Lyndall Ryan “Tasmanian Aborigines”, 2012.

It’s too early to start this thread, I know. My reading of Ryan so far is only up to the date of Musquito’s entry into Tasmania, ie. From 1803 to 1813. About 90 pages. Two days reading.

If you want to enjoy reading this book, avoid the preface. See why in my detailed review, below.

What caused the accelerating violent reaction of the Tasmanian Aborigines against British settlement in the early years leading up to 1826?

• Ryan’s first hypothesis (1981)
  The whites in Tasmania were racist genocidal bastards, who systematically wiped out the Tasmanian aborigines because they were black.
  Ryan had abandoned this hypothesis completely by 2012.

• Ryan’s second hypothesis (2012)
  The whites in Tasmania took the Aborigines food and land.
  This hypothesis fails completely because the whites, rather than depriving the Aborigines of food, supplied them with food, and because through the rest of Australia the aborigines and white farmers were happy to live adjacent to one another on the same land in a wary truce.

• mollwollfumble’s hypothesis (2019)
  Some of the whites in Tasmania were the scum of the Earth, former maximum security prison inmates including multiple murderers, psychopaths and career criminals. These criminals committed atrocities against the aborigines, the worst of the atrocities being hunting aborigines for sport and torturing aborigines for fun. Collins was wise to them by Arthur wasn’t.

• Windschuttle’s hypothesis (2002)
  (Not a clue because I haven’t read Windschuttle yet).

To test mollwollfumble’s hypothesis, would need to look into the prison histories and court records of white settlers, Ryan doesn’t delve that far.

Detailed review of Ryan’s book from 2012, so far.
Quick overview: Ryan’s book is deliberately provocative, using highly emotional and pejorative terms to alienate the reader. But look beyond that and Ryan’s facts are rock solid – almost. The scholarship of digging up obscure facts is remarkable.

1. Contents and preface.
The Chapter titles are deliberately provocative. It’s not a good idea to alienate the reader before they’ve even started to read the book, eg. “invasion”. In the preface, the last sentence of the first paragraph is again deliberately provocative, it deals with aboriginal motives. Settler’s motives are presented on the third page of the preface, again in a deliberately provocative emotionally charged way, eg. “genocide”, “leading proponents of scientific racism”, “fabrication of propaganda”. Stick to the facts, Ryan, you’re good at facts.

2. Chapter 1.
Concerned about the reliability of Reference 6. The chapter title is “Trouwunna”, the source of that word is Reference 6. Reference 6 is “Cameron, personal communication, 2010”.
Page 7, criticising early contemporary references, belittling them as being written by “agents of British colonialism”; who the hell else would they be written by, Chinese?
Page 8 “One of four major languages …”, good, this is very important, Reference 13.
Page 8 to 10. I very much like the descriptions of aboriginal technology. Ryan missed the diffeence between a hunting spear and a war spear, but that’s a very minor oversight.
Page 11. Pleaase replace the prejorative word “invasion” by an emotionally neutral word such as “arrival” or “settlement”.
Page 11. “Infidelity, jealousy, and raids for women were the chief causes of violent conflict”. :-) No argument from me there.
Page 12 to 13. I like Ryan’s use of the words “clan” and “nation” instead of “tribe”, but it makes comparisons with contemporary accounts difficult. Is it OK if I interpret “clan” to mean “tribe”? Map 3 is very important :-)
Page 14. “If, as he assumes, the average clan contained between 40 and 50 people … 3,000 to 5,000 people … more recently … 7,000 to 10,000 people.” The pre-British clan size had to be much bigger than 50 people, a group of 300 aborigines turned up hunting kangaroo in the early days. For details, see Ryan Page 49, who states that these were probabaly members of just two clans. That puts the pre-British clan size at 150, so I agree with Ryan and go for the more recent estimate. 48 known clans of 150 members each is 7,200 aborigines and according to Ryan there could easily have been more than 48 clans.
Page 17. Overuse of the word “Trouwunna” is starting to get annoying.
Page 18 to 41 about individual tribes and nations. Excellent work, Ryan. Perhaps a bit speculative, given that there are no written records to support most of this.
Page 41 “40,000 years of history” is a misuse of the word “history”. “40,000 years of prehistory” would be better. No need to quote Windschuttle, just ignore him.

3. Chapter 2. 1803 to 1807.
Page 43. Reference 1 needs a date.
Page 43. “advance guard of a three-pronged British invastion”. You’re doing it again Ryan, using perjorative language to deliberately alienate the reader. Use emotionally neutral words.
Page 43. “Within 30 years they had wiped out virtually all the Tasmanian Aborigines”. Yes, see how much better it is to use emotionally neutral words like these.
Page 45. Reference 7 needs checking. Reference 8 is unreliable.
Page 47. “Musquito was transported to Norfolk Island for killing another aborigine” could be whitewash, I doubt that anyone was transported to a maximum security prison for what was then considered such a minor crime.
Page 47. Reference 11 is important, needs to be quoted more often. Ditto reference 17 on page 49.
Page 49. Simultaneous attack on whites at a different location? Risdon massacre.
Page 49. “weapon of mass destruction”, deliberately prevocative perjorative language again, avoid.
Page 50. “Moungarrett yelled at Moore to shoot the black devils”. Need more biographical details of Jacob Mountgarrett – surgeon and magistrate. How did he come to be in charge of troops? Note also a massive conflict between Edward White’s account of no deaths Ref 17, and Edward White’s account of a great many killed Ref 20. Let’s take the “a great many killed” as definitive, as Ryan does. What happened to Mauntgarrett and Moore, apart from being dragged before an official enquiry? Were they deported? Yes, and the British settlement abandoned.
Page 51. Ryan gives the number of dead in the massacre as “2”, “5 or 6”, “30” and “no fewer than 50”. Let’s agree on 50. Big.
Page 53. 1804. Friendliness between whites and Aborigines in Hobart. Begging and cajoling by Aborigines.
Page 53. Derwent population nearly 481 from 1805 to 1807.
Page 54. Aborigine captured by fishermen, followed by killing of “2 or 3” British.
Page 54. Aborigines starting to attack straying Hobart inhabitants.

Page 54 – now this is that part that interests me most about this early period. At least two incidents of Hobart inhabitants illegally torturing natives. No date given. Reference 37, a popular history book from 1971. Need a better reference than that.

Page 54. Switch of narrative to Port Dalrymple near Launceston.
Page 55. Attack by aborigines on three white soldiers. One aborigine dead. Storekeeper speared a few days later.
Page 55. Aboriginal spearing of white kangaroo hunters to take their dogs.
Page 56. 1807. First killing of aborigines by kangaroo hunters. At least one of the kangaroo hunters was killed.
Page 56. By 1809 “kangaroo hunting had led to a considerable loss of life among the natives”. Reliable reference, but location unstated – Hobart or Launceston?
Page 56. Bushrangers (escaped convicts?) around Hobart by 1804.
Page 56. Two bushrangers, Lemon and Brown aound Hobart were reported to have tortured and killed two aboriginal men and three women. In response, aborigines began to harrass white aboriginal hunters. Reference 50.

