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85.10.20a

Preferred Citation:

William Lawes to Ferdinand von Mueller, 1885-10-20 [85.10.20a]. R.W. Home, Thomas A. Darragh, A.M. Lucas, Sara Maroske, D.M. Sinkora, J.H. Voigt and Monika Wells (eds), Correspondence of Ferdinand von Mueller, <https://vmcp.rbg.vic.gov.au/id//letters/1880-9/1885/85-10-20a-final.odt>, accessed June 17, 2026

1
Letter not found. The text given here is from ‘The Reported Massacre in New Guinea: Meeting of the Geographical Society’, Herald (Melbourne), 11 November 1885, p. 3. A report had been received indicating that the New Guinea exploring expedition organized by the NSW Branch of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia had been massacred while attempting to navigate the Fly River. Most of the present article is taken up by a report from Sydney of a meeting of the Administrative Council of the Geographical Society at which ‘the general tenor of the meeting was that Captain Everill and party were safe’. The report then introduces the comment about M with: ‘In corroboration of the above, it may be stated that’.
[Baron Von Mueller is just in receipt of a letter from the Rev W. G. Lawes, dated Port Moresby, 20th October. In this communication no allusion whatever is made to any rumor of the massacre reported on Saturday last by telegraph, and it may be taken for certain that up to that time—less than three weeks ago—no tidings of any such catastrophe had been received at Port Moresby.
2
The report concludes: ‘This may help to allay any uneasiness in reference to the expedition.’
]