Part 01: G. W. Rusden letters, 1846-1900

[centred] address [on right] Parliament Houses Melbourne

23 Aug^t 1875

My dear Sir William

I am very much obliged to you for your kind letter. I wrote a short note in reply and gave it to Sir W H F Mitchell, the President of our Legislative Council who has gone to Sydney for a week or two, and whom I have recommended to see Camden if he can.

He takes his daughters with him.

I am glad to find that you are well pleased at my undertaking the task of writing a general history of Australia.

I certainly should not have undertaken it if I had not been urged to do so. The verification of one's facts is an intricate and difficult thing, because even a careful writer sometimes accepts a fact from an inaccurate one, and thus one is apt to be misled. The only remedy is to trace every statement to a fountain head.

I must thank you very much for

your kindness in writing to me at all under such difficulties as you describe.

I sincerely hope that you are now quite convalescent.

I will heartily accept your kind invitation to Camden as soon as I can, but I cannot now do so. The present session may be eventful and till it is over I am chained.

I look forward to the rummage you promise me, with great pleasure.

I assure you I long ago came to the conclusion that Lang lied (as usual) in attributing Bligh's deposition to his unpopularity because he repressed drunkenness.

The case of ^ Andrew Thomson, the seizure of the boiler and the attempt to entrap your father into givin taking a receipt for "heads and worms" of which he never had possession, the case of the Paramatta [sic] and the subsequent violent procedure in various ways justify me in treating the matter of Bligh's deposition as almost

if not quite a necessity. I have compared it (for I have already written the Chapter roughly) to the officers and crew of a ship seizing the captain who, at the helm, steers straight for the rocks. This is just what happened the other day on board the Ellora.

Technically it is mutiny. Substantially it is loyalty to the owners.

There are three things I want to know, and if you could without putting yourself to any trouble, send me an answer however curt, I should be much indebted to you.

1. Was Andrew Thomson who refused to comply with his promise to your father about returning the wheat (and in whose favor Bligh pronounced on appeal against your father) the same man whom Macquarie made a magistrate, and Marsden & others declined to meet?

2. When your father proceeded against Bligh's officer for taking away the copper boiler what was the verdict? [on right] I can find

that there was a trial, and I read some part of your father's forcible statement but I see no record of the result.

3. Was your father forbidden, without any trial, to return to New South Wales? and if so under what instrument, and how did the English Govt communicate their decision?

[diagonal line] ________

But I must have done, or you will declare me an intolerable bore.

The Court martial on Kent I must learn about when I see you. I had not seen any account of it. Johnstons [sic] Court Martial I shall be glad to see, and if you can venture to part with it for a time, Sir W^m Mitchell might be a safe conveyer of it. Bigge's Report (without the evidence) I have found in our Public Library and can refer to there.

Arthur King can lend me your brother's book, I find.

I abominate the sea so much that I think I shall go overland to Camden, when I get an opportunity to go at all.

Pray accept my warmest thanks for your sympathy and aid, and believe me with kindest regards to Mrs Macarthur, Mrs Onslow and yourself (the little ones dont know me)

Yours very sincerely

[signed, on right] G W Rusden

[right of page] 28 Jan^y 1876 Parliament Houses Melbourne.

[centred stamp, showing a stag on a castle's battlements] NULLA PALLESCERE CULPA

My dear Sir William

I thought it merely possible that I might run over to Sydney in the vacation, and your old friend William Campbell half promised to go too if the session permitted. But our session has not permitted. There was only an interval of a few days at Christmas, and now the work drags slowly along as you may perhaps have observed in the newspapers. My trip to Camden is thus put off, but not I hope to the Greek Calends.

I hope you are all well there and must ask you to make my kind regards to all friends.

I have availed myself of the