Chapter 3. 1808 to 1820
Page 58. From Norfolk Island to Hobart. More than 100 “families” to Hobart in 1807 to a total of 600 “colonists” in Tasmania by 1813. Established small farms near Hobart and at Launceston. Why would serial killers, psychopaths and career criminals be given subsidised farming?
Page 58. “By 1814 had 10% of Tasmania under cultivation”. Check maths. 12,771 hectares is actually 0.2%, not 10%. Get your maths straight, Ryan.
Page 58. An increasing number of convicts absconded to the bush.
Page 59. From 1812 onwards. Peaceful trading between aborigines and the white sealers on the north coast, for seals, tobacco, flour and tea.
Pagr 59 to 61. Interbreeding between whites and aborigines on the north west. Some aboriginal women accompanied sealers as far as Mauritius. Employment for both aboriginal men and women who wanted it in the sealing industry. (Note by mollwollfumble, almost an exact match for what was happening in the Kimberleys 120 years later).
Page 62 “Such interaction was possible because, unlike the Norfolk Islanders, the sealers made no claims on aboriginal land”. Wild speculation. It could have been because the sealers weren’t former inmates of a maximum security prison. Elsewhere in Australia, farmers and aborigines lived side by side in a peaceful but uneasy truce.
Page 62, The quote from Reference 9 looks like a mixture of fact and wild speculation. Needs checking. Very important allegations against the former Norfolk Islanders. Reference 9 is missing from Ryan’s bibliography, so no date ascertainable, and I don’t see it on the web.
Page 62 At Coal River. “Had not the Lieutenant-Governor the most positive proof of such barbarous crimes having been committed …” by a British subject, Reference 9. I want to see such proofs. I have two good reasons for doubt of such atrocities, and only two good reasons for belief.
Page 63 “A boy who absconded from his master was sentenced to 12 months in a chain gang”. Nope. Australian courts were never that crooked – the boy must have murdered someone or committed some equally horrendous crime to get a sentence that severe.
Page 64 Musquito arrives in 1813.

moll – email

Oh dear Moll. You are making some fundamental mistakes and some odd assumptions there.
Sadly, I don’t have time for this.

All media is a product of biases of the author.

Without reading the book, I can see from your review that Ryan is using specific language not to alienate readers, but to argue a bias. By switching to so-called “emotionally neutral” language, (which these words are not, btw), Ryan would be dismissing current concerns of Aboriginal people.

Also, you mention checking prison records and court records to prove your hypothesis. May I be so bold as to suggest these things do not exist, or if they do, are woefully incomplete? Would a white be prosecuted for torturing an Aboriginal? If not, then prison and court documents wouldn’t prove/disprove anything.

You could just go by history and current human behaviour and make a very good assumption that people in almost absolute positions of power will treat other humans they consider inferior, extremely poor (as in genocide and torture).

They then cover it up when word might get out what they have done assuming they care what others think

They may have not even thought they were doing anything wrong as the mindset of the day especially in regards to colonisation is its ours for the taking not sharing

Cymek said:

You could just go by history and current human behaviour and make a very good assumption that people in almost absolute positions of power will treat other humans they consider inferior, extremely poor (as in genocide and torture).

They then cover it up when word might get out what they have done assuming they care what others think

They may have not even thought they were doing anything wrong as the mindset of the day especially in regards to colonisation is its ours for the taking not sharing

Plus “normal” human beings can and will commit horrid acts without any prior type behaviour if given the chance more so with little chance of punishment. Human monsters look quite normal I imagine. Following orders as well that’s an age old excuse to try and justify killings of people everywhere. Might is right is another

True to form, moll just reads what he wants it to read, and if it cannot be so manipulated, is either dismissed or denigrated.

PermeateFree said:

True to form, moll just reads what he wants it to read, and if it cannot be so manipulated, is either dismissed or denigrated.

He the reader feels alienated?

roughbarked said:

PermeateFree said:

True to form, moll just reads what he wants it to read, and if it cannot be so manipulated, is either dismissed or denigrated.

He the reader feels alienated?

It would help if he read the entire book before forming theories about why things have happened, he might then have less of a personal need to make the facts fit his opinion.

PermeateFree said:

roughbarked said:

PermeateFree said:

True to form, moll just reads what he wants it to read, and if it cannot be so manipulated, is either dismissed or denigrated.

He the reader feels alienated?

It would help if he read the entire book before forming theories about why things have happened, he might then have less of a personal need to make the facts fit his opinion.

For sure.

One great thing about Lyndall Ryan as an author, is that Ryan never twists the facts to support a hypothesis.

I’m also starting to realise that interpretations are almost totally superfluous. The wiping out of the Tasmanian Aborigines happened so fast that facts speak for themselves.

Further review, to the end of Chapter 4, 1826.

Page 64 Musquito arrives in 1813, after being sent to Norfolk Island in 1806. Apon arrival he was a free man, but not allowed to return to Sydney. In 1816 he tracked frown Michael Howe, one of the colony’s most notorious bushrangers. After that he became the colony’s first known Aboriginal resistance leader.
Page 64 Manalargenna had a clan of about 200 people in NE Tasmania in 1815-1816, and wanted white help in fighting the neighbouring clan led by Tolobunganah, who was allied to Michael Howe and his gang. (Note: still very large tribe sizes).
Page 66 Ryan keeps making the faulty assumption that all teenage aboriginal children employed on white farms were ‘abducted’, but is still sufficiently objective to retain the words ‘found’, ‘taken in’, ‘abandoned’ and ‘acquisition’.
Page 66 to 67. The hostility of aborigines towards whites in Hobart has declined in 1818. “These groups were known as tame mobs”. I can confirm the use of the words “tame mob” from about fifteen years later.
Pag 77. In 1818, “Newly emerging humanitarian view arising from the abolition of the slave trade (throughout the British empire) in 1806”.
Page 67. Colonial government’s announcement that Aborigines must be protected.
Page 67. “When the missionary Rowland Hassall visited Hobart in March 1819 and inquired ‘Why are no natives seen in town?’ the answer given was ‘we shoot them whenever we find them’. I see this as a vital piece of evidence, why the massive decline in peacible relations between 1818 and 1819?

