Alexander Hutchinson "Alec" Salmond (1850–1924) was an Australia

surveyor Surveying or land surveying is the technique, profession, art, and science of determining the terrestrial two-dimensional or three-dimensional positions of points and the distances and angles between them. A land surveying professional is ca ...

who was involved in surveying the borders between Queensland and South Australia.

Early life

Alexander Hutchinson Salmond was born in Scotland in 1850. His father was Dr David Salmond. Alexander acquired navigational skills as a cadet in the British merchant navy. Dr David Salmond and his four sons (including Alexander) immigrated to

Rockhampton Rockhampton is a city in the Rockhampton Region of Central Queensland, Australia. The population of Rockhampton in June 2021 was 79,967, Estimated resident population, 30 June 2018. making it the fourth-largest city in the state outside of the ...

, Queensland, on the ship ''

Fiery Star Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material (the fuel) in the exothermic chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. At a certain point in the combustion reaction, called the ignition point, flames are p ...

'', arriving 5 November 1864; Dr Salmond was the ship's Surgeon-Superintendent. Salmond married Annie M. Skinner on 23 December 1886 in St Philip's Church in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

Surveying career

His career was spent working in the remote Australian outback. Salmond became a licensed surveyor in 1878 and was based in

Cunnamulla Cunnamulla () is a town and a locality in the Shire of Paroo, Queensland, Australia. It is south of Charleville, and approximately west of the state capital, Brisbane. In the , Cunnamulla had a population of 1,140 people. Geography Cunnamulla ...

, Queensland. He was involved in the border surveys between Queensland and South Australia, including identifying Haddon Corner. As part of those expeditions, he visited Cooper Creek where he sketched the

Burke and Wills Dig Tree The Dig Tree is a heritage-listed, blazed, eucalyptus tree at Nappa Merrie Station, Durham, Shire of Bulloo, Queensland, Australia. It was blazed on 21 April 1861. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 28 February 2003. History ...

under which Robert O'Hara Burke died in 1861. In 1881, he was involved in surveying around Cunnamulla for the Trans-Continental railway, which was never constructed. The Trans-Australian Railway was built in 1917, but did not pass through Queensland. Salmond was lured to the Western Australian goldfields in the early 1890s. Thereafter he worked in

Kalgoorlie Kalgoorlie is a city in the Goldfields–Esperance region of Western Australia, located east-northeast of Perth at the end of the Great Eastern Highway. It is sometimes referred to as Kalgoorlie–Boulder, as the surrounding urban area includ ...

and in Carnarvon in the northwest. In 1903 he led a private expedition into the

Kimberley region The Kimberley is the northernmost of the nine regions of Western Australia. It is bordered on the west by the Indian Ocean, on the north by the Timor Sea, on the south by the Great Sandy and Tanami deserts in the region of the Pilbara, an ...

. Setting out from Wyndham he explored most of the rich area lying north of the Leopold Ranges to the westward of Cambridge Gulf.

Later life

Salmond died in March 1924 in

Fremantle Fremantle () () is a port city in Western Australia, located at the mouth of the Swan River in the metropolitan area of Perth, the state capital. Fremantle Harbour serves as the port of Perth. The Western Australian vernacular diminutive for ...

, Western Australia. He was about seventy four years of age at the time of his death.

Legacy

The

Salmond River Salmond is the name of: People *Anne Salmond (born 1945), New Zealand historian, anthropologist and writer * Alex Salmond (born 1954), Scottish politician and former First Minister of Scotland *Rev Dr Charles Salmond (1853-1932), Scottish minister ...

(near Wyndham) is named after him.Download

References

Attribution

This Wikipedia article was originally created fro
''"The Queensland heritage register"''
published by the State of Queensland under CC-BY 3.0 AU license (accessed on 7 July 2014
archived
on 8 October 2014)

External links

* (his obituary) {{DEFAULTSORT:Salmond, Alexander Hutchinson 1850 births 1924 deaths Australian surveyors Scottish emigrants to Australia