List of massacres of Indigenous Australians
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Numerous clashes involving Indigenous people (on the continent "Australia") occurred during and after a wave of mass immigration of Europeans into the continent, which began in the late 18th century and lasted until the early 20th century. These clashes resulted in significant numbers of deaths – and are considered to be a contributing factor in the decline of the
Indigenous Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention *Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band *Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehorse ...
population during an ongoing process of mass immigration and clearing of land for agricultural purposes. There are over 300 known sites involving clashes with Indigenous people on the continent. There are over nine instances of
mass poisonings of Aboriginal Australians Several recorded instances of mass poisonings of Aboriginal Australians occurred during the European colonisation of Australia. Aboriginal resistance to colonisation led settlers to look for ways to kill or drive them off their land. While th ...
. A project headed by historian
Lyndall Ryan Lyndall Ryan, (born 1943) is an Australian academic and historian. She has held positions in Australian Studies and Women's Studies at Griffith University and Flinders University and was Foundation Professor of Australian Studies and Head of Sc ...
from the University of Newcastle and funded by the
Australian Research Council The Australian Research Council (ARC) is the primary non-medical research funding agency of the Australian Government, distributing more than in grants each year. The Council was established by the ''Australian Research Council Act 2001'', ...
, has been researching and mapping the sites of these clashes. Significant collaborators toward this project include Jonathan Richards from the
University of Queensland , mottoeng = By means of knowledge and hard work , established = , endowment = A$224.3 million , budget = A$2.1 billion , type = Public research university , chancellor = Peter Varghese , vice_chancellor = Deborah Terry , city = B ...
, Jennifer Debenham, Chris Owen, Robyn Smith and Bill Pascoe. The controversial definition of a massacre as being the killing of six or more people has been used, and an interactive map developed. , an estimated 304 cross-cultural clashes have been recorded as having taken place in the period between 1788 and 1930, with some being regarded as possible massacres. The following list tallies some of the clashes of between
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...
people and colonial settlers (or their descendants), most of which took place during the mass-immigration period.


1790s – 1920s


New South Wales


1790s

* July 1791. Governor
Arthur Phillip Admiral Arthur Phillip (11 October 1738 – 31 August 1814) was a British Royal Navy officer who served as the first governor of the Colony of New South Wales. Phillip was educated at Greenwich Hospital School from June 1751 unti ...
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". * April 1794. At
Toongabbie Toongabbie is a suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. One of the oldest suburbs in Sydney, Toongabbie is located approximately 30 kilometres west of the Sydney central business district and is part of the Greater W ...
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. * September 1794. British settlers in the
Hawkesbury River The Hawkesbury River, or Hawkesbury-Nepean River, is a river located northwest of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The Hawkesbury River and its associated main tributary, the Nepean River, almost encircle the metropolitan region of Sydney. ...
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. * 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. * 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. * 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, killing an unknown number. The armed group then returned to Parramatta to rest.
Pemulwuy Pemulwuy (also rendered as Pimbloy, Pemulvoy, Pemulwoy, Pemulwy or Pemulwye, or sometimes by contemporary Europeans as Bimblewove, Bumbleway or Bembulwoyan) (c. 1750 – 2 June 1802) was a Bidjigal man of the Eora nation, born around 1750 in t ...
, 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. * March 1799.
Henry Hacking Henry Hacking (1750 – 21 July 1831) was an Australian seaman and early explorer in New South Wales. He was responsible for shooting and killing the Aboriginal resistance fighter Pemulwuy in 1802. Biography Hacking was quartermaster of , t ...
was ordered by Governor John Hunter to investigate claims of British sailors being trapped by Aboriginal Australians at the mouth of the
Hunter River Hunter River may refer to: *Hunter River (New South Wales), Australia *Hunter River (Western Australia) *Hunter River, New Zealand *Hunter River (Prince Edward Island), Canada **Hunter River, Prince Edward Island, community on Hunter River, Canada ...
to the north of the colony. Hacking encountered a group of
Awabakal The Awabakal people , are those Aboriginal Australians who identify with or are descended from the Awabakal tribe and its clans, Indigenous to the coastal area of what is now known as the Hunter Region of New South Wales. Their traditional te ...
people on the south side of the river who informed him that the sailors had left earlier on foot, endeavouring to walk back to Sydney. Hacking did not believe them and became agitated, shooting dead four Awabakal men. The sailors later arrived in Sydney having walked the distance to return.


1800s

* March 1806. A group of
Yuin people The Yuin nation, also spelt Djuwin, is a group of Australian Aboriginal peoples from the South Coast of New South Wales. All Yuin people share ancestors who spoke, as their first language, one or more of the Yuin language dialects. Sub-group ...
, resident to what the British named
Twofold Bay Twofold Bay is an open oceanic embayment that is located in the South Coast region of New South Wales, Australia. The bay was named by George Bass, for its shape of two bights. The northern bight is called Calle Calle Bay; while the southern ...
, attempted to forcibly remove a gang of eleven
sealers Sealer may refer either to a person or ship engaged in seal hunting, or to a sealant; associated terms include: Seal hunting * Sealer Hill, South Shetland Islands, Antarctica * Sealers' Oven, bread oven of mud and stone built by sealers around 18 ...
encamped on their land. After spears had been thrown, the sealers opened fire on them with
musket A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually d ...
s, killing nine, with the remainder fleeing. The bodies were hung overnight from nearby trees, in an attempt to intimidate the other Yuin.


1810s

* 1816.
Appin massacre Appin is a town in the Macarthur, New South Wales, Macarthur Region on Tharawal country near its boundary with Gandangara country, New South Wales, Australia in Wollondilly Shire. It is situated about south of Campbelltown, New South Wales, Cam ...
.
New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...
Governor Macquarie Major General Lachlan Macquarie, CB (; gd, Lachann MacGuaire; 31 January 1762 – 1 July 1824) was a British Army officer and colonial administrator from Scotland. Macquarie served as the fifth Governor of New South Wales from 1810 to 1821, an ...
sent soldiers against the
Gundungurra The Gundungurra people, also spelt Gundungara, Gandangarra, Gandangara and other variations, are an Aboriginal Australian people in south-eastern New South Wales, Australia. Their traditional lands include present day Goulburn, Wollondilly Shire ...
and
Dharawal The Dharawal people, also spelt Tharawal and other variants, are an Aboriginal Australian people, identified by the Dharawal language. Traditionally, they lived as hunter–fisher–gatherers in family groups or clans with ties of kinship, s ...
people on their lands along the Cataract River, a tributary of the Nepean River (south of Sydney), in reprisal for violent conflicts with white settlers (in which several died) in the adjoining Nepean and Cowpastures 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 17 April, at around , 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. *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 The Minnamurra River, an open mature wave dominated barrier estuary, is located in the Illawarra region of New South Wales, Australia. Location and features Minnamurra River rises within the Budderoo National Park on the eastern slopes of ...
on the pretext that they were retrieving two muskets lent to a group of Aboriginal people living on the river.


