Cameleers in

Australia
The Knowles Case

By Merve Onder
 It is no exaggeration to say that if it had not been for the Afghan and his camels
Wilcannia, White Cliffs, Tibooburra, Milperinka and other towns, each centres of
considerable population, would have practically ceased to exist
- John Edwards (in a letter to the Attorney-General)

Origin of Cameleers in Australia

During the early colonial times of Australian
history, before automobiles were widely used to
travel across the Australia plain, camels were
used to reach the interior of the Australian
outback. Camels were not easy to control, they
were often rebellious and difficult to ridei. In the
1800s camels were brought along with the men
to help with the expeditions across Australiaii.
Most of these men who came to Australia as
cameleers were Afghan, Malay, Indian or Turkiii.
Due to their commonalities in appearance they
were all known as Ghans, this blanket term
included Muslims, Sikhs and Hindusiv. They also
brought their culture with them and had built the
first mosque in Australia. It was built between
1888 and 1889v, funded by the communities of
Ghantowns, costing them approximately
3,000vi. During this period of cameleer history,
there were many notable cameleers who formed
their companies in Australia, such as Fuzzly

Figure 1 Cameleers resting by the first mosque built in Australia. Mosque at Hergott Springs near Marree, c. 1884.

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Figure 2 Afghan cameleers loading their camels in 1900.

Ahmed, Faiz Mahomet, Abdul Wade with his of camels and hundreds of employees that
business Bourke consisted of both Afghans and Marreeix. They
helped to shape tracks and camel-pads that
Camel Carrying Co., Ali Abdul and so onvii. The
helped to form roads across the Australian
need for cameleers and their camels increased as
outbackx. The cameleers, however, were soon
they transported food and water to desolate
replaced by rail and road networks that improved
spaces of the Australian outbackviii. They had
travelling conditions for Australians without the
great companies that would encompass hundreds
need of cameleers and their camelsxi.
Figure 3 Advertisement for workers in the Sydney Mail on August 18, 1917.

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 The Cameleers Experience
The cameleers that arrived at the shores of Australia
from Asia and found life in Australia amongst the
European colonialists and the indigenous Australians
to be difficult. They left their wives and children
behind to make money from assisting the explorations
of the Australian interiorxii. Although the cameleers
contributed to the transportation of goods and
assisted in explorations of the outback, they were
seen and treated as aliens. They experienced racial
discrimination from colonialists and were
marginalised from society both socially and
economically, by denying their rights as citizens and
rising taxes for camels and their transport
businessesxiii. The cameleers had allies amongst the
aboriginal Australians, and often traded with each
other and intermarried to form communities or
Ghantownsxiv. The Ghans themselves did not get
along well with the European settlers, and were
fearful of them:

From a Mohammedan point of view

Australians were loud and undisciplined, given
to swearing and drinking enormous quantities of
beer after which they kicked up a ruckus and fell
down drunk. They gambled and they smelt
because as everyone knew, they hardly ever
bathed or maybe it was because of the swine
flesh they enjoyed eating. Also they were not a
very God-fearing people; you often heard them
calling out for their lord at the most odd times:
Figure 4 An extract from the Kalgoorie Miner, 21
Jesus Christ! they yelled if they hit their thumb June 1897. Describing the Afghans as a danger to
with a hammer or if they got angry with you. society.
Religiously speaking, they were a peculiar lot of
kafirs (unbelievers) who worshipped idols in their complications of cultural difference and the
church How could you warm to such a race of highly nationalist political climate before the
people? Federation of Australia in 1901, there were
tensions between the two peoplesxvi.
-Hanifa Deen in Ali Abdul v the Kingxv

Their feelings towards each other were mutual

and they were fearful of each other. Due to the

3
 The shooting at Afghan Rock, the incident itself and the trial of Thomas Knowles is a
microcosm of how society viewed the Afghans and the Hawkins of the period Hanifa
Deen (in the By Compass and Quran)

