Great Scot May 2020 Great Scot 159_MAY 2020_ONLINE_V3 | Seite 90

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ABOVE: ROBERT RUTHERFORD MACPHERSON FOURTH FROM RIGHT, OUTSIDE TEMPORARY WOOLSHED AT DAGWORTH
STATION, 1894. RIGHT: ROBERT RUTHERFORD MACPHERSON.
THE SCOTCHIE WHO
INSPIRED WALTZING MATILDA
Bob Macpherson was involved in two pivotal events in Australian history
Waltzing Matilda is arguably Australia’s most recognisable song,
and some consider it a de facto national anthem. Despite debate
about its origins, it owes something of its contents to Scotch boy
Robert Rutherford Macpherson.
Born at Melbourne on 23 September 1855, Bob attended Scotch
from 28 May 1867 to December 1872, originally entering from
Peechelba Station (he re-entered Scotch in 1871). Bob was nine
when the station was held up by bushranger Dan ‘Mad Dog’ Morgan
on 8 April 1865, and he was present when Morgan was shot and
killed as he left the following day. Bob played in the 1872 1st XVIII
and rowed in the winning 1872 Head of the River crew.
By 1884 the Macpherson family owned Dagworth Station on the
Diamantina River, north-west of Winton, Queensland. Dagworth was
about to use non-union shearers during the violent shearers’ strike
of 1894, as Australia was in economic depression, and London
wool prices were down.
Shortly after midnight on 2 September 1894 the Dagworth
shearing shed was burnt down by 16 armed men, who fired about
a dozen shots through the shed, and others into the Macpherson
brothers’ cottage, waking them, and starting a shootout. The
Macphersons set off in hot pursuit of the attackers. Prominent
unionist, Samuel Hoffmeister, believed to be among the attackers,
was found shot dead that afternoon about 12 miles (19km) from
Dagworth beside Combo Waterhole (a billabong). His death was
ruled a suicide.
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In August 1895, the legendary Australian poet, Banjo Paterson,
visited Dagworth. He spent time with Bob on and around the station,
and heard Bob’s account of the extraordinary events of 1894.
Accounts vary, but point to Bob introducing Paterson to the term
‘waltzing Matilda’ in relation to a passing swagman. Some suggest
that Bob was (or was the inspiration for) the ‘squatter riding on his
thoroughbred’ in the song that Paterson was said to have penned
during an 80 mile (129km) buggy ride with Bob.
Other stories explain how Bob introduced stories of the billabong
and a recently drowned swagman (although Hoffmeister is generally
considered to have been substituted by Paterson for the swagman in
the song). As much as the exact origins of the song may be disputed,
less contentious is the origin of the tune, Thou Bonnie Wood 'o
Craigielea, which Bob’s sister, Christina Rutherford Macpherson
(born 19 June 1864, died 27 March 1936), played on an autoharp
for Paterson, exchanging several letters with him after his visit.
Bob left Dagworth in 1906 when mortgagees took possession
after a lengthy drought. He was station manager of Collulah Station in
1913, then spent at least the next six years managing cattle stations
for Vestey in the Northern Territory. Bob’s final years were lived out in
a boundary hut on Mimong Station near Kynuna, Queensland. As he
walked to a car to return home from Kynuna on 27 July 1930, he gave
a little gasp and dropped dead.
This Scotchie, with such a fascinating history, was buried beside
his brother John Rutherford Macpherson (born 26 February 1862,
Scotch 1873-79, died 16 March 1903) at Dagworth Station.
Great Scot Issue 159 – May 2020