The Peel Island CyArk Project is now available online

Tags

CyArk, Fantome Island, Lazaret, Peel Island

 

Church interior, 1950s. Originally built by Melanesian patients, this was the main church on the island. Photo by Doctor Morgan Gabriel.

You may have heard of the Peel Island Lazaret CyArk webpage which is now available to the public. (For more information, I refer you to my previous blogs of 14.05.2016 – Digitising the Lazaret at Peel Island; 15.10.2016 – Click; and 07.03.2017 – Peel Island episode now available to view on BBC’s ‘Click’ )

You are welcome to view the page here: http://www.cyark.org/projects/peel-island-lazaret

However it requires the latest and fastest computers or it may take too long to load. My computer overheated but I did manage to view the attached photo which is described as ‘Church interior, 1950s. Originally built by Melanesian patients, this was the main church on the island.  Photo by Dr Morgan Gabriel.’

However, I think it is more likely the church interior was at Fantome Island and not Peel. Comparing the external and interior images, it is obvious that their dimensions do not coincide.

Peel Island Lazaret – c.1955 – Anglican Church. Photo by Doctor Morgan Gabriel.

Doctor Gabriel did visit both Peel and Fantome Islands as part of his medical duties, and as such did take both photos. However much later the church interior may have been mistaken by others for Peel and not Fantome.

Friends of Peel Island Invitation

Tags

Fort Lytton, Lazaret, Leprosy (Hansen's Disease), Peel Island, quarantine

Friends of PeelIsland Association Inc.

The Friends of Peel Island Association Inc, PO Box 9019, Cleveland DC, Qld, 4163 Email: friendsofpeel@gmail.com

 Come and Join  The Friends of Peel Island 

on  SATURDAY, 9th SEPTEMBER, 2017 

at 
Fort Lytton National Park 
South Street, Lytton 
between 9:30am and 10:00am 

for 
MORNING TEA 
followed at 10:30am by 
A TALK BY PETER LUDLOW ON PEEL ISLAND 
“The History Behind the Horseshoe” 

Peter Ludlow, author historian, has been researching and writing about the unique history of Peel Island since 1977. With his PowerPoint presentation, Peter highlights Peel’s history including pre-European occupation, its use by Europeans and, in 2007, the Island being gazetted as a National Park and Conservation Park and the Lazaret Buildings being Heritage Listed.

The Friends of Peel Island Exhibition Room 
will be Open for Inspection following Peter Ludlow’s Presentation
also included will be
A TWO COURSE CHICKEN, HAM AND SALAD LUNCHEON 
and a LUCKY DOOR PRIZE 

Entrance Ticket : $25.00 per person 

(Note: Bookings and Payment to be received in Advance by not later than close of business on Friday, 1 September, 2017)

 Cut along Line – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

BOOKING FORM

Name: ………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Address: ………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Email: ……………………………………………………………………………………..

Telephone: ………………………… Mobile: ……………………………………..

Number of People: …………………………………………………………………..

Amount Paid: …………………………………………………………………………..

To secure your booking please either: 

• • Post the completed Booking Form to PO Box 9019, Cleveland DC 4163, together with your Cheque or Money Order made payable to “Friends of Peel Island Association”

  or

• • Email your details to “friendsofpeel@gmail.com” and make payment by way of direct deposit to our account at the Commonwealth Bank, BSB: 064-000 Account: 10649391

(If paying by direct deposit, please ensure your name is clearly indicated to identify your deposit)

Enquiries : Contact – Scott on 0407 934 147 or Email – friendsofpeel@gmail.com

The Lepers of Viluisk

Tags

Leprosy (Hansen's Disease), Peel Island

Leper Yakuts (Eastern Siberian people) in Viluisk (1905)

At a recent meeting of the Friends of Peel Island Association Inc. a colleague showed me the following extract from ‘The Friendship Book’ that had been published in 1976:

‘Wednesday July 7

 ‘Very few people in this country (England) have heard of Kate Marsden, yet in parts of modern Russia she is famous. For in the 1890’s this trained nurse and dedicated Christian began to inquire into the lot of lepers in Russia. Armed with a letter of introduction from the Princess of Wales, she personally interviewed the Empress of all the Russias and learnt of the lepers of Viluisk, expelled from their homes to a living death in the frozen forests of Siberia.

‘Kate Marsden went to see for herself, enduring terrible hardships on the journey which were to leave her an invalid for thirty years. What she saw made her badger the Russian authorities until, six years later, a leper hospital was built.

‘That same hospital was closed down not so many years ago because, thanks to one determined woman, there are now no more lepers in Viluisk.’

