Grovenor Street, Gunning: A New Front Opens in the History Wars

Radical, left wing historical revisionists are questioning whether we should continue to honour Gunning founding father William Grovenor as we look back at past events in these enlightened times.

An earlier article on this site, Gunning's First Ever Magpie Shooting Competition a Banging Success, reported on a live bird shooting tournament organised by Mr William Grovenor in 1880 during which nine eminent local Knights of the Trigger shot and killed 17 or more magpies.

Comments and questions on Facebook soon followed. This article attempts to address the issues  people have raised in these posts as well as adding some new information and clarification. So, here follows:

1. Should Grovenor Street be renamed in the light of Mr Grovenor's role in initiating and managing such a barbarous magpie murdering event?
2. Gunning's Elite - the high cost of joining the Knights of the Trigger.
3. The culinary qualities of the Australian Magpie.
4. Retraction and apology to the late Mr William Grovenor.

Should Grovenor Street be Renamed Remembrance Street?

Today we see the sporting fun enjoyed by the Gunning sportsmen as cruel and destructive. That's why two Facebook contributors suggested Grovenor Street be renamed - with Remembrance Avenue proposed as a more fitting title. But does the William Grovenor of this eponymous street deserve to have his name removed from our road signs?

The street is almost certainly named to honour William Grovenor [1804-1858], builder and long time licencee of the White Hart Inn and a leading businessman who established a major flour mill and store. He also served as the local post master for some time [which may help explain any aversion to magpies members of the Grovenor family may have suffered].

As a prominent, even pre-eminent, pioneer he undoubtedly deserves to be remembered. What's more, we cannot lay responsibility for the murderous magpie mayhem at his feet because he has an excellent alibi.  He had been in his Gunning cemetery grave for over 20 years when this event took place. If denunciations are to be made, they would be against his son, also named William, who was the organiser of the event. 

Happily, this incipient radical revisionist call to rename our small memorial to one of Gunning's founding fathers has thus far escaped the notice of Andrew Bolt and traditionally inclined historians.  So, Gunning's Grovenor Street will not join the Captain James Cook memorial in Hyde Park as a controversial cause celebre' in the ongoing History Wars.

Gunning's Elite: The High Cost of Live Bird Shooting Pleasure

Pigeon shooting circa 1900. An expensive pursuit. Illustration courtesy Dr Drew Hause

Magpies were not the normal targets for sportsmen.Their standard bird of choice was the pigeon and you had to be seriously wealthy to participate in competitive pigeon shooting in the 1880s. A decent quality pigeon gun cost the equivalent of two years of the basic wage. And when exclusive live bird shooting clubs became established from the the late 1800s joining fees were also very pricey. The initial entry subscription for the NSW Gun Club, established in the same year as our magpie shooting event, was twenty guineas.

How did Mr Grovenor and his fellow sportsmen afford their top of the line shotguns? There were nine participants in the Gunning event - Messrs J Bean jnr, R Reynolds, J Newman, W Grovenor, W P Rowland, J Hart, T Easterby, J Ferguson and A H Line. Of these, five were either publicans or members of hoteliers' families.  They were:

J Bean jnr - Joseph Bean was licencee of the Frankfield Inn from 1867-1881

R Reynolds - a member of the Grovenor family by marriage

J Newman - licencee of the White Hart Inn from 1879 - 1881

W Grovenor - licencee of the White Hart Inn prior to Mr Newman

A H Line - likely a relative of T H Line, licencee of the Telegraph Hotel for much of 1870 - 1874 and then the Commercial Hotel.

Forget wool and gold prospecting. The high proportion of hoteliers at the magpie shooting event suggests that hospitality was the place to be in 1880. Is there a PhD thesis waiting to be written on the forgotten role of hoteliers in creating wealth and opulence in late colonial Gunning ?

 The culinary qualities of the Australian Magpie

Mr Max Cullen, a commentator on colonial cooking practices, reported on Facebook that his father's recipe for cooking a magpie was to boil it with a rock. When the rock was soft, the magpie was ready. A variant of Mr Cullen Snr's recipe for magpies is also widely known for cockatoos with an old boot being substituted for the rock.

Were magpies favoured for the table by our forebears? First Fleeter Lt Ralph Clark wrote that  he was partial to "parrots, haws [sic] and every kind of birds.........the crows goes down the Same as a Barn dove in England."  However, this was written at a time of desperation when food was in perilously short supply.

Cooks in the mid to late 1800s were often keen users of native foods.  Mrs Beeton's book of household management published circa 1880 gave a recipe for parrot pie. The Wonga Pigeon, Brush Turkey, ducks, quail, and snipe were among the highly esteemed table fare they used. Poulterers at the Sydney Markets routinely had Red Wattle Birds [illustrated below] for sale.

The Red Wattlebird.  A much favoured table bird in the 1800s.  Photo Wikipedia

Wattlebirds, ducks and pigeons were great for the pot. What about the Magpie?  It seems that even the Cullen Snr approach to preparing this species for the table won't work.  Mrs Louisa Meredith, one of two 19th century cooks known to try this species wrote "after exhausting all my culinary skills upon them in roasts, stews, curries and pies, I have finally given them up as not cookable, or rather not relishable when cooked".  Clearly, the Gunning magpies were unlikely to have been eaten after the match.

Retraction and Apology to the Late Mr William Grovenor

At this inaugural event, the nine Gunning sportsmen had only four officially recorded kills credited to them in total. However, a dozen or more bullet-ridden magpies were found outside the grounds afterwards. The article suggested this was evidence of dodgy judging and sloppy stewarding. Having since read more about the rules of competitive live bird shooting I must acknowledge that Mr Grovenor's highly lauded event accorded fully with contemporary best practice. For a shot bird to be credited to the shooter it had to fall within the boundaries of the field. Birds unhelpfully falling dead outside the boundary could not be tallied. It was important to be clear about what hits counted as shooters would often be competing for high stakes.  I apologise to Mr Grovenor and his organising team for suggesting otherwise.

Want to know more about the rich and famous in early Gunning?  Or learn the secrets of colonial cooks?  

I can recommend the following for anybody wanting to know more:

• Where Once the Wagons Went by Gunning and District Historical Society's Keith Brown - an interesting and authoritative account of historical local hoteliers and the establishments they ran [go to the top of this site for more details].
• The Oldest Foods on Earth by John Newton - a history of Australian native foods with recipes
• Eat Your History by Jacqui Newling - stories and recipes from Australian kitchens.

Still to Come

Messrs Grovenor and  Reynolds will return in Pigeons Palatable and Pigeons Poisonous - the perils faced by late colonial Gunning gourmets.