A Fashion Statement
These vignettes draw attention to a question that is still a subject for debate today. Charles obviously takes the view that a coat is ridiculous in the heat of North Queensland.
Harold Finch-Hatton also had something to say on the matter:
‘The fashion of wearing no coats is peculiar to Mackay, and has been adopted by the planters, who consider themselves the elite of the place. At a dinner party on one of the plantations, it is a most curious sight to see all the ladies, en grande tenue, dressed in the latest fashion, and the gentlemen sitting down with no waistcoat, and their arms bare to the elbow’.
No one seems to mention the fact that the women must also have felt the heat dreadfully.
4 December 1871
‘Good Gracious! Charley! Where’s your coat?’
‘Coat! Havn’t seen one since I left Brisbane. You don’t suppose I wear a coat when the Thermometer is over 90’! What a beastly state you must be in!’
Charley shocks the inhabitants of Rockhampton by walking about that civilised city in a costume suitable to the weather! NB It is hot in Rockhampton. An old reprobate died there the other day, & of course went to the usual place assigned to those who might have led a better life in this world – He stood it pretty well for three days & then had to send back to Rockhampton for his Blankets!
September 1877
‘He won’t wear any of these things I am sure! I’ve a good mind to lend him my double breasted blue!’
‘Don’t you do anything of the sort! Here’s my old “claw hammer”, we’ll borrow Mick’s black satin waistcoat and with a pair of clean moleskin trousers what more can he want!’ Ned and Charley rake out their wardrobes to find a suitable turnout for Francis to go to Brisbane in!
Last updated: 10th January 2008
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