Agnes Teresa Dries and The Palm Island Tragedy
Too many months have passed since my last post but today is the day to share the story of Agnes Cahill's niece and her family.
Catherine Cahill (1856 to 1913) was the oldest child of James and Eliza Cahill. She was about 12 when her younger sister, Agnes, was born - the 10th of 11 children. Catherine married William Dries in 1873 in Branxton. More about the Dries family in another post. William and Catherine had 10 children. Agnes Dries (1887 to 1929) was the eight born. I was interested in Agnes Dries' life as she was most likely named after Agnes, my great-grandmother, and, at the time, no-one had complete details of her life or death on public trees. I spent many long hours researching to arrive at the point that I could share the details of Agnes Dries and her family.
Agnes Teresa Dries was born on 28 October 1887 in Glen Innes, NSW. She died in a private hospital in Charters Towers Road, Townsville, Queensland on 10 November 1929. She was 42.
Agnes Teresa had two children whose births were registered in the name of Dries with no father listed:
- Claude Richard Dries was born in 1907 in Paddington, NSW. Claude died in Lane Cove, NSW on 11 July 1956. He was 49 when he and another man were struck by a car when they were crossing Burns Bay Road. Claude died and the other man sustained injuries. The driver was charge with manslaughter and negligent driving. Claude was buried in Morisset Cemetery, Lake Macquarie, NSW. In 1933, when Claude was 26, he married Mary Coggan in Wyong, NSW. She was born in 1910 in Goulburn, NSW. Mary died on 20 December 2006. She was 96. She's buried with Claude. Claude and Mary had one child, Phillip John Dries, in about 1937.
- Edna May Dries was born in 18 October 1910 in Sydney, NSW. Edna died on Palm Island on 03 February 1930. She was nineteen. Edna was known as Edna May Mathers at the time of her death.
On 05 July 1917, when Agnes Dries was twenty nine, she married Robert Henry (Bob) Curry in Townsville. Bob was the son of George Adam Curry and Alice Amelia Wilson. Bob was born on 07 August 1885 in South Brisbane, Queensland. Robert Henry died on Palm Island on 03 February 1930. He was forty four. Agnes Dries' name on the marriage registration is Mathers. I can’t find any evidence of a prior marriage.
Agnes and Bob had one child. Robert Henry (Robbie) was born on 11 March 1919 in Queensland. Robbie died on Palm Island on 03 February 1930. He was 10.
You will notice the dates of death of Agnes, Bob, Edna and Robbie. Palm Island sparked my interest as we hear so much about it now.
"Bob Curry was superintendent of Palm Island Aboriginal reserve at the time of his death.
Bob enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force on 19 October 1915. He was a stockman at Malanda, Queensland at the time. He served in the Middle East with the 2nd Australian Remounts Unit from April to October 1916, and was discharged in Brisbane on 13 December with a 'mildly crushed foot' and a wasted left forearm.
Joining the Department of Native Affairs, Bob was appointed assistant superintendent at Barambah in June 1917.
On 5 July, at St Andrew's Presbyterian Church, Brisbane, he married "a widow Agnes Mathers, née Dries".
When a cyclone demolished Hull River settlement in March 1918, Bob was given the task of establishing a reserve on nearby Palm Island. Agnes was to follow as matron.
Bob slept in a tent on the beach while supervising the construction of the settlement. In response to challenges to white authority on the mainland, Palm Island soon became a punitive reception centre for those sentenced by courts or banished by mainland institutions.
By the 1920s, Bob had a reputation as a 'benevolent dictator' and a diligent worker. His efforts to establish a football team, movie theatre, brass band and weekly corroborees were widely appreciated by inmates. Yet others felt the force of his domination, with lengthy imprisonments, public humiliations and floggings of those he perceived as threatening his control. His ultimate punishment was to exile individuals to nearby Eclipse Island with only bread and water.
At 5 ft 9 ins (175 cm), Bob had a lean and suntanned figure, blue eyes and light brown hair. His constant patrols of the island were usually accompanied by Native Police. A crack shot, he would fire his revolver at wildlife, including whales, and at midnight each New Year's Eve.
By the close of his twelve-year reign he had become driven and ill-tempered, with an unhealthy attachment to the reserve. Despite chronic shortage of funds and widespread ill health, the population of the island had reached 1000 by 1930. Feuds among the staff became the subject of official inquiries. Relations between the reserve's doctor C. M. Pattison and the superintendent were bitter and Bob was found to have twice assaulted colleagues. The home secretary's office report concluded that the consumption of alcohol 'was at the bottom of the trouble’.
In April 1929, Bob was officially reprimanded for breaching regulations by severely flogging a female inmate. In November, his wife, Agnes, died in childbirth.
By December 1929, Bob was grief-stricken, fearful of losing his position, drinking heavily and withdrawing from novocaine - Dr Pattison’s treatment for 'neuralgia of the cranial nerve'.
The doctor and his patient had ceased to communicate.
In this context the home secretary's office began investigations into accusations by inmates that Bob had interfered with Aboriginal girls on the island.
The subsequent report found that there was no truth to the allegations, that the reserve functioned in 'a high state of efficiency' and that the management reflected the 'greatest credit on all concerned’.
In the early hours of 3 February 1930, however, Bob, the superintendent of Palm Island, run amok, clad in a bathing suit and armed with dynamite, petrol and revolvers.
He drugged his 11-year-old son Robbie and 19-year-old stepdaughter Edna and dynamited the family home in which they slept, shot and injured the doctor and his wife, set fire to the homes of other staff and blew up the reserve's main buildings.
Drinking from a bottle, and with bouts of 'maniacal laughter', Bob took the launch Rita to nearby islands. Returning to Palm Island in the afternoon, he marched up the beach "as if to 'frame his own execution". He was ambushed by a group of inmates, on the instruction of white officials, and died from bullet wounds at 6.15 pm."
Agnes is buried with her daughter and son in the Belgian Garden Cemetery, Townsville, Queensland (Section A3+A6, Row 7). Her husband is buried in Section C4, Row 1, Grave 7.
The tragedy provided the basis for Thea Astley's novel The Multiple Effects of Rainshadow (1996). I have a copy of this book which I am yet to read!
So on Saturday 3 February, we can think of the tragedy on Palm Island that took place 88 years ago when Bob took the lives of Robbie and Edna and was later killed himself. All this, less than three months after the death of his wife, Agnes, in childbirth.
Agnes is my 1st cousin 2x removed and her children, Claude, Edna and Robbie, are my 2nd cousins 1x removed.
