|
Historic Archive | The Digital Australian | NewsXtra Online Shop |
| Home | Archive Dates | News | FAQ | Support |
|
|
|
The Port Phillip Herald - Impartial but not neutral
by Kim Lockwood IT IS probably a good thing that the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Richard Bourke, visited the small settlement on the banks of the Yarra River in 1837. And it is also probably a good thing that he was a traditionalist. Had he not named the settlement in the customary way, the people of Australia's second city might now be reading the Bearbrass Bugle, because the tiny scattering of tents and slab huts was then known as Bearbrass. But he named it Melbourne, after a VIP back in England (in this case the Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne). And it grew quickly. It was not long before Melbourne was a fast-growing shipping, supply and banking centre, with more than 4000 inhabitants clustered on the shore of Port Phillipn Bay. Into this burgeoning town in 1840 came George Cavenagh (1808-1869). Cavenagh was born in India, the son of a major in the East India Company’s army. He came to Sydney in 1825 and after wroking as a magistrates’ clerk and farmer, by 1836 he was editor of the Sydney Gazette. Cavenagh took his wife and eight children, staff and machinery to Melbourne, and on January 3, 1840, published the first issue of The Port Phillip Herald. He directed the paper with an astute invective. He was often involved in litigation, and was the defendant in the first civil libel case in the colony. He was Protestant in principle, but was sympathetic towards Catholics, and won the support of the Irish community. His enemies nicknamed him “The Big Drum”, either because he was supposed to have been a drummer boy or because he was hollow and insincere and made a big noise. He retired in 1853, returned briefly the next year, and retired for good in 1855. Cavenagh was larger than life: powerfully built, he dressed well and usually carried a riding whip - which he sometimes used to defend himself from assault. His paper was not the first in the town. That was the Melbourne Advertiser, a hand-written weekly of 30 copies produced on January 1, 1838. Cavenagh's paper was challenged by the two existing publications, The Gazette and The Patriot, but by 1841 was outselling them. The first edition was free. Later editions sold for sixpence. In its early life it adopted the motto "Impartial — but not neutral", which ran under its masthead for the next 50 years. In 1849 Cavenagh went daily, and changed the name to The Melbourne Morning Herald and General Daily Advertiser. In 1855 it was The Melbourne Herald for a week, before settling on the name it held proudly for the next 135 years, The Herald. In 1869 it became the evening daily Melburnians cherished – it had a circulation of more than 520,000 at its peak 100 years later – and stayed so until it merged with its sister paper, The Sun News-Pictorial, in 1990, to form the Herald Sun, now the largest circulating daily in Australia. What sort of paper was it in those early days, those days of muddy streets, candle-lit rooms and horse-drawn transport? From its earliest days, news was always its watchword, despite the advertisements on the front page. In the 1850s, of course, one word told the story: gold. But other news constantly bubbled in The Port Phillip Herald. On November 12, 1850, it ran what today would be called a "banner" headline: "Glorious news. Separation at last!" Victoria was to become a self-governing colony. And in central Victoria, Ned and Dan Kelly, Steve Hart and Joe Byrne accounted for two years of news in The Herald, news that came to an end on November 11, 1880, when Ned was hanged. Kim Lockwood, a journalist for 35 years and author, editor or contributor to 13 books, is a keen student of Australian history. |
|
