The city founded by a cat

When you grow up in a place, you hear all the stories about that place and its origins. Ask me about the early days of the Swan River Colony or the historic Western Australian inland town of York and I could probably tell you hundreds of interesting tales and titbits I picked up over the years. From the ‘official’ history we were taught in primary school, and the histories of the local indigenous people which were slowly recognised and revealed, through to the word-of-mouth myths and legends older folks told us, I absorbed it all.

But when you move to a city as a young adult, you just tend to get on with day-to-day life and you don’t have that deeper understanding of some of the traditions, history or culture. This is how it was for me and Melbourne, and now I actively seek out background information about the city that I love and have called home for over 20 years.

Tomorrow is Melbourne Day – the anniversary of the arrival on 30 August 1835 of a group of settlers who sailed from Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) aboard the schooner Enterprize looking for land for farming purposes. They sailed up the Yarra River and came ashore on the north bank at the (since removed by dynamite) waterfalls near today’s Queensbridge Bridge.

I’m not sure that I agree with the celebration of ‘founding days’. The concept seems to assume that the arrival of colonists is a starting point for something, rather than just another milestone in the continuum of the history of a place.

The people of the Kulin nation — including the Boonwurrung, Woiwurrung, Taungurung and Djadjawurrung people had long lived and gathered for ceremonies and cultural activities on the land of the modern day Melbourne before anyone arrived to ‘found’ anything.

And the ‘founding’ of the European settlement of Melbourne itself seems to be a story mired in a web of dispute and deception with John Pascoe Fawkner and John Batman rivals in the race to grab land.

However, I still like to know and ruminate over all the various histories of a place, and one particularly interesting aspect of the Enterprize story regards the only woman on board.

This story has become part of the Melbourne Day legend:

“five men, a woman, and the woman’s cat — were the bona-fide founders of the present great metropolis,” wrote Garryowen, one of the city’s first journalists, in his important Chronicles of Early Melbourne 1888

(from the Melbourne Day website)

Mary Gilbert, wife of the blacksmith James Gilbert, arrived pregnant, giving birth to a son four months later and she brought her cat. There was also two horses, pigs, poultry and dogs on board, but for some reason the journalist Garryowen only saw fit to mention the cat…and thus a legend is born: Melbourne was founded by five men, one woman and a cat.

For a short period of time, the settlement of Melbourne was known as Batmania (after John Batman). Given one of its ‘founders’ was a cat, perhaps it should be renamed the City of Catmania?

Anyway, despite my hesitation in celebrating founding days, I do think initiatives that open our eyes to the past and encourage us to think about how we’ve got to where we have, are worthwhile. And I’m glad I now know about the role of Mary’s cat in the tapestry of Melbourne’s story.

Melbournians – check out the Melbourne Day website for all the activities that are happening this weekend.