 He then hired Alexander McPherson, a saddler from Epsom and Charlie Gray, a former sailor from Scotland who had worked as an ostler for Cobb and Co between Bendigo and Swan Hill and who was now employed at the Lower Murray Inn in Swan Hill.The party was strengthened further by the arrival from Melbourne of journalist, William Hodgkinson, and scientist Georg von Neumayer.The local inhabitants gave the expedition a rousing farewell as they crossed into New South Wales.