MELBOURNE CEMETERY: BURKE & WILLS MONUMENT

In 1860–61, Robert O'Hara Burke and William John Wills led an expedition of 19 men with the intention of crossing Australia from Melbourne in the south to the Gulf of Carpentaria in the north, a distance of around 3,250 kilometres (approximately 2,000 miles). At that time most of the inland of Australia had not been explored by non-indigenous people and was completely unknown to the European settlers. The south-north leg was successfully completed (except that they were stopped by swampland 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) from the northern coastline), but owing to poor leadership and bad luck, both of the expedition's leaders died on the return journey. Altogether, seven men lost their lives, and only one man, John King, crossed the continent with the expedition and returned alive to Melbourne.

The Victorian Government held a Commission of Enquiry into the deaths of Burke and Wills. Howitt was sent back to Cooper Creek to recover their bodies and the explorers were given a state funeral in Melbourne on Wednesday, 21 January 1863. The funeral car was modelled on the design used for the Duke of Wellington ten years earlier. There were reported to have been 40,000 spectators. Burke and Wills were then buried at the Melbourne General Cemetery.

The memorial in Melbourne General Cemetery consists of a massive granite slab. Around the four sides of the base are the following inscriptions:
In memory of
 Robert O'Hara Burke
 and William John Wills leader 
and second in command 
of the
 Victorian exploring expedition
 died at Cooper’s Creek
 June 1861.

Comrades in a great achievement 
companions in death
 and
 associates in renown. The first to cross
 the continent of Australia
 Burke Wills
 Gray King survivor.

Burke and Wills Statue (1865) by Charles Summers on the corner of Collins and Swanston Streets, Melbourne. Charles Summers was born in England in 1825. After gaining his early training with his stonemason father, he studied at London’s Royal Academy. Summers arrived in Australia in 1852, setting up his Melbourne studio three years later. He undertook many significant commissions around fledgling Melbourne, and designed one of the earliest sculptures erected in Fitzroy Gardens, River God Fountain

Artist  William Strutt (3 July 1825 - 3 January 1915) was only in Melbourne for a period of about twelve years. However the years from 1850 to 1862 were highly significant ones in the history of Melbourne, and Strutt, along with S.T. Gill left us some of our most enduring visual images of the period. Some of his works were painted in retrospect after returning to England.  William Strutt's Burial of Burke  is usually considered to be his finest painting and is on display at the State Library of Victoria.

This post is part of Julie's Taphophile Tragics meme.