Horizontal timbers extending from the riverbank, together with an associated stone wall are probably the remnants of the Australasian Steam Navigation Wharf (c. 1867).

Vertical piles projecting out of the river a short distance downstream are probably the remains of the J and G Harris landing (ca1862).

The site was also the location of a wharf owned by Walter Gray & Co (1847 - c. 1862) and was used by William Collins and Son in the first part of the twentieth century.

Poor road conditions meant that it was more convenient for the pastoralists to transport bulk goods from Ipswich to the coast along the Bremer and Brisbane Rivers using riverboats.

In 1848, a committee of townspeople was formed to upgrade the Ipswich "landing place" to a proper wharf with improved road access.

By the 1860s a wharf precinct had developed between the present location of the railway bridge and The Basin, a section of the Bremer River downstream from the town centre that was wide enough to permit steamers to turn.

In 1847, Gray, a Scottish immigrant, occupied a block of land that extended from Bremer Street to the riverbank at Site One.

He commenced business as a general storekeeper and agent trading in wool and other produce which he conveyed to Brisbane using Reid and Boyland's punts.

His business reputedly became the largest mercantile house in the district operating extensive stores capable of holding several hundred bales of wool.

He supported establishing Cleveland as the colony's main port and, in the 1850s, together with other Ipswich businessmen, bought land and signified his intention to build jetties there where punts could load and unload cargoes.

[1] Walter Gray died in 1862 and, by 1865, John and George Harris, merchants and agents from Brisbane, had taken over the wharf site.

The upstream side of the new shed was shaped in a "v" configuration to withstand water pressure on the regular occasions that the Bremer flooded the site.

Harris's appears to have ceased operation at the site by 1878 when they applied to the Ipswich Town Clerk to remove their buildings.

[1] Originally formed in Sydney in 1839/40 as The Hunter's River Steam Navigation Company, ASN had become the principal shipping firm in the Australian coastal trade by the 1850s.

The company commenced a regular service to Moreton Bay when it opened to free settlement in 1842 and in 1844 they established their first wharf facility in Brisbane.

A partial revival of river trade occurred in the 1890s, probably due in part to the lack of a rail link to Brisbane after the loss of the Albert Bridge at Indooroopilly in the 1893 flood.

However, the economic and political motives that had stimulated the trade in the 1860s and 1870s no longer existed, and it became difficult to justify expending money on keeping the river route viable.

Collins operated a number of vessels between Brisbane and Ipswich including the Mary, Eucalypta, Essex, Myora and Advance.

Increasingly unable to compete with road transport, Collins ceased the river service cira 1927.

[1] Remnants of Ipswich Town Wharves was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register on 31 July 2006 having satisfied the following criteria.

During this period, the Bremer and Brisbane Rivers below Ipswich constituted one of the most important mercantile routes in the colony.

The wharf remnants are also physical evidence of an important aspect of the historical rivalry between Ipswich and Brisbane.

The river trade, in which the wharves played a vital role, underpinned Ipswich's rapid growth and prosperity and was the key to its viability as an alternative export port to Brisbane.

The remnants of the wharves are uncommon insofar that they constitute a largely undisturbed archaeological site in an urban setting.