Aboriginal Massacres – Australia (1791-1928)

July 1791 Governor Arthur Phillip wrote in his own journal that he granted 27 ex-convicts allotments of land at Prospect Hill and The Ponds. He gave them muskets which were utilised to shoot at Aboriginal Australians in the area. In retaliation, some of the British huts were burnt down. Arthur Philip then deployed soldiers to the area who “dispersed” about 50 Aboriginal Australians. Furthermore, as the allotments of land were separated by bushland which helped in “concealing the natives”, the Governor ordered the woods to be cleared so that the “natives could find no shelter”.*

*(citebooklast1=Hunterfirst1=Johntitle=An Historical Journal of theTransactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island including the Journals ofGovernors Phillip and Kingdate=1793publisher=JohnStockdalelocation=Piccadillypage=474url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t0tfAAAAcAAJaccess-date=10 March 2018)

April 1794 At Toongabbie an armed party of settlers pursued a group of Aboriginal Australians who were taking corn from the settlers’ farms. They killed four, bringing back the severed head of one as proof of their exploits.*

*(cite booklast1=Collinsfirst1=Davidtitle=AnAccount of the English Colony in New SouthWalesdate=1804publisher=Cadell and Davieslocation=TheStrandpage=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_Yx0QAAAAYAAJ/page/n302260

url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_Yx0QAAAAYAAJaccess-date=10March 2018)

September 1794 British settlers in the Hawkesbury River area killed seven Bediagal people in reprisal for the theft of clothing and provisions.*

Some of the surviving children of this raid were taken by the settlers and detained as farm labourers. One boy, who was considered a spy, was later dragged through a fire, thrown into the river and shot dead.**

*(citejournallast1=Ryanfirst1=Lyndalltitle=Untangling Aboriginal resistance and the settler punitive expedition: the Hawkesbury River frontier in NewSouth Wales, 1794-1810journal=Journal of Genocide Researchdate=1 June2013volume=15issue=2pages=219-232doi=10.1080/14623528.2013.789206s2cid=108777720issn=1462-3528)

**(sfnpCollins, ”An Account of the English Colony inNSW”1804page=276)

May 1795 Conflict in the Hawkesbury region continued and following the alleged killing of two settlers, Lieutenant Governor William Paterson ordered two officers and 66 soldiers to “…destroy as many as they could meet with..in the hope of striking terror, to erect gibbets in different places, whereon the bodies of all they might kill were to be hung …”. Seven or eight Bediagal people were killed.*

A crippled man, some children and five women (one being heavily pregnant) were taken to Sydney as prisoners. One of the women and her baby had serious gunshot wounds. The child died not long after as did the newborn baby of the pregnant woman.**

*(cite booklast1=Connorfirst1=Johntitle=The Australian FrontierWarsdate=2002publisher=UNSWlocation=Sydneyref=(SfnRefConnor, ”TheAustralian Frontier Wars”2002))

*(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article626761 title=SYDNEY.newspaper=The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser date=12May 1805 access-date=25 October 2017 page=3 via=National Library ofAustralia)

**(sfnpCollins, ”An Account ofthe English Colony in NSW”1804page=299)

September 1795 In the lower parts of the Hawkesbury, British settlers conducted an armed expedition against local Aboriginal Australians killing five and taking a number prisoner, again including a badly wounded child.

(sfnp Collins, ”An Account of the English Colony inNSW”1804page=315)

March 1797 After Aboriginal Australians killed two British settlers, a large punitive expedition was organised which surprised and dispersed a native camp of about 100 people. The armed group then returned to Parramatta to rest. Pemulwuy, a noted Aboriginal resistance leader of the early frontier, followed them into the town demanding vengeance for the dispersal. A skirmish (known as the Battle of Parramatta) then occurred between Pemulwuy’s group and a collection of British soldiers and settlers. One of the settlers was injured but at least five Aboriginal Australians were shot dead with many more wounded, including Pemulwuy. An unknown number of Aboriginal Australians were killed in the initial dispersal which led up to the battle.

(sfnpCollins, ”An Account of the English Colony inNSW”1804page=406)

March 1799 Henry Hacking was ordered by Governor John Hunter to investigate claims of British sailors being trapped by Aboriginal Australians at the mouth of the Hunter River to the north of the colony. Hacking encountered a group of Awabakal people on the southside of the river who informed him that the sailors had left earlier on foot, endeavouring to walk back to Sydney. Hacking didn’t believe them and became agitated, shooting dead four Awabakal men. The sailors later arrived in Sydney having walked the distance to return.

(sfnp Collins, ”An Account of the English Colony in NSW”1804page=491)

1804 . Conflicting evidence of eyewitnesses indicated that either three Aboriginal Tasmanians were killed or “a great many were slaughtered and wounded” on 3 May 1804 at Risdon Cove when a large number came upon the 75-80 colonists there.

(http://{{citeweburl=https://www.australianhistorymysteries.info/pdfs/StudiesAHM-1.pdftitle=Massacre) at Risdon Cove? An Australian historyMysterypublisher=National Museum of Australiadate=2011access-date=11February 2017)

(citenewsurl=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb4817/is_1_93/ai_n29358359/?tag=content;col1title=An analytical approach to the events at RisdonCove on 3 ;May 1804author=W. F. Refshaugepublisher=Journal of theRoyal Australian Historical Society, June 2007 year=2007}}http://{{citenewsurl=http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/04/05/1049459857081.htmltitle=So who’s fabricating the history of Aborigines?author=PhillipTardifwork=The Age location=Melbournedate=6 April 2003)

March 1806 A group of Yuin people, resident to what the British named Twofold Bay, attempted to forcibly remove a gang of eleven sealers encamped on their land. The sealers opened fire on them with muskets killing nine, the bodies of which they hung from nearby trees to intimidate the other Yuin.

(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article627073 title=SYDNEY.newspaper=The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiservolume=IV issue=160 location=New South Wales, Australia date=6 April1806 access-date=7 September 2019 page=2 via=National Library ofAustralia)

1816 . Appin massacre. New South Wales Governor Macquarie sent soldiers against the Gundungurra and Dharawal people on their lands along the Cataract River, atributary of the Nepean River (south of Sydney), in reprisal for violent conflicts with white settlers (in which several died) in the adjoining Nepean and Cow pastures districts, during a time of drought.*

The punitive expedition split in two at Bent’s Basin, with one group moving south-west against the Gundungurra, and the other moving south-east against the Dharawal. On 17April, at around 1 am, this latter group of soldiers arrived on horseback at a camp of Dharawal people near Cataract Gorge (Broughton Pass). At least 16 indigenes were killed by shooting, and many other men, women and children were driven to fall from the cliffs of the gorge to their deaths below.**

*http://{{citeweburl=https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/explainer/explainer-appin-massacretitle=Explainer:

**The Appin Massacrepublisher=NationalIndigenous Television (NITV)last=Marlowfirst=Karinadate=18 April2016access-date=7 February 2017}} {{cite booklast=Kohenfirst=Jtitle=The Darugand their Neighbours: The Traditional Aboriginal Owners of the SydneyRegionyear=1993}}{{citeweblast=Kassfirst=Terrytitle=Western Sydney http://ThematicHistoryurl=http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/resources/heritagebranch/heritage/ThematicHistoryWesternSydney.pdfwork=State Heritage RegisterProjectpublisher=NSW Heritage Officedate=February 2005access-date=7February 2017}}{{rp7}}{{citeweblast=Fowlerfirst=Verlietitle=Massacre at http://Appin1816url=http://www.cahs.com.au/massacre-at-appin-1816.htmlwork=Cambelltown

Storiespublisher=Campbelltown & AirdsHistorical Society Inc.access-date=18 May 2012quote=One of the partyof soldiers, Captain Willis, wrote: “The fires were burning butdeserted. A few of my men heard a child cry … The dogs gave the alarmand the natives fled over the cliffs. It was moonlight. I regret to saysome (were) shot and others met their fate by rushing in despair over theprecipice. Fourteen dead bodies were counted in different directions.”}}

1818 . Minnamurra River massacre. Local settlers attacked and killed at least six members of the Wodiwodi people camped on the banks of the Minnamurra River on the pretext that they were retrieving two muskets lent to a group of aboriginals living on the river.

1824 . Bathurst massacre. Following the killing of seven Europeans by Aboriginal people around Bathurst, New South Wales, and a battle between three stockmen and a warband over stolen cattle which left 16 Aboriginal Australians dead, Governor Brisbane declared martial law to restore order and was able to report acessation of hostilities in which ‘not one outrage was committed under it, neither was a life sacrificed or even Blood spilt’. Part of the tribe trekked down to Parramatta to attend the Governor’s annual Reconciliation Day.

(cite http://weburl=http://www.nma.gov.au/education-kids/classroom_learning/multimedia/interactives/bells_falls_gorgetitle=NationalMuseum of Australia: Bells Falls Gorge interactiveaccess-date=22 November2014))<a href=”http://www.nsw.nationaltrust.org.au/ida/link_d3_1824war.html National Trust account of the 1824 Bathurst war” target = “_blank ” >http://www.nsw.nationaltrust.org.au/ida/link_d3_1824war.html National Trust account of the 1824 Bathurst war http://(webarchiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20050922233555/http://www.nsw.nationaltrust.org.au/ida/link_d3_1824war.html date=22 September 2005)

1826 Around 20 Birpai men, women and children at Blackmans Point. There is no single written account, but the diary of Henry Lewis Wilson, who oversaw convicts in the area, relates that after two convicts sent to work at Blackmans Point were killed by Indigenous men, a party of soldiers “got round the black sand shot a great many of them, captured a lot of women and used them for a immoral purpose and then shot them. The offending soldiers were sent to Sydney to be tried, but managed to escape punishment.”. Historian Lyndall Ryan, after studying other evidence, thinks that that the Blackmans Point event referred to by Wilson involved around 20 people, but other massacres in the area may have caused the deaths of up to 300people.

(cite web last=Sati first=Wiriya title=Blackmans Pointmassacre of Birpai people could soon be formally acknowledged website=ABC News publisher= Australian Broadcasting Corporation date=23 May 2021 http://url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-23/blackmans-point-massacre-birpai-people-push-for-recognition/100147292 access-date=28 May 2021)

1827 . 12 Gringai Aboriginal Australians were shot dead for killing in reprisal a convict who had shot one of their camp dogs dead.

(sfnWilliams2012p=17)

1827 Near Hadspen on the property of Thomas Beams, Aboriginal people surrounded his hut. In response to his firing at the Aboriginal people Beams’ neighbours arrived on foot and horseback. A “war party” was organised and a search conducted. At 10 o’clock at night the glow of afire was seen and the war party surrounded the Aboriginal encampment. At 3am fourteen muskets opened fire, the camp was rushed and eleven Aboriginal people were killed. Only one escaped.