1820s

* 1824. Bathurst massacre. Following the killing of seven Europeans by Aboriginal people around
Bathurst, New South Wales Bathurst () is a city in the Central Tablelands of New South Wales, Australia. Bathurst is about 200 kilometres (120 mi) west-northwest of Sydney and is the seat of the Bathurst Regional Council. Bathurst is the oldest inland settlement in ...
, and a battle between three stockmen and a warband over stolen cattle which left 16 Aboriginal Australians dead, Governor Brisbane declared
martial law Martial law is the imposition of direct military control of normal civil functions or suspension of civil law by a government, especially in response to an emergency where civil forces are overwhelmed, or in an occupied territory. Use Marti ...
to restore order and was able to report a cessation 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. * 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 blacks and 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 Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...
to be tried, but managed to escape punishment.". Historian
Lyndall Ryan Lyndall Ryan, (born 1943) is an Australian academic and historian. She has held positions in Australian Studies and Women's Studies at Griffith University and Flinders University and was Foundation Professor of Australian Studies and Head of Sc ...
, after studying other evidence, thinks 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 300 people. *1827. 12
Gringai Gringai otherwise known as ''Guringay'', is the name for one of the Australian Aboriginal people who were recorded as inhabiting an area of the Hunter Valley in eastern New South Wales, north of Sydney. They were united by a common language, stron ...
Aboriginal Australians were shot dead for killing in reprisal a convict who had shot one of their camp dogs dead.


1830s

*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. Of those shot, two were an elderly couple and another was a pregnant woman. *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 Bowman River, a perennial river of the Gloucester River catchment, is located in the Upper Hunter district of New South Wales, Australia. Course and features Bowman River rises on the eastern slopes of the Great Dividing Range, near Upper Bow ...
. Unburied, their bones could be seen there for years. * 11 July 1835. The expedition team of Thomas Mitchell, during their journey to the
Darling River The Darling River (Paakantyi: ''Baaka'' or ''Barka'') is the third-longest river in Australia, measuring from its source in northern New South Wales to its conflu ence with the Murray River at Wentworth, New South Wales. Including its long ...
, 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". * 27 May 1836.
Mount Dispersion massacre Mount Dispersion, in south-western New South Wales, is the location of the massacre of Aboriginal Australians by Major Thomas Mitchell on 27 May 1836. Officially recognised as an Aboriginal place under the ''National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974 ...
. 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 The Murray River (in South Australia: River Murray) (Ngarrindjeri: ''Millewa'', Yorta Yorta: ''Tongala'') is a river in Southeastern Australia. It is Australia's longest river at extent. Its tributaries include five of the next six longest r ...
, 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, 16 men 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. * 26 January 1838. The
Waterloo Creek massacre The Waterloo Creek massacre (also Slaughterhouse Creek massacre) refers to a series of violent clashes between mounted police, civilian vigilantes and Indigenous Gamilaraay peoples, which occurred southwest of Moree, New South Wales, Australi ...
, also known as the Australia Day massacre. A
New South Wales Mounted Police The New South Wales Mounted Police Unit is a mounted section of the New South Wales Police Force. Founded by Governor Thomas Brisbane, on 7 September 1825, the Mounted Police were recruited from a British military regiment stationed in NSW at th ...
detachment, despatched by acting
Lieutenant Governor of New South Wales The Lieutenant-Governor of New South Wales is a government position in the State of New South Wales, Australia, acting as a deputy to the Governor of New South Wales. The office was first created in October 1786, before the arrival of the Fir ...
Colonel
Kenneth Snodgrass Kenneth Snodgrass (1784 – 14 October 1853) was a Scottish-born soldier and colonial administrator. He acted as lieutenant-governor of Van Diemen's Land and governor of New South Wales for brief periods. Early life Snodgrass was born in ...
, attacked an encampment of
Kamilaroi The Gamilaraay, also known as Gomeroi, Kamilaroi, Kamillaroi and other variations, are an Aboriginal Australian people whose lands extend from New South Wales to southern Queensland. They form one of the four largest Indigenous nations in Aust ...
people at a place called Waterloo Creek in remote bushland. Official reports spoke of between 8 and 50 killed. The missionary
Lancelot Threlkeld Lancelot Edward Threlkeld (20 October 1788 – 10 October 1859) was an English missionary, primarily based in Australia. He was married twice and survived by sons and daughters from both marriages. Thelkeld is known for his work with Biraban i ...
set the number at 120 as part of his campaign to garner support for his Mission. Threlkeld later claimed Major Nunn boasted they had killed 200 to 300 black Australians, a statement endorsed by historian Roger Milliss. Other estimates range from 40 to 70. * 1838.
Myall Creek massacre The Myall Creek massacre was the killing of at least twenty-eight unarmed Indigenous Australians by twelve colonists on 10 June 1838 at the Myall Creek near the Gwydir River, in northern New South Wales. After two trials, seven of the twelve c ...
– 10 June: 28 people killed at Myall Creek near
Bingara Bingara (Aboriginal for 'creek') is a small town on the Gwydir River in Murchison County in the New England region of New South Wales, Australia. Bingara is currently the administrative centre for the Gwydir Shire that was created in 2003. The ...
, 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, a new 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. *1838. In about the middle of the year at
Gwydir River Gwydir River (locally wɑe̯də, a major inland perennial river of the Barwon catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is located in the Northern Tablelands, North West Slopes, and Orana districts of New South Wales, Australia. Th ...
. A "war of extirpation", according to local magistrate Edward Denny Day, was waged all along the
Gwydir River Gwydir River (locally wɑe̯də, a major inland perennial river of the Barwon catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is located in the Northern Tablelands, North West Slopes, and Orana districts of New South Wales, Australia. Th ...
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". * 28 November 1838. Charles Eyles, William Allen and James Dunn (employees of Gwydir River squatter Robert Crawford) shot dead nine
Gamilaraay The Gamilaraay, also known as Gomeroi, Kamilaroi, Kamillaroi and other variations, are an Aboriginal Australian people whose lands extend from New South Wales to southern Queensland. They form one of the four largest Indigenous nations in Aust ...
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. * 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 River The Murray River (in South Australia: River Murray) (Ngarrindjeri: ''Millewa'', Yorta Yorta: ''Tongala'') is a river in Southeastern Australia. It is Australia's longest river at extent. Its tributaries include five of the next six longest r ...
s in
New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...
. (extracts from ''Australian dictionary of dates and men of the time: containing the history of Australasia from 1542 to May 1879'' Published 1879)