Notwithstanding that the term ‘lepers’ was no longer in use in 1976 except in derogatory terms and jokes, the article surprised me because I had never considered Russia to have had such patients. However, as leprosy (or Hansen’s Disease, as it is now known) is thought to have originated in China, it would have been brought by traders along the Silk Road all those centuries ago and thence into what is now known as Russia.

Peel Island episode now available to view on BBC’s ‘Click’

Tags

Click, Electronics, Lazaret, Moreton Bay, Peel Island, robots

Drone at the Lazaret, Peel Island

Last year, I accompanied a group of young tech enthusiasts from CSIRO, UQ, and QUT to Peel Island to film a documentary for the BBC. It was all part of the CyArk project with the aim of digitising the Lazaret (see my earlier blogs: ‘Click’ of October 15, 2016 and ‘Digitising the Lazaret at Peel Island’ of May 14, 2016). It was all under the guidance of Nick Kwek, the show’s producer and director who came from London to do the filming. He realised that the story’s human side is really fascinating as well, so I was included in the team to supply a bit of the human history to the now empty huts that the drones and robots were to film.

Now it’s available for all to view on the BBC’s official YourTube account:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHDATAS-GQ4&feature=youtu.be

Stories from Peel Island – 5 (Lazaret)

Tags

Lazaret, Leprosy (Hansen's Disease), Moreton Bay, Peel Island

World Health Organisation:

‘In 1937 Dapsone, the first of a new sub‑class of sulpha drugs called the Sulphones was produced. Dapsone was found to be thirty times more active but only fifteen times more toxic than Sulphanilamide and in the 1940s is tested as a possible cure for Tuberculosis. Regrettably it is not effective but tests against rat leprosy provide dramatic results. Soon it was tried on human volunteers and by the mid 1940s it was believed that the miracle cure for Hansen’s Disease (Leprosy) has finally been found.’

Dr Eric Reye (Medical Officer, Peel Island Lazaret): 

‘On the 23rd of January 1947, twenty of Peel’s most severe cases received their first doses. The philosophy behind its administration was to deliver the maximum amount of drug in the shortest time, and as such the Promin was delivered by intravenous administration each morning for six days each week.  In all, by the end of April, my assistants and I have given 1,677 Promin injections, and the results were most encouraging!

(Promin is broken down in the body to dapsone, which is the therapeutic form.)

Thirtieth Session of the National Health and Medical Research Council:

‘The Commonwealth Government should pass a special Act granting to certain Lepers allowances along the lines of those available to sufferers of TB under the TB Act’.

However, the Commonwealth Government refused to accede to the recommendation.

Seventh International Congress of Leprology in Tokyo: 

‘The Congress is unequivocally in favour of the abandonment of strict segregation and other restrictive practices as currently applied to Hansen’s patients.’

Following this Congress, a full report was made to the Queensland Parliament, which then implemented legislation for the transfer of the lazaret from Peel Island to Ward S12 at the South Brisbane (now Princess Alexandra) Hospital. Such recommendations were contained in the Health Acts Amendment Act of 1959 (Division VI ‑ Leprosy), which replaced the Leprosy Act of 1892.

Peter Ludlow:

‘If isolation is deemed to be necessary, then it must be done within the community, in special wards at community hospitals, where patients and their relatives can go without fear of community ostracism.

‘These are the lessons we can learn from Peel Island. Its past was grim, at one time hopeless, but it should never be forgotten that such events did occur right here at our doorstep, and in recent times.  Let Peel Island always remain as a symbol of the individual’s determination to live on in the face of hopelessness, and of mankind’s ability to conquer such terrible afflictions as can beset our community at any time.’

Peel Island today – a popular boaties’ destination once more

Stories from Peel Island – 4 (Lazaret)

Tags

Lazaret, Leprosy (Hansen's Disease), Peel Island

Lazaret tennis court c1940. In background from left, white male hut, common room (obscured), bath house, dining room (photo courtesy ‘Alex’)

 A visitor (to the island in 1909):

‘The steamer stopped off Peel Island to let us down into a boat… We landed on the rocky beach (at the eastern end of) the island and were soon bumping over the stony road to the part fenced off for the lepers. This was reached after a disagreeable drive of twenty minutes. The first thing to attract our attention was a collection of graves. One was newly dug, ready to receive the corpse of a leper who was in the last stages…Passing on we sighted a large number of South Sea Islanders, all affected with leprosy. These kanakas waved us a hearty welcome.’ (1)

“Alex” (pseudonym) patient at Peel Island:

