Pushkin. This cautionary tale was inspired by a suggestion from a loyal listener. Thank you, JP, I hope you enjoy the episode. Brah, Robert O'Hara Burke calls out the name of the man he'd left in charge of the camp at Cooper's Creek, Coo.
Braha.
Dusk is falling, Burke and his two surviving colleagues recognize their surroundings. The camp is close. They've traveled thirty miles that day, clinging wearily to the backs of their two surviving camels, who are just as exhausted as they are.
Brah.
It's been over four months since they saw Braha and the other men they left at Cooper's Creek. In that time, they've trekked two thousand miles to the northern coast of Australia and back again. They're the first white men ever to cross the country. Glory and fame await when they get back to Melbourne, still nearly another thousand miles away, but now they'll have support, more men, fresh camels and horses and food and goodness. Been on half rations for weeks, But where's Braha?
Pattern mcdonna.
No response from anyone, Admittedly, Burke had assured them he'd be back at the camp in three months, not four. They might by now have assumed he was lost or had taken a different route back to Melbourne, but he'd asked them to stay at Cooper's Creek for as long as their supplies lasted, and their supplies should have been replenished long ago.
Braha pattern mcdonna.
They can't be far away. They've probably just gone to water the camels and the horses. They'll be back any moment. Then, Burke's second in command sees the dates carved into the Coolibar tree December six sixty April twenty one sixty one. The sixth of December eighteen sixty That was when they established this camp, four and a half months ago. So the other date must be when Braha abandoned the camp, the twenty first of eight April eighteen sixty one. That's today.
They abandoned the camp today, Braha. The ashes in the campfire are still worn. Other letters carved into the tree DG three ft NW dig three feet to the northwest. They dig loosely buried under camel doong and dirt is a trunk. In the trunk is a bottle, and in the bottle a note. It's signed by William.
Braha Depot Cooper's Creek, twenty first of April eighteen sixty one. The depot party leaves this camp today.
But why? For medical attention?
It seems Pattern is unable to walk, his leg has been severely hurt.
But where are the others?
Where's the third group of Burke's expedition, the ones he left at the last outpost of civilization on the Darling River, who are going to follow up to Cooper's Creek with all the other supplies? Where are they?
No person has been up here from the Darling.
So that depot party's supplies haven't been replenished, and Brajo will have had to take much of what remained for his journey back. Burke and his two companions look again in the buried chest. They've been left some flour, sugar, tea, and dried meat. Not much, not enough, but at least they can eat Tonight. They eat, they rest, they discuss their predicament, and then they make a catastrophically bad decision. I'm Tim Harford, and you're listening to cautionary tales. How the calm.
Stands fall like shot himself.
Robert O'Hara Burke sits in the front row of the theater. He was there last night. He'll be there tomorrow night too. Burke is Irish, a former soldier. Seven years ago he moved to the newly established British Crown Colony of Victoria, Australia wasn't yet a country with states. Burke became superintendent of police in a fast growing gold rush town seventy miles from Victoria's capital, Melbourne. He spends his time chasing horse thieves or quelling trouble from workers on the railway
who had disgruntled with their boss. What sort of man was Robert O'Hara Burke, Apart from, as it seemed, a theater lover, he was untidy, says one account. He dressed like a peasant and dribbled saliva down his bushy black beard. But he came from a well connected family. He spoke several languages, and he was quite at ease in the poshest social circles the young colony had to offer. He
was a daredevil eccentric. You might find him galloping his horse madly through swamps and forests, or reading police reports in a bathtub in his yard, wearing nothing but his helmet. He bore grudges. Burke fell out with a magistrate whose particular bugbear happened to be people swinging on his front gate. Burke would ride thirty miles just to swing on that gate. And a theater lover, not exactly Burke had fallen head
over heels for a young actress. She sang and starred in burlesques and pantomimes, roles like Cupid, the Mischievous God of Love. When she played in nearby towns, Burke always found an excuse to gallop over. He claimed there was a promising lead on a gang of horse thieves, when he really just wanted an excuse to watch Julia Matthews.
I don't think I'm ugly.
I'm only just twenty.
I know I shouldn't make a most excellent wife.
There girls all around me have lovers in plenty, but I'm not a sweetheart can get for my life.