(Citebooklast=Clementsfirst=Nicholastitle=The Black War: fear, sex andresistance in Tasmaniapublisher=UQPressyear=2014isbn=9780702250064location=St Luciapages=188)

29 December 1827 Captain Henry Smyth of the 39th Regiment of the British Army, Commandant of the British military outpost at Fort Wellington on the Cobourg Peninsula ordered a punitive mission against the local Iwaidja. A party of three armed convicts and three soldiers conducted an early morning raid on the native camp near to a beach on the Bowen’s Straits. Many were wounded and at least five Aboriginal people were killed, including a child and her mother, who was bayoneted as she was fleeing to the beach.*

Smyth had previously utilised one of the three18-pound carronades mounted at Fort Wellington against the Iwaidja on 30July. The reports of casualties from this cannon attack range from zero .** to thirty *** dead. dead. The use of cannon against Aboriginal people by the British in this area was not new as Phillip Parker King had fired a 6-pound carronade mounted to his survey ship, the ”Mermaid”, against the local people of the nearby Goulburn Islands on 30 March 1819.****

*(sfnpConnor, ”The Australian FrontierWars”2002pages=73-74)

**cite booklast1=Wilsonfirst1=T.B.title=Narrative of a VoyageAround theWorlddate=1835location=Londonpage=https://archive.org/details/narrativeavoyag01wilsgoog/page/n180148 url=https://archive.org/details/narrativeavoyag01wilsgoogaccess-date=4 November 2017}}

***(citebooklast1=McKennafirst1=Marktitle=From theEdgedate=2016publisher=Miegunyah Press)

****(citebooklast1=Kingfirst1=P.P.title=Narrative of Survey of Intertropicaland Western Coasts ofAustraliadate=1827url=https://archive.org/details/narrativeofasurv12046gutaccess-date=4 November 2017)”(then part of South Australia)”

1828 At Circular Head in Northwest Tasmania the Van Diemen’s Land Company dispatched the cutter ”Fanny” in response to the spearing of sheep. The Company’s Chief Agent, Edward Curr, sent four shepherds along with the cutter’s captain and crew in response. A resident of Curr’s homestead, Rosalie Hare, described in her journal “…while we remained at Circular Head there were several accounts of considerable amounts of Natives having been shot by them (the Company’s men), they wishing to extirpate them entirely, if possible. The master of the Company’s cutter ”Fanny,” assisted by four shepherds and his crew, surprised a party and killed ”12.””

(Cite booklast=Harefirst=Rosalietitle=The Voyageof the Caroline from England to Van Diemen’s Land and Batavia in 1827-28I Marriott (ed)publisher=Longmans, Green andCoyear=1927location=Londonpages=41)

1828-1832 The Black War in Van Diemen’s Land refers to a period of intermittent conflict between the British colonists, whalers and sealers (including those of the American sealing fleet) and Aboriginal people in the early years of the 19thcentury. The conflict has been described as a genocide resulting in the elimination of the full-blood Tasmanian Aboriginal population which had numbered somewhere between 1,500 and 22,000 prior to colonisation. Ann Curthoys ‘Genocide in Tasmania: The History of an Idea,’ in A. Dirk Moses (ed.) ”Empire, colony, genocide: conquest, occupation, and subaltern resistance in World History”, Berghahn Books,2008 ch.10 pp.229-252, pp.230, 245-6*

On New Year’s Eve 1831 the last of the eastern tribes surrendered. Settlers, who had imagined they were fighting an implacable foe numbering in the hundreds or thousands were shocked to discovered that all that remained of the eastern tribes was 16 men, nine women and one child.**

They were removed to Flinders Island never to see their home again. Most died of disease. By1830 the number of Tasmanians in the north-east was 74, with a further 70or so women who had been taken as slaves by sealers. While greater north-western Tasmania had been home to more than a dozen tribes, by1834 when Robinson contacted the final known remnants, these dozen tribes had been virtually exterminated. There are currently some 20,000 individuals who are of Tasmanian Aboriginal descent.=== Victoria ===Records in the early days in Port Phillip were sparse and unclear, and the level of resistance to the European settlers and other aspects of Aboriginal culture before this is a source of continuing investigation.***

*(citebooklast=Huntfirst=Davidtitle=True Girt: The Unauthorised History ofAustralia Volume2url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1kFKDQAAQBAJpublisher=SchwartzPublishing Pty Ltddate=October 2016isbn=9781863958844access-date=11February 2017)

**(Cite newsdate=14 January 1832title=TheCourier p. 2work=Hobart Town Courier)

***(citejournallast=Nancefirst=Beverleydate=1981volume=19issue=77title=Thelevel of violence: Europeans and aborigines in Port Phillip, 1835-1850journal=Historical Studiespages=532-552doi=10.1080/10314618108595658)

1828 . On 10 February – Cape Grim massacre, Cape Grim, Van Diemen’s Land. Four shepherds of the substantial Van Diemen’s Land Company ambushed and killed 30 Pennemukeer Aboriginal people. Company men had killed another 12 Aboriginal people only days earlier. Ian McFarlane,”*

HistorianKeith Windschuttle has disputed the numbers and other aspects of the event. Windschuttle, Keith (2002). ”The Fabrication of Aboriginal History”. pp 249-269, 2006, accessed 26 December2008Jan Roberts, pp1-9, ”Jack of CapeGrim”, Greenhouse Publications, 1986 (ISBN0-86436-007-X}}Lyndall Ryan, pp135-137, ”The Aboriginal Tasmanians”, Allen & Unwin, 1996,

*<a href=”http://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/C/Cape%20Grim%20Massacre.htm Cape Grim Massacre” target = “_blank ” >http://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/C/Cape%20Grim%20Massacre.htm Cape Grim Massacre

**(ISBN1-86373-965-3)

1828 On the 6th of December elements of the 40th Regiment together with two constables, Danvers and Holmes, surrounded a group of Aboriginal people during the night at Tooms Lake. In a dawn attack they killed a number of Aboriginal people variously described as ‘several’ or ten or sixteen. The bodies were then placed in a pile and burned. Attacking at first light and burning the corpses was to become standard procedure as the frontier moved across Australia.

In August 1829 John Batman was one of several groups conducting roving sweeps for Aboriginal people. He employed Aboriginal men from the Sydney area to help track and attack the local clans, a system that had proven successful on the mainland and that would continue and eventually evolve into the Native Mounted Police.*

Batman’s patrol came across a large Aboriginal camp of men, women and children at night. Their approach was disturbed by the camp dogs whereupon they opened fire and rushed the camp. They captured a woman and a child but the rest fled into the darkness. The next morning Batman’s party found two badly wounded men and many blood trails. The wounded men informed them that ten others had been seriously wounded and were dead or dying and that two women had also been severely wounded and had crawled away. The wounded Aboriginal men were subsequently executed by Batman.**

*(Citebooklast=Gappsfirst=Stephentitle=The Sydney Wars: Conflict in the early colony 1788-1817publisher=NewSouthyear=2018isbn=9781742232140location=Sydney)

(Cite booklast=Richardsfirst=Johnathontitle=The Secret War: atrue history of Queensland’s Native Policepublisher=UQPressyear=2008isbn=9780702236396location=Brisbane)

**(Cite booklast=Bottomsfirst=Timothytitle=Conspiracy of Silence: Queensland’sfrontier killing timespublisher=Allen andUnwinyear=2013isbn=9781743313824location=Sydney)

1830 . Fremantle The first official “punishment raid” on Aboriginal people in Western Australia, led by Captain Irwin, took place in May 1830. A detachment of soldiers led by Irwin attacked an Aboriginal encampment north of Fremantle in the belief that it contained men who had” broken into and plundered the house of a man called Paton” and killed some poultry. Paton had called together a number of settlers who, armed with muskets, set out after the Aboriginal people and came upon them not far from the home. “The tall savage who appeared the chief showed unequivocal gestures of defiance and contempt” and was accordingly shot. Irwin stated, “This daring and hostile conduct of the natives induced me to seize the opportunity to make them sensible to our superiority, by showing how severely we could retaliate their aggression.” In actions that followed over the next few days, more Aboriginal people were killed and wounded.

( http://{{citeweburl=http://www.facp.iinet.net.au/teachingnotes/myplaceback.htmltitle=Study guide to “My Place” by Sally Morganaccess-date=22 http://November2014archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070822135955/http://www.facp.iinet.net.au/teachingnotes/myplaceback.htmlarchive-date=22

August 2007url-status=dead}}Tom Stannage, (1979), The People of Perth: asocial history of Western Australia’s Capital City, p. 27

18 December 1832 . Joseph Berryman, overseer at Sydney Stephen’s Murramarang land acquisition near Bawley Point, shot dead four Aboriginal Australians in retaliation for the spearing of some cattle. Oft hose shot, two were an elderly couple and another was a pregnant woman.

(cite booklast1=Hamonfirst1=B Vtitle=They came toMurramarangdate=1994publisher=ANU Presslocation=Canberrapages=9-11)

1833 – 34. Convincing Ground massacre of Gunditjmara: On the shore near Portland, Victoria was one of the largest recorded massacres in Victoria. Whalers and the local Kilcarer clan of the Gunditjmara people disputed rights to a beached whale carcass.*

*(cite web url http://=http://www.museum.vic.gov.au/encounters/Journeys/Robinson/Convincing_Ground.htm title = Convincing Ground access-date = 18 May 2007 author =Clark, Ian D. year = 1998 work = Scars in the Landscape: A Register of Massacre Sites in Western Victoria, 1883-1859 publisher = MuseumVictoria quote = … and the whalers having used their guns beat them off and hence called the spot the Convincing Ground. archive-url http://=https://web.archive.org/web/20070930181117/http://www.museum.vic.gov.au/encounters/Journeys/Robinson/Convincing_Ground.htm archive-date = 30September 2007 url-status = dead)

Reports vary with from 60 to200 Aboriginal Australians killed, including women and children. Martin Boulton,”**

**<a href=”http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Anger-over-plans-to-build-on-site-site/2005/01/27/1106415738613.html Anger over plans to build on massacre site” target = “_blank ” >http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Anger-over-plans-to-build-on-site-site/2005/01/27/1106415738613.html Anger over plans to build on massacre site”, The Age, 28 January 2005. Accessed 26 November2008 An 1842 report on the incident notes that the Gunditjmara people believed that only two members of the Kilcarer clan survived. Ian D. Clark, pp17-22, ”Scars on the Landscape. A Register of Massacre sites in Western Victoria 1803-1859”, Aboriginal Studies Press, 1995 {{ISBN0-85575-281-5) Excerpt also published on http://museumvictoria.com.au/encounters/journeys/Robinson/convincing_ground.htm Museum Victoria website

(Webarchiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120905130138/http://museumvictoria.com.au/encounters/journeys/robinson/convincing_ground.htmdate=5 September 2012), accessed 26 November 2008

1834 . Pinjarra: Conflict with the Murray tribe – officialrecords state that 14 Aboriginal people were killed, but other accountsput the figure much higher, at 25 or more.Ben Kiernan,”Genocide and resistance in Southeast Asia: documentation, denial &justice in Cambodia&East Timor,” Transaction Publishers, 2008p.264.

(Cite http://weburl=http://www.hreoc.gov.au/bth/text_versions/timeline/title=Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission’Bringing Them Home’ website access-date=17 October 2005 http://archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061023181027/http://www.hreoc.gov.au/bth/text_versions/timeline/#1834 archive-date=23 October 2006 url-status=dead) http://{{citeweburl=http://www.walkabout.com.au/locations/WAPinjarra.shtmltitle=Fairfax Walkabout Australian travel guide on the Pinjarraaccess-date=22November http://2014url-status=deadarchive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080827163652/http://www.walkabout.com.au/locations/WAPinjarra.shtmlarchive-date=27 August2008) https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/641213/401

1835 . Settlers from the Williams Valley are said in a late report (1922) to have surrounded a Gringai camp and forced them all over a cliff.* A surviving band of the same group was hunted down and killed at the Bowman River. Unburied, their bones could be seen there for years.**

*(sfnWilliams2012p=17)

**(sfnW1922p=2)

11 July 1835 . The expedition team of Thomas Mitchell, during their journey to the Darling River, fatally shot two Aboriginal Australians after fight over a kettle. Additional shots were fired at the fleeing tribe as they swam across the creek. Mitchell said that the shooting occurred “without much or any effect”.

