The Squatters: The story of Australia's pastoral pioneers

by Barry Stone

A very readable history of an important group of Australian pioneers' - Graham Seal, author of the bestselling Great Australian Stories

For the early settlers who came from Britain's crowded cities and tiny villages, it must have been extraordinarily liberating to pack their belongings onto a bullock dray and head beyond the reach of meddlesome authorities to claim new land for themselves.

Settlers spread out across inland Australia constructing windmills and fences, dry-stone walls and storehouses, livestock yards and droving routes, the traces of which can still be seen today. The fortunate and indomitable succeeded, while countless others succumbed to drought and flood. Those who were successful became a class all their own: the scrub aristocrats.

Barry Stone has scoured through diaries, journals and newspapers, and sorted myth from legend. He tells the stories of pioneers whose vision and hard work built pastoral empires running thousands of head of stock, providing meat for a growing colony and wool for export, a rural juggernaut that would lay the foundations of a prosperous nation.

Genres: History

245 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 7, 2019

Reviews

[Nathan Mark · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had high hopes for this book. Sadly, it read as little more than a compilation of historical facts and figures. I found it lacked analysis and was let down by the author brushing over every topic in short excepts. There was plenty of room to expand and inform but for whatever reason, this wasn’t done. Not a book I would recommend.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recommended. Fascinating stories of the first Australian farmers, drovers and explorers as they came to grips with the strange, unfamiliar land.

[Elise · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an easy read but I suspect it may have suffered at the hands of an over-enthusiastic editor. Given the sheer number of examples of names, dates, properties etc it seems clear to me that Stone has done his research quite extensively, but this research hasn’t been sufficiently transported through to the final product.

For someone like me this book served a purpose of being a starting off point for some of the stories I was unfamiliar with. For example, I’m fairly familiar with the history of the Darling Downs, but much less across the background of Northern Queensland. While both of these subjects are covered in the book, the depth that’s actually gone into is quite shallow, leaving you feeling a bit dissatisfied. As some other reviews here have said, this approach is fairly consistent through the whole book, and there doesn’t really seem to be a reason for it other than to bring the word count down. That said, the book has certainly given me clues of what to look for for further information on my own purposes.

For those completely unfamiliar with the subject matter, I think this would be a suitable enough primer. It might be the type of thing I’d give to interested or visiting overseas friends - particularly if they were heading out of the main metro areas - or a young high school student just getting into the subject matter. Particularly for the latter, this book should raise a lot of questions for them, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Easy read, good enough, but not life changing.

[Dennis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it. I'd describe it as very good and built on great research, but something was missing for me to judge it a great book. Perhaps it was a lack of a consistent theme or thread running through it or maybe I was so repulsed by the callous murder of so many innocent indigenous men, women and children by the squatters who were hell bent on stealing their land and stuff to the consequences. This is where you see the consequences of the terra nullius proclamation by the first English to set foot in Sydney Cove, which begs the question - if there was no one in this country, who were they dispossessing and murdering?

[Alex Rogers · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was a little disappointed at how the squatters were essentially lionised, brave colonists taming the wild grassland - with little insight into the ecological and cultural devastation that we can see in hindsight.

[Ned Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good book, not easy to put down at times.
A very large topic. The full country over the period of squatting. All in just 219 pages. Obviously there are omissions.
It is a good armslength, starter book for someone who desires a quick understanding of the start of the Australian pastoral industry.