The Diary of Emily Caroline Creaghe, Explorer (Paperback or Softback)

'We none of us ate any salt meat, or anything that would tend to give us a thirst. We are now on what is called the "Table-land", a flat piece of country on the top of a very high mountain. We are now in unexplored country where no white man has been before, so it is uncertain when we may see water again.'

So reads part of the entry in Caroline Creague's diary for Monday 23 April 1883. By that time, as a sole female member of an exploring party, she was already well acquainted with the privations and harshness of travel in Australia's north. Ahead lay territory unknown to Europeans, as well as numerous tests of endurance, strength and courage.

Creaghe's diary is one of the most remarkable documents of Australian exploration, written by one of the rarest of explorers - a woman.

Emily Caroline Barnett aka Emily Caroline Creaghe born Emily Caroline Robinson (1 November 1860 - 1944) was an Australian explorer around the Gulf of Carpentaria. Her diary records her achievement and the violent relationship between the white settlers and the Indigenous population. She was born on a ship in the Bay of Bengal. Her mother was Mary Harriett (born Woodward) and her father Captain George Cayley Robinson was in the Royal Artillery. She spent her childhood in England and emigrated to Australia in 1876.

Peter Monteath was born in Brisbane and educated in Queensland and in Germany. He has taught previously at The University of Queensland, Griffith University, Deakin University, The University of Western Australia and The University of Adelaide. He has also been Adjunct Professor at The University of St. Louis Missouri and the Technical University of Berlin, where he was an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow. At Flinders he teaches modern European history. His research interests span modern European and Australian history. He is author or editor of numerous books.