(cite booklast1=Mitchellfirst1=Thomastitle=ThreeExpeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia Vol.1url=https://archive.org/details/b29335966_0001date=1838publisher=Boonelocation=Londonpages=https://archive.org/details/b29335966_0001/page/269 269 -270)

1836 . August, Henry William St Pierre Bunbury after killings in the York area, tracked one wounded Aboriginal man into the bush and shot him through the head. Bunbury also recorded the names of another 11Aboriginal men he killed during this period. Settlers to the district collected ears of Aboriginal men slain.

(cite AuDBid2=bunbury-henry-william-st-pierre-1846title=Biography – Henry William St Pierre Bunbury access-date=22November 2014) “Chronology of Western Australian Aboriginal History” (1993, Gaia Foundation of Western Australia) (HarvpConnor, ”The Australian FrontierWars”2002page=83) ‘Lieutenant Henry Bunbury was sent from Perth with orders ‘to make war upon the natives’.

From 1838 to 1851 , during the spread of pastoral stations along the Macleay River, it is estimated that some 15 massacres took place of the Indigenous peoples of this Djangadi area.

(sfnHarrison2004p=104)

1838 . Up to 100 Aboriginal people were killed in reprisals carried out in response to the Faithfull Massacre.*

On 11 April, by the Broken River at Benalla, a party of some 18 men, employees of George and William Faithfull, were searching out new land to the south of Wangaratta for their livestock, when they were attacked by about 20 Indigenous Australians.**

At least one Kooriand eight Europeans died. There were reports of reprisals at Wangaratta and at Murchison(led by the native police under Henry Dana and in the company of the young Edward Curr, who said that he took issue with the official reports). Other incidents were recorded at Mitchelton and Toolamba.***

*http://citenewsurl=http://www.smh.com.au/news/Victoria/Benalla/2005/02/17/1108500206241.htmltitle=Benallawork=The Sydney Morning Heralddate=17 February2005access-date=20 November 2019)

(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article101152305 title=Early Settlementin Victoria. newspaper=Albury Banner and Wodonga Express (NSW : 1896 – 1938) location=NSW date=9June 1916 access-date=24 February 2014 page=38 publisher=National Library of Australia)

(citebookurl=https://books.google.com/books?id=YIXXppWIah0C&pg=PT58title=This Errant Ladyauthor=Lady Jane Griffin Franklineditor=PennyRussellvia=National Library of Australiaaccess-date=23 November2014pages=47-48isbn=9780642107497year=2002) also known as the Battle of Broken River and according to historian Chris Clark “a battle which the Aborigines won”. (cite book last=Clark first=Chris date=April 2010title=The encyclopaedia of Australia’s battles location=Crows Nest, NSWpublisher=Allen&Unwin http://page=14isbn=9781742373355url=https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/books/general-books/military/The-Encyclopaedia-of-Australias-Battles-Chris-Clark-9781742373355)

**(cite journal first=Judith last=Bassett title=TheFaithful Massacre at the Broken River, 1838journal=Journal of AustralianStudies volume=13issue=24pages=18-34doi=10.1080/14443058909386991date= May 1989) (possibly as are prisal for the killing of several Aboriginal people at Ovens earlier by the same stockmen).

***(citeweburl=https://twistedhistory.net.au/2016/04/11/the-faithfull-massacre/website=Twisted Historytitle=The Faithfull Massacredate =11May 2016format=photo and text)

1838 . The Mount Cottrell massacre of around 10 Wathaurong people was carried out in retaliation for the killing of squatter Charles Franks and his convict shepherd Thomas Flinders.

(cite web title= Mt Cottrell, Werribee website=Colonial Frontier Massacres in Australia, 1788-1930publisher=Centre For 21st Century Humanities, Australiaurl=https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=504 access-date=30 June 2021)

1838 . The Waterloo Plains massacre of between 8 and 23 DjaDja Wurrung people was a reprisal raid for the killing of two station hands and the theft of sheep.

26 January 1838 . The Waterloo Creek massacre, also known as the Australia Day massacre. A New South Wales Mounted Police detachment, despatched by acting Lieutenant Governor of New South Wales Colonel Kenneth Snodgrass, attacked an encampment of Kamilaroi people at a place called Waterloo Creek in remote bushland.*

Official reports spoke of between 8 and 50killed.Jeffrey Grey, ”A military history of Australia”, Cambridge University Press, 2008 p.35. The missionary Lancelot Threlkeld set the number at 120 as part of his campaign to garner support for his Mission. Robert Manne, ”In denial: the stolen generations and the right”, Black Inc., 2001 p.95 Threlkeld later claimed Major Nunn boasted they had killed 200 to 300 black Australians, a statement endorsed by historian Roger Milliss. R. Milliss,”Waterloo Creek: the Australia Day massacre of 1838, George Gipps and the British conquest of New South Wales”, University of New South Wales Press, 1994 p.2 Other estimates range from 40 to 70.ChrisClark, ”The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles,”Allen&Unwin,2010p.13

*(http://citeweburl=http://www.abc.net.au/frontier/education/slavery.htm#waterlootitle=Australian Broadcasting Corporation Frontier Education historywebsiteaccess-date=22 November http://2014archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131016082243/http://www.abc.net.au/frontier/education/slavery.htm#waterlooarchive-date=16 October 2013url-status=dead)

27 May 1836 . Mount Dispersion massacre. Major Thomas Mitchell felt threatened by a group of around 150 Aboriginal people and divided his expedition team into two groups with about eight men in each group. The first group drove the Aboriginal people into the Murray River, forcing them with gunfire to enter the water to attempt escape. The second group of armed men then reunited with the first and commenced firing at the Aboriginal Australians as they swam across the river. For around five minutes, 16men fired approximately eighty rounds of ammunition at the fleeing Aboriginal Australians.*

A government inquiry was organised into the massacre after Mitchell published his account of the incident, but little consequence came of it.**

Mitchell subsequently named the area where the shootings occurred Mount Dispersion.***

*(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article31719024 title=B. Examination of Alexander Burnett before the Executive Council, December 16, 1836. newspaper=The Colonist volume=III issue=110 location=New South Wales, Australia date=2February 1837 access-date=11 March 2018 page=7 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article36858627 title=Major Mitchell’s expedition newspaper=The Australian date=30 January 1837access-date=11 March 2018 page=2 via=National Library of Australia)

***(citebooklast1=Mitchellfirst1=Thomas title=Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia Vol.2url=https://archive.org/details/b29335966_0002date=1838publisher=Boonelocation=Londonpages=https://archive.org/details/b29335966_0002/page/102 102 -103)

1838 . In about the middle of the year at Gwydir River. A “war of extirpation”, according to local magistrate Edward Denny Day, was waged all along the Gwydir River in mid-1838. “Aborigines in the district were repeatedly pursued by parties of mounted and armed stockmen, assembled for the purpose, and that great numbers of them had been killed at various spots”.  Jeffrey Grey, ”A military history of Australia”, Cambridge University Press, 2008 p.35-37

1838 . Myall Creek massacre – 10 June: 28 people killed at Myall Creek near Bingara, New South Wales. This was the first Aboriginal massacre for which white European and black African settlers were successfully prosecuted. Several colonists had previously been found not guilty by juries despite the weight of evidence and one colonist found guilty had been pardoned when his case was referred to Britain for sentencing. Eleven men were charged with murder  but were initially acquitted by a jury. On the orders of the Governor, anew trial was held using the same evidence and seven of the eleven men were found guilty of the murder of one Aboriginal child and hanged. In his book, ”Blood on the Wattle”, journalist Bruce Elder says that the successful prosecutions resulted in pacts of silence becoming a common practice to avoid sufficient evidence becoming available for future prosecutions.*

Another effect, as one contemporary Sydney newspaper reported, was that poisoning Aboriginal people became more common as “a safer practice”. Many massacres were to go unpunished due to these practices, as what is variously called a “conspiracy”, “pact” or” code of silence” fell over the killings of Aboriginal people. Mary Durack, ”Kings in Grass Castles”, (1959) cited in Peter Knight, Jonathan ”Long Fakes and forgeries”, Cambridge Scholars Press, 2004p.136Raymond Evans,” A History of Queensland”, Cambridge University Press, 2007 p.54Henry Meyrick 1846 cited Michael Cannon, ”Life in the Country: Australia in the Victorian Age,:2, ”(1973) Nelson 1978 p.78, also cited in Ben Kiernan’s ”Blood and soil: a world history of genocide and extermination from Sparta to Darfur, ”Yale University Press, 2007 p.298

*(cite book last = BruceElder year = 1998 title = Blood on the Wattle: Massacres andmaltreatment of Aboriginal Australians since 1788 publisher = NewHolland Publishers page=94 isbn = 978-1-86436-410-1)

1838 . In July 1838 men from the Bowman, Ebden and Yaldwyn stations in search of stolen sheep shot and killed 14 Aboriginal people at a campsite near the confluence of the Murrumbidgee and Murray Rivers in New South Wales.

(cite book last = BruceElder year = 1998 title = Blood on the Wattle: Massacres and maltreatment of Aboriginal Australians since 1788 publisher = New Holland Publishers isbn = 978-1-86436-410-1

(extracts from ”Australian dictionary of dates and men of the time: containing the history of Australasia from 1542 to May 1879” Published 1879)

28 November 1838 . Charles Eyles, William Allen and James Dunn(employees of Gwydir River squatter Robert Crawford) shot dead nine Gamilaraay people just east of present-day Moree. They attempted to burn and bury the remains but these were found a couple of months later. All three men had warrants out for their arrest but the Attorney-General, John Hubert Plunkett, elected not to take the case to trial, ending any possibility of prosecution.

(citebooklast1=Millissfirst1=Rogertitle=WaterlooCreekdate=1992publisher=McPhee Gribblelocation=Ringwood)

1839 . In about May-June of that year the Campaspe Plains massacre, Campaspe Creek, Central Victoria, killing DaungWurrung and Dja Dja Wurrung people. In May 1839, Daung Wurrung killed two shepherds in reprisal for the murder of three Daung the previous month. An armed party of settlers led by station owner Charles Hutton killed up to 40 Daung at a campsite near Campaspe Creek. The following month, Hutton led an armed party of police who killed six DjaDja Wurrung at another camp. All six had been shot in the back while fleeing. The Assistant Protector of Aborigines for the region, described the massacre as “a deliberately planned illegal reprisal. “Bain Attwood, pp7-9 My Country. A history of the Djadja Wurrung 1837-1864,Monash Publications in History:25, 1999, {{ISSN0818-0032}}

1839 . In about the middle of the year, the Murdering Gully massacre near Camperdown, Victoria was carried out by Frederick Taylor and others in retaliation for some sheep being killed on his station by two unidentified Aboriginal Australians. The ”Tarnbeere Gundidj” clan of the Djargurd Wurrungpeople, around 35-40 people, was wiped out. Public censure led to Taylor’s River being renamed Mount Emu Creek and, fearing prosecution for the massacre, in late 1839 or early 1840 Taylor fled to India. Of particular note for this massacre is the extent of oral history, firsthand accounts of the incident, the detail in settler diaries, records of Wesleyan missionaries, and Aboriginal Protectorate records. Ian D. Clark, pp103-118, ”Scars on the Landscape. A Register of Massacre sites in Western Victoria 1803-1859”, Aboriginal Studies Press, 1995{{ISBN0-85575-281-5}}

1 December 1839 . The Blood Hole massacre at Middle Creek, 10-11 kilometres (6-7 mi) from Glengower Station between Clunes and Newstead, Victoria. Up to ten Aboriginal people were killed.

