Chequered lives : John Barton Hack and Stephen Hack and the early days of South Australia

"Chequered Lives" is the fascinating story of a Quaker family from England who camped on the beach in 1837 before the city of Adelaide was created, but rose to owning a 3000-acre estate in the Adelaide Hills. Barton Hack built his first house where the Adelaide Railway station now stands, became a merchant who owned ships, a whaling station and the first vineyard in the Province, and was chairman of the first Chamber of Commerce in Australia. His younger brother Stephen became a grazier and explorer. After they lost everything in the crash of 1841-1843, their lives took a very different turn. When Barton's great-great-granddaughter, journalist Iola Mathews, opened a trunk full of their letters, diaries and memoirs, she knew she had to write the family's story.

The Hack's left on the 'Isabella', September 1836, arriving in Launceston 4 January 1837. The Hack brothers purchased stock and goods with the intention of continuing in the Isabella to Adelaide. They arrived in Adelaide end of January 1837.