Maytown in Far North Queensland would become the centre of the Palmer River Goldfields. Today, nothing much
remains of the former “capital”, other than an old baker’s oven, stone kerbing and the cemetery.
The rusting shells of the 19th Century mining machinery, scattered about, are also, a reminder of the town's
gold rush past. Crumbling boilers, steam engines, stamp mills and pumps lay scattered around the old mining reefs.
Near Maytown, there are the remains of many mining camps and batteries, including the Queen of the North Mine and Battery, the Ida Mine and the Mabel Louise and Comet Batteries. At one time, there were 12 hotels, various Chinese stores, three bakers, a butcher, lemonade factory, chemist and doctor. The remains of a Flagged Floor of a Store owned by Sun Yee Lee can also be seen.
Kuku Yalanji People
The Kuku Yalanji people (Kubirri-Warral) who belong to the Bama Rainforest Peoples, lived in the Maytown area before
European settlement; living as hunting and gatherers. Many Aboriginal people still speak the native language of their ancestors and share Dreamtime stories from a time that they call
Ngujakura.
The Kuku Yalanji language, which is spoken in the area between Mossman and Cooktown in North Queensland, is a living language. Dyirbal-speakers to the south were mostly regarded as enemies. However, there were at least 60 clans in the rainforest tropics
of the region and much diversity.
The Bama
Rainforest People are notable for their rich material culture. They made large
wooden shields and swords, the cross boomerang, giant stone axes and bark blankets.
Interestingly, the Kuku Yalanji people would detoxify cycad seeds for eating. These seeds are a source of carbohydrates, but they contain a toxic substance called cycasin which can cause nausea and vomiting and also damage to the nervous system. One method of detoxification they used was to cut open the seed and leach out the toxins in water.
During
the wet season, some of the Bama people would mummify their dead. And sometimes, relatives would carry the body around as they moved about until the body was cremated.
The reminiscences of Norman Mitchell, a Kuku- Yalanji man with direct experience of the Aboriginal-Chinese interactions after the Palmer River gold rush, are very interesting and provide a
unique perspective, especially as Mitchell spent his early life at Maytown. Such interesting, uncurated words are rare today and sometimes shocking. Read
here |
| Burial: wrapping the body in bark, Northern Australia. Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 1 August 1917 |
 |
| Making a dilly-bag, Cape York, QLD, Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 27 May 1931 |
 |
| Carrying water, Cape York, QLD, Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 27 May 1931 |
 |
| TROPICAL AUSTRALIA. (1917, July 4). Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Sydney Mail (NSW : 1912 - 1938), Wednesday 4 July 1917 |
The GoldfieldThe Palmer goldfield was discovered in 1872 by explorer William Hann and soon after, European and Chinese diggers rushed to the region with hopes of making their fortune.
Following gold being discovered on the Palmer River in 1873,
Cooktown was founded as a port and service centre. Within 4 months, Cooktown and the Palmer River goldfields had a population of about 3,000 people.
Mining communities developed at Palmerville, Maytown and Byerstown. Maytown, however, was the administrative centre of the area.
Maytown was originally called Edwardstown after the local butcher, John (Jack). Edwards, one of Hann’s stockmen, who became the Maytown butcher.
Maytown Post Office opened on 7 June 1874 (closed 1945).
Maytown was formally surveyed in 1875 by A.C. MacMillan and named Maytown in honour of his daughter (this is disputed).
By 1876 there were twelve hotels, six stores, three bakers, three tobacconists as well as banks and a post office. In 1877 a newspaper, the Golden Age
was established, later to be replaced by the Palmer Chronicle in 1883. Read
here
The first issue of the Golden Age made the following claim:
"We can boast of having three banks, a lawyer, telegraph and Post-Office, a new Court-House, and Warden's and C.P .S.'s office, three medical men, two chemists, twelve hotels, eight large stores, and a number of Chinese and European small stores, three first-class bakery establishments, the largest butchering establishment in the north, one wholesale wine and spirit merchant, two first-class billiard salons, two circulating libraries, two first-class hairdressing establishments; and though last not least, our noble selves."The first crushing mill was established in 1876, after the alluvial gold ran out, on the Wardens Reserve, and deep reef mining began.
The population of Maytown in May 1877 was estimated at 19,500.
The town was booming. Gold field administrator, Philip Frederic Sellheim, was instrumental in the establishment of a Government Savings Bank, a state school, courthouse, school of arts, hospital, police barracks as well as a miners’ institute.
At the peak of the rush there were 6,000 Europeans and up to 18,000 Chinese in the area.
 |
| A Typical miner's hut of the 1870s, North Queensland Register (Townsville, Qld. : 1892 - 1905), Monday 18 December 1905 |
Frontier ViolenceNorth Queensland was also a place of significant frontier violence. According to one newspaper report, "The natives murdered every white they captured; the whites shot natives on sight." "River Of Gold Ran Red With Men's Blood" Truth (Brisbane, Qld. : 1900 - 1954) 22 August 1954
The response by the Aboriginal people to Europeans and Chinese goldminers on the Palmer had been
described as "... that of
fierce resistance and virtual guerilla warfare."
