For millennia, the indigenous people of Moreton Bay lived in and travelled about their country without external disruption. There had been the occasional sighting of ships in the distance, a surveying boat now and then, and a few brief sightings of Europeans, but they had not had their lands entirely taken over.
The establishment of the Moreton Bay Penal Colony, without so much as a by-your-leave, brought catastrophic changes to their lives. Areas which had once been reserved for hunting now had buildings built and crops planted, and the population of white people grew enormously from the few dozen in 1824 to nearly a thousand some six years later.
Early encounters in Moreton Bay, such as the stranding of Pamphlet, Parsons, Finnegan and Thompson, were benign. Although Thompson died of thirst before encountering the local indigenous people, Pamphlet and his companions were rescued, fed and sheltered and owed them their lives. In 1823, John Oxley encountered the shipwrecked Europeans in 1823 on the surveying journey that located the Brisbane River. Pamphlet in particular was sorry to leave the society of indigenous people after such kind and inclusive treatment.
By 1827, the crops planted to feed the convicts became a point of contention, and the first reports of open conflict appeared in the press.
AFFRAY WITH NATIVES AT MORETON BAY.
Some days before the Speedwell schooner, and shortly after his Excellency the Governor left the settlement at Moreton Bay, a disposition was evinced, on the part of a tribe of the black natives, to pillage or destroy portions of the second maize crop, then in the ground, and on the culture and preservation of which, Captain Logan, the Commandant at Moreton Bay, bestowed particular attention.
Sentries were placed accordingly to protect the crop. One of the sentinels who was stationed by night, in a direction towards where one of the boats attached to the settlement lay, perceiving the approach of a party of natives, which appeared, it is said, to be meditating a fresh invasion, fired among them ; one of the party dropped ; but it was not immediately known whether the native was killed by the shot.
Two runaway prisoners from the settlement, white men, having appeared among the hostile tribe, were pursued by the military as far as the native encampment where a black was dis- covered, stretched dead on the ground, having received a shot through both knees. One of the soldiers had been wounded by a native spear. The two bushrangers who appeared with the native tribe, had not, we believe, been captured, when the Speedwell sailed from Moreton Bay.
The Australian, 1827
The following years saw many entries of convict deaths in the Chronological Register of Moreton Bay along the lines of “Killed by the blacks”. By 1835, the time of the Book of Trials, open conflict had been replaced by subtler miseries – disease, depredations upon indigenous women and girls, and social upheaval.
John Smith “Agamemnon”. 1819, Life 03 September 1835
Concealing the venereal disease and communicating it to a black native girl.
By the statement of a native child at Amity Point affected with the venereal disease, it appears that she had connexion with the prisoner and got it from him.
Assistant Surgeon Robinson, duly sworn, says that he can positively state that the prisoner has had sores on the penis within a very recent period, and which were hardly healed at the time Robertson examined him. It appears that he has never reported his illness.
Prisoner denies having had any venereal complaint lately or having had any connexion with the girl in question.
Sentence: 50 Lashes Commandant Clunie
John Smith, a native of London who was transported for life in 1819, probably picked up his condition in London or Sydney, and passed it on to the only available females he could find at Moreton Bay – the local indigenous women and girls. Female Prisoners were kept apart from the male prisoners, and housed at Eagle Farm, quite a distance from the Prisoners’ Barracks. The few other women about were the wives and daughters of Soldiers and administrators, and thus equally off-limits. The indigenous women bore the brunt of convicts’ attentions, willingly or not, and suffered for it.
By 1840, a prisoner who had been awarded the role of Constable in the Colony, took an indigenous girl away with him, in defiance of orders.
Moreton Bay, 20 December 1840
Prisoner of the Crown John Kennedy, Constable.
Charged with disobedience of orders, in going to a Black’s camp near Eagle Farm in the night of the 3rd inst. and taking away a black girl by force.
Evidence: Constable Thompson duly sworn deposeth that a black man called “pretty boy” came to him that prisoner now before the court had taken away his sister named “Tempora” from their camp at Eagle Farm on the night he was going down in the boat which was on the night of the 3rd inst., and that he wanted witness to go with him to the Commandant to make a complaint of it, but as the Commandant was then sick and confined to his bed, I told him that he cannot see him but that I would report the case to the Commandant as soon as I saw him, which I did. I was then ordered by the Commandant to find out the truth of this report and see if any white people knew anything of it. On the morning after Glory again came to my hut and told me that if I went to Edward Danns, he would tell me all about it. I went to Danns and asked him if he had been in the Black camp on that night or if he had seen anything of Kennedy there. He said that he heard a noise in the camp amongst the Blacks was that he believed Kennedy was amongst them.
Prisoner of the crown Edward Danns per Captain Cook, being duly sworn deposeth on the night of the 3rd inst., I was asked by a black man named Glory to go out to the Black camp near Eagle Farm and he would get me a black girl named Tempora. I went with him to the Camp about 2 o’clock and just as we got there the Prisoner now before the Court who was in the camp went away taking the black girl named Tempora with him. She made no resistance, but her mother shouted out to her not to go and thus caused the noise that took place in the camp.