1840s

*June 1841. Major Henry Robert Oakes, the Crown Lands Commissioner for the
Macleay River The Macleay River is a river that spans the Northern Tablelands and Mid North Coast districts of New South Wales, Australia. Course and features Formed by the confluence of the Gara River, Salisbury Waters and Bakers Creek, the Macleay River r ...
District was returning from an overland expedition to the Clarence River with his Border Police troopers, when they encountered some strong Aboriginal resistance. Around 20 Aboriginal people were killed and a Government enquiry was proposed. Oakes' paramilitary brigade had previously shot dead at least three Aboriginal people at William Forster's nearby pastoral run in the preceding year. *27 August 1841. The
Rufus River massacre The Rufus River Massacre was a massacre of 30–40 Aboriginal people that took place in 1841 along the Rufus River, in the Central Murray region, after three consecutive ambushes with " overlanders" (stock drovers) on the recently opened overla ...
, various estimates – between 30 and 40 deaths. *24 October 1841. British pastoralists William Lee, Joseph Moulder and Andrew Kerr, together with troopers of the
New South Wales Mounted Police The New South Wales Mounted Police Unit is a mounted section of the New South Wales Police Force. Founded by Governor Thomas Brisbane, on 7 September 1825, the Mounted Police were recruited from a British military regiment stationed in NSW at th ...
conducted a massacre of at least twelve Aboriginal people at Duck Creek on the
Bogan River Bogan River, a perennial river that is part of the Macquarie– Barwon catchment within the Murray–Darling basin, is located in the central west and Orana regions of New South Wales, Australia. From its origin near Parkes, the Bogan River ...
after local Aboriginal men killed three stockmen there. *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 the 1842 "Pelican Creek tragedy". *From 1838 to 1851. during the spread of pastoral stations along the
Macleay River The Macleay River is a river that spans the Northern Tablelands and Mid North Coast districts of New South Wales, Australia. Course and features Formed by the confluence of the Gara River, Salisbury Waters and Bakers Creek, the Macleay River r ...
, it is estimated that some 15 massacres took place of the Indigenous peoples of this
Djangadi The Djangadi people, also spelt Dhungatti, Dainggati, Tunggutti or Dunghutti are an Aboriginal Australian people resident in the Macleay Valley of northern New South Wales. Language Dhanggati / Dunghutti belongs to the Yuin–Kuric languag ...
area. *29 November 1847. Kangaroo Creek poisoning.
Thomas Coutts Thomas Coutts (7 September 1735 – 24 February 1822) was a British banker. He was a founder of the banking house Coutts, Coutts & Co. Early life Coutts was the fourth son of Jean (née Steuart) Coutts and John Coutts (merchant), John Coutts (1 ...
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. *April 1849. Frederick Walker and his newly formed
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
troopers shot dead five Aboriginal people on the Darling River 100 km south of Bourke. *1849. Massacre of Muruwari people at
Hospital Creek Hospital Creek, originally Arroyo de Ospital, or Arroyo del Osnital is a tributary of the San Joaquin River draining eastern slopes of a part of the Diablo Range within San Joaquin County. The creek is approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. ...
in
Brewarrina Brewarrina (pronounced 'bree-warren-ah'; locally known as "Bre") is a town in north-west New South Wales, Australia on the banks of the Barwon River in Brewarrina Shire. The name Brewarrina is derived from 'burru waranha', a Weilwan name for a s ...
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. *1849. Massacre of Aboriginal people at Butchers Tree near Brewarrina, along the Barwon River, and on the Narran River.


1850s

* 1854. East Ballina massacre. Around 40 Aboriginal people were killed with many more wounded during an early morning
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
raid.


1890s

* 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 Aconitine is an alkaloid toxin produced by various plant species belonging to the genus ''Aconitum'' (family Ranunculaceae), known also commonly by the names wolfsbane and monkshood. Monkshood is notorious for its toxic properties. Aconitine is ...
, 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.


Tasmania

(formerly
Van Diemen's Land Van Diemen's Land was the colonial name of the island of Tasmania used by the British during the European exploration of Australia in the 19th century. A British settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land in 1803 before it became a sepa ...
)


1800s

*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 Risdon Cove is a cove located on the east bank of the Derwent River, approximately north of Hobart, Tasmania. It was the site of the first British settlement in Van Diemen's Land, now Tasmania, the island state of Australia. The cove was name ...
when a large number came upon the 75–80 colonists there.


1820s

* 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 a fire 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. *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."'' *1828. On 10 February – Cape Grim massacre,
Cape Grim Cape Grim, officially Kennaook / Cape Grim, is the northwestern point of Tasmania, Australia. The Peerapper name for the cape is recorded as ''Kennaook''. It is the location of the Cape Grim Baseline Air Pollution Station and of the Cape Gri ...
, Van Diemen's Land. Four shepherds of the substantial
Van Diemen's Land Company The Van Diemen's Land Company (also known as Van Dieman Land Company) is a farming corporation in the Australian state of Tasmania. It was founded in 1825 and received a royal charter the same year, and was granted 250,000 acres (1,000 km2) ...
ambushed and killed 30 Pennemukeer Aboriginal people. Company men had killed another 12 Aboriginal people only days earlier.Jan Roberts, pp1-9, ''Jack of Cape Grim'', Greenhouse Publications, 1986 Lyndall Ryan, pp135-137, ''The Aboriginal Tasmanians'', Allen & Unwin, 1996, Historian
Keith Windschuttle Keith Windschuttle (born 1942) is an Australian historian and former board member of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. He was editor of '' Quadrant'' from 2007 to 2015 when he became chair of the board and editor-in-chief. He was the pub ...
has disputed the numbers and other aspects of the event. *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. * 1828–1832. The
Black War } The Black War was a period of violent conflict between British Empire, British colonists and Aboriginal Tasmanians in Tasmania from the mid-1820s to 1832. The conflict, fought largely as a guerrilla war by both sides, claimed the lives of 600 ...
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 Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
in the early years of the 19th century. The conflict has been described as a
genocide Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Latin ...
resulting in the elimination of the full-blood Tasmanian Aboriginal population which had numbered somewhere between 1,500 and 22,000 prior to colonisation. 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 discover 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. By 1830 the number of Tasmanians in the north-east was 74, with a further 70 or 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 Port Phillip ( Kulin: ''Narm-Narm'') or Port Phillip Bay is a horsehead-shaped enclosed bay on the central coast of southern Victoria, Australia. The bay opens into the Bass Strait via a short, narrow channel known as The Rip, and is com ...
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. It is estimated that massacres by white settlers resulted in the death of approximately 11% of the Aboriginal population between 1836 and 1851.