The Palmer goldfield has been described as "the most remote and harshest field worked by early Australian diggers". It was also violent.
 |
| Chinese man in traditional dress seated with opium pipe, Palmer Goldfields, Qld. c1870 (Queensland State Archives) |
 |
| Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld. : 1872 - 1947), Thursday 3 December 1885 |
 |
| Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld. : 1872 - 1947), Wednesday 2 April 1879 |
 |
| Maytown Men - Palmer River Goldfields, Nth Qld - 1876, Kaye |
 |
| The Maytown General Store in the 1880s on the Palmer River, Far North Queensland, Australia |
Getting ThereOriginally a hand-cut track, the Laura to Maytown Coach Road, was built from 1877 to 1895. Building the road was difficult and the hauling of machinery hazardous and slow. The Engineer for Public Roads was Archibald Campbell Macmillan (Airdmillan
near Ayr).
Andrew Binnie, a Scottish engineer, also constructed a road below Lone Star Gap, which was used to transport a 5 head stamper machine and mill for Lone Star Mine.
There was even a plan to build a railway line "from Cooktown to Maytown" in the 1880s.
 |
| The old Ita mine near Maytown, QLD, Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld. : 1866 - 1939), Saturday 10 February 1912 |
 |
| QLD, Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld. : 1866 - 1939), Saturday 10 February 1912 |
 |
| Maytown Post Office, QLD, showing the first light vehicle which has travelled over the Laura Maytown road for several years, driven byMr H.H Hamley, chief engineer under the Public Estates improvement fund Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld. : 1866 - 1939), Saturday 10 February 1912 |
 |
| Laura to Maytown Coach on the Palmer River Goldfields , Nt QLD |
 |
| On the palmer River, Nt QLD, Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld. : 1866 - 1939), Saturday 30 December 1911 |
 |
| Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 13 May 1899 |
 |
| Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 13 May 1899 |
More Scenes and Stories |
| Lone Star Gap, Conglomerate Range, near Wild Irish Girl, c. 1930 on Cape York Qld |
 |
| Breakdown on the Laura to Maytown Road, Far North Qld during 1930. Sam Elliot owned this mine after WW2 until he died in 1985. |
 |
| Cairns Post (Qld. : 1909 - 1954), Tuesday 3 July 1934 |
"ROTTED JOSS-HOUSES
THE Maytown field, where several big companies are now carrying out investigation work, was noted in the early days for its Chinese population. tapestries with which the joss-houses were elaborately decorated. Outside some of the temples are to be seen more gruesome relics— huge porcelain jars containing the crumbling skeletons of Chinese, who had been packed thus to be sent back to their native land for burial. For some unknown reason many of the dead men were never sent home; their coffin-jars lie scattered about, neglected .and forgotten, slowly but surely being smothered by the jungle."
1937 'GHOST TOWN of the FAR NORTH', The Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld. : 1872 - 1947)
Decline
By 1882 there were about 19,000 people in the area with six hotels, 10 Chinese stores, two European Stores, two banks, two butchers, baker, blacksmith, saddler, chemist, lemonade factory and printer.
In 1886 the population was 154 Europeans and 450 Chinese. And the only place of worship was a Chinese temple. Interestingly, Chinese miners packed rocks into retaining walls,
as they cleared various areas, and some of these can be seen tod
ay. By 1900 Maytown was down to about 500 residents, and by 1945, the town was largely abandoned.
The last family to live at Maytown was that of the postmistress Mrs Parsons, who left deserted Maytown in the mid-1940s.
Places to visit in the area are the Chinese cemetery, Louisa mine, Comet mine and Queen of the north mine.
The Wild Irish Girl Mine (Emily Battery) and Battery were built from 1894 to 1980s, situated on the edge of the Conglomerate Range escarpment. Today, the remains of mine workings, battery shed and quarters, earlier hut and campsite, alluvial workings and water races, and a Chinese grave, can be seen.
Palmer Goldfield Resources Reserve is closed throughout the wet season every year from 1 December, re-opening on Good Friday—roads into and on the park become impassable for extended periods and are closed to public access.
Around Maytown
 |
| On the Laura to Maytown Coach Road, QLD |
 |
| Mabel Louise battery (formerly known as the Ida), located near Maytown in the Palmer River Goldfields in Far North QLD. - Features at the site include a ship’s water tank, sections of the pump arm and piping, an incomplete Robey twin cylinder portable engine, two battery cam shafts marked ‘Langlands FC’ one with ring gear attached, one mortar box lying on the ground with stamp rods inside, plus a scatter of stamp rods and numerous other metal artefacts. |
 |
| Remains of the Queen of the North Mine, near Maytown, QLD. Walkers stationary boilers manufactured by John Walker & Co. Ltd |
 |
| Remains of mining equipment near Maytown, QLD |
 |
| Remains of mining equipment near Maytown, QLD |
 |
| Steam boilers at the Queen of the North gold mine near Maytown at the Palmer River Goldfields, QLD |
 |
| Miner's hut, Maytown, QLD |
 |
| Comet Mill near Maytown, QLD |
 |
| Stone kerbing, main st, Maytown, QLD |
 |
| Grave of young William Knightly in the Maytown cemetery, QLD, who died at only 5 months of age |
 |
| Unmarked Chinese grave, Maytown Cemetery, QLD |
 |
| Rock art site near Laura, Cape York Peninsula, 15,000 to 30,000 years old. Quinkan rock art. Representations of "Quinkans" (an Aboriginal mythological being). A sandstone escarpment divides Maytown from the Laura valley |
Things To Do and Place To Go
About Palmer Goldfield
Reminiscences of Harry Harbord