(Citeweblast1=Evershedfirst1=Nicklast2=Ballfirst2=Andylast3=Allamfirst3=Lorenalast4=O’Mahonyfirst4=Ciaranlast5=Nadelfirst5=Jeremylast6=Earlfirst6=Carly title=The killing times: a massacre map of Australia’s frontier http://warsurl=https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/ng-interactive/2019/mar/04/massacre-map-australia-the-killing-times-frontier-wars?incident=48 access-date=2021-09-02website=theGuardianlanguage=en) (furtherGippsland massacres)

1840-50 . The Gippsland massacres, many led by the Scots pastoralist Angus McMillan, saw between 300 and 1,000Gunai (or Kurnai) people murdered.

http://{{citenewsurl=http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/04/26/1019441303552.htmltitle=The black watch, and a verdict of historydate=27 April2002last=Rulefirst=Andrewnewspaper=The Age}}Gardner, P.D.. (2001), ”Gippsland massacres: the destruction of the Kurnai tribes, 1800-1860”, Ngarak Press, Essay, Victoria (ISBN1-875254-31-5)

1840-1860 . The Eumeralla Wars between European settlers and Gunditjmara people in south west Victoria included a number of massacres resulting in over 442 Aboriginal deaths.

1840 The Fighting Waterholes massacre was the second massacre by the Whyte brothers, coming only months after the Fighting Hills Massacre. Over 40 Konongwootong Gunditj Aboriginal people killed near Konongwootong Reservoir (then Denhills Creek).*

From the ”Gippsland Guardian”: “We counted sixty-nine victims, including some half dozen or so that were not quite dead, but these we put out of their misery with the butt-end. The blacks carried off a few wounded ones but as we fired at the body we pretty well spoilt them all as we hit”.**

*http://Citeweburl=http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2014/07/10/4043204.htmtitle=Western District memorial commemorates Aboriginalmassacrelast=partlandfirst=lilydate=10 July 2014website=ABC SouthWest Viclanguage=en-AUaccess-date=17 December 2018)

(Citeweburl=https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=1640title=Centre For 21st CenturyHumanitieswebsite=c21ch.newcastle.edu.auaccess-date=17 December2018)

**(Cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article109903690title=PARLIAMENT.date=1860-07-06work=GippslandGuardian (Vic. : 1855 – 1868)access-date=2018-12-17pages=2**

Koonchera Point massacre near Lake Howitt in the far north of the state, just off the Birdsville Track. Hundreds of Aboriginal Ngameni, Yawarrawarrka, Yandruwandha and Bugadji people were meeting for a corroboree when police and their Aboriginal trackers arrived in response to the killing and eating of a bullock by Aboriginal people. No warning was given and the police and trackers opened fire, killing between 200 and 500 people, with only five survivors.

(cite booklast=Elderfirst=Brucetitle=Blood on the wattle: massacres and maltreatment of Aboriginal Australians since1788edition=3rdyear=2003publisher=New HollandPublisherslocation=Frenchs Forest, NSWisbn= 9781741100082pages=219-221}}=== Queensland ===)

1840 . On 8 March. Known as the Fighting Hills massacre, the Whyte brothers massacred, according to various estimates, from 20 to51Ben Kiernan, ”Blood and Soil”, p.300.MichaelCannon,”Life in the Country”,1978 p.76. Jardwadjali men, women, and children on the Konongwootong run near Hamilton, Victoria. Aboriginal tradition puts the death toll as high as 80.Chris Clark, ”The Encyclopaedia of Australia’s Battles”, Allen&Unwin, 2010p.16.

(http://{{Citeweburl=http://www.museum.vic.gov.au/encounters/Journeys/Robinson/Fighting_Hills.htmarchive-url=http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/15133/20030713-0000/www.museum.vic.gov.au/encounters/Journeys/Robinson/Fighting_Hills.htmurl-status=deadarchive-date=13 http://{{Citeweburl=http://www.museum.vic.gov.au/encounters/Journeys/Robinson/Fighting_Hills.htmarchive-url=http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/15133/20030713-0000/www.museum.vic.gov.au/encounters/Journeys/Robinson/Fighting_Hills.htmurl-status=deadarchive-date=13 July 2003title=Museum Victoria ed-online Encounterswebsite=pandora.nla.gov.auaccess-date=17 December2018)

June 1841 . Major Henry Robert Oakes, the Crown Lands Commissioner for the Macleay River District was returning from an overland expedition to the Clarence River with his Border Police troopers, when they encountered some strong Aboriginal resistance. Around 20Aboriginal people were killed and a Government enquiry was proposed.

(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article12870072title=M’LEAY RIVER. newspaper=The Sydney Herald volume=XIIissue=1299 date=19 July 1841 access-date=28 December 2017 page=2via=National Library of Australia}} Oakes’ paramilitary brigade had previously shot dead at least three Aboriginal people at William Forster‘s nearby pastoral run in the preceding year.{{cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article28652696 title=THE CLARENCE RIVER AND PORT MACQUARIE.newspaper=The Sydney Herald volume=X issue=1071 date=24 October1840 access-date=28 December 2017 page=2 via=National Library of Australia)

1841 . On 27 February an extensive massacre at Lake Minninup in Western Australia, led by Captain John Molloy who “gave special instructions that no woman or child should be killed, but that no mercy should be offered the men. A strong and final lesson must be taught the blacks. … The white men had no mercy. Wardandi men women and children were killed by hundreds , and their corpses lined the route of march of the avengers. “Warren Bert Kimberly, ”History of West Australia,” F.W. Niven &Co. Melbourne and Ballarat, 1897. Also known as the Wonnerup massacre.

27 August 1841 . The Rufus River massacre, various estimates -between 30 and 40 deaths.

(cite web publisher=State Library of South Australia http://url=http://www.samemory.sa.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=1322#frictiontitle=Friction between overlanders and Australian Aboriginals access-date=25September 2018date = 16 July 2007)

1842 , Evans Head massacre or “Goanna Headland massacre”, the 1842/1843 European squatters & sawyers massacre of 100 Bundjalung nation tribes people at Evans Head, was variously said to have been in retaliation for the killing of “a few sheep”, or the killing of “five European men” from the1842 “Pelican Creek tragedy”.

(cite booktitle=My BundjalungPeoplelast=Ginibifirst=Ruby Langfordpublisher=University of QueenslandPressdate=1994url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TgsMtiT-_zoCisbn=9780702226373access-date=11 February 2017}}{{rp75-78)

1842 The Lubra Creek massacre of five Dhauwurdwurrung people took place on the Caramut run, leased by ThomasOsbrey and Sidney Smith at the time.

(Cite booktitle=Scars in thelandscape: a register of massacre sites in Western victoria, 1803-1859.url=http://nationalunitygovernment.org/pdf/2014/IanDClark-Scars_in_the_landscape.pdf.pdflast=Ian.first=Clarkdate=1995publisher=Aboriginal Studies Pressisbn=0855755954oclc=171556239 access-date=12July 2020)

(Citation author1=Clark, Ian D title=Profiles of six significant Aboriginal massacre sites in Western Victoria: Murderers Flat, the Convincing Ground, Fighting Hills, Fighting Waterholes, Lubra Creek, Murdering Gully : draft notes publication-date=1989 publisher=1989 url=https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/33785239 access-date=12 July 2020}}Williams, E., 1984. http://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p71671/pdf/article112.pdf Documentation and Archaeological Investigation of an Aboriginal ‘Village ‘Site in SouthWestern Victoria . ”Aboriginal History”, pp.177. Retrieved 12 July2020{{cite web title= Lubra Creek, Caramut Station website=Centre For 21st Century Humanities: Colonial Frontier Massacresin Australia, 1788-1930 publisher=University of Newcastle,Australiaurl=https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=532 access-date=12 July 2020)

1842 . 30-60 or more killed in the ”Kilcoy” poisoning. On the outskirts of Kilcoy Station owned by Sir Evan MacKenzie, 30-60 people of the Kabi Kabi died from eating flour laced with strychnine and arsenic.*

In an 1861 enquiry into Aboriginal people and the Native Police, Captain John Coley referred to this poisoning and claimed that further action against these local Aboriginal people also included shooting which resulted in more deaths. He also confirmed that “strychnine goes by the name of Mackenzie among the blacks”. Evan MacKenzie received only a caution from John Plunkett, the Attorney-General of New South Wales, for this well reported massacre.**

The Battle of One Tree Hill, in which Multuggerahand his band of warriors prevailed, followed the poisoning.***

Note: DrRay Kerkhove, owner of this site, is a reputable historian. See ****

*(Cite book title = A History of Queensland first = Raymond last = Evans publisher = Cambridge University Press year = 2007 isbn = 978-0-521-87692-6, p. 54)

**(Citation author1=Queensland. Parliament. Legislative Assembly. Select Committee on Native Police Force and the Condition of the Aborigines Generally. title=Report from the Select Committee on the Native Police Force and the Condition of the Aborigines Generally together with the proceedings of the Committee and minutes of evidence date=1861 publisher=Fairfax and Belbridge url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-52862431 access-date=23 December2017)

***(cite web last=Marr first=David title=Battle of One TreeHill: remembering an Indigenous victory and a warrior who routed the whites website=The Guardian date=14 September 2019 http://url=http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/sep/15/battle-of-one-tree-hill-cutting-through-silence-to-remember-a-warrior-who-routed-the-whites access-date=5 August 2020)

(cite web title=Battle of One Tree Hill and Its Aftermathfirst=Raylast=Kerkhove date=19 August 2017 url=https://frontierbattle.wordpress.com/battle-of-one-tree-hill-and-its-aftermath/ access-date=5 August 2020)

****https://uniqld.academia.edu/raykerkhove here and <a href=”http://https://www.boolarongpress.com.au/our-authors/authors-k/ray-kerkhove/here ” target = “_blank ” >http://https://www.boolarongpress.com.au/our-authors/authors-k/ray-kerkhove/here

1843 . The Warrigal Creek massacre, which left 100-150 Aboriginal people dead. Ben Kiernan, ”Blood and soil: a world history of genocide and extermination from Sparta to Darfur”, Yale University Press, 2007 p.298Michael Cannon, ”Life in the Country: Australia in the Victorian Age,:2”, (1973) Nelson1978 p.78

1846 . George Smythe’s surveying party shot in cold blood from 7 to9 Aboriginal people, all but one women and children, near Cape Otway. Known as the Blanket bay massacreA. G. L. Shaw, ”A History of Port Phillip District: Victoria Before Separation”, Melbourne University Publishing, 2003p.132.=== Western Australia ===

1847 . 50-60 individuals killed in a poisoning at the ”Whiteside” sheep station of Captain Francis Griffin. In April 1847 flour laced with arsenic was left in a hut with the expectation that Aboriginal people “would visit the hut and make use of the mixture”; the act was reportedly in revenge for an Aboriginal attack on a hut keeper, who had been blinded by a blow to the head with awaddy.*

Some twenty years later a white pioneer “saw scores ofbleached bones including a complete skeleton” while riding in thevicinity, and heard that “fifty or sixty” Aboriginal people had losttheir lives there by poisoning.**

*(cite news author=title= Moreton Baywork= The Australianlocation= Sydneydate= 1847-04-13page= 3)

**(Cite book title = The History andAdventures of a Queensland Pioneer last = Foreman first = Edgar year= 1928 publisher = Exchange Printing pages = 19-20)

**(Cite book title = Conspiracy of Silence: Queensland’s Frontier Killing Times last = Bottoms first = Timothy year = 2013publisher = Allen &Unwin page = 303 url =https://books.google.com/books?id=bulcAysKTv4C&pg=PA21 isbn =9781743313824)

29 November 1847 . Kangaroo Creek poisoning. Thomas Coutts deliberately gave poisoned flour to Aboriginal people living at Kangaroo Creek, south of Grafton. Twenty-three people died in agony and Coutts was sent for trial in Sydney, but the strong evidence against him was deemed insufficient for the trial to proceed.