1830s

* 1833–1834.
Convincing Ground massacre The Convincing Ground Massacre was a massacre of the Indigenous Gunditjmara people Kilcarer gundidj clan by British settler whalers based at Portland Bay in South-Eastern Australia. It was part of the wider Eumeralla Wars between the British col ...
of
Gunditjmara The Gunditjmara or Gunditjamara, also known as Dhauwurd Wurrung, are an Aboriginal Australian people of southwestern Victoria. They are the traditional owners of the areas now encompassing Warrnambool, Port Fairy, Woolsthorpe and Portland. Their ...
: On the shore near
Portland, Victoria Portland is a city in Victoria, Australia, and is the oldest European settlement in the state. It is also the main urban centre in the Shire of Glenelg and is located on Portland Bay. As of the 2021 census the population was 10,016, increasin ...
was one of the largest recorded
massacre A massacre is the killing of a large number of people or animals, especially those who are not involved in any fighting or have no way of defending themselves. A massacre is generally considered to be morally unacceptable, especially when per ...
s in Victoria. Whalers and the local Kilcarer clan of the Gunditjmara people disputed rights to a beached whale carcass. Reports vary with from 60 to 200 Aboriginal Australians killed, including women and children.Martin Boulton,
Anger over plans to build on massacre site
',
The Age ''The Age'' is a daily newspaper in Melbourne, Australia, that has been published since 1854. Owned and published by Nine Entertainment, ''The Age'' primarily serves Victoria (Australia), Victoria, but copies also sell in Tasmania, the Austral ...
, 28 January 2005. Accessed 26 November 2008
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 Excerpt also published o
Museum Victoria website
, accessed 26 November 2008
* 1838. Up to 100 Aboriginal people were killed in reprisals carried out in response to the Faithfull Massacre, also known as the Battle of Broken River and according to historian Chris Clark "a battle which the Aborigines won". On 11 April, by the Broken River at
Benalla Benalla is a small city located on the Broken River gateway to the High Country north-eastern region of Victoria, Australia, about north east of the state capital Melbourne. At the the population was 10,822. It is the administrative cent ...
, a party of some 18 men, employees of George and William Faithfull, were searching out new land to the south of
Wangaratta Wangaratta ( ) is a city in the northeast of Victoria, Australia, from Melbourne along the Hume Highway. The city had an estimated urban population of 19,318 at June 2018. Wangaratta has recorded a population growth rate of almost 1% annually ...
for their livestock, when they were attacked by about 20
Indigenous Australians Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...
(possibly as a reprisal for the killing of several Aboriginal people at
Ovens upA double oven A ceramic oven An oven is a tool which is used to expose materials to a hot environment. Ovens contain a hollow chamber and provide a means of heating the chamber in a controlled way. In use since antiquity, they have been us ...
earlier by the same stockmen). At least one
Koori Koori (also spelt koorie, goori or goorie) is a demonym for Aboriginal Australians from a region that approximately corresponds to southern New South Wales and Victoria. The word derives from the Indigenous language Awabakal. For some people ...
and eight
European European, or Europeans, or Europeneans, may refer to: In general * ''European'', an adjective referring to something of, from, or related to Europe ** Ethnic groups in Europe ** Demographics of Europe ** European cuisine, the cuisines of Europe ...
s died. There were reports of reprisals at
Wangaratta Wangaratta ( ) is a city in the northeast of Victoria, Australia, from Melbourne along the Hume Highway. The city had an estimated urban population of 19,318 at June 2018. Wangaratta has recorded a population growth rate of almost 1% annually ...
and at Murchison (led by the native police under
Henry Dana Henry Edmund Pulteney Dana (1820–1852) established the Native Police Corps in the Port Phillip District (later Victoria) in 1842, he was responsible for two massacres of Aboriginal people one at Barmah Lake in 1843 and the other at Snowy River i ...
and in the company of the young
Edward Curr Edward Curr (1 July 1798 – 16 November 1850) was an Australian settler and politician. Curr was born in Sheffield, England. He travelled to Hobart Town, arriving in February 1820. In 1823 he returned to England. In 1824 he was appointed ma ...
, who said that he took issue with the official reports). Other incidents were recorded at Mitchelton and
Toolamba Toolamba is a town in the Goulburn Valley region of Victoria, Australia. It is in the City of Greater Shepparton local government area, north of the state capital, Melbourne. At the , Toolamba and the surrounding area had a population of 873. ...
. *1838. The
Mount Cottrell massacre The Mount Cottrell massacre involved the murder of an estimated 10 Wathaurong people near Mount Cottrell, Victoria, Mount Cottrell in the colony of Victoria in 1836, in retaliation for the killing of two European settlers. Description On 16 Jul ...
of around 10
Wathaurong The Wathaurong nation, also called the Wathaurung, Wadawurrung and Wadda Wurrung, are an Aboriginal Australian people living in the area near Melbourne, Geelong and the Bellarine Peninsula in the state of Victoria. They are part of the Kulin all ...
people was carried out in retaliation for the killing of squatter Charles Franks and his convict shepherd Thomas Flinders. *1838. The Waterloo Plains massacre of between 8 and 23
Dja Dja Wurrung Dja Dja Wurrung (Pronounced Ja-Ja-war-rung), also known as the Djaara or Jajowrong people and Loddon River tribe, are an Aboriginal Australian people who are the Traditional owners of lands including the watersheds of the Loddon and Avoca riv ...
people was a reprisal raid for the killing of two station hands and the theft of sheep. * 1839. In about May–June of that year the
Campaspe Plains massacre Campaspe (; Greek: Καμπάσπη, ''Kampaspē''), or Pancaste (; Greek: Πανκάστη, ''Pankastē''; also ''Pakate''), was a supposed mistress of Alexander the Great and a prominent citizen of Larissa in Thessaly. No Campaspe appears in ...
, Campaspe Creek, Central Victoria, killing
Taungurung The Taungurung people, also spelt ''Daung Wurrung'', are an Aboriginal people who are one of the Kulin nations in present-day Victoria, Australia. They consist of nine clans whose traditional language is the Taungurung language. Their Country ...
and
Dja Dja Wurrung Dja Dja Wurrung (Pronounced Ja-Ja-war-rung), also known as the Djaara or Jajowrong people and Loddon River tribe, are an Aboriginal Australian people who are the Traditional owners of lands including the watersheds of the Loddon and Avoca riv ...
people. In May 1839, Taungurung killed two shepherds in reprisal for the murder of three Taungurung the previous month. An armed party of settlers led by station owner Charles Hutton killed up to 40 Taungurung at a campsite near Campaspe Creek. The following month, Hutton led an armed party of police who killed six Dja Dja 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." * 1839. In about the middle of the year, the
Murdering Gully massacre Murdering Gully, formerly known as Puuroyup to the Djargurd Wurrung people, is the site of an 1839 massacre of 35–40 people of the ''Tarnbeere Gundidj'' clan of the Djargurd Wurrung in the Camperdown district of Victoria, Australia. It is a ...
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 Wurrung The Djargurd Wurrong (also spelt Djargurd Wurrung) are Aboriginal Australian people of the Western district of the State of Victoria, and traditionally occupied the territory between Mount Emu Creek and Lake Corangamite. Language The Djargu ...
people, around 35–40 people, was wiped out. Public censure led to Taylor's River being renamed
Mount Emu Creek The Mount Emu Creek, (Aboriginal Australian:''Tarnpirr'') a perennial creek of the Glenelg Hopkins catchment, is located in the Western District of Victoria, Australia. Course and features The Mount Emu Creek is a long and small meanderi ...
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, first hand accounts of the incident, the detail in settler diaries, records of
Wesleyan Wesleyan theology, otherwise known as Wesleyan– Arminian theology, or Methodist theology, is a theological tradition in Protestant Christianity based upon the ministry of the 18th-century evangelical reformer brothers John Wesley and Charles W ...
missionaries, and Aboriginal Protectorate records. *1 December 1839. The
Blood Hole massacre The Blood Hole massacre occurred in what is now the Australian state of Victoria at Middle Creek, from Glengower Station between Clunes and Newstead at the end of 1839 or early 1840, killing an unknown number of Aboriginals from the Grampian ...
at Middle Creek, 10–11 kilometres (6–7 mi) from Glengower Station between Clunes and Newstead, Victoria. Up to ten Aboriginal people were killed.


