Wagga racetrack and stand. Inset: In the late 1800s, Edward “Augur” Chapman was Australia’s favourite sportswriter. Photo: State Library of Victoria.
These days a trip between Melbourne and Wagga is an easy run of less than five hours in the car where we can enjoy air-conditioned comfort as we pass through pretty countryside and some great little towns and villages providing comfort and interest along the way.
But according to an editorial in the Wagga Wagga Advertiser and Riverine Reporter 152 years ago, it was considered a “dreadful” chore by Melbournians who had to make the trip by train, horseback and carriage in the summer sun.
In the late 1800s Edward S Chapman was one of Australia’s most widely read sportswriters and was known across the country by his nom de plume ‘Augur’.
In December 1874 the burly 32-year-old reporter headed to the Spencer Street railway station in Melbourne to begin the journey to the annual race meeting of the Wagga Wagga Turf Club. His reflections on the journey offer a colourful insight into 19th century Riverina life.
“Having heard such doleful accounts of the trip to Wagga Wagga, the reader may imagine with what apprehensive feelings I set out on my journey last week,” he began.
“I was to have my hair scorched off by the sun; to be half killed by the jolting in the coach on the road from Albury to Wagga; to be half choked with the dust; to be half starved when I arrived at my destination; to be half melted away by the powerful influence of a Wagga sun; and to be deprived of more than half my customary rest by having to sleep in a room with 18 or 20 others.”
Chapman survived the train journey without comment and, during a stopover in Albury, he was pleasantly surprised not to have been carried off by the legendary Murray River mosquitoes.
His concerns over the bush-bashing final leg of the journey to Wagga increased when he arrived at the coach stop at 6 am to find more than 20 passengers and their luggage piled up perilously on the small vehicle.
Sure enough, the overburdened carriage had travelled less than a mile before someone cried out from inside, “Dwell the box!” (Stop the coach).
“A halt was made, and it was then discovered that the great weight on the top of the coach threatened destruction to those inside,” Chapman wrote.
The drivers calmed the crowd and a man was sent back to town to secure a second vehicle to offload the luggage and a number of the punters.
As the journey resumed, Chapman expressed his disappointment about the unusually flat country, “excepting that portion of the journey where the Tabletop Mountain meets the view, the scenery is not at all romantic or picturesque”.
While the roadside accommodations were “of the most primitive designs” he expressed great enthusiasm for the food that was provided along the way and the drivers that skilfully steered their team of six horses around the “dead logs that abound in all directions”.
“The weather was warm but pleasant, and though the dust compelled the passengers to ‘liquor up’ at every stage, nobody suffered from the frequent libations,” said Chapman.
“The dust was disagreeably plentiful, but beyond swallowing about a bushel, and spoiling a suit of clothes, I felt no ill effects. Whiling away the time with amusing snatches of song, it passed pleasantly enough, and soon after 8 o’clock in the evening the lights of Wagga Wagga hove in sight.”
At the Criterion Hotel, Chapman bathed and changed and headed out onto the bustling streets where all sorts of entertainment was on offer for the race carnival weekend.
“When one enters Wagga Wagga, and sees what a diminutive town it is, the question naturally occurs as to how so small a community can provide such a program,” he wrote.
“The town was full to overflowing, and Burton’s Circus near the Australian, an itinerant concert company at the Masonic Hall, and various minor amusements, did capital business.”
The next morning he took a stroll around the town and was again impressed, delivering a positive sketch of the growing Riverina town.
“The Murrumbidgee runs close by, and its water is far superior to that in the Yarra, while from Forsyth’s Well the most deliciously cool liquid may be procured.
“The system of tree-planting has found favour in Wagga Wagga as it does in all Australian towns where the municipal authorities are possessed of common sense, and spacious balconies are erected in front of the principal hotels.
“The public buildings are creditable, and those portions of the pathways that are paved with brick are remarkably level and clean, but the streets are dusty at times, owing to the presence of so much sandy matter, albeit the water cart is kept going almost constantly.”
After a visit to the location of the infamous butcher’s shop once owned by the fake Tichborne claimant, the racing scribe turned his attention to a busy day at the track that boasted facilities that he believed rivalled those of Sydney and Melbourne.
“I can safely say that I never attended an up-country meeting where the affairs were carried out in a more satisfactory manner,” he concluded.
“And, should duty take me that way again next year, I hope that I may spend as pleasant a time as I did at the annual meeting of 1874.”