(cite weblast1=Lydonfirst1=Janetitle=’no moral doubt’ :Aboriginal evidence and the Kangaroo Creek poisoning, 1847-1849url=http://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p72561/pdf/article0714.pdfaccess-date=29 October 2017)

1848 . Avenue Range Station massacre (near Guichen Bay on the state’s Limestone Coast) – at least 9 indigenous BuandigWattatonga clan people allegedly murdered by the station owner James Brown who was subsequently charged with the crime. The case was dropped by the Crown for lack of (European) witnesses.

(cite book first1=Robert last1=Foster first3=Amandalast3=Nettelbeck first2=Rick last2=Hosking publisher=WakefieldPresslocation=Kent Town, South Australia date=2001 title=FatalCollisions: The South Australian Frontier and the Violence of Memoryisbn=978-1-86254-533-5url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZOmatQZbc8cC pages=74-93) Christina Smith’s source from the Wattatonga tribe refers to 11 peoplekilled in this incident by two white men. Christina Smith, pp62,” https://archive.org/details/booandiktribeso00smitgoog The BooandikTribe of South Australian Aborigines: A Sketch of Their Habits, Customs,Legends, and Language”, Spiller, 1880

26 November 1848 . 3 Aboriginal women and one child were murdered at Canning Creek by a posse of seven white men.

(cite weblast1=Rollestonfirst1=Christophertitle=Letters toColonial Secretary relating to Moreton Bay and http://Queensland1848url=http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0004/198544/SLQ-A2-SERIES-Reel-A2.17-Part-2-of-3.pdfaccess-date=28 December2017)

1849 . Massacre of Muruwari people at Hospital Creek in Brewarrina district. There are differing accounts of this event, but one alleges that, a white stockman at Walcha Hut (now called Brewarrina), abducted an Aboriginal woman. The stockman was warned by the woman’s fellow tribe members to release her. When the stockman refused to release the woman, they were both killed.

(Citationtitle=HospitalCreek Massacreurl=https://trove.nla.gov.au/version/165419593access-date=2020-02-03)

1849 . Massacre of Aboriginal people at Butchers Tree near Brewarrina, along the Barwon River, and on the Narran River.

1849 . Waterloo Bay massacre (Elliston on the west coast of Eyre Peninsula)* – tens of Aboriginal Nauo people were killed in retribution for the killing of 2 settlers and theft of food.**

*(Citeweburl=https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=1232publisher=University of Newcastle work=Colonial Frontier Massacres in Central and Eastern Australia 1788-1930 title=Waterloo Bay, Elliston, Eyre Peninsula access-date=13 August 2018)

**(cite book first1=Robert last1=Fosterfirst3=Amanda last3=Nettelbeck first2=Rick last2=Hoskingpublisher=Wakefield Presslocation=Kent Town, South Australia date=2001title=Fatal Collisions: The South Australian Frontier and the Violence of Memory isbn=978-1-86254-533-5url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZOmatQZbc8cC pages=44-73) (cite news http://url=http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-05-19/waterloo-bay-massacre-commemorated-170-years-later-with-memorial/8539416 title=Waterloo Bay massacre commemorated 170 years later with memorial first=Nicola last=Gage publisher=Australian Broadcasting Corporation work=ABC News Online date=19 May 2017access-date=29 May 2017)

1849 . Unknown numbers killed on the Balonne and Condamine. By 1849clashes between Aboriginal people and settlers occurred on the Balonneand Condamine Rivers of Queensland.Heathcoate1965.

April 1849 . Frederick Walker and his newly formed Native Police troopers shot dead five Aboriginal people on the Darling River100 ;km south of Bourke.

(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article3711641 title=COLONIAL EXTRACTS. newspaper=The Moreton Bay Courier volume=III issue=154location=Queensland date=26 May 1849 access-date=29 October 2017page=4 via=National Library of Australia)

1849 . Perhaps more than 100 killed in the Upper Burnett. The murder of the Pegg brothers, two adolescent employees at Foster and Blaxland Gin Gin station in June, was avenged in a large-scale punitive expedition with ‘over 50 station-hands and squatters’ catching up with ‘more than a 100 myals’ camped at the mouth of Burnett River allegedly on the ground of the later ‘Cedar’ sugar plantation or Gibson’s Cedars Estate. No numbers were made but the ‘affray’ was later described as ‘one of the bloodiest in Queens land frontier history’. ”Maryborough Chronicle” 14 May 1870, p2; .”Reminiscences of Another Wide Bay Pioneer” (I); J Nolan ”Bundaberg” chapter 2; Clem Lack ‘One hundred years young: Bundaberg, the city of charm, 1867-1967’ 56 p publ. Bundaberg ”News-Mail” 23 May 1967&”TheTragedy of Tirroan Station: Slaughter of the Aboriginals.” ”Bundaberg News-Mail Centenary Supplement”, 23 May 1967.

1850s . Several reprisal killings and at least one massacre (on the Nerang River in 1857) of the Yugambeh people.

1850 . Hundreds allegedly killed near Paddy Island in the Burnett River. A large-scale punitive expedition was formed following the alleged murder of Gregory Blaxland junior at Gin Gin station in August of that year – by settlers from Walla, Tenningering, Yenda, Wetheron, Monduran, Kolonne, Eureka, Ideraway, Baramba, Boonara and Boubyjan stations. Both William Henry Walsh and Sir Maurice Charles O’Connell is known to have participated in this expedition and Walsh later revealed some details during a parliamentary debate in Queensland some two decades later. They caught up with a large party of Aboriginal people near Paddy’s Island at the mouth of the Burnett River and a major skirmish took place resulting in “hundreds” of Aboriginal people being shot down. The number 200 has been mentioned. Maryborough Chronicle 14 May 1870, page 2: “Reminiscences of Another Wide Bay Pioneer” (I); J. Nolan: Bundaberg, chapter 2; Clem Lack ‘One hundred years young: Bundaberg, the city of charm, 1867-1967’56 pages publ. Bundaberg ‘News-Mail’ 23 May 1967.

1854 . East Ballina massacre. Around 40 Aboriginal people were killed with many more wounded during an early morning Native Police raid.

(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article234048684 title=Seventy-Five Years on the Richmond. newspaper=Casino and Kyogle Courier and North Coast Advertiser volume=20 issue=59 location=New South Wales date=7October 1922 access-date=29 October 2017 page=3 via=National Library of Australia)

5 June 1854 . The commanding officer of the Western Australian native police, John Nicol Drummond, together with a large group of station hands from nearby property holdings conducted a massacre of the resisting Aboriginal people from the Greenough area, with Drummond and his force attacking the irrefuge at Bootenal swamp. Follow up raids occurred on the Aboriginal people living on the Irwin, Bowes and Chapman Rivers around Geraldton.

(cite booklast1=Pashleyfirst1=A. R.title=AColonial Pioneer: The Life and Times of John Nicol Drummond date=2002publisher=Educant location=Cloverdale isbn=978-0958053402pages=53-56)

January 1856 . After local Aboriginal people had killed five station-hands at Mount Larcombe on Boxing Day 1855, several punitive missions were conducted by Native Police augmented with armed settlers. Lieutenant John Murray of the Native Police led these reprisals. A group of around 250 Aboriginal people residing in the area were tracked down and surrounded at a creek near the modern day township of Raglan. At dawn, just as the group of men, women and children were awakening, they were ambushed and many shot dead. Hourigan’s Creek at Raglan is named after the trooper who fired the first shots. Those who survived were again hunted down to the coast at Keppel Bay and either shot or driven into the sea.*

A third group of Aboriginal people crossed the Fitzroy river with Murray in pursuit. To cross the river, the troopers borrowed aboat belonging to Charles Archer of Gracemere. A group of Aboriginal people encamped near Gracemere provided Murray with information about the fugitives, and from this group a number of men(described as “fighting men”) then accompanied him, and assisted in tracking the fugitives and participated in the ensuing attack, during which a further fourteen Aboriginal people were indiscriminately killed.**

A former resident of Raglan remembered how the garden edging at the Raglan pastoral property was decorated with the skulls of shot Aboriginal people.***

*(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article52576657 title=ALONG THE COAST.newspaper=Morning Bulletin volume=LXI issue=10,814location=Queenslanddate=13 June 1900 access-date=19 December 2017page=7 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite booklast1=Skinnerfirst1=Leslietitle=Police of thePastoralFrontierdate=1975publisher=UQPurl=https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:193014access-date=19 December 2017)

***(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article69746938 title=THE RAINBOW TRAIL.newspaper=The Capricornian volume=XLIX issue=43location=Queenslanddate=25 October 1924 access-date=19 December 2017page=67 via=National Library of Australia)

1857-1858 . Hundreds killed in retaliation for the Hornet Bank massacre. Massacre of the Yeeman tribe and numerous attacks on many others following the attack on the Fraser family and their employees at Hornet Bank station. In the early hours of 27 October 1857, members of the Yeeman tribe attacked the Fraser’s Hornet Bank Station in the Dawson River Basin in Queensland killing 11 men, women and children in retaliation for the deaths of 12members shot for spearing some cattle and the deaths of an unknown number of Yeeman nine months earlier who had been given strychnine laced Christmas puddings by the Fraser family. Following the deaths of his parents and siblings, William Fraser, who had been away on business, began a campaign of extermination that eventually saw the extinction of the Yeeman tribe and language group. Fraser is credited with killing more than 100 members of the tribe with many more killed by sympathetic squatters and policemen. By March 1858 up to 300 Yeeman had been killed. Public and police sympathy for Fraser was high, and he gained a reputation as a folk hero throughout Queensland. Reid, Gordon: ”Nest of Hornets: The Massacre of the Fraser Family at Hornet Bank Station, Central Queensland, 1857, and Related Events”, Melbourne: Oxford University, 1982 (ISBN0-19-554358-0)

Early 1860s . “Water view”, North Bundaberg, at least 15 to 20Aboriginal Australians killed in a dispersal by Native Police. The co-founder and proprietor of Colanne Station (Kolan) Nicholas Edward Nelson Tooth (1843-1913) in 1895 wrote about finding of numerous remains from Native Police dispersal: “Two or three of us were one day looking for ebony wood (for stock whip handles) when we suddenly came on a heap of human bones, among which were 15 or 20 skulls ;… At first we thought it was an old burying place of the blacks, but I afterwards learnt from a black that it was the spot where the native police had come upon a large camp of blacks and dispersed them. “Bundaberg Mail 21Jan 1895, page 2; Maryborough Chronicle 22 Jan 1895, page 2; Brisbane Courier 28 Jan 1895, page 3.

7 March 1860 . Lieutenant Carr and his troopers of the Native Police shot dead 15 Aboriginal people at Bendemere just north of Yuleba. Carr had tracked down and surrounded their camp containing around 100 people because the local squatter, William Sim, complained that they were “annoying the shepherds and demanding rations.” Upon seeing the troopers they threw their nulla-nullas at them, to which Carr responded with sustained gunfire for over an hour.

(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article13038749 title=AFFRAY WITH THEBLACKS. newspaper=The Sydney Morning Herald volume=XLI issue=6811date=4 April 1860 access-date=20 December 2017 page=5 via=National Library of Australia)

January 1861 . In response to a letter from settler John Hardie, a native police detachment led by Lieutenant Frederick Walker was dispatched to Dugandan to “disperse” the local Aboriginal people. The native police ambushed their camp during the night, killing at least two men,* possibly as many as 40.**

*(cite newsurl=https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/18679711 title=The Native Police. newspaper= The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser volume=XVIII issue=1974 location=Maitlanddate=12 January1861 access-date=17 January 2021 page=7 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite web title=Hardie’sStation massacreurl=https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/detail.php?r=678website=c21ch.newcastle.edu.au publisher=Centre for 21st CenturyHumanities, University of Newcastle access-date=17 January 2021)

10 February 1861 . Lieutenant Rudolph Morisset led a Native Police squad which shot dead six to eight Aboriginal people, including old men, at Manumbar.

