Edward Sidney Borradaile
Edward Sidney Borradaile took part in surveying expedition to the Northern Territory of Australia in June 1874 with Thomas Permain, a skilled and experienced surveyor; they disappeared and were never seen again.They were presumed killed by Aboriginal Australians near Mount Tor Rock in Arnhem Land.
Life
Edward Sidney Borradaile was born on 30 March 1845 at Littlehampton, Sussex. His father, Harry, was retired from the Bombay Civil Service. Their country home was Stokes Hall on Ham Street from the mid 1840s to the 1870s, although they had other addresses in London, Ealing and Brighton. His parents are both buried in the churchyard of St Andrew’s Church and his younger brother was baptised there. Edward and his elder brother Arthur sailed from Plymouth to Melbourne on the ‘Yorkshire’ in 1867. They attended the 1868 Queen’s birthday in Melbourne. Between 1868-69 he was an assistant engineer on the Launceston and Western railway, Tasmania, and was mining correspondent for the Bendigo Independent newspaper 1870-73. He had later been at Sandhurst, in the gold fields of Victoria. In 1870 and 1871 he was shareholder in mining companies and in 1872 manager of the Christmas and Possum United Tribute Company. In 1873 he was reporting on mining in Kapunda, South Australia. In December 1873 he had applied unsuccessfully for a position with the Northern Territory Government as an engineer and draftsman with experience of railway construction in Victoria and Tasmania.“One of the most prominent men during the great Sandhurst fever was Mr. Edward S. Borradaile. When the great crash came, Mr. Borradaile formed one of the many who went to Port Darwin to try their fortunes, and he has remained there ever since. He was a very daring and plucky young fellow, as many in Sandhurst know.”
The expedition
In June 1874 Borradaile and his companion Permain set off with five horses from Palmerston, Darwin, via Pine Creek in the Northern Territory of Australia to explore the region around Port Essington. They were reported to be well equipped but turned down the offer of taking a Port Essington aboriginal guide. Their last communication was a telegram on 11 June from Pine Creek.Thomas Hanbury Permien
Thomas Hanbury Permien was an older, widowed man with three daughters; his wife Mary had died in 1864. He was a surveyor who had been in the Indian Survey Department. He moved to Victoria in 1850 and then worked as a surveyor for the Queensland government, moving to the Northern Territory in 1873 and trading with the Indian Islands.The search party
In October a search party led by John Lewis with an Aboriginal tracker went to search for them but did not find them. “Mr. Lewis interviewed a tribe of natives near the Tor Rock, and from their replies he believed that Permain and Borrodaile were murdered by them. Mr. Lewis had a native boy with him who acted as interpreter.” They reported being attacked by 200 men armed with spears.Another report said “that certain natives not belonging to the Port Essington tribe had recently come in with the information that two white men had been killed by a neighboring tribe, supposed to be East Alligator blacks. That previous to their murder they had robbed them of everything except their books, that the explorers declined giving up these, and were consequently murdered. The locality of this barbarous deed was described as being near the Tor Rock, which is about 725 feet in height.”
Memorials
Both men have mountains named after them: Mt Borradaile, a registered Aboriginal sacred site known as Awunbarna, and Mt Permain which is near Mt Tor.There is a memorial plaque in Christ Church Cathedral, Darwin.
Recalling
Edward Sidney Borradaile
Born March 1845
Lost June 1874
"Exploring in the Northern Territory of
Australia two mountains being there
named after himself and his companion
Permain in memory of the event."
– Ubique Deus –
St Andrew’s Church on Ham Common has a memorial plaque to Borradaile; the plaque has an outline of the part of the Northern Territory where they vanished with a cross marking 12°S 133°E where they are thought to have died.