Page 68. The answer is on Page 68. Following the killing of a sealer near Hobart in 1818, soldiers of the 48th regiment were dispatched and killed 22 aborigines. This seems to be the first recorded massacre of aborigines in Tasmania since the Risdon massacre of 1803-4, and the first near Hobart. :-(

Page 68. “Lieutenant-Colonel William Sorell was horrified by” this massacre. “He warned that he would punish any colonist who destroyed or maltreated any of the native people”.
Page 68. By 1820, a limit had been enforced by Sorell on the amount of ammunition (4 or 5 shells) that any convict stock-keeper was permitted.
Page 69. Ryan uses the words “slavery” and “bondage” without giving even the slightest evidence for them. No Reference is quoted.
Page 70. There is an implication that sealing was practiced by the Tasmanian aboriginals before the arrival of whites. Perhaps this is something I missed earlier in the book.
Page 71. “By the end of 1819 the aboriginal and colonial populations had almost reached parity, the aboriginal population had fallen from 7,000 to 5,000 and the colonial population had increased to 4,350.” There is insufficient explanation in Ryan’s book as to why the aboriginal population had crashed, assuming that that figure of 5,000 is correct. Total aborigines recorded or even suspected to be killed by whites in Ryan’s book from 1803 to 1819 is only of the order of 100 individuals, not 2,000 individuals, so that leaves about 95% of the population decline unaccounted for. Ryan says the decline is unlikely to be from exotic disease, most likely from settler violence, which makes sense. “Gonorrhoea and skin complaints (from allergy to) dogs were not life threatening and responded to treatment”. True, but fear of gonorrhoea could lower the birth rate.
Page 71. “Colonists occupied less than 15% of van Dieman’s land”. Either the word “occupied” or the number “15%” is wrong. They occupied about 0.2%.
Page 71. “Up to 500 aborigines were still seen at seasonal gatherings at Oyster Bay”. Well, if that’s a gathering of 9 tribes then the population per tribe has dropped from 150 to only 60, a massive population drop. My wild guess is that it’s a gathering of five tribes, with an average population per tribe down from 150 to 100, a big drop. If only three tribes then no population drop at all.
Page 71. “Emergence of creole communities on the Bass Strait islands”.
Page 72. Ryan says: “He could not have been more wrong”. As far as the Risdon Cove massacre and resistance to farming – he was probably right. I suspect that neither played a dominant role in the following escalating violence.

Chapter 4. 1817 to 1826 (Um … we’re already up to 1820)
Page 74. The colonial population increased from 2,000 in 1817 to 12,6433 in 1824. Land grants totalling 500,000 hectares up to 1820. Settlers included “retired Napoleonic soldiers, landed gentry from England, Ireland and Scotland, and sons of colonial officials from across the empire”.
Page 75. Ryan’s math is still terrible; “30% of the total area of the island”, should read 7.3%. Which is large.
Page 75. “They watched in amazement …”, please stick to the facts.
Page 75. “An increased presence of police and military patrols to control the convicts”. Ryan hasn’t said anything about an increase in the number of convicts, is this just guesswork or is a major piece of important evidence missing? I can’t tell which of four references Ryan gets this from.
Page 77. “Most of the new settlers had deeply ingrained prejudices against native people”. That makes sense. :-(
Page 77. “When violent conflict broke out in November 1823 the settlers considered that the Aborigines, rather than they themselves, were the aggressors”. Yes.

Page 77. Now we’re getting serious. 1823. “The reprisal massacre that Constable Adam Amos recorded in his diary”. Very important, this is the first recorded hidden massacre of aborigines in Tasmania. It was kept completely out of the newspapers (Ryan says this and I’ve confirmed it). Reference TAHO NS 323/1, 16-20 Nov. 1823. Perhaps the following hyperlinked reference. Only available for view at Murray St. in Hobart.
https://librariestas.ent.sirsidynix.net.au/client/en_AU/tas/search/detailnonmodal/ent:$002f$002fARCHIVES_ITEMS$002f0$002fARCHIVES_ITE_DIX:NS323-1-1/one
This would also be the first known massacre of aborigines in Tasmania that didn’t get a horrified response from the Government. Could it be that the Government was never informed? Also, I can’t help wondering if there was any overlap in perpetrators between the 1818 and 1823 massacres?

Page 77 to 78. Five dead white stockkeepers in four separate events in 1823 and 1824. Musquito and Black Jack were charged with murder and hanged in 1825.
Page 64. Musquito’s motive was revenge for having been denied a passage to Sydney.
Page 78. Governor Arthur arrived in 1824, very pro-aborigine.
Page 79. Arthur’s proclamation that anyone who wantonly destroyed aborigines would be prosecuted. (The need for such legislation implies that such events were occurring, even though they never made it into any newspaper).
Page 79. 1824. Thirteen colonists dead in the past nine months.
Page 79. Peaceful relations resumed, but not for long. 60 aborigines visited Hobart (possibly all that remained of an initial tribe of 150) and were treated kindly, “provisioned with food and clothing” and 200 aborigines visited Launceston.

Page 79. 1824. The Launceston blacks “were wantonly fired on as they crossed Patersons Plains, some of their women treated with indescribably brutality”. Reference 11, but which damn Reference 11? Ryan’s Reference 11 covers a multitude of separate and unrelated facts in that paragraph and points to no less than 12 separate sources. So this extremely important event is impossible to check up on. Who was involved? How many dead? What was the Govenment response? How many whites were arrested under the new legislation? So many questions and Ryan has no answers. I didn’t see any mention of this in the Tasmanian newspapers.

Page 79. The bushrangers were a more serious threat, and there was a major camapaign against the bushrangers in 1824 to 1826.
Page 79 to 80. 1826. Three more colonists speared to death. Two aborigines arrested and hanged for the murder. Arthur firmly believed that these would be the last of the killings of whites.
Page 80. Six more colonists killed in 1826, bringing the total over three years to thirty six.
Page 80. No reprisal attacks against the aborigines were mentioned in any newspapers, nor did Ryan find any evidence of any. The newspapers were now forcing the issue, demanding “the immediate forcible removal of all aborigines in the settled districts”. “The idea of forcible removal seems to have been adopted from the United States”. Arthur refused, opting instead for the option of allowing settlers to protect their own property. ie. He “accorded to colonists the right to arm and join the military to drive off with force any Aborigine who was about to attack, rob or murder them.”
Page 80. Arthur was expanding the police force to contain convict unrest and aboriginal insurgency, and establishing four new military posts. He “was confident that the settlers demands for assistance … could now be met.”
Page 80. The newspapers called this a “declaration of war”, which is wasn’t, and Ryan claims “Arthur’s intention was to use extreme measures”. I see this as Arthur, an army man, being unaware of the cooperative criminal activities of the psychopathic convicts in his wallless maximum security prison. He was lied to by almost everyone and believed the lies. Arthur was like a babe dropped in at the deep end to sink or swim. He sank. Ryan says this event “has been interpreted by historians in very different ways”, I don’t disagree with that.

Let’s compare Lyndall Ryan to Keith Windschuttle. Specifically as regards their analysis of the Risdon Cove massacre, in 1804.

And yes, Ruby, I have been reading Windschuttle with BS detectors full on and checking references. It turns out, perhaps annoyingly, that Windschuttle’s references are more reliable than Ryan’s.

Keith Windschuttle “The fabrication of aboriginal history, Volume one, Van Diemen’s Land 1803-1847”, 2002.