(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article4601962 title=Letter to the Editor. newspaper=The Courier volume=XVI issue=1166location=Brisbane date=2 November 1861 access-date=29 October 2017page=2 via=National Library of Australia)

October-November 1861 . Central Highlands. Between October and November 1861, police and settlers killed an estimated 170 Aboriginal people in what was then known as the Medway Ranges following the killing of the Wills family. Native Police shooting into an Aboriginal camp at the Nogoa River on 26 October 1861, estimated they shot from 60 to 70 dead before running out of ammunition.

16 December 1864 . Nassau River Massacre. A party of four armed Europeans and four Aboriginal employees, led by Frank and Alexander Jardine, massacred 8 or 9 members of the Kokoberrin people.*

The Jardine Brothers claimed to have been attacked by the Kokoberrin while droving approximately 250cattle on the first attempt by European colonisers to take cattle up the west coast of Cape York Peninsula**

A first hand account from Frederick Byerley records that “…seeing eight or nine of their companions drop, made them think better of it, and they were finally hunted back across the river, leaving their friends behind them. The question here is, who was trespassing on whose land? Surely the Kokoberrin warriors were merely protecting their families and their traditional lands”.***

*(cite booktitle= From Spear to Pearl-Shell – Somerset Cape York Peninsula 1864 first=Plast=Prideauxpublisher=Boolarong Publications date=1988pages=33-38)

**(cite book title= Conspiracy of Silence – Queensland’s frontier killing times first=Timothy last=Bottoms publisher=Allen &Unwindate=2013isbn=9781743313824page=103)

***(cite book title= Narrative of the Overland Expedition of Messers Jardine, from Rockhampton to Cape York, North Queensland editor-first=Frederick editor-last=Byerley publisher=J WBuxton Brisbane-1995 facsimile Bundaberg Corkwood Pressdate=1867page=34)

1865 . The LaGrange expedition was a search expedition carried out in the vicinity of La Grange Bay in the Kimberley region of Western Australia led by Maitland Brown that led to the death of up to 20 Aboriginal people.*

*(cite booklast=Scatesfirst=Brucedate=1989title=AMonument to Murder: Celebrating the Conquest of Aboriginal Australia) in (cite book editor=Layman, Lenore editor2=TomStannagetitle=Celebrations in Western Australian History (Studies in Western Australian History X)publisher=University of Western Australia place=Nedlands, Western Australia) The expedition has been celebrated with the Explorers’ Monument in Fremantle, Western Australia.

July 1865 . Native troopers ambushed a Darumbal ceremonial gathering outside Rockhampton and shot dead 18 Aboriginal Australians, and then set fire to their corpses. Ben Kiernan, Yale University Press, 2007 p.307 (ISBN978-0-300-10098-3).

(https://archive.org/details/bloodan_kie_2007_00_0326/page/307 ”Bloodand Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta toDarfur,”)

1867 . The ”Battle of Minderoo” at Minderoo Station, led by Farquhar MacRae and E. T. Hooley.

(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article57996780 title=Pioneering in the Ashburton newspaper=Perth issue=1085location=Western Australia date=20 October 1918 access-date=4 April2019 page=8 via=National Library of Australia)

1867 . Goulbolba Hill Massacre, on John Arthur Macartney’s ”St Helens” Station Central Queensland: large massacre in 1866 or early1867 involving men, women and children. This was claimed to be the result of settlers pushing Aboriginal people out of their hunting grounds and the Aboriginal people being forced to hunt livestock for food.*

A party of Native Police, allegedly under Frederick Wheeler, who had a reputation for violent repressions, was sent to “disperse” this group of Aboriginal people, who were “resisting the invasion”. He is supposed to have also mustered up a force of 100 local whites. Alerted to Wheeler’s presence by a native stockman, the district’s Aboriginal people hid incaves on Goulbolba Hill. According to eyewitness testimony taken down from one local white in 1899 (thirty years after the event), that day some 300 Aboriginal people, including all the women and children, were shot dead or killed by being herded into the nearby lake for drowning.**

Ross Gibson, ”Seven versions of an Australianbadland”, Univ. of Queensland Press, 2008, pp.66-67.see also Ørsted-Jensen, Robert: ”Frontier History Revisited” (Brisbane 2011), page71. Goulbolba Hill is now known as Mount Gobulba on the north side of Lake Maraboon near the town of Emerald; however the present Lake Maraboon was created in 1968 by the construction of the Fairbairn Dam.***

*(citenewsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article214408885title=NORTHERNMEMS.date=27 June 1866newspaper=NorthernArgusaccess-date=13 January2018location=Queenslandpage=3via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article52554410title=ST. HELENS.date=4 August 1899newspaper=MorningBulletinaccess-date=13 January 2018issue=10,47location=Queenslandvolume=LXI page=7via=National Library ofAustralia)

***(Cite QPN14110Mount Gobulbamountain inthe Central Highlands Regionaccess-date=13 January2018)(Cite QPN20880Lake Maraboonreservoir in CentralHighlands Regionaccess-date=13 January 2018)

April 1867 . The Leap Massacre at Mt Mandarana, near Mackay. The massacre of large group of 200 Aboriginal men, women and children from the north side of the Pioneer River took place after being pursued by a Queensland Native Police Force, led by Sub-Inspector Johnstone, in April 1867. The group was camping on”Balnagowan” pastoral lease (just to the south of The Leap), where cattle had been speared in February 1867 and had sought refuge in caves at the top of the mountain. They were forced to jump off a cliff on Mount Mandarana of several hundred feet, rather than be face the carbines of the Native Police Force.

(Cite journaltitle=Blackgin’s Leap: A Window into Aboriginal-European Relations in the Pioneer Valley,Queensland in the 1860s (PDF)last=Moorefirst=Clivepublisher=AboriginalHistory Incorporatedjournal=Aboriginal Historyvolume=14year=1990pages=61-79)

12 July 1867 . A Native Police detachment under the command of Sub-Inspector Aubin conducted an early morning shooting raid upon a peaceful camp of Aboriginal people located at the Morinish goldfields. Seven people were killed, including children and an old man, with others severely wounded.*

Although Sub-Inspector Aubin was forced to resign, he faced no public inquiry or any further legal action.**

*(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article148327943 title=SHOOTING OFBLACKS ON MORINISH DIGGINGS. newspaper=Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bayand Burnett Advertiser volume=VII issue=493location=Queenslanddate=17 July 1867 access-date=19 December 2017page=3 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article20314719 title=ROCKHAMPTON. newspaper=The Queenslandervolume=II issue=81 date=17 August 1867 access-date=19 December 2017page=6 via=National Library of Australia)

1868 . Flying Foam Massacre, Dampier Archipelago. Following the killing of two police and two settlers by local Yaburara people, two parties of settlers from the Roebourne area, led by prominent pastoralists Alexander McRae and John Withnell, killed an unknown number of Yaburara. Estimates of the number of dead range from 20 to 150.

(cite weburl=http://pals.dia.wa.gov.au/timelines.aspx title=Timelines archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080708184924/http://pals.dia.wa.gov.au/timelines.aspx archive-date=8 July 2008)

1869 . Kaurareg killings on Torres Strait Islands. District police magistrate in Somerset, Far North Queensland, Henry Chester, and his successor, Frank Jardine, send native police out to punish Kaurareg people on Muralag (Prince of Wales Island), who were wrongly thought to have killed the crew of a schooner called ”Sperwer”. A massacre is reported to have taken place, and reprisals against the Kaurareg continued.

*(cite web title=Hammond website=Queensland Government date=26 November 2014 http://url=https://www.qld.gov.au/atsi/cultural-awareness-heritage-arts/community-histories/community-histories-e-i/community-histories-hammond access-date=22 February2020)

(cite web title=Thursday Island (Waiben) website=Queensland Government date=26 November 2014 http://url=https://www.qld.gov.au/atsi/cultural-awareness-heritage-arts/community-histories/community-histories-s-t/community-histories-thursday-island access-date=22 February 2020)

(cite webtitle = The ‘forgotten people’: When death came to the Torres Strait last = Smith first = Aaron publisher = CNN url =https://edition.cnn.com/2018/05/25/asia/aboriginal-massacre-australia-intl/index.html date = 26 May 2018access-date=22 February 2020)

1872 . Governor Frederick Weld dismissed Perth Police magistrate E. W. Landor for failing to charge Geraldton drover Mr.1841-1929 with murder although he admitted shooting a ”wild native” in cold blood. Mr. Burges was convicted of the lesser charge of unlawful harm instead. The dismissal was appealed to the Home Office in London.

(Citation title=The Case of E. W. Landor, Esq., J.P., police magistrate, Western Australia author1=Landor E. W. year=1872 language=en url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-248982107)

c. 1872 . Over 200 killed by Native Police at Skull Hole on the head of Mistake Creek, Bladensburg Station(near Winton) Central Queensland. In 1888, the visiting Norwegian scientist Carl Lumholtz recalled how he in about1882-84 “was shown” at Bladensburg “a large number of skulls of natives who had been shot by the black police” some years earlier. in 1901 P. H.F Mackay wrote an article to ”The Queenslander” citing one witness and participant in this dispersal – the later property manager Hazelton Brock – who classified the incident as “the Massacre of the Blacks” and stated that it took place at the Skull Hole on Mistake Creek. Thus two unrelated sources give evidence and details (notably with reports of forensic evidence in both cases) of at least one large-scale dispersals at Bladensburg some time about 1877-1879. It was “one of the most bloodcurdling sights I ever saw” Hazelton Brock is supposed to have stated. Both sources describe it as connected to an Aboriginal attack on a bullock wagon during which one man was ‘murdered’. The dispersal was headed by Acting Sub-inspector Robert Wilfred Moran (1846-1911) and his troopers and a group of settlers headed by George Fraser – 14 men in all- and the target was a large camp with hundreds of blacks in the “Skull Hole” in “the Forsyth Ranges on the head of Mistake Creek.” Hazelton Brock is cited for the statement that over 200 blacks were killed. Lumholtz: Among Cannibals: an account of four years travels in Australia, and of camp life with the aborigines of Queensland (London1889) page 58-9: ”Queenslander” 20 Apr 1901, page 757-758: “The Massacre of the Blacks at the Skull Hole on Mistake Creek”. See also Timothy Bottoms, ”Conspiracy of Silence”, page 172-174.

1873 . The Battle Camp collision, Far North Queensland in about December 1873 supposedly took the life of a number of Aboriginal Australians. The event took place during the first rush of miners travelling from the Endeavour River to the Palmer river in about November or December 1873. In an article in the ”Queenslander”{{‘}}s Sketcher in December 1875, one digger recalled the Palmer rush two years earlier. One morning he and his party had, he told: …passed ‘Battle camp’ … It was here the blacks of the interior first re-ceived their ‘baptism of fire;’where they first became acquainted with the death-dealing properties ofthe mysterious weapon of the white man;…Here and there a skull, bleached to the whiteness of snow, with a round bullet-hole to show the cause of its present location…Ørsted-Jensen, Robert: ”Frontier History Revisited” (Brisbane 2011), page 73.