1840s

*1840–1850. The
Gippsland massacres The Gippsland massacres were a series of mass murders of Gunai Kurnai people, an Aboriginal Australian people living in East Gippsland, Victoria, committed by European settlers and the Aboriginal Police during the Australian frontier wars. ...
, many led by the Scots pastoralist
Angus McMillan Angus McMillan (14 August 1810 – 18 May 1865) was a Scottish-born explorer, pioneer pastoralist, and perpetrator of several of the Gippsland massacres of Gunai people. Arriving first in New South Wales in 1838, McMillan rose swiftly in Au ...
, saw between 300 and 1,000 Gunai (or Kurnai) people murdered.Gardner, P.D.. (2001), ''Gippsland massacres: the destruction of the Kurnai tribes, 1800–1860'', Ngarak Press, Essay, Victoria *1840–1860. The
Eumeralla Wars The Eumeralla Wars were the violent encounters over the possession of land between British colonists and Gunditjmara Aboriginal people in what is now called the Western District area of south west Victoria. The wars are named after the region ...
between European settlers and
Gunditjmara The Gunditjmara or Gunditjamara, also known as Dhauwurd Wurrung, are an Aboriginal Australian people of southwestern Victoria. They are the traditional owners of the areas now encompassing Warrnambool, Port Fairy, Woolsthorpe and Portland. Their ...
people in south west Victoria included a number of massacres resulting in over 442 Aboriginal deaths. *1840. On 8 March. Known as the Fighting Hills massacre, the Whyte brothers massacred, according to various estimates, from 20 to 51
Jardwadjali The Jardwadjali (Yartwatjali), also known as the Jaadwa, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the state of Victoria, whose traditional lands occupy the lands in the upper Wimmera River watershed east to Gariwerd (Grampians) and west to Lake Bri ...
men, women, and children on the Konongwootong run near
Hamilton, Victoria Hamilton is a large town in south-western Victoria, Australia, at the intersection of the Glenelg Highway and the Henty Highway. The Hamilton Highway connects it to Geelong. Hamilton is in the federal Division of Wannon, and is in the Southern ...
. Aboriginal tradition puts the death toll as high as 80. *1840. The
Fighting Waterholes massacre In April 1840 the Fighting Waterholes massacre of up to 60 Jardwadjali Aboriginal people of the Konongwootong Gundidj clan occurred near the current day Konongwootong reservoir (then known as Den Hills creek), near present-day Coleraine, Victoria, ...
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". *1842. The Lubra Creek massacre of five
Dhauwurd wurrung The Gunditjmara or Gunditjamara, also known as Dhauwurd Wurrung, are an Aboriginal Australian people of southwestern Victoria. They are the traditional owners of the areas now encompassing Warrnambool, Port Fairy, Woolsthorpe and Portland. Thei ...
people took place on the
Caramut Caramut is a town in the Western District of Victoria, Australia on the Hamilton Highway. It is in the Shire of Moyne local government area and the federal Division of Wannon. The name "Caramut" is believed to be derived from the Aborigi ...
run, leased by Thomas Osbrey and Sidney Smith at the time. *1843. The Warrigal Creek massacre, which left 100–150 Aboriginal people dead. *1846. George Smythe's surveying party shot in cold blood from 7 to 9 Aboriginal people, all but one women and children, near
Cape Otway Cape Otway is a cape and a bounded locality of the Colac Otway Shire in southern Victoria, Australia on the Great Ocean Road; much of the area is enclosed in the Great Otway National Park. History Cape Otway was originally inhabited by the Gadub ...
. Known as the Blanket Bay massacre


Western Australia


1830s

* 1830.
Fremantle Fremantle () () is a port city in Western Australia, located at the mouth of the Swan River in the metropolitan area of Perth, the state capital. Fremantle Harbour serves as the port of Perth. The Western Australian vernacular diminutive for ...
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. * 1834. Pinjarra: Conflict with the Murray tribe - official records state that 14 Aboriginal people were killed, but other accounts put the figure much higher, at 25 or more. *1836. August,
Henry William St Pierre Bunbury Colonel Henry William St Pierre Bunbury CB (2 September 1812 – 18 September 1875) was a British Army officer who served for periods in Australia, South Africa, and India. Early life Bunbury was the son of Lt.-Gen. Sir Henry Bunbury, 7th Baro ...
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 11 Aboriginal men he killed during this period. Settlers to the district collected ears of Aboriginal men slain.


1840s

*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." Also known as the
Wonnerup massacre The Wonnerup massacre, also known as the Wonnerup "Minninup" massacre , was the killing of dozens of Waadandi Noongar people by European settlers in the vicinity of Wonnerup, Western Australia in February 1841. The massacre on Waadandi-Doonan lan ...
.


1850s

* 5 June 1854. The commanding officer of the Western Australian
native police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
, 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 their refuge at Bootenal swamp. Follow up raids occurred on the Aboriginal people living on the Irwin, Bowes and Chapman Rivers around
Geraldton Geraldton ( Wajarri: ''Jambinu'', Wilunyu: ''Jambinbirri'') is a coastal city in the Mid West region of the Australian state of Western Australia, north of the state capital, Perth. At June 2018, Geraldton had an urban population of 37,648. ...
.


1860s

* 1865. The La Grange expedition was a search expedition carried out in the vicinity of La Grange Bay in the
Kimberley region of Western Australia The Kimberley is the northernmost of the nine regions of Western Australia. It is bordered on the west by the Indian Ocean, on the north by the Timor Sea, on the south by the Great Sandy and Tanami deserts in the region of the Pilbara, an ...
led by
Maitland Brown Maitland Brown (17 July 18438 July 1905) was an explorer, politician and pastoralist in colonial Western Australia. He is known as the leader of the La Grange expedition and massacre, which searched for and recovered the bodies of three colon ...
that led to the death of up to 20 Aboriginal people. The expedition has been celebrated with the Explorers' Monument in
Fremantle, Western Australia Fremantle () () is a port city in Western Australia, located at the mouth of the Swan River in the metropolitan area of Perth, the state capital. Fremantle Harbour serves as the port of Perth. The Western Australian vernacular diminutive for ...
. * 1867. The ''Battle of Minderoo'' at
Minderoo Station Minderoo Station, commonly referred to as Minderoo, is a pastoral lease that once operated as a sheep station but now operates as a cattle station in Western Australia. Description It is situated about south of Onslow and west of Pannawon ...
, led by Farquhar MacRae and E. T. Hooley. * 1868. Flying Foam Massacre,
Dampier Archipelago The Dampier Archipelago is a group of 42 islands near the town of Dampier in the Pilbara, Western Australia. The archipelago is also made up of reefs, shoals, channels and straits and is the traditional home of five Aboriginal language group ...
. 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 Pastoralism is a form of animal husbandry where domesticated animals (known as "livestock") are released onto large vegetated outdoor lands (pastures) for grazing, historically by nomadic people who moved around with their herds. The animal s ...
Alexander McRae and
John Withnell John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second ...
, killed an unknown number of Yaburara. Estimates of the number of dead range from 20 to 150.