‘The patients were housed in four distinct compounds ‑ the white women to the west of the main quadrangle, the white men to the east, and the aborigines in two separate compounds (men and women) to the south. In the white compounds the patients were billeted one to a hut, but in the aboriginal compounds, there were two or more to a hut. The women’s huts were the most serviceable and consisted of a bedroom, verandah, and a small kitchen, which contained a wood burning stove for cooking purposes. Women were expected to cook for themselves where possible, but if they were feeling unwell, an attendant would bring them a meal from the main kitchen. The women always dined in their cabins.’ (2)

“Jim” (pseudonym) patient at Peel Island:

‘Before World War II patient management had been relatively simple. Basically it utilized the social stigma surrounding Hansen’s patients (or “Lepers” as they were then known). The term “Leper” immediately invokes Biblical connotations of a person who is unclean and a social outcast, and to contract “Leprosy” was a life sentence of social discrimination and segregation not only for the patient by also for the patient’s family. It was this very real fear of the community’s reprisals against their families that was used to keep unruly patients in check. For it was an easy matter for the Superintendent at Peel to threaten to send the police around to a trouble‑maker’s relatives. Neighbourhood gossips would then quickly broadcast the news of the visit.

‘The other alternative available for patient control at the lazaret was by the use of sanctions ‑ specifically aimed at the issue of visitors’ passes. In the early 1940s each patient was allowed two visitors per month. In previous times it had been more often, but evidently someone had broken the rules and the number had been restricted. Before boarding the Government vessel, visitors were required to show a pass which had been previously applied for by the patient to the Superintendent at Peel. Naturally any misdemeanours on the part of the patient could be used against him when he came to request his visitors’ passes.’ (2)

Rosemary Opala (nee Fielding) (former nurse at Peel Island Lazaret):

‘When invited, we all shared the patients’ social activities such as tennis, concerts, and dances. Ingrained Hospital Protocol, not fear of contagion, was a factor in nurses not further “fraternising with the patients”. I’ve told elsewhere of how we had to hike across to the Horseshoe to swim, instead of using the patients’ jetty at high tide, because it “wasn’t professional” to be seen in our decorous bathers.’ (3)

An early colorised print of the Lazaret tennis court. Recreation Hall behind (photo courtesy Rosemary Opala)

References:

• Moreton Bay People – The Complete Collection
• Peel Island – Paradise or Prison
• Moreton Bay Letters

Stories from Peel Island – 3 (Lazaret)

Tags

Art, Lazaret, Leprosy (Hansen's Disease), Moreton Bay, Peel Island

 LEVITICUS (regarding a person with leprosy):

‘his clothes shall be rent, and his head bare, and he shall put a covering on his upper lip and shall cry unclean, unclean.  All the days wherein the plague shall be in him shall be defiled: he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be.’

Luke 16:1: (In the parable of the rich man and the beggar, which begins…)

‘There was once a rich man who dressed in the most expensive clothes and lived in great luxury every day.  There was also a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores, who used to be brought to the rich man’s door, hoping to eat the bits of food that fell from the rich man’s table.  Even the dogs would come and lick his sores… ‘

‘Lazarus and the rich man’ by Heinrich Aldegrever (German painter 1502–1555)

 C.R.Wiburd (a former Quarantine Officer at Brisbane):

‘Maritime Quarantine, as we know it, commenced in 1348 when the overseers of Public Health at Venice were authorised to spend public moneys for the purpose of isolating infected ships, persons, and goods, at an island of the lagoon.  A medical man was stationed with the sick.  As a result of these arrangements the first maritime quarantine station of which there is any record was established in 1403 at the island of Santa Maria di Nazareth at Venice.

 ‘The Venetian Authorities framed in 1348 a code of quarantine regulations which served as a model for all others to a very recent period.  All merchants and persons coming from the Levant were compelled to remain in the House of St. Lazarus for a period of forty days before admission into the city.  From this is derived the term “lazaret” which has persisted until now.’

The lazaret was established in the north-western corner of Peel Island in 1907.

Tom Welsby (early bay historian):

 ‘It (Peel) would have made an ideal township, or rather residential quarter, had mercantile buildings been erected at Cleveland and its surroundings.  Had the surface of Peel been covered with well built villas and terraces a fifteen minute or less run would have taken the businessmen and others from Cleveland to a home where in summertime the weather is always delightful, and where north‑easters and south‑easters alike cool the day and evening and night with the charm of Southern Seas … but surely so large and conspicuous an island as Peel might have been left from the charge of having its soil so sadly contaminated (by the lazaret).’