Introduction
Page 2. “In 2001, Dean said that Australia had committed genocide against the Aborigines. … The country accepted it without demur”. I agree. Lyndall Ryan held this hypothesis at that time, rejecting it in 2012.
Page 3. “This book examines the credibility of this. … The findings of this series are radically at variance with the story now so widely accepted”. A fair statement.
Page 3. “Some mass killings were committed on both sides but they were in the tens rather than in the hundreds”. That agrees with Ryan for 1803 to 1826. But what about illegal killings that were hushed up?
Page 4. “The worst crime Australia committed against the Aborigines was not violence or exploitation but this very policy of separating and interning them on missions and reserves”. Aagh, no, this is 1940s revisionism. Aborigines were never interned on missions, and the separation of whites and civilized aborigines from myall cannibals was, and still is, absolutely necessary. “Those who did this are still celebrated as great humanitarians and as Aborigines’ friends”. Well, we’ll see, perhaps celebrated by historians, but definitely not by aboriginal activists.
Page 4. Tasmania “has long been regarded as the worst-case scenario”. It is the worst case scenario, no doubt about that. Skip the rest of the paragraph, Windschuttle, we get the point.
Page 4. “The settlement established on Flinders Island from 1833 to 1847 became the model for all the missions and reserves that followed”. Total bullshit. Skipping the rest of the introduction, which is largely about the faults of individual historians.

Chapter 1. Risdon Cove, 1804.
Page 11-12. Ryan’s description of the Risdon Cove massacre is more factual, but is missing vital details that I hope to find in Windschuttle.
Page 13. “According to the principal historian of the ruling interpretation, Lyndall Ryan, these tribal people were the victims of a conscious policy of genocide”. This was true when Windschuttle wrote these words. Since then, Ryan’s opinion has changed completely. Ryan (2012) now says that this massacre was not genocide but a revenge attack following an aboriginal attack on a white called Burke.

Page 16. Finally. Windschuttle is moving from opinions to facts.
Page 16. “The Risdon Cove settlement had by then been replaced as an administrative centre but there were some troops and settlers located there”. That’s important information missing from Ryan.
Page 16 “an attack by natives made on the camp today”, hmm, “the number of natives was not less than 5 or 6 hundred”. Definitely missing from Ryan. Ryan says 300 and is garbled about whether they were or were not involved in the attack. Impeccable reference by Windschuttle.
Page 16 “had wounded one of the settlers, Burke, and was going to burn his house down and ill-treat his wife”. Again, impeccable reference, except that it gets the settler’s name wrong, it was actually Birt.
Page 17 Report from Lieutenant William Moore, “it would appear fron the numbers of them and the spears etc. with which they were armed that their design was to attack us”. Again, an impeccable reference. Ryan claims that the 300 aborigines were not armed with spears, but were hunting kangaroos with clubs. Hmm. I have a question – there is a world of difference between a war spear and a hunting spear, would Lieutenant William Moore have known the difference? If so, then a single glance at a spear would tell him whether the aborigines were hunting game or intent on murdering whites. I think it’s fair to give Moore the benefit of the doubt, and assume that he had seen a war spear before. And “they had thoroughly convinced me of their intentions by using violence to a settler’s wife and my own servant”.
Page 17 Report by Moore continued. The aborigines “were fired upon on their coming into camp and surrounding it. I went towards them with five soldiers … during this time I was informed that a party of them was beating Birt, the settler, at his farm. I then dispatched two soldiers to his assistance with orders not to fire if they could avoid it.” Two aborigines, not more, were killed in the defence of Birt.
Page 17 Report by Moore continued. “But at this time a great party was at camp, and on a proposal by Mr Mountgarrett to fire one of the Carronades to intimidate them they dispersed. Mr Mountgarrett with some soldiers and prisoners followed them some distance up the valley. they were in camp, a number of old men were perceived at the foot of the Hill near the valley employed in preparing spears”. What an enormous difference to Ryan’s account which, as I said above, is missing vital details. Ryan actually seems to get the number of aborigines killed in camp and at Burke’s place arse about. Ryan says nothing whatever about an attack by aborigines on camp, which is a horrific oversight.
Page 17 “Moore’s report is obviously that of a man trying to justify his actions, it is also clear he was simply doing his duty by rescuing a settler and protecting his camp.” I can’t argue with that.
Page 17 Moore reports two aboriginal deaths and Mountgarrett reports three. This excludes those aborigines who died attacking the main camp. Recall that Ryan gives four different values for the death toll “2”, “5 or 6”, “30” and “no fewer than 50”.

Quick summary. Score so far: Windschuttle 1, Ryan 0.
Windshuttle’s references are impeccable. Ryan has badly distorted events, this was not a harmless group of 300 aborigines hunting kangaroo who were set upon by whites. This was a deliberate attack by a claimed “not less than 500 or 600” aborigines on a white camp. The whites must have been terrified.

A note here. There are implications in the accounts of Windschuttle and Ryan that cannot be taken as facts. Windschuttle never says that all the aborigines carried spears, he never says that any white was speared. It is even possible that the spears referred to in the start of Moore’s account only belonged to aborigines who didn’t participate in the main attack. If so, then that could go a long way towards explaining the claimed low death count. Also, Windschuttle never claims that all of the aborigines seen participated in the two attacks. On the other hand, Ryan never says that the British “weapon of mass destruction” ie. cannon, ever killed even a single aborigine. Windschuttle makes a good case for the possibility that the cannon was only for ceremonial purposes and was therefore loaded with blanks, the aborigines were scared off by the sound.

Windschuttle’s research technique is better than Ryan’s. Ryan’s approach is holistic, giving equal credence to all sources regardless of date. Ryan, for example, rates a quote from a 1970 popular history book as equal to one from a contemporary eyewitness. Windschuttle peels references off by date, tracking down the original sources that were quoted ad nauseam by later writers, and examining the credibility of every original source individually. In particular, on Page 21 he discovers that the first claim that “nearly 50” aborigines were killed at Risdon Cove was made 26 years after the event, by a sealer who would have been a boy of 12 at the time, who was not an eyewitness, and who gave false testimony on another matter. We can therefore safely ignore this much-quoted claim and later claims of more than 50 deaths.

Page 22. Windschuttle is aware of conflicting evidence here. Moore reports “I was informed that a party of them was beating Birt, the settler, at his farm”. But Edward White, a neighbour of Birt, claims that the natives never went within 200 metres of Birt’s house. So either the two soldiers shot and killed a harmless pair of aborigines, or Edward White remembered wrongly. Windschuttle prefers the latter explanation, Ryan prefers the former explanation. I’m inclined to agree with Ryan.

Page 24 to 26. The claim that Moore was drunk and racist never appeared until 66 years after the event. The claim that Moore had a hangover at the time was invented 184 years after the event. The claim that “close to a hundred” aborigines were killed at Risdon Cove is an even more recent fabrication.

I haven’t seen how many soldiers were in the camp when it was attacked by the aborigines. It’s an important statistic. The two undeniable deaths were not at the camp, but near the settlement on the other side of the river. How, I ask myself, how could there have been not even one death on either side resulting directly from the attack of hundreds of armed aborigines on a British army camp?

