Found this document amongst files held with the National Archives of Australia. It's a page from the journal that held the records of Brisbane's Port Office (now known as the City) flood gauge. A handsome looking record it is with fine hand writing, the time of the recordings represented in Roman numerals and an archive stamp top right.
The Port Office gauge was refurbished in 1900 and to compare floods, the earlier records needed to be discounted by about a foot to align with records for 1900 to 1974. The document below shows the readings of the above flood converted into what is referred to as the new datum.
As floods go, the flood of 1898 was on par with 1974 in terms of the levels recorded at the Port Office gauge, but as we learnt in January 20011, what's happening in the city does bot reflect the varying impacts further up the Brisbane River.
The newspaper account of the impending 1898 flood has a tone of reserved expectation rather than panic and doom and provides descriptions of businesses and residents evacuating to higher ground. What struck me, was the comprehensive summaries of what was occurring and expected in individual Brisbane suburbs and seems a whole lot more informative than some of the information leading up to the flood peaks of January 2011. To read the article in full, follow the link in the citations.
Did we mention the Brisbane flood of 1974? Below are records of the flood from the files of Bureau of Meteorology, Brisbane.
Citations:
1898 'THE FLOOD.', The Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864 - 1933), 12 January, p. 5
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3664529
National Archives of Australia: Series# BP676/1
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