June Berthelsen (a former patient at Peel Island lazaret, on her diagnosis with Hansen’s Disease/leprosy):

 ‘I felt dazed.  I had Leprosy ‑ that dreadful disease mentioned in the Bible, where the Lepers were shunned by the people.  Lepers ‑ with loathsome sores and disfigured limbs. Would I finish up like that?  Would my family and friends disown me as something unclean and horrible?  I remembered the fate of lepers in the Bible, how they wandered in the waste places of the desert, treated more like animals than human beings.  Cast out forever by their own kind.  Would it be like that for me?’

Lloyd Rees (artist, describing his mother’s incarceration on Peel):

 ‘leprosy was diagnosed.  The world being what it was and what it still is, that, of all diseases, threw a stigma. With cancer there was a horror, but with leprosy ‑ a stigma…  There was a nasty air of secrecy about it all. From Cleveland, down south of Brisbane…a mysterious launch left to take visitors to the island.’

Reference: Peter Ludlow ‘Exiles of Peel Island – Leprosy’

Stories from Peel Island – 2 (Inebriates Home)

Tags

inebriates, Lazaret, Moreton Bay, Peel Island, quarantine

An oil painting by William Simmons in 1910 showing the beach below the Inebriates Home with Dunwich Benevolent Asylum in the background.

By 1910 Peel Island’s quarantine station (see blog of 22.10.2016) had fallen into disuse, so it was decided to use the empty buildings as a home for the more vocal inebriates (alcoholics) from the Benevolent Asylum at nearby Dunwich. The Inebriate Asylum operated for seven years from 1910 until 1916 when the inmates were returned to Dunwich, and the wooden buildings demolished. 

Ivy Rowell (nee Jackson):     

‘In 1910 my family came south from a farm in Atherton to Peel Island,” Ivy recalls. “I was just three years old then. There had been trouble with the inebriate inmates at the Benevolent Asylum in Dunwich, so the authorities shifted them to nearby Peel.  Father and Mother were given the task of running the new Inebriate Asylum, which had been established in the old Quarantine Station buildings. I still remember the yellow and green flags in a box in the storeroom.  And the large flagpole stood just outside our house.  This was the only evidence of the quarantine days.  My brother once climbed to the yard-arm and gave Mother an awful fright.  Father had to climb up to rescue him.

‘People were sent to the Inebriate Asylum to dry out. We had two types of patients: public and private.  Just like today’s health care.  Private patients, or their relatives, had to pay one Guinea a week for board and lodgings.  Public patients had earn their keep by working.’

An inebriate patient (pleading with his relatives to pay for his board):

‘ (Please release me from) this most awful degraded Hell I can imagine darkening God’s earth.’

Health Department Records:

‘William Simmons of Brisbane was convicted on July 20th 1910 of being found drunk on July 19th in Herston Road. Under the Licensing Act of 1885 (section 84) because he had no less than three convictions against him within the preceding twelve months, he was sentenced to submit to a curative treatment term of twelve months at the Institution for Inebriates, Peel Island. William Simmons was a public patient, and accepted the challenge of going, ‘cold turkey’ by applying himself in the kitchen as assistant to the cook. To keep his mind occupied in the quieter moments off duty, he took up oil painting.’

Dr Linford Row (to the Under Secretary, Home Department):

‘After serving six months of his twelve month term, William Simmons’ condition has improved to such an extent that I wish to make an application for discharge on probation, with every prospect of beginning a new life for himself in Rockhampton.’

Peter Ludlow:

‘William Simmons never returned to the Inebriates’ Home on Peel Island, so hopefully he made good.’

The beach below her parents’ house was a favourite haunt for Ivy, her brother and sisters.  Every day, when not required for lessons, they could be found playing at its rock pool or jetty. At the other end of the island was the Lazaret, home to Queensland’s Leprosy patients.  At this time, the Inebriate Asylum’s dinghy was used to transfer the hapless patients from ship to shore.  It was fumigated after each such occasion. 

Ivy Rowell:

‘One of the leprosy patients had come down from up north in a huge wooden box the size of a room. She had her meals and everything in there.  She was probably carried as deck cargo on a ship.  At Peel, the box was unloaded onto Father’s dinghy and rowed ashore.  After the patient had been removed to the Lazaret, the box was burned ‑ on my beach!  To this day, in my mind’s eye, I can still see it burning.’

Oil painting by William Simmons showing the Jacksons’ house.