Ruby, if you only have the Lyndall Ryan book “The Aboriginal Tasmanians” (1981, 1982) then throw it out and get the Lyndall Ryan book “Tasmanian Aborigines” (2012). The later book completely supersedes the earlier one, and I have reason to believe that it’s much better.

Both Lyndall Ryan and Keith Windschuttle are great scholars, but I can illustrate the difference quite simply. The Risdon Cove massacre of 1804 has only three extant eyewitness accounts, by Jacob Mountgarrett (surgeon and settler), by Lieutenant William Moore (soldier) and by Edward White (convict and gardener). There are some discrepancies between the accounts of Mountgarrett/Moore, who were together, and White who was some distance away.

Lyndall Ryan rejects the eyewitness accounts by Mountgarrett and Moore as agents of British Colonialism, and sides with White. Ryan blames Mountgarrett and Moore for the massacre, a case of ‘when you don’t know who is responsible, blame the messenger’.

Keith Windschuttle on the other hand rejects the eyewitness account of White on the grounds that White had no line of sight on the massacre and because White’s account was dictated 26 years later. Windschuttle sides with Mountgarrett and Moore.

At face value, Windschuttle’s response is more logical than Ryan’s, but not so. It’s always important to look deeper.

In this case, White’s line of sight included where Mountgarrett and Moore claimed that two aborigines had been shot. White did not see this shooting, and therefore somebody is lying. In addition, Mountgarrett and Moore, being in the centre of an attack from at least hundreds of armed aborigines, cannot be expected to be totally objective.

My opinion is that all three accounts, those of Mountgarrett, Moore and White, have to be accepted as being of equal value, and the discrepancies between them have to be accepted as unknowables.

My opinion at this precise moment (which may not be my opinion tomorrow) is that the two soldiers who shot these two aborigines lied their arses off to Moore. Another soldier (who may be one of the two), the one who brought the phony SOS message to Moore in the first place, is almost equally culpable.

Keith Windschuttle is regarded very poorly amongst historians and academics involved with Aboriginal History, yet in this thread he is held as an authority on the subject.

Henry Reynolds interprets his book as an attempt to revive the concept of terra nullius, and regards it as “without doubt, the most biased and cantankerous historical work to appear since the publication of G.W. Rusden’s three-volume History of Australia in the 1880s”.

The historian of genocide, Ben Kiernan, who classifies the fate of Aborigines as an example of the practice, situates Windschuttle’s polemical history within a new campaign, led by Quadrant, but taken up by a “chorus of right-wing columnists” within the Australian mass media with a record of antagonism to both Aborigines and their “leftist” supporters.

Stephen Garton, Professor of History, Provost & Deputy Vice-Chancellor at Sydney University, argued that “the flaw in Windschuttle’s argument is his belief that history can only be based on the evidence that survives. Evidence is always partial and only takes on a meaning if placed in an appropriate context. In other words historians always construct larger worlds from the fragments that survive”.

The University of Aberdeen’s Gregory D. B. Smithers, an Australian comparativist working on native histories, argues that Windschuttle’s political agenda shows a “discomfort with the way the “orthodox school” by inflating Aboriginal deaths, impugns Australian identity and its virtuous Anglo-Saxon origins”. Windschuttle’s book plays to “the white wing populism of white Australians, who feel their racially privileged position is under attack”. By reaction, Smithers argues, Windschuttle highlights “the nation’s virtues”, privileging the opinions of settlers and colonial officials, “while rejecting Aboriginal oral histories”. Smithers argues that Windschuttle ignores documentary evidence that contradicts his own ideology, and fails to perceive that the island reserves created for indigenous Tasmanians were “racialized spaces” for a people regarded as a form of “social pollution”“. He argues that the book is “a therapeutic history for white (Anglo-Saxon) Australians that distorts and distracts” and that in denying the reliability of historical evidence of racialized groups, Windschuttle employs a tactic used by historians to discredit historical accounts that do not fit with their presentist morality.

For Stuart Macintyre, Windschuttle’s book was not “so much counter-history as an exercise in incomprehension”. He finds Windschuttle’s method of calculating Aboriginal losses flimsy, and the figures he allocates to each incident “no more reliable than those, which he dismissed as guesswork, of mainstream frontier historians”. He concludes that the first volume is “a shocking book, shocking in its allegation of fabrication and also in its refusal of the interpretive framework that earlier historians employed, and that its author “fails to register the tragedy of what was a fatal encounter”. When challenged on his lack of compassion, Windschuttle is reported as replying: “You can’t really be serious about feeling sympathy for someone who died 200 years ago”. For Macintyre, “It is the absence of any sense of this tragedy, the complete lack of compassion for its victims, that is surely the most disturbing quality of Windschuttle’s rewriting of Aboriginal history”.

For University of Sydney historian Vicki Grieves, Windschuttle’s approach reads as though indigenous people “were not the intentional targets of the colonisers but accidental targets, mostly through their inability to be realistic, objective, logical and moral, and thus the “seeds of their own destruction” lay within their own “psyche and culture”. Even were one to concede Windschuttle’s guesstimate for the pre-white population of Tasmania, by his own figures, the death-rate for his plausible deaths still works out as higher in percentage terms than the mortality risk of the Australian population during WW1, when 60,000 soldiers died. Windschuttle shows, she argues, a predilection for old colonial explanations, and Darwinist values, as though nothing had happened in between. Regarding native treatment of women, who in his account were viciously brutalized, Windschuttle appeals to the reader’s moral outrage at the way a 14-year-old native girl was traded. In doing so, he ignores the fact that the age of consent in Britain at that time was 12, and whites themselves on the frontier exchanged wives or traded them for tobacco and rum.

James Boyce, in an extended review, notes that Windschuttle ignores native views for the period after 1832, precisely the date when almost all of what is known of Aboriginal perspectives began to be recorded. Examining Windschuttle’s use of sources, he finds his selection of material narrow, and his reading of their contents “selective”.

Bain Attwood of the School of Philosophical, Historical and International Studies at Monash University dismisses him as a “tabloid historian”. However, Attwood concedes that “Boyce is unable to demonstrate” that the documents he says Windschuttle ignored “would have provided factual killings of Aborigines”, and that “‘revisionist’ critics have demonstrated that the academic historians lacked documentation for most of the killings represented in their accounts”.

Shayne Breen, lecturer in Aboriginal history at the University of Tasmania, reads the book as “systematic character assassination”, replete with “unsupportable generalizations”, and nurtured by a “delusion” that only Windschuttle can find the historical truth. For Breen, “In making “the most primitive ever” claim, Windschuttle is not practising forensic scholarship. He is renovating a colonial ideology that decreed that Tasmanian Aborigines were the missing link between apes and man. This idea formed a central plank of what is known to scholars as scientific racism”.