Julia was not, in fact, only just twenty. She was still a teenager. Burke was pushing forty. Julia must have been disconcerted that a man twice her age was stalking her from town to town, gazing adoringly up from a front row seat, dribbling saliva. Burke proposed marriage. Julia said no, but Burke wasn't discouraged. He bought a piano and hired a teacher to teach him the Songsia sang hour after hour. He practiced with blankets draped around the piano so he
didn't wake the neighbour's baby. In Melbourne, meanwhile, the freshly minted Royal Society of Victoria was planning an expedition from their city in the south to the northern coast. It had never been done before. Ships had sailed round Australia and explorers from various coastal cities were venturing further inland, but the center on a map remained a ghastly blank. What was there just desert? Or was there, as some thought, an inland sea. Could they map a route for a
telegraph wire to speed up communication with Europe. Might they find land that was good for pasture.
Or more gold?
The society had raised the money for the expedition, but couldn't agree on who should lead it. Ideally they'd hire an experienced explorer, but no one was available, or no one from Victoria. The experienced explorers were all from other British colonies. Elsewhere in Australia, rivalry was strong. It was a matter of pride to the Royal Society of Victoria that someone from Victoria should cross the country first. They
advertised the post and got some unconvincing applicants. One proposed to solve the problem of crossing the desert by stretching out a very long hose pipe from the last known river. Then a major funder of the project, a railway magnet, suggested someone had got to know Irish former office now a police chief, very effective at quelling trouble from disgruntled workers, A manly character with determined energy. Eccentric, yes, but from
a very good family, Robert O'Hara Burke. Some who knew Burke were astonished at the idea of him crossing Australia. He was the worst bushman I ever met, said one. Another added he could not tell the Norse from the South in broad daylight. Burke himself needed no persuading.
If I come out successful, I have no doubt but that Julia will accept my offer of marriage.
In August eighteen sixty the expedition prepared for departure in a park in Melbourne. It consisted of nineteen men, twenty three horses, seven camels and twenty one tons of baggage. Burke watched it all being piled on wagons and animal's backs with mounting alarm. He had somehow lost control of what was being packed.
What are we going to do with all this?
Who?
For instance, decided they'd need twelve sets of dan draft brushes in the outback. They were taking an oak dining table and a gong from China, and a boat. A boat on wheels, so it was also a wagon, but a boat. Nonetheless, they might need one if they encountered an inland sea. Before they set off, Burke had one thing he needed to do. It had a photograph taken and made into a miniature portrait, which he now placed in a locket. He went to see Julia Matthews and
again asked her to marry him. This time, the teenage actress didn't reject the proposal out of hand. Burke might be twenty one years her senior, but if he succeeded, he'd be the most famous man in the land. Wise, perhaps to keep her options open, Julia said she'd consider his proposal on his return. For now, she accepted the locket cautionary tales, will be back after the break. Robert O'Hara Burke was trying to cross Australia from Melbourne, Victoria
in the south to the unmapped north. The journey hit planned had two stopping off points. About a quarterway up. A few hundred miles north of Melbourne was the last outpost of civilization, a tiny settlement on the Darling River, a few houses, a pub, and general store. From there, Burke would press on a few hundred miles more to Cooper's Creek, almost halfway up the country, the furthest point
mapped by any explorer. At Cooper's Creek, he'd establish a camp and a depot, he'd secure his lines of communication back to the outpost on the Darling, and then he'd set forth into uncharted territory, a thousand or so miles remaining to a gulf in the north. That was the plan, anyway, But then they'd accumulated twenty one tons of baggage.
What are we going to do with all this?
As it happened, Burke's despairing question had a sensible answer. For the first leg of the journey, at least that outpost on the Darling River was served by a paddle steamer. Burke could have shipped most of his supplies up the river and traveled light with the horses and camels that arrived fresh and ready for the push to Cooper's Creek. That would be sensible. Why not do that? Alas Burke had fallen out with the owner of the steamboat company,
he insisted on hauling everything over land instead. That was his first catastrophic decision, if you don't count taking the job in the first place. The journey from Melbourne to the Darling could be done in ten days by a messenger on horseback. It took Burke's expedition fifty six days. In that time. Of the nineteen men who had set out, Burke had lost eleven, either he fired them or argued with them till they quit. He hired five more along the way and lost three of them. Two He hired
more wagons to help with the baggage. That ruinous expense he kept breaking down. As Burke complained in messages to Melbourne.
