Doughboy, King of the Bloomfield’, hanging from a chain around his neck) escorted two of us white men on a fishing excursion to the Hope (Little Hope and Big Hope) Islands.

1952

Jul 16 The Bloomfield River State School opened with first Principal Ian Alister McLennan until 1955. School was conducted in one of the old timber mill houses donated by Charlie Patterson who had started the mill again. This school must not be confused with the Ayton school which opened in 1897 on the 1 March and closed on the 1 June 1924.

1955 – 1962

Mr Jack Althaus, Principal of Bloomfield State School, wrote: There were 60 kids in that school, mostly straight out of gunyahs, who spoke only their own language. They came on quite well. I taught them the syllabus. The King George is a 30 foot launch owned by Mr Oscar Olufson who ran a store a couple of miles further up the river.

The old shed [schoolhouse] leaked like a sieve. I used to wear my raincoat in the building

I took the first dentist into Bloomfield. Her name was Vivian. Viv had been a model. She was smoking a big cigar. She pulled 582 teeth in the one day! Her wrist had had it, but she’d done a bloody good job. I picked the school site with Roy Haak. The school was built. Mr Foggarty took over from me.’

1957

The Hope Valley mission board was granted £2,500 to re-establish a reserve at the Bloomfield River, and 260 acres, including part of the old reserve, were gazetted in May 1958. It became a government settlement known as Wujal-Wujal, which is sometimes translated as ‘Many Falls’

Dec / Lutheran Missionaries Clarence and Olive Hartwig and their two daughters moved to Bloomfield. Initially appointed to the position of Welfare Officer, Clarence Hartwig was appointed as Superintendent of the Bloomfield River Mission Reserve from 31 May 1958.

The Bloomfield River Mission opened.

There were between 118 and 130 Indigenous people living in the Bloomfield River area in three camps

1962

Dec / The girls' dormitory was officially opened.

1964

A new school was built.

1965

A new boys' dormitory was completed. By January 1970 it was recorded as being 'not in use'.

Mr John Cornell was appointed head teacher, with his wife Joy and newborn Cheryl Leanne.

‘Mrs Hartwig, was my very helpful assistant teacher. Though very run down and no longer sawing timber, the mill still specialised in rotary veneer cut from a variety of Queensland cabinet timbers. Inheriting a brand new school building and residence was some compensation for the privations of life in the place.” Mr Cornell left after 3.5 years with another daughter Wendy Joy

1968/69

Geoff Martin owned the undeveloped land which became Bloomfield Lodge.

1970

Jan / it appears that the girl's dormitory was no longer being used.

1975

Ian Curtis bought the Bloomfield Lodge land from Geoff Martin and in 1978 erected a construction camp on the land

1976

Aug / Queensland Police Force raided a hippie community at Cedar Bay, just north of Bloomfield.

1980

Feb 16 / The Bloomfield River Mission was officially renamed Wujal Wujal and the Aboriginal Shire Council came into being

Bloomfield Lodge opened its doors. Solicitor Lester Brien became the owner and built the pool and deck during the next few years.

1990

Mike Gooley of Trailfinders bought the Bloomfield Lodge. It was in a dilapidated condition and required $5.5 million investment.

1995

Bloomfield Lodge became part of Small Luxury Hotels.

Bloomfield River Public Hall opened.

2003

Peppers became part of the brand name of Bloomfield Lodge until Nov 2006.

2012

The Bloomfield Lodge joined Eco-Lodges of Australia, still owned by Mike Gooley of Trailfinders who also owned Hinterland Aviation which provided air transport to the Lodge.

2015

Mike Gooley, aged 79 will mothball Bloomfield Lodge by September if not sold.

2016

In the Census, Wujal Wujal had a population of 282.

2019

Jan 26 / Torrential rain caused the Bloomfield River to flood. Houses at Degarra had water flowing through.

Mar / Douglas Shire Council reluctantly took ownership of the Bloomfield Bridge, damaged by Cyclone Yasi in 2011. Transport and Main Roads and the Queensland Reconstruction Authority rebuilt it for $12 million in 2014.

2021

Bloomfield Lodge with its 18 units was on the market for $15m, still owned by Mike Gooley.

Sep / Bloomfield Beach Camp at Ayton was bought by Kat Hewitt and Craig Noble. It had been operating since the late 1980s.The Hideaway Café there opened in April 2022. The was only licensed venue between Cape Tribulation and the Lions Den Hotel.

Compiled by Pam Willis Burden with Gail Cockburn, March 2022.