Thanks Permeate for presenting a few opinions of Windschuttle’s work. I think it may be good for Moll to read them side by side, and he is free to have his own thoughts on both. Just as anyone is free to have an opinion on his opinion on their opinion….
And thanks Moll for reading with a critical eye. It has been interesting seeing your thoughts on both.

And this is the challenge of history, to take the crumbs of what is left and try to understand what may have been there.

Also Moll, I’m glad you have Lyndall’s updated book, where some mistakes have been corrected. I do not have a copy, I was lent her book by my friend who introduced me to Lyndall. She knew of my keen interest in aboriginal history and current affairs, and said that I had to read the book, and that I had to meet the author, her long time friend. I count myself very fortunate to do both. And I think our country is lucky to have such a well grounded person who is passionate about moving our country forwards. The work she has done and is doing will hopefully lead to some justice and healing. And not too much backlash.

ruby said:

Thanks Permeate for presenting a few opinions of Windschuttle’s work. I think it may be good for Moll to read them side by side, and he is free to have his own thoughts on both. Just as anyone is free to have an opinion on his opinion on their opinion….
And thanks Moll for reading with a critical eye. It has been interesting seeing your thoughts on both.

And this is the challenge of history, to take the crumbs of what is left and try to understand what may have been there.

Also Moll, I’m glad you have Lyndall’s updated book, where some mistakes have been corrected. I do not have a copy, I was lent her book by my friend who introduced me to Lyndall. She knew of my keen interest in aboriginal history and current affairs, and said that I had to read the book, and that I had to meet the author, her long time friend. I count myself very fortunate to do both. And I think our country is lucky to have such a well grounded person who is passionate about moving our country forwards. The work she has done and is doing will hopefully lead to some justice and healing. And not too much backlash.

Thank you Ruby for being so patient with me. Yes, I like to read Lyndall Ryan and Keith Windschuttle side by side. Windschuttle helps to fill.in what Ryan has left out about specific events and vice versa. For example from reading Ryan, I couldn’t tell whether the Risdon Cove massacre was one event or two events at different dates, but Windschuttle explains clearly that was two events in close proximity at the same time. Where Ryan says that the carronade was tuned on the aborigines and fired, Windschuttle explains that because it was a signal gun for ceremonial occasions it was probably filled with blanks. On the other hand, while Windschuttle explains that the aborigines were definitely carrying spears, it becomes clear that it’s likely that none of the aborigines with spears actually took part in the fight. And putting the two authors together it looks like there was an attempted violent theft of an aboriginal 12 year old child by unknown British soldiers.

The aim of all this for me was to put together a timeline for aboriginal history across Australia. The following is tentative because so far I’ve only read two books and three half books. I haven’t read much yet prior to 1889 for mainland Australia. I haven’t read much after 1935 for any state other than NSW.

A brief timeline of Aboriginal history in Australia.

1600 to 1650 – Dutch explorers, Australia’s West coast. Describe Aborigines as a wretched poeple, filthy, always with two teeth missing, no permanent houses, but with a knowledge of fire, waving spears.

1770 – James Cook, not much contact with Aborigines, but some peaceful trading near Cooktown in Qld.

1788 – Captain Phillip establishes a settlement for convicts in Sydney.

1789 – Famous Aborigine Bennelong was captured near Sydney, and acted as ambassador for the aboriginal people for many years. He travelled to Britin and lived there from 1892 to 1895. He died in Sydney in 1813.

1803 – settlement of Hobart in Tasmania by convicts ejected from Sydney for further criminal acts. Estimated population of Tasmanian aborigines at the time was 7,000 to 10,000. In 1804 at nearby Risdon Cove there was a battle between whites and aborigines, estimates of the number of aborigines involved range from 300 to “more than 600”, reliable aboriginal death toll estimates range from 2 to 30. Following this, relations between whites and aborigines were good until the middle of 1818.

1818 – The killing of 22 aborigines in reprisal for killing a white sealer in late 1818 sparked mutliple guerilla attacks by aborigines that escalated into a frontier war. In 1831 the Tasmanian government attempt to round up and relocate all Tasmanian aborigines offshore was a complete and expensive fiasco; of the only two aborigines caught, one escaped.

1847 – By 1847, George Robinson had succeeded where the government had failed. All surviving Tasmanian aborigines had been relocated on offshore islands, incluing Flinders Island in the Bass Strait. George Robinson saw himself as a benefactor of mankind because he had completely ended the war virtually all by himself. Pro-aboriginal whites on the mainland disagreed. The Tasmanian aborigines on the islands rapidly died out.

1845 to 1848 – Kennedy’s explorations in Cape York. As was common throughout early explorations, the number of whites killed by aborigines closely matches the number of aborigines killed by whites. Kennedy was speared to death in 1848.

1850 – Start of an aboriginal mission at Poonindie in the Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. This acted as a boarding school for children and their parents, makeshift hospital, as supply of food to aborigines (not just those living at the mission), and had a farm for aborigines. Before the privately owned missions, there were government farms where aborigines could learn practical farming techniques.

1850s and 1860s – Victorian gold rush. The loss of whites to the goldfields opened up employment for aborigines on farms and in the police.

1856 to 1858 – Aborigines given the right to vote in SA, Vic and NSW. Few aborigines actually voted.

1869 – Legslation to protect aborigines in Victoria, in the aftermath of the gold rush.

1886 – The half-caste act in Victoria and WA. This caused problems many years later, such as the ejection of mothers with half-caste children from an Aboriginal mission in Victoria. There was no such legislation in NSW.

1890 – Escalation of the spearings of whites by Aborigines in tropical Queensland.

1892 – Post gold-rush economic depression. Slow collapse of the aboriginal tribal system, with influenza, syphilis and alcoholism involved. Claims of mistreatment of aborigines by whites, chinese and malays.

1892 – The Yarrabah mission near Cairns under E.R. Gribble began to help aborigines. Poonindie mission closes, the aborigines there being relocated to other nearby missions.

1899 – Henry Lawson writes “If you come across any niggers, learn to sleep calmly, notwithstanding the fact that a big greasy black nigger, a perfect stranger to you, is more than likely to crawl in without knocking through a slit in the tent, any minute during the small hours, rip out your innards with a nasty knife and leave without explaining”.

1899 to 1912 – Four superb books about contemporary tribal aboriginal life. These form the core of modern knowledge of pre-European aboriginal life and every aspect of their culture. The first book is by Spencer and Gillen: “The Native Tribes of Central Australia”.

1902 – Votes for women. The possibility of votes for aborigines was floated at the time but rejected, because women had a much greater role in the Australian economy than aborigines. It probably wouldn’t have mattered, because even votes for women had zero effect on the balance of political power.

1905 – Daisy Bates, a fashionable white woman living with the Aborigines near Perth, became a fervent campaigner for the Aborigines

1905 – The “Report on the Royal Commission on the Condition of the Natives” by Roth in Western Australia is exceedingly critical of the condition and treatment of aborigines. This led to legislation throughout Australia to protect aborigines. The legislation was implemented state by state, 1905 in WA, 1909 in NSW, 1910 in SA, Vic, and NT.

