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The First Fleet table. Photo: Dragi Markovic.
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A small Pembroke worktable dating from the 1790s helps to tell a remarkable story about style, patronage and commerce in the early days of the Australian colony.
The First Fleet table, bought by the National Museum of Australia at auction, was handcrafted in England from a veneer of Australian grevillea, or silky oak.
The timber used to make this table was sent from Australia by Surgeon-General John White, who arrived with the First Fleet.
The wood was known in the colony as beef wood, because the cut timbers resembled salted beef.
It attracted early attention from cabinetmakers and was a valuable export for the colony
of New South Wales.
A label in the hand of Sir Andrew Snape Hamond found on the underside of the table records the timber's origin . It reads:
Sent from Botany Bay, by Dr White, surgeon of the Navy - in planks of this table made up in London - Beef Wood.
The Hamond family had links with Australia and the Pacific and Sir Andrew was appointed to the court martial board that tried the Bounty mutineers. As the well-connected Commissioner of the Navy he received many petitions from naval officers. Hamond was White's patron and when the naval surgeon when he wished to return from Australia to England, he applied to Hamond, who then lobbied on his behalf.
The table, which stands 60.5 centimetres in height, was owned by Hamond's descendants until it became part of the National Museum's National Historical Collection.
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