Reference: Moreton Bay People – The Complete Collection

Stories from Peel Island – 1 (Quarantine)

Tags

Moreton Bay, Peel Island, quarantine

Memorial (to ‘Emigrant’ passengers buried at Dunwich, August 1850): ‘Around this stone are interred the mortal remains of twenty six immigrants who, seeking in this land an earthly home, have found elsewhere we trust a better country.’

(The quarantine station was moved to the Bluff on Peel Island in 1873.)

Peel Island map

Gurski family (quarantined at Peel aboard the Friedeburg in 1873):  ‘About 40 of the single men first pitched tents while the rest washed themselves and their clothing. The married people were then sent to do likewise. Some of the ship’s fittings had been landed on the island, and were being used on the tents. When Hamilton discovered this, he ordered the lot to be taken away immediately and burnt. There were only two cases of serious illness on the island. Matilda Kluck, 6 years old who had ulcerated bowels and chronic diarrhoea, and her older brother, Auguste, who had contracted Scarlet Fever the day the ship entered port. By the 29th the captain was able to report that the ship had been thoroughly cleaned and fumigated and (was) ready for inspection. On the 31st the ship’s crew were inspected, released from quarantine, and admitted to pratique.’

Tom Welsby: ‘The quarantine station on Peel occupied a most charming site on the headland (The Bluff) looking towards the south end of the bay and towards Dunwich. As a pure quarantine station, Peel Island has, in this direction, seen many vicissitudes and many eventful phases. On the hoisting of the Yellow Jack, the vessel from whose mast it fluttered was generally taken to an anchorage in the deep water between Peel and Bird Islands, and there stationed until all was well. Serious cases of illness were taken on shore for treatment. The healthy passengers were detained at Departmental will on the island also.

‘During one regime, in all cases of death from virulent contagious diseases the bodies were taken to Bird Island, and there, well above high water mark, were buried deep in the sand, with quick‑lime. In some cases there were burials on Peel Island at no great distance from headquarters…Since that time, many another soul has been laid to rest in that Peel Island cemetery, but I regret to say a couple of years ago a fire passed completely over it, and little now remains to tell of the mortals resting there.’

Bird Island in 1992 (it is now just a sandbank exposed only at low tide)

Dr J.I.Paddle (‘Southesk’ Surgeon Superintendent): ‘The Immigrants, on the whole, behaved very well on the Island and gave little trouble. The single women had to be closely watched all the time, as they had a great tendency to wander beyond their limits. At dusk they were ordered in and mustered to make sure that none were absent. I would further beg to suggest that it would greatly lighten the work of the Matron and the Constables in watching the single women, if a fence could be erected around their precincts.

‘One of the single women, Elizabeth Morris, gave much trouble one night, and I reported her to the Immigration Officer. On Monday evening May 22nd she gave a good deal of abuse to the Matron and kept swearing and cursing among the single women and inciting them to riot. She has been all along a very coarse and vulgar woman and very little amenable to authority throughout the voyage.’

The Bluff today

Reference: Peter Ludlow ‘The Exiles of Peel Island – Quarantine’

Click

Tags

Click, Electronics, Lazaret, Moreton Bay, Peel Island, robots

Drone at the Lazaret, Peel Island

I recently accompanied a group of young tech enthusiasts from CSIRO, UQ, and QUT to Peel Island to film a documentary for the BBC. It was all part of the CyArk project with the aim of digitising the Lazaret (see my earlier blog Digitising the Lazaret at Peel Island of May 14, 2016). It was all under the guidance of Nick Kwek, the show’s producer and director who came from London to do the filming. He realised that the story’s human side is really fascinating as well, so I was included in the team to supply a bit of the human history to the now empty huts that the drones and robots were to film.

Robot at the Lazaret, Peel Island

Nick was indeed bowled over by the place and spent many hours filming the buildings as well as the robots and drones. He also conducted several interviews, of which I scored about ten minutes.

Although I did feel a bit out of place amongst all the geeky tech talk, (but I did understand the terms drone and wi-fi) it was a very stimulating experience for an old codger like me to be amid the intelligence and enthusiasm of these fine young University people.

Like the production of all documentaries, most ends up on the cutting room floor, and it was with some dismay that I learned that the entire segment, for the BBC series called Click, would only run for five minutes. I doubt that I’ll get much of an airing in the final product. As an historian, I often lament the discarding of so much history on the cutting room floor, which must be even worse now that we have changed from film to videotape and digital, but the media have little regard for anything outside their current projects. Nick did however say that a full documentary should be made of the place. I hope he talks to someone at the BBC about this idea!

You can watch out for this and other episodes on the web at Click http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/n13xtmd5