King's Central Mount Stuart

Central Mount Stuart with the exploration party's pack bags spread out in the foreground, drawn 11 March 1862. One of 44 sketches of the John McDouall Stuart expedition across Australia 1861-1862.

Stephen King Junior joined McDouall Stuart's expedition to break in the horses that were being brought from the Chambers' station at Cobdogla. These were Stuart's horses of preference, tough bush-bred horses with more stamina than town-bred horses. King was a tough and resourceful bushman, but also a talented artist. Stuart wrote of him on one occasion 'as the one in whom I can place the greatest dependence to execute any charge I may give him with care and faithfulness.' (Webster, p. 216)

King's drawings are the visual record of the expedition, as he recorded the landscapes they passed through and incidents with the horses. His drawing of Central Mt Stuart with the pack saddles neatly arrayed below, has a more immediate and personal touch to it than Angas's illustration in the Hardman edition of Stuart's journals.

View all King's sketches of the expedition.

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