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Additional help is sought as required, but is very much subject to supply. In
some instances the extra help becomes available when children return
home for school holidays.
1.4.5 Milparinka Township Site
Milparinka now consists of an isolated hotel and one other intermittently
occupied building, situated on an area of higher ground west of Evelyn
Creek. A former courthouse was restored in 1988 as an Australian
Bicentennial project, with funds raised locally and received in grant from
the Western Lands Commission. The town itself has a population of
between five and eight persons. Initial research indicated the town has
been in decline since the mid-1880s, despite the establishment there of
various Colonial Government agencies and offices, and favourable
treatment in terms of other Government infrastructure. Government
promotion of the town continued at both State and Federal levels for a
significant period after Federation.
Approximately two and a half kilometres upstream was a Chinese
community, at a site known as Chinaman's Garden Well. The well for
which the location was named is derelict. The site appears to have
consisted of four or five main structures located adjacent to garden beds.
Another (perhaps earlier) Chinese community was located at Chinaman's
Well, three kilometres further away on a tributary of Evelyn Creek. Here a
windmill and bore adjacent to the original well still provide a good supply of
palatable water. The first mentioned site was on Milparinka common,
separated from the town by an area used as a camp by travellers,
including 'Afghan' cameleers and drovers. The second site was located on
the Mount Poole pastoral holding.
1.5 Community groups not Considered in Detail
As already suggested, at Milparinka four distinct cultures were present ­
the Australian Aborigines, Europeans, Chinese, and 'Afghans'. The roles of
the Aboriginal and Afghan groups, although important in the history of
western New South Wales, has not been dealt with in detail. To complete
adequate accounts of these groups would have required major research in
its own right and was not regarded as an essential component of my
research into the role of the Chinese. I have, however, provided below a
broad outline of the information which arose co-incident with my research
into the Chinese and European groups.