Defence: The prisoner being called upon to state any thing he may have in his defence denies that he forced any girl from the camp and calls upon Prisoner of the Crown Richard Brian to prove that he saw him go to sleep at about 10 o’clock at night and that he did not go to any camp or away from the river side before 5 o’clock the following morning when they awoke and found the Black there.
Prisoner of the Crown Richard Brian being duly sworn deposeth: Myself and the prisoner John Kennedy now before the Court lay down to sleep on the banks of the river near the lower wharf when we were on duty with the boat on the night of the 3rd inst., about 10 o’clock. I fell asleep very soon after and did not awake until about 5 o’clock next morning. Kennedy was lying in the same place and I do not know whether he left the place during the night or not.
Opinion and sentence: The Prisoner having been found guilty of taking the black girl from the Camp on the night of the 3rd inst., although no force was used it was in disobedience of orders he is therefore dismissed from his situation as Constable.
Tempora’s mother and brother did not like the idea of her going off with a white convict, but their objections meant nothing to Kennedy. At least the Military on duty in the Barrack Yard took notice of an assault on a child in 1839.
19th June, 1839
Cornelius Dunn “Jane”: Striking a Black Boy
Corporal Samuel Wincharge, 28th Regiment, duly sworn, I saw the prisoner running within the limits of the Barrack Yard, I ordered the sentry to stop him, the prisoner rushed past the sentry and struck the young black boy in the belly. The prisoner states in his defence that the boy had been throwing stones at him.
Admonished.
Increasingly, indigenous men had been working with the convicts and overseers in tracking and surveying capacities, and the inquiry into the death of “Mike” shows a greater level of concern and understanding than the inquest into the death of the man who had been raiding the corn a few years earlier.
New South Wales
To Wit
Depositions taken on oath before me Owen Gorman Esquire one of Her Majesty’s Justices of the Peace touching the death of “Mike”, an Aboriginal native of this settlement.
27 September 1840
John Winstanley a prisoner of the Crown, duly sworn, deposeth that at about 12 o’clock this day, I was going through the bush about three miles from here, accompanied by the deceased Mike and another Aboriginal native, when the deceased shouted out and said a snake had bit him. I took no further notice of what he said at the time and continued to go on for about half an hour when the deceased complained of a pain in his head. He lay down and got quite sleepy. I then got alarmed, and I desired the other native to stop and take care of the deceased and that I would run to the settlement and tell the doctor. I then returned to the settlement as fast as I could and reported the circumstance to Colonial Assistant Surgeon Ballow who desired me to go and report it to the Commandant and ask him for two Constables to bring the deceased into the Hospital. I went to the Commandant and got the two Constables, and we three accompanied by Colonial Assistant Surgeon Ballow and Mr James Gorman went out to the bush where we found the deceased in a state of stupor. The Doctor examined him and gave him some medicine, and ordered us to convey him to the Hospital, where he now lies dead.
Prisoner of the Crown Robert Giles, a Constable in this settlement having been duly sworn deposeth that at about two o’clock this day I received orders Colonial Assistant Surgeon Ballow to the bush for the purpose of bringing to the Hospital an Aboriginal native of the settlement named “Mike”, who was reported to have been bitten by a snake. I proceeded accordingly accompanied by John Winstanley, a Prisoner of the Crown, and John Finlay a Prisoner of the Crown, and a Constable of this settlement with Colonial Assistant Surgeon Ballow and we found the deceased “Mike” lying on the ground quite stupid. Colonial Assistant Surgeon Ballow examined him and gave him some medicine and then ordered us to convey him to the Hospital where he now lies dead.
Colonial Assistant Surgeon David Keith Ballow having been duly sworn deposeth that John Winstanley, a Prisoner of the Crown on this Settlement reported to me this day about two o’clock that an Aboriginal native named “Mike” had been bitten by a snake and was lying in the bush. I immediately reported the circumstance to the Commandant, procured the assistance of two Constables and proceeded to the spot where I found the deceased lying upon the ground in a sleepy state with hurried rattling breathing. His faculty of speech was nearly gone, and an Aboriginal native who was standing near him told me that he had been bitten by a snake. I administered some medicine that I had with me and had him immediately removed to the Hospital, where every means was tried without success and he expired at half past six this evening.
Two years later, the Penal Settlement was closed and land was open up to free settlement. The competition for land and resources grew keener, and gradually fewer indigenous people were seen in Brisbane as time went on.
It’s comforting to note that at least for a few years following free settlement, the indigenous people were still able to stroll around Brisbane in the nuddy, horrifying the local housewives, and causing the Moreton Bay Courier to call upon the authorities to “act energetically” in prosecuting them.
SOURCES:
Russell, Henry Stuart, “The Genesis of Queensland”, 1888, Sydney; Turner & Henderson, pp 20-24.
Book of Trials Held at Moreton Bay, 1835-1842. Item ID 869682, State Archives of Queensland.
Moreton Bay Courier, Saturday 11 September 1847, page 2. Domestic Intelligence.
Convict Hospital Photo credit: Brisbane Images.
Australian (Sydney, NSW : 1824 – 1848), Wednesday 25 July 1827, page 3
Moreton Bay and More 