November 9.
Artwork by Glenn Loughrey
Mass Killings
“..at least 100 were killed in nine known mass killings of six or more, and many others were killed in ones, twos and threes.”
Following the surrender of the Big River and Oyster Bay clans in December 1831 and of another Oyster Bay clan in January, 1832, [Governor] Arthur revoked martial law, reduced the military patrols and disbanded the roving parties. The colonists in the southern, central and eastern parts of the Settled Districts were now in unfettered possession of the land.
In the period between the proclamation of martial law in November 1828 and its revocation in January 1832, at least ninety colonists in the settled Districts were reported killed by the Aborigines. They included at least ten white women and six children. Most were killed in ones and twos, although, in three cases, three to four colonists were killed in one incident. [1] A further 180 colonists are known to have been injured.
Of the 500 Aborigines from the Big River, Oyster Bay, North Midlands and Ben Lomond nations estimated to have been in the Settled Districts in 1828, fewer than 100 of them surrendered to [George] Robinson and his parties in 1830 and 1831. Although others were known to have died from inter-clan warfare or from disease, an estimated 350 were either killed outright or died from gunshot wounds. Of these, at least 100 were killed in nine known mass killings of six or more, and many others were killed in ones, twos and threes. Further mopping-up operations in the country of the North nation along the Meander River between 1832 and 1834 yielded forty more Aboriginal deaths and the loss of ten colonists. In defending their country against the pastoral invaders, the Aboriginal nations in the Settled Districts had indeed paid the supreme sacrifice.
Norman James Brian Plomley, The Aboriginal/Settler Clash in Van Diemen's Land 1803-1831, Launceston: Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, 1992, 73-100.
Acknowledgment: Lyndall Ryan, Tasmanian Aborigines, pp. 141, 373 n.40.
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brown water looting
hardly stopping to think
that adults can hurt you
we'd wander the mudflats alone -
brown water looting
make-shift fishing poles
and mosquito song
for hours and hours
wandering
away from our parents
away,
looking for where the feral pigs slept
or where swamp wallabies crash through
and us, never thinking
about the kids who don't make it home
kids who were just like us,
innocent explorers
brown water looting
with no shoes, no money
no fear
just the eternity of the mudflat
the sun never setting.
Acknowledgment: Samuel Wagan Watson, Of Muse, Meandering And Midnight, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia, 2000, p. 20.