1910 – The ratio of full blood to mixed race aborigines in NSW is 50:50, compare to the year 1942.

(1907 – shocking news, a man in central Melbourne went for a walk without a hat).
(1914 to 1918 – first world war).

(1872 – 1967) David Unaipon is a famous aborigine, now with his portrait on the $50 notes. He was a preacher, author, scientist, aboriginal activist and inventor of a perpetual motion machine.

1924 – “The aborigine still seems to be heading for extinction, despite the best efforts of the whites”

1932 – The Australian Aborigines League formed in Victoria, one of the first aboriginal political activist groups, led by half-caste William Cooper.

1936 – Albert Namatjira (1902 to 1959) starts to become a famous aboriginal painter.

1937 – The Aborigines Progressive Association is an aboriginal activist group formed in NSW, led by quarter-caste William Ferguson

1940 – The Aboriginal Protection board in NSW was disbanded and replaced by the Aboriginal Welfare board. This was far more than just a name change, the Aboriginal Welfare board was largely run by aboriginal activists, including William Ferguson. The previous white policy of segregation was replaced by the aboriginal policy of assimilation, including optional Australian citizenship. Similar legislation in other states.

1942 – There are only 570 full bloods in the whole of NSW, of a total mixed race aboriginal population there of 10,000.

1944 – There are only 29 full bloods in the whole of Victoria.

1949 – Right to vote for aboriginal soldiers after WW2.

1954 – Pearl Gibbs, the undisputed leader of aboriginal activism for women since 1937, is elected to run the NSW Government’s Aboriginal Welfare Board.

1961 – The conference of NSW aboriginal activists publishes a list of demands.

1962 to 1965 – Aboriginal right to vote in all federal and state elections by 1965.

1967 – All legislation concerning aborigines is taken away from the states and passed to the Federal Government.

1971 to 1982 – Neville Bonner, an aboriginal rights campaigner, is the first Aboriginal Australian to become a member of federal parliament. In 1979 he was named Australian of the year. In 1983 he was made a director of the ABC.

1974 – Prime minister Whitlam implements some pro-aboriginal policies. Aboriginal people could now obtain housing, loans, emergency accommodation and tertiary education allowances. He also increased funding for, and expanded, the Aboriginal Legal Service.

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.

The French explorers

During the late 18th century when there was widespread speculation in Europe about Terra Australis Incognita (the unknown southern land), Britain and France were competing to chart and explore the new world. French explorer La Perouse following Captain Cook’s 1770 voyage notes, arrived in Botany Bay just days after the First Fleet in 1788, then sailed north with his two ships, disappearing without a trace.

Three years later an expedition led by Bruni d’Entrecasteaux left France under orders from Louis XVI to try to find missing French explorer La Perouse and also to complete charts of the southern land. The expedition set sail in two 350 tonne frigates, the Recherche and the Esperance.

The landing in Van Diemen’s Land in April 1792, was the result of an accident. Following a violent storm, the French vessels mistook what was later named Recherche Bay for Adventure Bay, a safe harbour observed by Tasman, as a place to recuperate. They stopped there for more than four weeks, then undertook an extended but unsuccessful search for La Perouse to the northeast of Australia, and returned to Recherche Bay for another three weeks in 1793.

During both visits, Recherche Bay saw much activity by the 221 passengers and crew. The explorers set up a camp, made a garden and scientific observatory and while they replenished their supplies, they also dedicated as much time as possible to scientific research.
Scientific observations of the southern land

Not only did they prepare a garden to establish European plants, but the expedition’s botanists catalogued almost 5,000 specimens including the blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus), which later became Tasmania’s floral emblem.

Jacques Julien Houtou de Labillardiere’s botanical collection from Recherche Bay, is included in the first publication of general flora of Australia— Novae Hollandiae Plantarum Specimen (1804-06).

Elisabeth Paul Edouard Rossel set up an observatory at Bennett’s Point and conducted the first scientific experiment in Australia, observing that geo-magnetism varied with latitude. This discovery was to revolutionise compass use and make navigation much safer, especially in and around Terra Australis Incognita. This was of great significance to navigational science and the event was commemorated by the unveiling of a plaque on the site by the CSIRO in 1992.
French-Indigenous encounters

The ‘French Garden’ was planted with the intention of providing food for other maritime adventurers, but also as a ‘gift’ from the French for the benefit of the Indigenous people.

The relatively extensive, well-documented (both pictorially and written), encounters on the north east peninsula of Recherche Bay between the expedition members and the Indigenous people provided a very early opportunity for meetings and mutual observation. The recordings, from the French perspective, of these encounters, are important observations of the lives of the Tasmanian Aboriginal people. These observations contribute significantly to knowledge of the diversity of traditional Aboriginal cultures.

https://www.environment.gov.au/heritage/places/national/recherche

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.
—-

If it were a myth there would be no evidence of taking children away and they are still taking children away. So fuck that statement.

sarahs mum said:

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.
—-

If it were a myth there would be no evidence of taking children away and they are still taking children away. So fuck that statement.

Pauline Hanson is on the lookout for people with those single minded views. Perhaps moll is thinking of going into politics.

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.

—-

Are you being serious, moll?

dv said:

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.

—-

Are you being serious, moll?

Surely not.

Rule 303 said:

dv said:

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.

—-

Are you being serious, moll?

Surely not.

Moll has argued previously that Stolen Generations did not take place.

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

ruby said:

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

Are you saying that he is biased? If so , I am good with that.

sarahs mum said:

ruby said:

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

Are you saying that he is biased? If so , I am good with that.

I think my opinion might be a bit more forcefully put than that, sm.

For now I will just say that I suspect that Moll got bored reading a real historian’s writings, started skim reading after a few pages, skipped on to the Risdon Cove bit, and then read that with an agenda. And then went back to his favourite ‘historian’ Windschuttle to back up what we were all taught, back in those good old days. And I reckon he has not read Lyndall’s book past that.

ruby said:

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

Moll even by forum standards is exceedingly eccentric.

Witty Rejoinder said:

ruby said:

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

Moll even by forum standards is exceedingly eccentric.

He does like to take up the contrarian position on a number of issues, I have noticed.

Witty Rejoinder said:

ruby said:

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

Moll even by forum standards is exceedingly eccentric.

Even I have noticed. Telling him doesn’t seem to help either.

ruby said:

Witty Rejoinder said:

ruby said:

Bloody hell Moll. I’m speechless.
You’re not serious with all that, are you?

Moll even by forum standards is exceedingly eccentric.

He does like to take up the contrarian position on a number of issues, I have noticed.

He’s not contrarian; that would entail at least understanding the opposite point of view.

For those who might like to read Lyndall Ryan on Risdon Cove-
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236615840_Risdon_Cove_and_the_Massacre_of_3_May_1804_Their_Place_in_Tasmanian_History

ruby said:

For those who might like to read Lyndall Ryan on Risdon Cove-
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236615840_Risdon_Cove_and_the_Massacre_of_3_May_1804_Their_Place_in_Tasmanian_History

Ta.

