Our Past

The first part of Moira Gums, as we know it today, was built in 1856. It was just a small hut which is now the kitchen. The hut was built by Joseph Waldo Rice, the first European settler in Barmah. There is a sketch of the hut just outside bedroom 1.

Joseph Waldo Rice was born at Lincoln, Massachusetts in the United States of America on 8th February 1828.
At the age of twenty, like thousands of others Joseph decided to travel to the gold fields of California to seek his share of gold. He searched for gold with little success and decided to join a group of miners who wanted to try the gold fields of Australia.
They sailed on the “SS Monumental City”, the first steam driven ship to cross the Pacific Ocean. After two months at sea they reached Sydney on 23 April 1853 and Joseph landed in Melbourne on 10 May 1853.
Joseph worked on the gold fields at Bendigo for two years before he realized more money could be made supplying the miners with food.
At the age of 27 Joseph moved north to the Murray River and settled in the Barmah-Moira Lakes area and formed the Murray Fishing Company.
He was known locally as “Governor Rice” due to the relationship he had with local indigenous tribe that lived in the vicinity, who sold him the Murray Cod they caught and speared.
Joseph married Mary Ann Gill at Moama, New South Wales on 10 December 1886 and she stayed for a while at Echuca until she was accepted by the indigenous Elders and permitted to stay with Joseph.
Together they moved into a slab house that he had built, on the western side of Broken Creek, near Rice’s Weir.The fig trees that Joseph planted still stand to mark the place where the house stood. They raised a family of 8 children.

By 1862 Joseph and Mary Ann had a very profitable business with the Murray Fishing company. There were six men working for them. They employed indigenous men to catch and spear very large Murray Cod for them. Duck and wildfowl were plentiful and these were netted and sold at markets in Bendigo and Melbourne as well as one ton of fish weekly. The company had three coaches and thirty horses to carry their produce.
Leeches were also caught, packed in blue clay and sent to London for use by the medical profession.
The Sydney Morning Herald on 4 August 1862 stated the company was making £10,000 a year for their efforts.
It seems reckless and short sighted to us today to see the land stripped of its resources without any thought to the devastation to the environment, the loss of the food supply for the local indigenous tribes, when it could have been managed sustainably.
At the time there were already questions being asked as to how long such huge amounts of fish could last. There are numerous photos of huge numbers of large Murray Cod being dried for the markets.
“Governor” Rice was known to be a generous hospitable man and always celebrated 4th July every year with his neighbors. After 51 years on the Murray River, on 4 April 1906 he was presented with an illuminated address signed by his friends and neighbors, many of whom have descendants living in the district today. You will see a copy of this on the wall outside bedroom 2.

The house was later extended and became the Moira Lakes Wine Palace. It was licensed from 1888 to 1922. It was also used as a boarding house and some say, a “House of Ill Repute”. There is a photo of the old Wine Palace outside bedroom 3 as well as an old photo from the 1930s taken from the other side of Broken Creek.
The lounge and dining area is a later edition from the 1970s and was built onto the front verandah of the Wine Palace. This is the raised step that goes across the front of the bedrooms. There was also a walkway joining the house behind, but this was removed long ago.
The house was later known as Pearce’s Guest House in the late 1920s and 30s. The family owned the property until 1975.
One of the guests Mr Harold W Clapp of Spencer Street, Melbourne wrote to Mr. Matthew Pearce on 15 May 1922 as follows:
“Dear Sir,
I have your letter dated 10th instant, and I am very pleased indeed to say that during the time that I stayed at your house, Easter 1921, I was most comfortable and delighted with the accommodation and the meals provided also the courteous treatment which I and my friends received while we were there.
Yours very truly,
Harold W Clapp”