The roads are very bad.
He wrote so many checks for wagon repairs. The Royal Society of Victoria's bank account round dry, and the checks began to bounce. Burke finally decided he'd have to dump some supplies. In a small town, he held a public auction. Among the stuff he got rid of was their lime juice, which helps prevent scurvy. As we heard about in another cautionary tale, when limeers get scurvy, scurvy creeps up on you with lack of vitaminc. It starts with aching gums,
then slowly rots your body. Burke really shouldn't have ditched the lime juice. As the expedition stutted on, news reached Melbourne that another explorer from another Crown colony was also setting off with the aim of crossing the country first. Members of the Royal Society of Victoria's Exploration Committee hen anxious letters.
My dearest Burke, well know to a certain extent the erase, I know how exciting this must be to you. The honor of Victoria is end your hands. Oh and the committee were rather alarmed that, finding the expense greater than they anticipated.
Burke tried a shortcut to make up time. The wagons sank so deep in sand they had to be dug out with shovels. The horses got so exhausted they simply stopped. After fifty six days, Burke and what remained of his expedition staggered towards the handful of houses on the Darling River. They had completed barely a quarter of their outward journey, and it should have been the easiest part through land
that was already colonized. As they arrived, they watched the parbon General's store unload a new shipment of stock from a paddle steamer. At the outpost on the Darling River. Burke assessed his options. It fired his second in command, so he needed to promote someone. He chose an earnest young Englishman called William Wills. Wills's mum hadn't wanted him to go on this expedition, but, as he wrote.
Her, were we born to be locked up in comfortable rooms, never to incur the hazard of mishap.
Unlike Burke, Wills was a scientist, a trained surveyor. It was his job to find their way with a compass and by observing the stars at night, and to keep meteorological observations. Wills had quite enjoyed the journey so far.
Riding on the camels is much more pleasant than I anticipated. I sit on the back portion behind the hump, and packed the instruments in front. I can thus ride on, keeping my journal and making calculations.
By now it was late in spring. The summer heat would soon make it dangerous to travel further north. It would be sensible to wait a few months and resume their travels in autumn. Sensible, but Burke was in a race. He decided to split the party up. He'd take the fittest men, horses and camels, and a few months worth of food and press on to Cooper's Creek in charge of the others. He left a man he'd met in the pub who'd managed a local sheep station and seemed
to know what he was doing. Burke sent a letter to Melbourne to explain.
I informed him that I should consider him third officer of the expedition, subject to the approval of the committee. In the meantime, I have instructed him to follow me up with the remainder of the camels to Cooper's Creek.
But was the man from the pub expected to wait for the committee's approval before he followed up to Cooper's Creek. Burke's instructions alas were unclear. When I've talked about civilization, I've been using quote marks on the colonial maps. The center of Australia might have looked like a ghastly blank, but it was of course home to ancient civilizations of its own. Near Cooper's Creek lived four main groups of
Aboriginal people. They moved around to find food and water, but they knew whose land was whose, and when you visited others land there were conventions to follow, much as I might knock on your door and wait to be invited in Burke and Wills neither knew nor cared about these conventions. They simply marched straight up to the watering holes with their horses and camels. The Aboriginal people didn't know what to make of these white fellers. They tried to be friendly. Wills was having none of it.
A large tribe of blacks came pestering us to go to their camp and have a dance, which we declined. They were very troublesome, and nothing but the threat to shoot will keep them away.
The desert heat was stifling. Will's thermometer showed one hundred and nine, but they found Cooper's Creek to be teeming with life, fish and birds and trees, though also rats and flies and mosquitoes. On the sixth of December eighteen sixty they set up their camp like the jolly Swagman
of Song, under the shade of a kolibar tree. Remember what Burke was supposed to do at Cooper's Creek, establish a depot, secure his lines of communication back to that outpost on the Darling, and only then explore the uncharted territory to the north. It would have been sensible to wait for the man from the pub to arrive with the rest of the supplies, but Burke was sure he'd be along soon, and anyway, there was a race on split his party again. He'd push for the northern coast.
With Wills and two others in charge of the depot, he left a quiet but capable young German, William Braha. Burke told Braha they'd be back in three months. He was taking only three months worth of food, after all, And if Burke wasn't back in three months, well, he might have found a route to another settlement in another colony.