The Knowles Case

The Incident at Afghan Rock

The rising tensions between the cameleers and the

European colonialists meant that conflicts between
them would be inevitable. On the afternoon of
October 13th, 1894, Thomas Brandon Knowles, a man
of anti-Afghan sentiment, shot and killed two Afghan
brothers at a watering hole at Afghan Rock (near
Balladonia) in Western Australiaxvii. When Knowles
approached the watering hole he found Jan Mahomet
making his wudu (ablution) and shot him for polluting
the watering hole, as he was shot, Jan called out for
help where his brother Noor Mahomet arrived and
was shot and injured by the same manxviii. Eleven days
after he shot the brothers, he was arrested for the
manslaughter of Jan Mahomet and unlawful
wounding of Noor Mahometxix. The case was highly
contested as European sentiments against the
cameleers were high and the witnesses of the incident
spoke very little English, making it difficult to charge
Knowles of murderxx. However, on the 12th of
December 1894, Noor Mahomet died of his wounds
after multiple surgeries and refusing to stay in
hospital due to his inability to speak English and
inability to safely eat the food provided by the
hospital due to his halal diet (a prescribed diet of
Muslims of no pork and meat cut according to the
method of Islamic law)xxi. Although there were two
versions of the story as Knowles attempted to free
himself of his charges and the cameleers were seeking
justice for the two brothers.

Knowles Perspective Figure 5 Excerpt from Daily News Newspaper 7

Knowles account of the incident is looked at through
the perspective of an anti-Afghan, as he was assisted
by the Anti-Asian League to help drop his sentence
from murder to manslaughterxxii. His accounts begins
with him seeing an Afghan washing his feet in the
water tank after he and his friend Hatfield collected
the water they neededxxiii. Knowles shouted at Jan
Mahomet to stop contaminating the water, whereby
he replied, No care and then Knowles continues by
December 1894, pg. 3.
shouting at the Afghans to tell him to remove his feet,
but they had not listened eitherxxiv. Knowles explained
that he pushed the man with his foot and tried to
move him away, then Noor shouted at his
companions and threw stones at Knowles, where one
had hit his facexxv. After the rock hit his face, Knowles
shot Noor in self-defence in the shoulder and then
when his brother approached him to take away his

4
Figure 7 Agroup of Afghan cameleers and their camels Figure 6 Afghan cameleer

revolver, Knowles accidently shot Jan in the stomach

and died six hours afterwardsxxvi.

Afghans Perspective

The Afghan account differed from Knowles account.

They insisted that Noor was washing his face during
ablution (apart the washing of ones self before
prayer) not washing his feet, when Knowles
approached him, kicked him into the water, then shot
him in the shoulderxxvii. Noor shouted for help from his
friends, whereby four of them including his brother
approached Knowles, unarmed, trying to disarm him
as he was trying to shoot themxxviii. As the Afghan men
were trying to disarm him, Knowles deliberately shot
Jan Mahomet in the stomachxxix. One of the Afghan
men, Salaam, yelled for rifles from their camp, to
capture Knowles, when they did capture him he was
disarmed and tied up until police arrivedxxx.

I twisted the revolver out of Knowles' hand and he

ran away. I called to the other Afghans to get
firearms from the camp, and bring the man back
before he got away.
Salaam (Eyewitness of the incident)xxxi
The Outcome
Successful cameleers such as Gunny Khan and Figure 8 An excerpt of the Daily News. Explaining the
Knowles case outcome and the judge's warning to him.
Faiz Mahomet were also involved in the case to
help support the case as translatorsxxxii. This case who had said that he was very lucky to freed and
had been dramatic for all parties, however, in one innocent of all charges, and that this case is
hour the jury found Knowles innocent against the warningxxxiv.
charges laid against himxxxiii. After Knowles was
found not guilty, he was warned by the judge,

5
 Cameleers Today: Descendants and
Influence
After Federation in 1901, life for cameleers became The cameleers of the Australian outback are a mystery
difficult. The Immigration Restriction Act of 1901 kept alive by the memorabilia, artefacts and their
restricted non-European migration into Australiaxxxv . culture that had been passed down to their children
This included the Afghan cameleers who were and their communitiesxxxviii. Today Australia
considered non-Australian due to their Asiatic remembers the cameleers through The Ghan railway
background. The Australian government passed laws that imitates expeditions into the undiscovered
to shut down the cameleer trade, by 1939 cameleers outback in the late 1800sxxxix.
were out of work after the introduction of
automobilesxxxvi. Most of them left Australia back to
their homelands, however, some decided to stay.
Most of their descendants can be found all over
Australia, as they married into Aboriginal and
European families.

When I even think about my grandfather and my

father I said that Im only a short person but I
stand 10 feet tall because I have that pride Im a
Muhammad and Im proud of it and I dont care
who knows it. Ive been born with something thats
special and thats where it is with the other Afghan
descendants, weve got something that nobody
else can lay claim to.
Janice Travenar-Mahomet (Descendant of Peer
Figure 10 Sign of the Afghan Mosque in Alice Springs, Northern Territory.
Mahomet)xxxvii

Figure 9 The Ghan railway. A memory of the trails travelled by the cameleers from Darwin to Adelaide.