1870s

*1872. Governor
Frederick Weld Sir Frederick Aloysius Weld (9 May 1823 – 20 July 1891), was a New Zealand politician and a governor of various British colonies. He was the List of Prime Ministers of New Zealand, sixth Prime Minister of New Zealand, premier of New Zealand, ...
dismissed Perth Police magistrate E. W. Landor for failing to charge Geraldton drover Mr. Lockier Burges (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.


1880s

* 1887.
Halls Creek Halls is a plural of the word hall. Halls may also refer to: People * Walter Halls (1871–1953), British trade unionist and politician * Ethel May Halls (1882–1967), American actress * Julian Halls (born 1967), British field hockey player * ...
.
Mary Durack Dame Mary Durack (20 February 1913 – 16 December 1994) was an Australian author and historian. She wrote ''Kings in Grass Castles'' and ''Keep Him My Country''. Childhood Mary Durack, born in Adelaide, South Australia, to Michael Patrick ...
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. When a prospector named George Barnett from the
Panton River Panton River is a river in the Kimberley (Western Australia), Kimberley region of Western Australia. The river rises below Alice Hill and it flows in an easterly direction before discharging into the Ord River on the southern edge of Purnululu ...
was killed by Aborigines, a punitive party set out to "disperse the blacks". During the three week expedition, the group had "dispersed" over 600 men, women and children, with a newspaper reporting "only six niggers butchered". They also brought back two small Aboriginal boys with them as "trophies". One of the punitive expedition's leaders, Augustus Lucanus, remembers dispersing around 200 Aboriginal people in this incident while
Mary Durack Dame Mary Durack (20 February 1913 – 16 December 1994) was an Australian author and historian. She wrote ''Kings in Grass Castles'' and ''Keep Him My Country''. Childhood Mary Durack, born in Adelaide, South Australia, to Michael Patrick ...
wrote that it was one of the most sweeping massacres in the region's history with one participant alone killing 35 Aboriginal people. The Government Resident of Roebourne stated that 70 were killed.


1890s

* 1890–1926. Kimberley regionThe Killing TimesEast 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 only 1% of the white population dwelt. Violent means were used to drive off the Aboriginal tribes, who were hounded by police and pastoralists alike without judicial protection. The Indigenous peoples reacted with payback killings. Possibly hundreds were killed in the
Derby Derby ( ) is a city and unitary authority area in Derbyshire, England. It lies on the banks of the River Derwent in the south of Derbyshire, which is in the East Midlands Region. It was traditionally the county town of Derbyshire. Derby gai ...
,
Fitzroy Crossing Fitzroy or FitzRoy may refer to: People As a given name *Several members of the Somerset family (Dukes of Beaufort) have this as a middle-name: ** FitzRoy Somerset, 1st Baron Raglan (1788–1855) ** Henry Charles FitzRoy Somerset, 8th Duke of Bea ...
and
Margaret River The Margaret River is a river in southwest Western Australia. In a small catchment, it is the eponym of the town and tourist region of Margaret River. The river arises from a catchment of just 40 square kilometres in the Whicher Range. ...
area, while
Jandamarra Jandamarra or Tjandamurra (c. 1873—1 April 1897), known to European settlers as Pigeon,
in: Taylor (2004)
w ...
was being hunted down. Reprisals, and the "villainous effects" of settler policy left the Kimberley Aboriginal people decimated. Massacres in retaliation for attacks on livestock are recorded as late as 1926. The Gija people alone recall 10 ten mass killings for this period. * 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. * 11 November 1895.
Ivanhoe Station Ivanhoe or Ivanhoe Station is a pastoral lease and cattle station located just north of Kununurra in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. Founded in 1893 by the Durack brothers, station is presently owned by the Consolidated Pastoral C ...
A group of police and trackers followed a group of Aboriginal people to a camp-site after they were alleged to have stolen cattle. About 20 Aboriginal people were shot and killed after they tried to flee. One of the participants in this massacre, Constable Mick Rhatigan, was later implicated in the 1915
Mistake Creek massacre The Mistake Creek massacre was a massacre of Indigenous Australians that took place in Western Australia in 1915. Massacre On 28 March 1915, between 8 and 32 Gija people were shot and killed, and their bodies burned, at Mistake Creek in the ...
.


South Australia


1840s

*1842.
Pillaworta Station Charles Christian Dutton (presumed died 1842) was a pastoralist in the Colony of South Australia who disappeared, believed murdered by Aboriginal people, while driving cattle from Port Lincoln to Adelaide in July 1842. Origins Dutton was born i ...
, end of Arno Bay,
Eyre Peninsula The Eyre Peninsula is a triangular peninsula in South Australia. It is bounded by the Spencer Gulf on the east, the Great Australian Bight on the west, and the Gawler Ranges to the north. Originally called Eyre’s Peninsula, it was named aft ...
– unknown number of Aboriginal people killed by soldiers in retribution for the killings of colonists in the Port Lincoln district earlier in 1842. * 1848.
Avenue Range Station massacre The Avenue Range Station massacre was a murder of a group of Aboriginal Australians by white settlers during the Australian frontier wars. It occurred in about September 1848 at Avenue Range, a sheep station in the southeast of the Colony of ...
(near
Guichen Bay Guichen Bay, (French: Baie de Guichen) is a bay located on the south-east coast of the Australian state of South Australia about northwest of the regional city of Mount Gambier and about south-southeast of the state capital of Adelaide. It wa ...
on the state's
Limestone Coast The Limestone Coast is a name used since the early twenty-first century for a South Australian government region located in the south east of South Australia which immediately adjoins the continental coastline and the Victorian border. The ...
) – at least 9 indigenous Buandig Wattatonga clan people allegedly murdered by the station owner
James Brown James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honor ...
who was subsequently charged with the crime. The case was dropped by the Crown for lack of (European) witnesses. Christina Smith's source from the Wattatonga tribe refers to 11 people killed in this incident by two white men. * 1849.
Waterloo Bay massacre The Waterloo Bay massacre, also known as the Elliston massacre, was a clash between European settlers and Aboriginal Australians that took place on the cliffs of Waterloo Bay near Elliston, South Australia, in late May 1849. Part of the Austr ...
( Elliston on the west coast of
Eyre Peninsula The Eyre Peninsula is a triangular peninsula in South Australia. It is bounded by the Spencer Gulf on the east, the Great Australian Bight on the west, and the Gawler Ranges to the north. Originally called Eyre’s Peninsula, it was named aft ...
) – tens of Aboriginal
Nauo people The Nauo people, also spelt Nawu and Nhawu, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the south-western Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. The Nauo language became extinct by the twentieth century, but efforts are being made to revive it. Countr ...
were killed in retribution for the killing of 2 settlers and theft of food.


1880s

* Koonchera Point massacre near Lake Howitt in the far north of the state, just off the
Birdsville Track The Birdsville Track is a notable outback road in Australia. The track runs between Birdsville in south-western Queensland and Marree, a small town in the north-eastern part of South Australia. It traverses three deserts along the route, the St ...
. Hundreds of Aboriginal Ngameni,
Yawarrawarrka The Yawarrawarrka (also written Yawarawarka, Jauraworka) were an in Indigenous people of South Australia. Country According to the calculations of Norman Tindale the Yauraworka's tribal lands encompassed some , running north of Cooper Creek to ...
, 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.