That had also been vague talk of a ship being sent to meet him at the Gulf in the north he hoped to reach, but the man from the pub would have come with more supplies by then, so Braha could stay at Cooper's Creek anyway, whatever, it'd be fine.
You must not fret. I shall be back in a short time.
Caution, retales will also be back in a short time. In his nineteen sixty book The Strategy of Conflict, the game, theorist Thomas Shelling asks us to imagine a couple who lose each other in a department store. It's nineteen sixty, so they can't just call. But the chances are good, says Shelling, that they'll find each other. They'll each think of some obvious place to meet that will obviously be obvious to the other. Shelling calls this a coordination game.
Can you coordinate if you can't communicate? You win the game if you give the same answer as the other player. The question, he says, is not what would I do if I were she? But what would I do if I were she? Wondering what she would do if she were I wondering what I would do if I were she. The trick is to look for what Shelling calls a focal point in the situation. Different places in the department store will seem obvious to different couples, but we can
play coordination games with strangers too. Shelling asks people to imagine they've been told to meet someone in New York, but not a time or location. Where might they try In an age when most people arrived by train, many gave Shelling the same answer by the famous clock at Grand Central Terminal at noon. How do you play the coordination game? Logic helps, says Shelling, but usually not until imagination has selected some clue to work on from among
the concrete details of the situation. The problem comes when you're so confident in your own answer you don't bother to look for a backup plan. In Cooper's Creek in April eighteen sixty one, William Braher wonders how long it's reasonable to keep waiting for Burke Wills and their two companions. They have been gone for over four months. Maybe they're dead, maybe they're on a ship back to Melbourne. He has no way to communicate with them. The man from the
pub never arrived. Pattens hurt his leg and can't walk, but more worryingly, his gums are bleeding too. Wait much longer and they risk never making it back to civilization at all. They decide to leave on the morning of April or twenty first. Braha writes a letter just in case Burke eventually makes it back. He puts the letter in a bottle, and the bottle in a chest with as much food as he can spare. He buries the chest.
Now will Burke no, it's there? The focal point for coordination seems obvious, the coolibar tree in the shade of which they made their camp. He carves instructions into the tree, dig three feet northwest. He adds the date and abandons the camp. That evening, Burke, Wills, and one more man, John King, stagger into the camp. The fourth man died, and the three were so weak it took a whole day to dig his grave. If they hadn't buried him that had been back at Cooper's Creek a day earlier.
They try not to think about that. Burke, Wills, and King assess their options. Should they follow Braha back along the track towards the outpost on the Darling River. It's hundreds of miles but never make it. But if a search party comes, it would be from that direction. Burke has another idea. The incomplete maps of Australia show another tiny outpost only one hundred and fifty miles away along Cooper's Creek. It's called Mount Hopeless. The food from the
chest might just be enough for that shorter journey. Burke writes a letter outlining his plans.
We proceed on tomorrow slowly down the creek towards Mount Hopeless. We are very weak, we have all suffered much from hunger. Greatly disappointed at finding the party here gone, we shall move very slowly down the creek.
He puts the letter in a box, puts the bottle in the chest, and buries it in the same place. The three men briefly discuss whether they should also add a mark to the tree. They decide not to bother. As King later explained.
We thought the word deg would answer our purpose as well as ours.
Obviously, if a search party came to the camp, let's see the word dig and dig up the chest, wouldn't they? Burke, Wills and King spread dung over the chest so it doesn't look like the ground has been disturbed. They don't want the locals to steal it. They leave the abandoned camp looking almost exactly as they found it. Just ninety miles south of Cooper's Creek, William Braher bumps into the man from the pub, William Wright. So he is making his way from the Darling to Cooper's Creek, just months
later than expected. Wright's instructions remember were unclear. He'd explained to Braha that he had assumed he should wait for the Royal Society of Victoria to approve his appointment. Burke's checks had been bouncing. He didn't want to set off until he got explicit assurance that he'd be paid in Melbourne. The Society's committee assumed there was no rush to confirm Right's appointment because he would have set off already. When Wright eventually did set off, his journey was slow because
some of his men were suffering from scurvy. Braha and Wright agreed there was no longer any point in lugging the rest of the supplies to Cooper's Creek. They should all now return to the Darling. But they shared a nagging worry. What if Burke had made it back. The ill men could use a few days rest. Braha and Right decided to ride together quickly back to Cooper's Creek.