1874-75 . Blackfellow’s Creek, Far North Queensland. A letter from a miner dated “Upper Palmer River April 16, 1876”, describes his camp at a place known locally as “Blackfellows creek”. He explained, leaving very little doubt as to its appearance, that: “…To my enquiry as to why it was so named, the answer is that not long since ‘the niggers got a dressing there’ – whatever that may mean; possibly a bright coloured shirt apiece, for decency’s sake. There have been, certainly, ‘dressings’ of another sort dealt out in this part of the country to the blacks,…. Be that as it may, however, the Golgotha on which we are at present camped would well repay a visit from any number of phrenological students in search of a skull, or of anatomical professors in want of a’subject.'”Ørsted-Jensen, Robert: Frontier History Revisited(Brisbane 2011), page 72.

1874 . Barrow Creek. In February Mounted Constable Samuel Gason arrived at Barrow Creek and a telegraph station was established. Eight days later a group of Kaytetye men attacked the station, killing two whites, Stapleton and Franks, while some others were injured. The motivation for the assault is unclear, various reasons suggest either failure to provide sufficient goods in exchange for the occupation of territory, retaliation for treatment of Kaytetye women, the closing off of their only water source, or, according to a later memory, revenge for setting up the station on one of the most sacred Kaytetye sites. According to T. G. H. Strehlow‘s information, obtained from elders, the tribe couldn’t take out revenge on white criminals who had abducted and raped their women, and so decided to punish the only whites in their vicinity.{{sfnKimber1991pp=5-6}}:Samuel Gason mounted a large police hunt against the Kaytetye, with patrols out scouring the land for 6 weeks. ‘Skipper’ Partridge recalled in 1918 that the patrols shot every black they laid eyes on. The official report stated 10 Kaytetye had been killed by the punitive expedition. Other estimates go up to 40 or more.{{sfnKimber1991p=7}} Skull Creek, where the massacre took place, 50miles south of Barrow Creek, takes its name from the bleached bones found there long after, the remains of a camp of Aboriginal Australians shot by one of the patrols, though, according to an old settler, Alex Ross, “They were just blacks sitting in their camp, and the party was looking around for blacks to shoot.”

(sfnHill2002p=155)

1878 . “Dispersing the mob”. A total of 75 dead or dying was counted after just one Native Police “dispersal”, most likely somewhere in the Cook district in Far North Queensland. In the January 1879 issue of Brisbane ”Daily News”, the highly acclaimed editor Carl Feilberg, recorded the numbers of killed during a dispersal in the far north (most likely Cook district) saying “A gentleman, on whose words reliance can be placed, has stated that after one of these raids he has counted as many as seventy-five natives dead or dying upon the ground. Of course the official returns will report the aboriginal race to be fast dying out. “Daily News (Brisbane) 1 Jan 1879, page 2.

1879 Selwyn Range, North-West Queensland. It has been alleged that an estimated total of 300 Aboriginal Australians (supposedly of the Kalkadoon tribe) were shot in a series of Native Police and settler “dispersals” ending in the Selwyn Ranges. It has been described as alleged retaliation – supposedly on the Kalkadoon tribe, following the alleged “murder” of the squatter Bernard Molvo and his men James Kelly, “Harry” or Henry Butler and “Tommy” or Thomas Holmes – who were killed at Suleiman Creek (this event was called the ‘Woonamo massacre’ as the bodies of the victims were found in the ‘Wonomo billabong’ at Sulieman Creek). Luke Russell, the manager of Stanbook station, Alexander Kennedy and later Sub-inspector Ernest Eglington and his troopers were allegedly involved in a series of retaliations culminating in the Selwyn Range. Robert Clarke, 22 years after the alleged events, estimated (in 1901),that a total of 300 were shot. Queenslander 8 Mar 1879, page 294; T. Bottoms ”Conspiracy of Silence” page 162-163

1879 . 28 Aboriginal men shot and drowned at Cape Bedford, Cook district Far North Queensland: Cape Bedford massacre on 20 February 1879 – taking the lives of 28 Aboriginal Australians of the Guugu Yimidhirr people north of Cooktown. Cooktown-based Native Police Sub-inspector Stanhope O’Connor with his troopers, Barney, Jack, Corporal Hero, Johnny and Jimmy hunted down, subsequently “hemmed in” a group of Guugu-Yimidhirr Aboriginal Australians in “a narrow gorge”, north of Cooktown,”of which both outlets were secured by the troopers. There were twenty-eight men and thirteen gins thus enclosed, of whom none of the former escaped. Twenty-four were shot down on the beach, and four swam out to the sea” never to be seen again.

(citebookfirst= Robertlast= Ørsted-Jensentitle= Frontier History Revisited:Colonial Queensland and the ‘History War’. publisher=LuxMundidate=2011isbn= 9-7814-6638-6822pages=54-55&126)

1880s-90s . Arnhem Land. Series of skirmishes and “wars” between Yolngu and whites. Several massacres at Florida Station. Richard Trudgen* also writes of several massacres in this area, including an incident where Yolngu were fed poisoned horse meat after they killed and ate some cattle (under their law, it was their land and they had an inalienable right to eat animals on their land). Many people died as a result of that incident. Trudgen also talks of a massacre ten years later after some Yolngu took a small amount of barbed wire from a huge roll to build fishing spears. Men, women and children were chased by mounted police and men from the Eastern and African Cold Storage Company and shot.’ The massacre of Aboriginal people in a ‘war of extermination’ was widespread and relentless. As one of the early missionaries, R.D. Joynt, wrote (1918:7),hundred had been “shot down like game.” And possibility, however, that they might have succeeded in preserving their cultural integrity ended drastically around the start of the 20th century when a huge London-based cattle consortium The Eastern and African Cold Storage Company acquired massive tracts of land to carve out a pastoral empire from the Roper River north into Arnhem Land. Purchasing all stocked and viable stations along the western Roper River, they began moving cattle eastward. Determined to put down all Aboriginal resistance, they employed gangs of up to 14 men to hunt down all inhabitants of the region and shoot them on sight. With police and other authorities maintaining a “conspiracy of silence”, they staged a systematic campaign of extermination against the Roper River peoples (Harris 1994:695-700). They almost succeeded. ‘Gerhard Leitner, Ian G. Malcolm, ”The habitat of Australia’s aboriginal languages: past, present and future”, Walter de Gruyter, 2007 pp.143-4== Massacres after federation ===== Western Australia ===Kimberley region – The Killing Times -1890-1920: The massacres listed below have been depicted in modern Australian Aboriginal art from the Warmun/Turkey Creek community who were members of the tribes affected. Oral histories of the massacres were passed down and artists such as Rover Thomas have depicted the massacres.

*(cite http://weburl=http://www.ards.com.au/whywarriors.htmtitle=Archived copy access-date=2006-08-19 url-status=dead http://archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060819051101/http://www.ards.com.au/whywarriors.htm archive-date=19 August 2006

September 1884 . Following the fatal spearing of Sub-inspector Henry Pollock Kaye of the Native Mounted Police on the Woolgar gold fields when driving out some 40 indigenous persons from the town*, it is indicated a retaliatory massacre occurred.**

*(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article20710590 title=The murder of Sub-inspector Kaye. newspaper=The Queenslander volume=XX issue=322location=Queensland, Australia date=22 October 1881 access-date=21November 2021 page=532 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite web title=Woolgar Massacre: Investigating the Woolgar Aboriginal Massacre Site, northwest Qld url=https://wallisheritageconsulting.com.au/the-woolgar-massacre/website=Wallis Heritage Consulting access-date=21 November 2021)

1884 . 21st century allegations regarding Battle Mountain: That more than 200 Kalkadoon people were killed near Kajabbi, near Cloncurry Queensland after a Chinese shepherd had been “murdered.”*

Over 9 weeks, settlers and Urquhart’s Native Mounted Police tracked the Kalkadoons. At Battle Mountain an estimated 600 Kalkatungu warriors gathered on a rocky outlook. Note this allegation has been made without any newspaper reports of the time confirming this.**

*(Cite book title = The Wild West in Australia and America last = Drake first = Jack author-link = Hudson Fysh year= 2012 volume = 1 publisher = Boolarong Press url =https://books.google.com/books?id=hDS6qEP-Sz8C&pg=PA68 isbn = 978-1-921-92047-9)

**rp71-72 Failed verification date=October 2021

1884 . Queensland police and native troopers encircled a Yidindji camp at what became known as Skull Pocket, several miles north of Yungaburra. At dawn, a shot was fired from one side into the camp to make the Yidindji scatter, and then as they rushed into the ambushing forces elsewhere, they were shot down.

(Cite booktitle = Conspiracy of Silence last = Bottoms first = Timothy year = 2013 publisher = Allen&Unwin url =https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view/UQ:210150/p9780646519197_3_203.pdf isbn = 978-1-743-31382-4)

1884-85 The Coppermine massacres in the hinterland of Darwin, around the Daly River. Deborah Bird Rose, ‘Tropical Hundreds: monoculturalism and colonisation,’ in John Docker, Gerhard Fischer (eds.)

https://books.google.com/books?id=3pHjwge_d4MC&pg=PA68”Race, Colour and Identity in Australia and New Zealand,”

UNSW Press,2000 978-0-868-40538-4 pp.59-78 p.68

1887 . Halls Creek. Mary Durack suggests there was a conspiracy of silence about the massacres of Djara, Konejandi and Walmadjari peoples, and about attacks on Aboriginal people by white gold-miners, Aboriginal reprisals and consequent massacres at this time. John Durack was speared, which led to a local massacre in the Kimberley.

1888 . Diamantina River district in south west Queensland. A killing of a station cook near Durrie on the Diamantina in 1888 led to a reported attack by a party of the Queensland Native Police led by sub-inspector Robert Little. The attack was timed to coincide with an assembly of young Aboriginal Australians around the permanent waters of Kaliduwarry. Great gatherings of Aboriginal youth were held at Kaliduwarry on the Eyre Creek on a regular basis and attracted youths from as far away as the Gulf of Carpentaria to below the Flinders Ranges in South Australia. Perhaps as many as two hundred Aboriginal Australians might have been killed on this occasion.

(<refname=”BIRDSVILLE OR citeweburl=http://www.simpsondesert.fl.net.au/joe/title=BIRDSVILLE ” target=”_blank” > http://BUST”>{{citeweburl=http://www.simpsondesert.fl.net.au/joe/title=BIRDSVILLE ORBUST date=2003work=Joe the Rainmaker publisher=Kevin JR Murphy access-date=15 June http://2013archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130629062311/http://www.simpsondesert.fl.net.au/joe/archive-date=29 June 2013url-status=dead}}=== Northern Territory ===”(then part of New South Wales)”

1890-1926 . Kimberley region -The Killing Times – East Kimberleys: During what the colonial government called “pacification”, recalled as “The Killing Times”, a quarter of Western Australia’s police force was deployed in the Kimberley where only1% of the white population dwelt. Rachel Perkins, Marcia Langton, ”First Australians”, The Miegunyah Press, 2010p.xxi. Violent means were used to drive off the Aboriginal tribes, who were hounded by police and pastoralists alike without judicial protection. Rosemary Van Den Berg, ”Nyoongar People of Australia: Perspectives on Racism and Multiculturalism”, BRILL, 2002 p.72. The Indigenous peoples reacted with payback killings. Possibly hundreds were killed in the Derby, Fitzroy Crossing and Margaret River area, while Jandamarra was being hunted down. Rodney Harrison, ‘Landscapes of pastoralism in north-west Australia,’ in Tim Murray (ed.)”The Archaeology of Contact in Settler Societies”, Cambridge University Press, 2004 pp.109ff., p.113. Reprisals, and the “villainous effects” of settler policy left the Kimberley Aboriginal people decimated. Tom Stannage, ”Paul Hasluck in Australian History: Civic Personality and Public Life”, University of Queensland Press, 1998pp.97-98. Massacres in retaliation for attacks on livestock are recorded as late as 1926.Liam Gearon, ”Human Rights and Religion”, Sussex Academic Press, 2002 p.331 The Gija people alone recall 10 ten mass killings for this period. Heather McDonald, ”Blood, Bones and Spirit: Aboriginal Christianity in an East Kimberley Town”, Melbourne University Press,2001 p.55. Two others occurred, according to one native informant’s memory, in the 1930s.=== South Australia ===

1893 . Behn River. After an affray in which 23 Aboriginal people were shot and a policeman speared, a punitive expedition was launched in which another 30 Aboriginal people were shot to “teach them a lesson” and instill fear of the white man into the Indigenous population as a whole.

