A copy of my former report to the previous Minister of the Department, who has already delt1 with this case is respectfully again submitted, and now also a statement of the artisan Cottrell, correcting the assertions of the Carpenter Petersen.2 The hon. the Minister will kindly observe, that since 1870 I have no funds to employ a regular Carpenter, that the man Petersen was engaged at weekly warning, that he has no claims on the Department, that he is quite able to obtain employment elsewhere in his trade, that he is quite fit to work, and that any supposed injury to his sight arose, if really such took place, entirely out of incautiousness of his own.3
Ferd. von Mueller,
Direct. botan. Garden
24/8/72.
dealt.
See M to C. Duffy, 18 November 1871, a copy of which (in G. Luehmann's handwriting) is attached to the file, together with H. Petersen's renewed complaint dated 20 August 1872 to the Minister of Lands, J. Casey, concerning M's alleged injustice towards him, and a statement dated 24 August 1874 signed 'Sam Cottrell', setting out the work Cottrell normally did in the Garden, that Petersen claimed he should have been employed to do but that Cottrell said was not of a kind that required the attention of a trained carpenter. The latter carries an annotation by M: 'The wages of Artisan Cottrell are considerably less than those of an ordinary Carpenter FvM 24/8/72.'
See M to J. McCulloch, 3 October 1870, where M commented on Petersen's complaints of poor eyesight being caused by his employment at the Botanic Garden.
Please cite as “FVM-72-08-24,” in Correspondence of Ferdinand von Mueller, edited by R.W. Home, Thomas A. Darragh, A.M. Lucas, Sara Maroske, D.M. Sinkora†, J.H. Voigt† and Monika Wells accessed on