Extraordinary Tale of William Buckley, The

On a stifling hot Christmas Eve in 1803 William Buckley, an English 23-year-old court-martialled soldier, transported to Australia on Victoria's first fleet, escaped the doomed settlement of Sorrento in Port Phillip. Buckley exhausted and near death, took a spear from an Aboriginal grave to help him walk - the luckiest decision he ever made in his life. Thirty-two years later at 2pm on Sunday, 6 July 1835, a giant of a man shambles into the camp recently established by John Batman at Indented Head near Geelong. This is his story.