Queensland


1840s

*1842. 30–60 or more killed in the Kilcoy, Queensland, ''Kilcoy'' poisoning. On the outskirts of Kilcoy, Queensland, Kilcoy Station owned by Sir Evan MacKenzie, 30–60 people of the Gubbi Gubbi people, Kabi Kabi died from eating flour laced with strychnine and arsenic. In an 1861 enquiry into Aboriginal people and the
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
, 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 ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...
, for this well reported massacre. The Battle of One Tree Hill, in which Multuggerah and his band of warriors prevailed, followed the poisoning. Note: Dr Ray Kerkhove, owner of this site, is a reputable historian. See her

and her

*1847. 50–60 individuals killed in a poisoning at the Whiteside, Queensland, ''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 hutkeeper, who had been blinded by a blow to the head with a waddy. Some twenty years later a white pioneer "saw scores of bleached bones including a complete skeleton" while riding in the vicinity, and heard that "fifty or sixty" Aboriginal people had lost their lives there by poisoning. *26 November 1848. 3 Aboriginal women and one child were murdered at Canning Creek, Queensland, Canning Creek by a posse of seven white men. *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, Queensland, 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 Queensland frontier history'. *1849. Unknown numbers killed on the Balonne and Condamine. By 1849 clashes between Aboriginal people and settlers occurred on the Balonne and Condamine Rivers of Queensland.Heathcoate 1965.


1850s

*1850s. Several reprisal killings and at least one massacre (on the Nerang River in 1857) of the Yugambeh people#Early European exploration and colonisation (1824-1900), 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, 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 Maurice Charles O'Connell, 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. *January 1856. After local Aboriginal people had killed five station-hands at Mount Larcom, Queensland, Mount Larcombe on Boxing Day 1855, several punitive missions were conducted by
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
augmented with armed settlers. Lieutenant John Murray (native police officer), 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, Queensland, 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 (Queensland), Fitzroy river with Murray in pursuit. To cross the river, the troopers borrowed a boat belonging to Charles Archer of Gracemere, Queensland, 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. * 1857–1858. Hundreds killed (including Wandoan#History, Juandah (Wandoan) massacre) 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 (Queensland), Dawson River Basin in Queensland killing 11 men, women and children in retaliation for the deaths of 12 members 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.


1860s

* Early 1860s. "Water view", North Bundaberg, at least 15 to 20 Aboriginal 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 stockwhip 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." * 7 March 1860. Lieutenant Carr and his troopers of the
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
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. * January 1861. In response to a letter from settler John Hardie, a Australian native police, native police detachment led by Lieutenant Frederick Wheeler was dispatched to Dugandan, Queensland, 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. * 10 February 1861. Lieutenant Rudolph Morisset led a
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
squad which shot dead six to eight Aboriginal people, including old men, at Manumbar. * 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 Cullin-La-Ringo massacre, 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. * January 1863. Fifteen members of an Aboriginal group resident to the area around Mount Elliot, Queensland, Mount Elliot shot dead. * 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 250 cattle on the first attempt by British 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". * July 1865. Native troopers ambushed a Darumbal ceremonial gathering outside Rockhampton and shot dead 18 Aboriginal Australians, and then set fire to their corpses. *1867. Goulbolba Hill Massacre, on John Arthur Macartney's ''St Helens'' Station Central Queensland: large massacre in 1866 or early 1867 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 in caves 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. Goulbolba Hill is now known as Mount Gobulba on the north side of Lake Maraboon near the town of Emerald, Queensland, Emerald; however the present Lake Maraboon was created in 1968 by the construction of the Fairbairn Dam. * April 1867. The Leap, Queensland, 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. * 12 July 1867. A
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
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, Queensland, 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. * 1869. Kaurareg#1869: Sperwer incident and reprisals, Kaurareg killings on Torres Strait Islands. District police magistrate in Somerset, Queensland, Somerset, Far North Queensland, Henry Chester, and his successor, Francis Lascelles Jardine, Frank Jardine, send
native police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
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.


1870s

* c. 1872. Bladensburg massacre. Over 200 killed by Native Police at Skull Hole on the head of Mistake Creek, Bladensburg National Park, Bladensburg Station (near Winton) Central Queensland. In 1888, the visiting Norwegian scientist Carl Sofus Lumholtz, Carl Lumholtz recalled how he in about 1882–84 "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 dispersalthe later property manager Hazelton Brockwho 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 dispersal at Bladensburg some time about 1877–1879. It was "one of the most blood curdling 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 Fraser14 men in alland 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. * 1872. Mogool, Mount Coliseum, Miriam Vale station, the Goreng Goreng tribe had killed a bullock and were feasting on it at base of Moogool, and the native troopers under Acting Sub-inspector Douglas were called in. The troopers rounded the tribe into a circle and massacred almost all of them; only Gimmie escaped with his young nephew Nyralung on his shoulders and ran to the mountain. * 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 of the 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... * 1874–1875. 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.'" * 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." * 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 retaliationsupposedly 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 Holmeswho 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 Eglinton 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. * 1879. 28 Aboriginal men shot and drowned at Cape Bedford Mission, Cape Bedford, Cook district Far North Queensland: Cape Bedford massacre on 20 February 1879taking the lives of 28 Aboriginal Australians of the Guugu Yimidhirr people north of Cooktown, Queensland, Cooktown. Cooktown-based Native Police Sub-inspector Stanhope O'Connor with his troopers Barney, Jack, Corporal Hero, Johnny and Jimmy hunted down and 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 List of ethnic slurs#G, 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.


1880s

* 1884. 21st century allegations regarding Battle Mountain: That more than 200 Kalkatungu, Kalkadoon people were killed near Mount Isa, 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. *1884. Queensland police and native troopers encircled a Yidinji people, 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. * September 1884. Following the fatal spearing of Sub-inspector Henry Pollock Kaye of the Queensland Police Service, Native Mounted Police on the Woolgar, Queensland, Woolgar gold fields when driving out some 40 indigenous persons from the town, it is indicated a retaliatory massacre occurred. * 1884–1885. The Coppermine massacres in the hinterland of Darwin, around the Daly River. * 1888. Diamantina River district in south west Queensland. A killing of a station cook near Durrie Station, 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.


Northern Territory


1820s

''(then part of New South Wales)'' * 29 December 1827. Captain Henry Smyth of the 39th Regiment of the British Army, Commandant of the British military outpost at Fort Wellington, Australia, Fort Wellington on the Cobourg Peninsula ordered a punitive mission against the local Iwaidja language, 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 three 18-pound carronades mounted at Fort Wellington against the Iwaidja on 30 July. The reports of casualties from this cannon attack range from zero to thirty 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.


1870s

''(then part of South Australia)'' * 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 people, 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 Ted Strehlow, 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. :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. Skull Creek (Northern Territory), Skull Creek, where the massacre took place, 50 miles 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." * 1875. Corporal George Montagu led a punitive expedition resulting in up to 150 Aboriginal people being shot dead around the Roper River. * 1878. Constable William George Stretton led a punitive expedition resulting in at least 17 Aboriginal people being shot dead near the Daly River.


