WILLIAM BUCKLEY: THE WILD MAN OF MARTON

William Buckley was born in Marton around 1780, worked as a bricklayer, saw active service in Holland with the Army, and, returning home, got into trouble with the law.

His offence, in one version, was that of receiving stolen goods, and, in another, attributed to Buckley himself, "some riotous dissipation."

He was transported for life to a convict settlement at Port Phillip Bay on the coast of Australia, later to be called Victoria.

He escaped, and that should have been the end of him as other convicts who had tried it either perished in the inhospitable landscape, populated only by boomerang-throwing Aborigines, or returned to the settlement begging to be let in again. Indeed, the settlement itself was so difficult to maintain that it was eventually abandoned.

Nothing more was heard of Buckley, so he, too, was believed to have died like the others, that is, until, 32 years later, a man named John Batman set up an expedition and sailed across Bass Strait to Port Phillip looking for land on which he could settle.

He needed some title to the land, so he contacted the natives to this end, and his men were suddenly confronted by what the 1934 article described as "an enormous savage, 6ft. 6ins. in height, with long flowing hair and beard, and wrapped in a capacious rug of opossum skin".

Beneath the dirt and grime was a white skin, and on his arm was a tattoo mark containing the initials "W.B,". It was, of course, Buckley, who, at first, could not answer their questions, but little by little, the language he had forgotten returned to him.

He was subsequently of great assistance to the settlers, and for this, the Government gave him a formal pardon. There are permanent reminders of him in Australia. One is a cave in which he was said to have lived, and which is now a tourist attraction.

The other is that he added perhaps the best known phrase to the Australian language, for while we would say something "He hasn't got a cat in hell's chance" to describe a no-hoper in some venture or situation, the Aussies say "He hasn't got a Buckley's", because, after all, Buckley had no chance when he left the settlement.

It says of Buckley that other convicts escaped with him, but they disappeared without trace. Buckley himself managed to survive in the Geelong area for the 32 years he was missing, being befriended by Aborigines of the Watourong tribe, and enduring "incredible hardships before giving himself up in July, 1835, to members of a party landed by John Batman at Indented Head". "One of the factors which caused Buckley to surrender himself was his knowledge of an Aboriginal plot to massacre Batman's party, and he hoped to save them from this fate".

However, it goes on, his feelings were "tumultuous", and in a autobiography which was recorded by someone named John Morgan, he said: "At length, I arrived in sight of a long pole, or staff, with the British colours hoisted upon it, and there I also saw a sort of camp. "I now was overwhelmed with feelings." After his pardon by Governor Arthur, of Tasmania, he was employed as an interpreter, first by Batman and for a time by a Superintendent La Trobe. Later, he was a storeman and gatekeeper in Hobart, when he died on 30th January, 1856, after a fall from a horse in one version, and "from a vehicle" in another.

Apparently, he had two caves, a cavern in the cliffs at Point Lonsdale is still called Buckley's cave, the book tells us, "and there is another similarly named in the You Yangs". J. J. Wedge, an associate of Batman, named Buckley's Falls on the Barwon River after him, and sketched them in his Field; Book in August, 1835.

Buckley could well have been "rescued" earlier than was the case. Apparently, prior to Batman's arrival in the area, various unknown seal-hunting vessels made occasional visits there, and while the cutter "Lively" was in Corio Bay during April, 1831, for her "scurvy-ridden" crew to rest ashore, she parted her anchor cable and drifted higher up the bay, where she was pillaged by the Aborigines.

Her crew recovered her, and sailed to Derwent, ignoring Buckley's desperate attempts to contact them.

He was still living with the Aborigines then, and later recalled being given a flag, probably from the "Lively", by the tribesmen.

He also recalled finding a dead white man buried in the sand, and a large boat stranded on a beach.

This incidents distressed him greatly, says Austin, and appeared to have influenced his decision to give himself up to Batman's men.

Part two... Soon after his escape, Buckley was on the point of starvation when he flopped down on what appeared to be an ant hill with this spear stuck in the ground nearby, when Aborigines came across him. What he didn't know was that his resting place was not an ant hill at all, but the grave of a great chief. When the locals saw this huge man - he was 6ft. 6ins. tall with long flowing hair and a beard in such a sacred spot, with his spear in the ground alongside him, they believed him to be the spirit of their warrior chief, returned to earth.

. Buckley could neither read nor write,, and therefore dictated his autobiography to a John Morgan. It had been suggested, that Morgan had compiled a Robinson Crusoe style romance, but the main outline was in accordance with the facts, and there were reliable historians named Bonwick, Turner and Sutherland, who had given details of Buckley's story

It revealed that Buckley was one of convicts in an expedition by a Col. Collins to form the first settlement at Port Philip.

Two other convicts named Pye and Marmon escaped with him from the camp at Sorrento, equipped with in iron kettle and some provisions, which lasted as far as Yarra.

As they wandered round the bay, shellfish and berries kept them alive, but it was summer, and drinking water was very scarce. At one point, they saw ships at anchor a few miles across the bay, and longed to be back in the camp from which they had escaped, despite the flogging which would await them.

They tried to attract attention with smoke signals, and hoisting their shirts on trees, and a boat did, in fact, put out towards the shore as if heading for them, but then it turned back to the ship.

Pye and Marmon decided to return to Sorrento to surrender themselves, and nothing was heard of them again Buckley wandered on until his chances of a return disappeared - Col. Collins decided to give up the idea of colonising Port Philip , and pulled out.

During his wanderings, apparently, Buckley saw groups of Aborigines from time to time, but managed to evade them, and he was, in fact eventually found by three women, who instantly called their men folk. . Believing him to he their warrior chief returned to earth, they called him "Murrangurk", and he was the possessor of much prestige.

He did not travel very far after that, there being an abundance of teal, duck, geese and swans in the tribe's hunting grounds, and bream which came up the river with the tide, and were caught in baskets of twigs and brushwood as they returned.

But as well as hunting for food, the Aborigines hunted each other in tribal wars which Buckley said was worse battles in Holland in which he had been engaged as a British soldier.

He came out of these murderous affrays without injury, and when he wished to live by himself in his cave, he did so unmolested. Once a ship, probably a sealer arrived in the bay, and Buckley hid until he was sure as to the reception he would get, and watched as to white men were brought ashore, tied to a tree and shot.

The Marton giant, as he has also been called, decided he was safer with the natives!

His life was merely one of hunting, eating, drinking and sleeping, and he said after his rescue": How I could have passed so long a time in such a way is no small matter of bewilderment and astonishment .

Memories of his past, not only in Cheshire but of his early life generally faded as he sunk into lethargy and mental tupor to the extent that he even forgot his own language.

After "surrendering" to the leader of the expedition led by John Batman, as described above, he showed his gratitude by calling on his old bricklaying skills to build the chimney for Batman's house, and is thus credited with laying the first brick in what later became Melbourne.

He became a permanent part of Australian legend, putting, as we said above, the saying of "He hasn't got a Buckley's" into its language, and providing a tourist attraction which will continue to be visited by thousands of people - the cave which was his home.