The History

This is the story of Waltzing Matilda. Written in January 1895 by A. B. Paterson, to a version of the tune ‘Thou Bonnie Wood of Craigielea' played for him by Christina Macpherson.

When taken into context, the history of the events and people surrounding the creation of Waltzing Matilda, represent the complex nature of the social and political climate of early Australia.

The original song, which in truth is part love song, also in just a few verses, touches on the very physch from which the Austalian character was born. Distain for authority, the ability to laugh in the face of adversity and the absolute commitment to personal freedom.

This novel seeks to tell the story of the people and the events leading up to and surrounding the writing of the original Waltzing Matilda. This is a wide vista. From the lush green plains of Western Victoria to the dry and barren brown earth of Western Queensland.

Like the tune to which Waltzing Matilda was written, that traveled with Christina Macpherson from Western Victoria to Dagworth Station in Western Queensland, so did the early settlers from Victoria in the 1870s, to take up enormous holdings in outback Queensland. These were extremely wealthy pastoral families whom had made their fortunes from huge holdings of land in Western Victoria, which they had gained for almost nothing and had worked with cheap labor. Then in the 1890s; with the depression forcing some banking institutions to close their doors, profits began to dry up. Banks applied pressure to the land holders, who were now for the first time being confronted by a united workforce.

This new socialist ideology, called ‘Unionism', spread through the Australian outback like a bushfire. The poor itinerant workers (swagman) who walked hundreds of miles in the Australian out back, who were unable to vote, now found comfort and strength in the mateship of the union. Confronted with the wealthy pastoralists, who were backed by the Governments and the military, the great shearing strikes of the 1890s began. During 1891, battalions of armed military with a gattling gun were dispatched to Western Queensland to confront the workers (unionists).

In the end the union was defeated and the strike leaders were sentenced to three years hard labor in St. Helena prison.

But once again, in 1894, this time with better preparation, the shearers went on strike. Again the back-country was on the verge of civil war, with shearing sheds and paddle-steamers being burnt by the unionists. One of the last sheds to be burnt was at the Dagworth Station in Western Queensland. The leader of the union arsonists was the shearer, Samuel Hoffmeister. The next morning, Hoffmeister's dead body was found by the squatter Bob Macpherson and three policemen, beside the billa-bong.

Into this class war at Dagworth station strode Banjo Paterson, Australia's most loved poet. It was with this backdrop, surround by violence, social and political upheaval, Banjo was confronted by the beautiful and young Christina Macpherson who played for him the wonderful old Scottish tune, ‘Thou Bonnie Wood of Craigielee". Banjo was moved, not only by the tune, but also the player of the tune, the attractive Christina.

Amongst his mixed emotions for Christina, and his fiancée of eight years Sarah Riley present in the same house, surrounded by the volatile events of the 1894 shearers strike, while staying at the Dagworth homestead where the shearing shed had been burnt down, Banjo wrote Waltzing Matilda.

For some years many people speculated that Banjo did not write Waltzing Matilda because of what seemed a reluctance to talk about the song. This simply is not the case.

There is no doubt that Banjo Paterson took a liking to Christina, which ended with Sarah Riley breaking off her engagement with him. The humiliation and social embarrassment of this affair led Banjo Paterson to distance himself from the writing of Waltzing Matilda, and anything that connected him to the song or events at Dagworth Station whilst he was there.