6
i
Afghan cameleers in Australia, Australian Government [website] < http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-
story/afghan-cameleers>, accessed 11 Sep. 2017.
ii Ibid.
iii Hanifa Deen, Ali Abdul v the King: Muslim stories from the dark days of White Australia (Western Australia, University of Western

Australia Publishing, 2011), 2.

iv Ibid, 3.
v June Edwards, Afghans, Adelaidea [website] <http://adelaidia.sa.gov.au/subjects/afghans?showMenu=true>, accessed 11 Sep. 2017.
vi Jude Elton, Adelaide mosque, Adelaidia [website] <http://adelaidia.sa.gov.au/places/adelaide-mosque>, accessed 11 Sep. 2017.
vii Afghan cameleers in Australia, Australian Government [website] < http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-

story/afghan-cameleers>, accessed 11 Sep. 2017.

viii June Edwards, Afghans, Adelaidea [website] <http://adelaidia.sa.gov.au/subjects/afghans?showMenu=true>, accessed 11 Sep.

2017.
ix Ibid.
x Phillip Jones, Australias Muslim cameleer heritage, National Museum of Australia [website]

<http://recollections.nma.gov.au/issues/vol_2_no2/notes_and_comments/australias_muslim_cameleer_heritage>, accessed 11 Sep.

2017.
xi Afghan cameleers in Australia, Australian Government [website] < http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-

story/afghan-cameleers>, accessed 11 Sep. 2017.

xii Ibid.
xiii Peter Scriver, Mosques, ghantowns and cameleers in the settlement history of colonial Australia, Fabrications: The Journal of the

Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, 13/2 (2012), 32.
xiv Hanifa Deen, Ali Abdul v the King: Muslim stories from the dark days of White Australia (Western Australia, University of Western

Australia Publishing, 2011), 46.

xv Ibid, 14.
xvi Peter Scriver, Mosques, ghantowns and cameleers in the settlement history of colonial Australia, Fabrications: The Journal of the

Society of Architectural Historians, Australia and New Zealand, 13/2 (2012), 32.
xvii Hanifa Deen, Ali Abdul v the King: Muslim stories from the dark days of White Australia (Western Australia, University of Western

Australia Publishing, 2011), 19.

xviii Compass: by Compass and Quran [video], (ABC, 2015), < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buMLmCBzNSs >, accessed 13 Sep.

2017.
xix Hanifa Deen, Ali Abdul v the King: Muslim stories from the dark days of White Australia (Western Australia, University of Western

Australia Publishing, 2011), 19.

xx Ibid, 23-24.
xxi The Pont Malcolm shooting case, Daily News, 8 Jan. 1895, in Trove [online database], accessed 4 Sep. 2017.
xxii Compass: by Compass and Quran [video], (ABC, 2015), < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buMLmCBzNSs >, accessed 13 Sep.

2017.
xxiii Hanifa Deen, Ali Abdul v the King: Muslim stories from the dark days of White Australia (Western Australia, University of Western

Australia Publishing, 2011), 20.

xxiv Ibid.
xxv Ibid.
xxvi Ibid.
xxvii Ibid.
xxviii Ibid.
xxix Ibid.
xxx Ibid, 21.
xxxi The shooting of the Afghans, West Australian, 10 Nov. 1894, in Trove [online database], accessed 4 Sep. 2017.
xxxii Hanifa Deen, Ali Abdul v the King: Muslim stories from the dark days of White Australia (Western Australia, University of Western

Australia Publishing, 2011), 34.

xxxiii Compass: by Compass and Quran [video], (ABC, 2015), < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buMLmCBzNSs >, accessed 13 Sep.

2017.
xxxiv The Point Malcolm shooting case, Daily News, 8 Jan. 1895, in Trove [online database], accessed 4 Sep. 2017.
xxxv Compass: by Compass and Quran [video], (ABC, 2015), < https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buMLmCBzNSs >, accessed 13 Sep.

2017.
xxxvi Ibid.
xxxvii Ibid.
xxxviii Phillip Jones & Anna Kenny, Australias Muslim Cameleers: Pioneers of the inland 1860s 1930s (South Australia, Wakefield Press,

2007), 158.
xxxix The Ghan, Great Southern Rail [website] < https://www.greatsouthernrail.com.au/trains/the-ghan>, accessed 8 Oct. 2017.

7
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Figure List:
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Figure 1: The Mosque (1884), State Library of South Australia, viewed 11 September 2017,
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<https://maas.museum/inside-the-collection/2015/05/06/afghans-and-camels-for-australian-inland-
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8
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