Contemporary Redcliffe hides its agrarian past well, so it may come as a surprise to learn what lies beneath our houses and other infrastructure. For instance, did the dignitaries who attended the opening of the Redcliffe golf course in 1936 – or do today’s golfers – know that in years past their fairways were a sugar cane plantation?
Histories of the Queensland sugar industry are coy as to where the first viable sugar production occurred, saying only that it was “near Brisbane”; and while Humpybong may not be able to lay claim to being the cradle of the Queensland sugar industry, it was certainly among the earliest places where cane was grown. In 1864, Walter Hill, Secretary for Lands and Works, observed during his visit to the “Redcliff Reserve” that crops were being cultivated, among which was sugar cane, which, he said, “is small in quantity, but excellent in growth”.
Exactly where Hill saw this is not known, but certainly by the end of the 1860s, sugar was being grown in Clontarf, on the site now occupied by the golf course. This land was first purchased by William and Mary Ward in 1869 and then leased to Thomas Ham, who planted the first sugar cane. When Ham died the following year, his widow, Mary, continued to farm cane with her sons until relinquishing the lease in 1873. While sugar continued to be farmed there, the land was not well suited to it and production ceased in about 1877.
Other Sugar Producers and the Industry’s Decline
Another early Clontarf sugar producer was Charles Kislingbury, who grew a small crop and imported a mill from Scotland to crush the cane. This venture was not a success and he moved to Gympie. It was probably the remains of his mill that languished on the golf course until the 1950s.
North of Clontarf, in the vicinity of Kippa Ring, Mr John Dodds’s Bellvale plantation was recorded as having “two fine patches of cane planted”. He, too, set up a mill and reportedly crushed both his and his neighbours’ crops. This foray into sugar production was also short-lived and Dodds sold the land in 1876.
Despite one assessment that “some of the finest crops of cane yet seen in Queensland” were to be seen on the peninsula, sugar production had all but ceased by the end of the 19th century and now, 150 years on, it takes a real effort of imagination to envisage “the whole of [Clontarf] point … under sugar cane” but, had it thrived, who knows, we could now be drinking Redcliffe rum.
[With thanks to City of Moreton Bay. Image courtesy of John Oxley Library Record No 996977434702061.]
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