[Tindal Pearson Porter, licensed surveyor, Brisbane, Australia.] Autograph Letter Signed (Tindal P. Porter) to his brother George, describing his life at the mining township of Nigger Creek, Herberton, North Queensland.

5pp., 4to. In good condition, on five sheets of aged and lightly-stained paper. Written in a difficult crabbed hand. Porter begins the letter by explaining that he is writing at night during steady rain, and that the previous day he rode in from his camp 'to "come in from the wet" and have been weather-bound here ever since'. Guests in the house are 'Alan and R, who 'are here from Townsville for their mid-summer holiday [...] We have also in the house a lad of about eleven, named Leslie Grant, whose people are graziers in a small way living at a place called on the Herbert River some 36 or 37 miles below this. They have no decent school nearer them than Herberton so Jess [his wife] has consented to have Leslie living here so that he may attend the State School. He has his pony & rides to and fro about 2 miles each & every day; and when the boys go back to School and to the Camp, Leslie will be, we hope a bit of a help to Jess in the house - cutting firewood & running errands, also a bit of a companion of an evening when she would otherwise be quite alone in the house - Leslie has gone to bed - Jess is busy at the sewing machine putting a capacious pocking into a working jumper for me to hold my Field book - having just polished a voluminous letter to Master Bill Wilfred at the Hawkesbury Agri Coll'. The letter continues for another three pages in the same intimate mode. He reports that 'the present idea is for Alan to enter as a Cadet in the Old Railway Surveying & Engineering (construction) and for R. to go through the Old Agri. Coll. at with a view to his joining Billy later "on the land"'. News of other individuals is given, before he concludes: 'Rain has abated a little, but the insects flying in to the lamp are pretty maddening so shall now close down & shortly go to bed'. He sends his wife's regards, and informs his brother of a photograph being sent 'by same mail'. W. F. Morrison, in his Aldine History of Queensland (1888), gives a biographical account to the late 1880s: Tindal Pearson Porter, licensed surveyor, Brisbane, was born in Gloucestershire, England, in 1856, and educated at Cheltenham College. In 1866 he came to Queensland with the intention of engaging in pastoral pursuits, but, after a short experience of station life, he turned his attention to the profession of surveying, and passed his examination in 1880. Prom that period, up to 1885, he was engaged in the survey of runs for the Pastoral Occupation Branch of the Lands Department. In the latter year he revisited England, and while there married the only daughter of the late Captain G. S. Holme, 5th Fusiliers. In 1886 he returned to Queensland and resumed his professional duties in the Rockhampton district. He was then on the survey of farms for the Lands Department. In December, 1887, he commenced private practice in Brisbane, [...]'. From another source we learn that Porter was managing director of the Australian Meat company at Ramornie in New South Wales, working there from about 1888 to early 1900.