Okay, the colour shots I took of this relatively recent tourist attraction just didn't fly. These tree sculptures looked exactly like they are meant to in photos: Tourist snapshots. I converted this one to black and white. Better, but not the sort of scene that goes well in monochrome. So what the heck, I decided to give it the full colour tinting treatment.
The scene depicted here on this once grand old tree is of the building of Campbell Town's famous bridge. I can actually remember the trees and they were so lovely, and the decision to go with this obvious tourist attraction is still a sore spot with some locals.
There were actually three trees carved by Ross artist Eddie Freeman. Each depicts an element of local history.
www.justmovindowntheroad.com/campbell-town.html
In this one we see a British soldier (a Red Coat) guarding the convict Martin Cash (1808-1877) who was in the gang that built the bridge. Martin Cash's story is phenomenal. He ended up living quite a long life (very rare for a bushranger who was usually shot or hanged) and publicised his own exploits in a book published in 1843. This is perhaps the first sensationalist autobiography of a criminal in Australian history.
Cash also escaped from the high security prison camp at Port Arthur. I won't go into details here, but the geography of Port Arthur was specifically chosen to make escape almost impossible. Cash did it TWICE! His sentence of death was commuted and he was sent to the convict prison at Norfolk Island. Late in life he was released and returned to Van Diemen's Land where he died in 1877. A remarkable life!
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Cash 