1880s

* 1882. Constable Augustus Lucanus and Corporal George Montagu led a punitive expedition where a number of Aboriginal people were shot dead. * 1884. In August Constable William Willshire (policeman), William Willshire led a punitive expedition resulting in around 50 Aboriginal people being shot dead. :In September, Constable William Willshire shot dead at least 3 Aboriginal people, and ex-Constable Augustus Lucanus led a punitive expedition which "dispersed" two large "mobs" of Aboriginal people. :In October, Corporal George Montagu led a punitive expedition resulting in around 150 Aboriginal people being shot dead, and Constable Allan MacDonald shot dead 14 Aboriginal people. :In November, Constable Erwein Wurmbrand shot dead 7 Aboriginal people. * 1885. In June, Constable Erwein Wurmbrand led a punitive expedition which resulted in at least 17 Aboriginal people being shot dead and in October, Constable Cornelius Power shot dead at least four Aboriginal people. * 1886. Constable William Curtis led a punitive expedition which resulted in 52 Aboriginal people being shot dead and another 12 falling to their deaths. * 1880s–1890s. 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 Supply Company and shot.


1890s

* 1890. Mistake Creek massacre: Sixty Aboriginal men were being taken to Wyndham, Western Australia, Wyndham jail under police guard, on suspicion of cattle theft. A message was received stating that the actual perpetrator had been found, and the police were ordered to release the detainees. However, instead they shot and killed all 60 of them and then burned their bodies.


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.


1910s

* 1906–1907. Canning Stock Route: an unrecorded number of Aboriginal men and women were raped and massacred when Martu (Indigenous Australian), 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 in 1908, 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. * 1911. Sergeant Richard Henry Pilmer of the Western Australia Police Force led a punitive expedition along the Canning Stock Route after three drovers were killed near Well 37. Pilmer's party, labelled as a "nigger hunting expedition" in the local press, shot dead at least 10 Aboriginal people at Wells 31, 35 and 46. * 1915.
Mistake Creek massacre The Mistake Creek massacre was a massacre of Indigenous Australians that took place in Western Australia in 1915. Massacre On 28 March 1915, between 8 and 32 Gija people were shot and killed, and their bodies burned, at Mistake Creek in the ...
: In March 1915, telegraph linesman at Warmun Community, Turkey Creek, Michael Rhatigan, together with his two Aboriginal employees, Joe Wynne and Nipper, shot dead a number of Gija people at Mistake Creek in the East Kimberley. Rhatigan and Nipper were arrested and Wynne was shot dead by police. Rhatigan was acquitted of any wrongdoing, while Nipper was ordered to face trial for murder, but found not guilty and was released.


1920s

* 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. * 1924. Bedford Downs massacre: a group of Gija people, Gija and Worla men were tried in Wyndham, Western Australia, Wyndham for spearing a milking cow on the Bedford Downs Station. When released from the court they were given Pet tag, 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 then either shot or they were clubbed to death. The bodies were subsequently burned by the local police. 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. * June 1926. Forrest River massacre: Western Australian police constables, James Graham St Jack and Dennis Hastings Regan led a month long punitive expedition against Aboriginal people living in the Forrest River region. After the local mission station reported around 30 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 a native 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.


Queensland


1910s

* 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.


Northern Territory


1910s

*1911. Gan Gan massacre, when over 30 men, women and children were killed by colonial police and settlers; a fictionalised version is presented in Stephen Maxwell Johnson's 2020 film ''High Ground (2020 film), High Ground.'' * 1918. Constable O'Connor led a punitive expedition which resulted in seven Aboriginal people being shot dead.


1920s

* 1928. Coniston massacre: In August 1928, a Northern Territory Police constable, William George Murray, was ordered to investigate the killing of a white man named Fred Brooks by several Aboriginal people at a waterhole to the west of Coniston (Northern Territory), Coniston cattle station. Murray led a series of punitive expeditions from August until October 1928 which officially resulted in the deaths of 31 mostly Warlpiri people, Warlpiri and Kaytetye people. Other men who participated with Murray in the mass killings included local landholders William "Nugget" Morton and Randall Stafford; cattlemen John Saxby, William Briscoe and Alex Wilson; and three Aboriginal trackers who went by the names of Paddy, Dodger and Major. Analysis of the existing documentation and surviving Aboriginal testimonies indicate that somewhere between 100 and 200 people were shot dead during this police operation, a number far higher than the official bodycount. Murray later escorted two Aboriginal prisoners to Darwin, Northern Territory, Darwin to face trial for the killing of Fred Brooks. At this trial Murray freely gave evidence to the presiding judge that he shot a large number of Aboriginal people during the operation, that he shot to kill and shot dead wounded men and women. The judge noted that Murray "mowed them down wholesale." Murray's admissions in court led to widespread publicity about the massacres and a governmental Board of Enquiry was set up to investigate the incident. The Board of Enquiry was a whitewashing (censorship), whitewash set up to protect the colonial system in the Northern Territory and it found that the shootings were justified. No charges were laid against any of the perpetrators and Murray continued to serve in the Northern Territory Police until the 1940s. A survivor of the massacre, Billy Stockman Tjapaltjarri, later became part of the first generation of Papunya painting men. Billy Stockman was saved by his mother, who put him in a coolamon (vessel), coolamon.Jo-Anne Birnie Danzker ''Dreamings—Tjukurrpa: aboriginal art of the Western Desert, the Donald Kahn Collection'', Prestel, 1994


See also

* Aboriginal deaths in custody * Australian frontier wars * Australian genocide debate *
Black War } The Black War was a period of violent conflict between British Empire, British colonists and Aboriginal Tasmanians in Tasmania from the mid-1820s to 1832. The conflict, fought largely as a guerrilla war by both sides, claimed the lives of 600 ...
(Tasmania) * Genocides in history#Australia, Genocides in history in Australia * Genocide of indigenous peoples#Colonization of Australia and Tasmania, Genocide of indigenous peoples of Australia and Tasmania *History of Indigenous Australians *Mass poisonings of Aboriginal Australians *
Native Police Australian native police units, consisting of Aboriginal troopers under the command (usually) of at least one white officer, existed in various forms in all Australian mainland colonies during the nineteenth and, in some cases, into the twentie ...
* Tasmania#Removal of Aboriginal people, Removal of Aboriginal people in Tasmania


Footnotes


References


Cited works

* * * * * *


Further reading

* * * in William Logan, William Stewart Logan, Keir Reeves (eds.) ''Places of pain and shame: dealing with 'difficult heritage * (citing ''Aboriginal history'', Volumes 6–8) * * * * * * * * * * * * * (D Byrne's A Critique of unfeeling heritage) * {{DEFAULTSORT:Massacres of Indigenous Australians Australian crime-related lists Lists of massacres, Australian Aboriginal Massacres Massacres of Indigenous Australians, * Indigenous Australia-related lists Genocides in Oceania-Pacific