Hydrographic Survey Bench Mark is a heritage-listed survey marker at Bessie Point, off Pine Creek-Yarrabah Road, East Trinity, Cairns Region, Queensland, Australia. It was designed by Royal Navy and built in 1878 by Royal Navy. It is also known as Bessie Point. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 9 May 2014. History A broad arrow bench mark, or datum mark, is chiselled into a large granite boulder on the Rolling Bay (west) side of Bessie Point, located on the east side of Trinity Bay. The arrow was cut in early February 1878 during a hydrographic survey of Cairns Harbour by Navigating Lieutenant Edward Richard Connor, Royal Navy (RN). The bench mark, used to indicate the datum (low water ordinary spring tides) from which the depth of water in the harbour was calculated, is surviving physical evidence of 19th century efforts to survey the Queensland coastline to assist marine navigation, and of the development of Cairns as a port. When the Hodgkinson goldfield was discovered in 1876, Trinity Bay was chosen as its port - since Cooktown, established in 1873 as the port for the Palmer River goldfield, was too far north. The first settlers arrived in Trinity Bay in October 1876 and Cairns became a port of entry on 1 November 1876. The town of Smithfield, surveyed in late 1876 on the north bank of the Barron River, was an early rival to Cairns, but it was largely abandoned after heavy flood damage in 1877. The founding of Port Douglas in 1877 almost stifled Cairns, as Port Douglas provided an easier access route to the Hodgkinson. When tin was discovered on the Wild River in 1880, the road from Port Douglas to Herberton was also preferred to the pack tracks from Cairns. However, Cairns salvaged its economy after a heavy wet season in early 1882 closed the road from Port Douglas, resulting in calls for a railway from Herberton to the coast. On 10 September 1884 the government announced Cairns as the preferred terminus for the railway, over rivals Port Douglas and Mourilyan; Cairns' future as the main settlement and port for Far North Queensland was assured. Although ships delivered freight and passengers to Cairns from October 1876 and the town was surveyed the same year, the harbour was not surveyed for shipping until 1878. Until then, buoys were used to guide ships from the Fairway buoy