Just to check.
At Cooper's Creek. Braha and Right see no sign that Burke's been there. The camp looks just like we left it. Braha tells Right. They don't bother to dig up the chest. Obviously, if Burke had put a message there, he would mark the tree. Burke, Wills, and King were moving very slowly down the creek, as their note had said, they were just a day's ride away. When Braha and Right didn't read that note, the task of reaching Mount Hopeless was looking hopeless.
The rations are rapidly diminishing. Our clothing, especially the boots, all going to pieces. Camel is completely done up and can scarcely get along. I suppose this will end in our having to live like the Blacks for a few months.
But they couldn't live like Aboriginal people. They didn't have the skills to catch fish or over sixty thousand years worth of accumulated nohow on how to extract nourishment from the local plants. The Aboriginal people tried to be kind, bringing gifts of food. Burke fired his revolver to scare them away.
King recalled he was afraid of being too friendly, lest they should always be in our camp.
Burke got his wish. They were left alone to slowly starve.
My legs and arms are nearly skin and bone.
Burke had learned one noble lesson. At least, he told King.
This is my wish that you leave me unburied.
Wright and Braha made it back to the outpost on the Darling and sent news to Melbourne. Burke was missing. The newspapers were aghast. The Royal Society of Victoria organized a search party and this time found a proper explorer to lead it. They were asked to take a letter with them from Julia Matthews.
My dear Sir, I dare say you almost forget me, But if you scrape your various reminiscences of the past, you will recollect the laughing and joyous etc.
Cupid. All the citizens in Melbourne join in love to you, bless your little heart.
The search party eventually found a white man living with the Yandruanda tribe not far from Cooper's Creek.
Who, in the name of wonder are you?
I am, King Sir of Bug's exploring expedition?
Where is he? And Wills?
Did? Both dead? Long ago?
After Burke and Wills expired John King had understood that only friendliness could save him. The news of Burke's death reached Melbourne, and the news from King that they actually had made it to the north, not quite as far as the ocean, but to impenetrable mangroves, where the water was salty and moved with the tide close enough, and the news they might have made it home if only Braha had stayed one day longer. Burke was a hero,
a tragic fallen hero. As the city mourned, a young woman went to a newspaper to place an ad in the Lost and Found column Lost.
In the Botanical Gardens yesterday afternoon, a gold bracelet with carbuncle in center and miniature The finder will be handsomely rewarded.
The newspaper reported the story behind the ad. The miniature portrait lost by Julia Matthews was of none other than Robert O'Hara Burke. Yes, this star of the stage was the fallen hero's sweetheart. Hmm. Had Julia really lost Burke's gift or had she spied an opportunity for publicity. If it was a stunt, it was cynically brilliant. Robert O'Hara
Burke made one catastrophic error after another. He overpacked, he ditched the lime juice, he gave unclear instructions, he didn't plan for contingencies, and he failed to appreciate that Aboriginal people had skills he lacked. Yet he still might have been saved if he had played a better game of what would I do if I were he wondering what would he do if he were I? To bra Her and Wright, marking the tree was so obvious that they
didn't bother to check the chest. To Burke and Wills, checking the chest was so obvious that they didn't bother to mark the tree. Playing the coordination game, says Thomas Schelling, takes both logic and imagination. Burke and Wills were undone by a failure of both. For a full list of our sources, see the show notes at Timharford dot com. Cautionary Tales is written by me Tim Harford, with Andrew Wright, Alice Fines, and Ryan Dilley. It's produced by Georgia Mills
and Marilyn Rust. The sound design and original music are the work of Pascal Wise. Additional sound design by Carlos San Juan at Grain Audio and Dan Jackson bend A. Dafhaffrey edited the scripts. It features the voice talents of Melanie Guttridge, Genevieve Gaunt, Stella, Harford, Massa Munroe, Jamal Westman, and rufus Wright. The show also wouldn't have been possible without the work of Jacob Weisberg, Greta Cohne, Eric Sandler,
Carrie Brody, Christina Sullivan, Kira Posey, and Owen Miller. Cautionary Tales is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you like the show, please remember to share, rate, and review. It really does make a difference to us, and if you want to hear it, add free and receive a bonus audio episode, video episode, and members only newsletter every month. Why not join the Cautionary Club. To sign up, head
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