Charlie McKeahnie
Encyclopedia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n horseman born in Gudgenby, ACT
Australian Capital Territory
The Australian Capital Territory, often abbreviated ACT, is the capital territory of the Commonwealth of Australia and is the smallest self-governing internal territory...
to Alexander and Mary McKeahnie into a family of five sisters. He is believed by some historians to be the inspiration for the poem 'The Man from Snowy River' by Banjo Paterson
Banjo Paterson
Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson, OBE was an Australian bush poet, journalist and author. He wrote many ballads and poems about Australian life, focusing particularly on the rural and outback areas, including the district around Binalong, New South Wales where he spent much of his childhood...
.
McKeahnie was known to have chased a well bred horse through the very rugged country between Yaouk and the headwaters of the Snowy River
Snowy River
The Snowy River is a major river in south-eastern Australia. It originates on the slopes of Mount Kosciuszko, Australia's highest mainland peak, draining the eastern slopes of the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales, before flowing through the Snowy River National Park in Victoria and emptying into...
north west of Adaminaby at the age of 17. This chase was documented in a poem by poet and friend of the McKeahnie family, Barcroft Boake
Barcroft Boake
Barcroft Henry Thomas Boake was an Australian poet.Born in Sydney, Boake worked as a surveyor and a boundary rider, but is best remembered for his poetry, a volume of which was published five years after his death....
called "On the Range" in which the horse being chased died when it ran into a granite outcrop. According to a letter by one of McKeahnie's sisters Lem McKeahnie, Banjo Paterson learnt of the tale in Sydney while in the presence of a friend of McKeahnie's, Mrs Jim Hassall. At the time Paterson wrote the poem, the Eucumbene River
Eucumbene River
The Eucumbene River rises in the northern part of the Kosciuszko National Park in the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales, Australia, and flows south. Its flow is blocked by Eucumbene Dam, the largest dam in the Snowy Mountains Scheme...
had been known as the Snowy River. The area around the upper Eucumbene and the adjacent upper Murrumbidgee
Murrumbidgee River
The Murrumbidgee River is a major river in the state of New South Wales, Australia, and the Australian Capital Territory . A major tributary of the Murray River, the Murrumbidgee flows in a west-northwesterly direction from the foot of Peppercorn Hill in the Fiery Range of the Snowy Mountains,...
was where Charlie McKeahnie had lived and worked. According to Monaro
Monaro, New South Wales
Monaro is the name of a region in the south of New South Wales, Australia. A small area of Victoria near Snowy River National Park is geographically part of the Monaro, whilst the Australian Capital Territory is frequently considered part of the region: most towns have very close links with...
district folklore, Paterson had told somebody at the Bredbo Hotel that the poem was based on McKeahnie's ride.
McKeahnie died at the age of 27 at the Bredbo Hotel after a horse riding accident and was buried at Adaminaby cemetery. He had never married and had no known children.