(cite booktitle=’The police appear to be a useless lotup there’: law and order in the East Kimberley 1884-1905last=Owen first=Chris publisher=Australian National University date=2002)(rp112)

7 June 1895 . John Frederick Kelly, an older white man, was charged with manslaughter of Tommy Doyle, one of six Aboriginal people killed at Fernmount near Bellingen, by giving him a bottle of aconitine, claiming it was “fiery rum”, and others subsequently partook of the substance and another five died. A jury found Kelly not guilty. In his defence he claimed to have taken some himself and suffered similar symptoms.

(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article254645676 title=Poisoning at Fernmount newspaper=The Albury Banner and Wodonga Express location=New South Wales, Australia date=9 August 1895 access-date=12December 2020 page=28 via=National Library of Australia)=== Tasmania ===(formerly Van Diemen’s Land){{furtherTasmania#Removal of Aboriginal peopleBlack War}}

1906-7 Canning Stock Route: an unrecorded number of Aboriginal men and women were raped and massacred when Mardu people were captured and tortured to serve as “guides” and reveal the sources of water in the area after being run down by men on horseback, restrained by heavy chains 24 hours a day, and tied to trees at night. In retaliation for this treatment, plus the party’s interference with traditional wells and the theft of cultural artefacts, Aboriginal people destroyed some of Canning’s wells, and stole from and occasionally killed white travellers. A Royal Commission in1908, exonerated Canning, after an appearance by Kimberley Explorer and Lord Mayor of Perth, Alexander Forrest claimed that all explorers had acted in such a fashion.

(<a href=”http://www.remoteareatours.com/history.html Remote AreaTours – History” target = “_blank ” >http://www.remoteareatours.com/history.html Remote AreaTours – History http://{{webarchiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20050829214700/http://www.remoteareatours.com/history.html date=29 August 2005)

1915 Mistake Creek Massacre: In March 1915, Michael Rhatigan, a telegraph linesman based at Turkey Creek, together with his two Aboriginal employees, Joe Wynne and Nipper, shot dead twelve Kija people at Mistake Creek in the East Kimberley. They initially rushed an Aboriginal camp killing six men, burning their remains. Six women were later rounded up and shot dead. A police squad was sent to track down and capture Rhatigan and his accomplices.[1]

Rhatigan and Nipper were arrested while Wynne was shot dead by police. A coroner’s inquest held at Turkey Creek acquitted Rhatigan of any wrongdoing, while Nipper was ordered to face trial for the murder of eight people.[2]

Nipper was found not guilty and was released. He later worked at the police stables in Perth. According to local Aboriginal oral history, the massacre was in reprisal for the killing of Rhatigan’s cow; the cow was later claimed to have been found alive after the massacre had already taken place.[3]

Members of the Gija people, from the Warmun (Turkey Creek) community have depicted the massacre in their artworks.[4]

MichaelRhatigan remained a telegraph linesman at Turkey Creek until his death in1920.[5]

His son, John Rhatigan, became along serving Labor Party politician in the Western Australian Legislative Assembly.[6]

A painting by renowned Indigenous artist Queenie McKenzie depicting the massacre was bought by the National Museum of Australia in 2005, but due to controversy over the facts of the event, part of the History Wars, it had never been hung. From July 2020 it was put on display as part of anew exhibition titled “Talking Blak to History” at the Museum.[7]

[1](cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article26937927 title=SENSATIONALCHARGES. newspaper=The West Australian location=Western Australia date=1 April 1915 access-date=15 January 2020 page=7 via=Trove)

[2](cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article26940262 title=NORTH-WEST SENSATION. newspaper=The West Australian location=Western Australia date=27 April 1915 access-date=15 January 2020 page=8 via=Trove)

[3](cite news author=Deane, William http://url=http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/11/26/1038274302698.html title=Decrying the memories of Mistake Creek is yet further injustice series= Opinion work=Sydney Morning Herald date= 27 November2002 access-date= 17 June 2006 author-link= William Deane)

[4](cite web last1=Carrington first1=Bettytitle=Mistake Creek Massacre url=https://desertriversea.com.au/art/40website=DesertRiverSea access-date=15 January 2020)

[5](cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article27678744title=Family Notices newspaper=The West Australian location=Western Australia date=30 March 1920 access-date=15 January2020 page=1 via=Trove)

[6](citation needed date=July 2020)

[7](citeweb title=Queenie McKenzie’s ‘Mistake Creek Massacre’ displayed byNational Museum after years of controversyfirst =Nikilast =Burnside website=ABC News publisher =Australian Broadcasting Corporation date=22 July 2020 http://url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-22/talking-blak-to-history-indigenous-exhibition-at-national-museum/12472370 access-date=22 July 2020)

1918 Bentinck Island: Part of the Wellesley Islands group, which includes Mornington Island, Bentinck Island was home to the Kaiadilt clan of just over 100 people. In 1911, a man by the name of McKenzie (other names unknown) was given a government lease for nearby Sweers Island that also covered the eastern portion of the much larger Bentinck Island. Arriving on Bentinck with an Aboriginal woman plus a flock of sheep, he built a hut near the Kurumbali estuary. Although the Kaiadilt avoided contact and refrained from approaching McKenzie’s property he is alleged to have often explored the island, shooting any males he found while raping the women. In 1918, McKenzie organised a hunt with an unknown number of settlers from the mainland and, beginning from the northern tip of the island, herded the Indigenous inhabitants to the beach on its southern shore. The majority of the Kaiadilt fled into the sea where those that were not shot from the shore drowned. Those that tried to escape along the beach were hunted down and shot, with the exception of a small number who reached nearby mangroves where the settlers’ horses could not follow. Several young women were raped on the beach, then held prisoner in McKenzie’s hut for three days before being released. As the Kaiadilt remained isolated throughout much of the 20th century, the massacre remained unknown to the authorities until researchers recorded accounts given by survivors in the 1980s.

(cite book last = BruceElder year = 1998 title = Blood on the Wattle: Massacres and maltreatment of Aboriginal Australians since 1788 publisher = NewHolland Publishers pages=203-206 isbn = 978-1-86436-410-1 }}=== Northern Territory ===)

1922 Sturt Creek massacre: of more than a dozen people occurred in October 1922 when policemen were sent out to investigate the murders of two white stockmen, Joseph Condren and Tim O’Sullivan,* at Billiluna Station. For many years the only record of the massacre was the oral histories of local Aboriginal elders who described the police shooting a group of Aboriginal people near Sturt Creek, but forensic evidence has confirmed the deaths.**

*(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article106684934 title=TERRIBLE TRAGEDYnewspaper=Daily Herald volume=XIIIissue=3943 location=South Australia date=7 November 1922 access-date=31 October 2017 page=3 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite webtitle=Forensicstudy of Aboriginal massacre http://sitesurl=http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-01/forensic-science-study-seeks-truth-of-aboriginal-massacres/9001770website=ABC Newsaccess-date=31 October2017language=en-AUdate=1 October 2017)(citeweblast1=Walshefirst1=Keryntitle=Oral testimony of an Aboriginal massacre now supported by scientificevidenceurl=https://theconversation.com/oral-testimony-of-an-aboriginal-massacre-now-supported-by-scientific-evidence-85526website=TheConversationaccess-date=31 October 2017language=en)(citeweblast1=Smithfirst1=Pamela A.title=THE STURT CREEK MASSACRE – SUMMARYOF http://FINALREPORTurl=http://www.flinders.edu.au/ehl/fms/archaeology_files/research/Kimberley%20Frontier/Sturt%20Creek%20-%20Final%20Report%20Summary.pdfwebsite=Department ofArchaeologypublisher=Flinders Universityaccess-date=31 October2017)

1924 Bedford Downs massacre: a group of Gija and Worla men were tried in Wyndham for spearing a milking cow on the Bedford Downs Station. When released from the court they were given dog tags to wear and told to walk the 200 kilometres back to Bedford Downs. On arrival they were set to work to cut the wood that was later used to burn their bodies. Once the work was finished they were fed food laced with strychnine by white station hands and their writhing bodies were the neither shot or they were clubbed to death. The bodies were subsequently burned by the local police. Nevill Drury, Anna Voigt, ”Fire and shadow: spirituality in contemporary Australian art, ”Craftsman House,1996 p.84 This massacre has been depicted in artworks by members of the Gija tribe, the identities of the alleged perpetrators passed down and the events re-enacted in a traditional corroboree that has been performed since the massacre allegedly occurred.* The accounts became widely known after oral histories collected for the 1989 East Kimberley Impact Assessment Project (EKIAP)were published in 1999. As is customary for Indigenous reports, the EKIAP did not name anyone who was dead. Moran was unaware that several of the original written accounts did name not only the eyewitnesses and survivors but also the killers and other whites who were present but did not participate.**

*(http://{{citeweburl=http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2002/s475292.htmtitle=ABC7:30 report access-date=22 November http://2014archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060427165422/http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2002/s475292.htmarchive-date=27 April 2006url-status=dead)

**(http://nma.gov.au/shared/libraries/attachments/review/review_submissions/dr_clement/files/218/Dr_Clement.pdf Review of exhibitions and public programs http://{{webarchiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20070705062249/http://www.nma.gov.au/shared/libraries/attachments/review/review_submissions/dr_clement/files/218/Dr_Clement.pdf date=5 July 2007) National Museum of Australia

June 1926 . Forrest River massacre: Western Australian police constables, James Graham St Jack and Dennis Hastings Regan led a monthlong punitive expedition against Aboriginal people living in the Forrest River region. After the local mission station reported around30 people missing, a police investigation was organised. This investigation found that at least 16 Aboriginal people were killed and their remains burnt in three purpose-built stone ovens. The police investigation led to a Royal Commission the following year. During the proceedings of this commission, the suggestion of the evidence of anative being equal to that of a white man was openly mocked.*

Despite this overt attempt to protect the perpetrators, the Commissioner still found that somewhere between 11 and 20 people were killed and St Jack and Regan were subsequently arrested for murder.**

Instead of going to trial, the men were brought before police magistrate Kidson who, in spite of the findings of the two previous investigations, deemed that the evidence was insufficient to go before a jury.***

Regan and St Jack were released and the Premier, Philip Collier, even re-instated them to their previous positions in the Kimberley.****

*(citenews url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article38008987 title=Mr. GribbleCross-Examined. newspaper=Western Mail volume=XLII issue=2,145location=Western Australia date=10 March 1927 access-date=13 January2018 page=16 via=National Library of Australia)

**(cite newsurl=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article21838926 title=MURDER OF NATIVES.newspaper=The Brisbane Courier issue=21,636 date=1 June 1927access-date=13 January 2018 page=17 via=National Library of Australia)

***(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article154036638 title=RELEASE ORDERED newspaper=The Daily Telegraph volume=XLVII issue=188location=Tasmania date=11 August 1927 access-date=13 January 2018page=3 via=National Library of Australia)

****(cite news url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article233314709 title=Constables Regan and St. Jack newspaper=The Yalgoo Observer And Murchison Chronicle location=Western Australia date=22 March 1928 access-date=13 January 2018 page=3 via=National Library of Australia}}=== Queensland ===)