Hammond Island has an area of 1,660 hectares and is situated some 10 minutes by boat north of Thursday Island. Hammond Island is of rocky hilly terrain with the Hammond community extending into rocky foothills from strip development along the beach. The population of Hammond Island currently is approximately 235.
Hammond Island is well known to us as "Kirriri" which is part of the Prince of Wales (Muralag) group of islands traditionally owned by the Kaurereg people. They were moved from hammond and from other associated islands from the then Government and moved to Kubin Village on Moa Island.
It was in March 1881 when Pope Leo xiii requested the Sacred Heart Fathers to establish a mission in Papua New Guinea. The Fathers later decided that it would be better facilitativeif a site was selcted and settled in the Torres Strait. It would serve as a stop over station and provide a vital link between the Australian and Papua New Guinea missions.
Hammond Island was then established as a mission settlement in 1927 when Father Doyle who was the parish priest at that time, realised the need for a sttlement that would offer stability to the men engaged as pearl divers and their families. He obtained a government grant and permission from the Department of Mative Affairs to do this. With a dozen boys and Father Mcdermott in charge, they came to live on Hammond. The Mission was officially opened in 1929 and families started gradually started to build thier homes.
Father Mcdermott drafted a letter 67 years ago to his superior highlighting the fact that "he wanted to stay because good beggings have been made to Hammond, theres alot of potential". The first families to inhabit to the mission community were the Sabatino's and kanak's followed closely by the Sebasio's.
The Island is divided into four little residential areas. They are the Mission, Beach front, Village and Sebasio village. The Hammond Island Council receives funding from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Housing to provide houses for the community. Designs of the houses vary from high set, medium and low sets which our elderly takes advantage of.
Most families that are here now are descendants of the first settlers to the the island from the Catholic Mission days, and others are related to existing families. Many have since left before world war II broke out where so many had stayed on the mainland with only a handfull coming back.
Water is supplied to the community from a underwater pipeline running from Thursday Island and also from local wells that we have here on the Island which is pumped up to our 430,000lt header tank which is then gravity fed to the community.
We have a powerhouse that supplies power to the community since 1993, so you can imagine what it was like before when you had to use kerosene lanterns, pressure lamps etc and after that era, we experienced using small petrol generators which meant we had to purchase fuel in order to run the motors.
Most community members work here on the Island for the Council or under the CDEP program. While a handfull travel to Thursday Island for their areas of employment and some of our men are employed by crayfishing vessels, which is one of the largest marketed product in the Torres Strait.
Most of the children travel to Thursday Island to access primary and secondary education, due to only having access to a Catholic primary school which only caters for years 1 and 2. There is also a childcare centre here which provide childcare to the many working parents.