Something irked me back there somewhere about having to remain unemotional. That is hard for me. Feeling stuff doesn’t rule out truth.

Julie Gough has spent years in the archives. She has found approximately 300 Tasmanian children that were taken away. Her work is response.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julie_Gough

ruby said:

For those who might like to read Lyndall Ryan on Risdon Cove-
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236615840_Risdon_Cove_and_the_Massacre_of_3_May_1804_Their_Place_in_Tasmanian_History

p119 I’ve met Greg Lehman. I’ve been to a few of his lectures. He is an astute fellow. I’d trust him.

sarahs mum said:

ruby said:

For those who might like to read Lyndall Ryan on Risdon Cove-
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236615840_Risdon_Cove_and_the_Massacre_of_3_May_1804_Their_Place_in_Tasmanian_History

p119 I’ve met Greg Lehman. I’ve been to a few of his lectures. He is an astute fellow. I’d trust him.

So many of the Europeans involved are now the names on the maps. Just saying.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/ng-interactive/2019/mar/04/massacre-map-australia-the-killing-times-frontier-wars

PermeateFree said:

Rule 303 said:

dv said:

1981 – Peter Read, an academic in Canberra, invents the myth of the Stolen Generations.

—-

Are you being serious, moll?

Surely not.

Moll has argued previously that Stolen Generations did not take place.

Thank you. Yes. I have argued previously that the Stolen Generations did dot take place in NSW. I am not saying it didn’t take place in other states. Peter Read’s paper is all about NSW, not at all about any other states, and I have already gone through his paper in excruciating detail. His scholarship is abysmal. Read has zero, flat zero knowledge of Aboriginal activism in NSW. Other total ignorance of Read includes not knowing the difference between a home and a mission, not knowing the difference between a mission and paid employment, not knowing the difference between the Aboriginal Protection Board and the Aboriginal Welfare Board, and not knowing the difference between the Aboriginal Welfare Board and Child Services. In short, Read’s total ignorance is horrifying.

Peter Read personally admitted that four years before writing this, he knew absolutely nothing about aborigines. While writing it, he still knows SFA. Peter Read invented the words “stolen generations” and every reference to “stolen generations” eventually leads back to Peter Read.

I have gone through literally about a thousand complaints to and from the aboriginal activists in the period that Read refers to, i.e. prior to 1964 in NSW, without finding even one event that could even be possibly misconstrued as “stolen generation”. The most common complaints are about aboriginal housing conditions, but all those complaints come from whites. The next most common complaints are from underage teenagers who are being prevented from going out the the town for booze and sex.

Let’s take Read’s mythological cases of stolen children: two left home voluntarily to find employment, one left home because he was arrested for violent crime, one was taken to hospital, etc. Not one was an actual stolen child.

OK, so let’s ignore Read, what about other evidence? And other states. Yes for Victoria, rarely, see the following:

I also reviewed “Living Aboriginal History of Victoria”, 1991. This contained excerpts from interviews with ~55 Aborigines and is very anti-white throughout. Most of the complaints are minor, such as about how difficult it is in a white world to early a living weaving baskets. This book contains 9 claims of stolen children. If I take the words in the book as factual, rather than exaggeration, there are three unequivocal cases of stolen children. In each case, the perpetrator of this crime was a social worker or policeman who thought they were doing the right thing, but of course they weren’t.

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I found the book “The fabrication of aboriginal history: The stolen generation” by Keith Windschuttle. I have it beside me now, I haven’t yet looked inside the front cover.

—-

Going back to Ryan and Windschuttle, the interplay between them is really amusing, like watching a slow motion tennis match. Here’s an example I really like.

Ryan (1981 or 1996) – The 48th regiment in 1815 massacred 22 aborigines at Oyster Bay in reprisal for the killing of a sealer.
Windschuttle (2002) – Quoting the above from Ryan. “As Chapter Five of my book demonstrates, this incident not only did not happen, it could not have happened”.
Ryan (2012) Preface – “in my riposte” to Windschuttle “I readily conceded that there were indeed some errors in” my book including …
Ryan (2012) Page 68 – “In November 1818 following the killing of a sealer … the 48th regiment was dispatched to the area where they killed 22 …”

You can’t deny that Windschuttle was right. Ryan’s “oops 1818 not 1815” is very important because the end of 1818 marks the abrupt transition between increasingly friendly relations between that specific aboriginal tribe and the whites, and the start of violence on both sides. I haven’t seen Windschuttle’s reply to Ryan’s change of date, but I might make a comment. If this massacre actually occurred, why was there not a hint of it happening in any of the Tasmanian newspapers?

And yes, I have read the Tasmanian newspapers at around that date.

https://www.newcastle.edu.au/profile/lyndall-ryan
The story of Professor Lyndall Ryan from Newcastle’s Centre for the History of Violence began in her mid twenties when she was knee deep in archives in Hobart – a “historian’s delight” in her words – documenting the history of Tasmania’s convict system.
Professor Lyndall Ryan“I was a research assistant at the time for Professor Manning Clark at the Australian National University in Canberra. He was working on Volume 2 of his six volume History of Australia and dispatched me to Hobart for six weeks, to uncover details of Governor Arthur’s policies.
It was during this six-week sojourn that the archivist showed her the 18 volumes of letters and reports on Tasmania’s Black War in the 1820s. He then suggested that if she were considering postgraduate study they would make a wonderful topic.

“This really whet my appetite. I kept coming back to the idea time and time again, and then decided to follow through with the archivist’s proposal.”
This decision was a pivotal moment, carving Lyndall’s path for the next 40 years as a leading academic on Aboriginal, Australian and Feminist history.
“People had assumed that Tasmanian Aboriginals had died out but what we discovered was that in fact, they were well and truly alive.”

Following her thesis research, Lyndall published her first book in 1981 called The Aboriginal Tasmanians, which documented the extraordinary and dramatic history of Tasmanian Aborigines from first colonisation to the present.

As an Australian historian, Lyndall says she is bestowed with a responsibility to present the available facts and figures in a way that people can understand and come to terms with the events of the past.
“The more research I do, the more dumbfounded I am by the amount of violence and brutality that actually took place.”
“Invaluable new knowledge is constantly being brought to the surface, which is critical to comprehending who we are today and the reasons behind why Aboriginal communities are faced with the current state of social circumstances,” she explained.

In November 2013, Lyndall and Dr Jonathon Richards from the University of Queensland were awarded an Australian Research Council (ARC) Grant to pursue their enquiry into the violence, which took place on the Australian colonial frontier from 1788 through to 1960.
“There are gaps in our knowledge and inaccuracies masked by blank walls,” said Lyndall.
“People still do not want to talk about what took place on this land not all that long ago, which indicates that we have more work to do… This project is designed to use new analytical methods to study how Aborigines and settlers were killed on the Australian frontier,” she continued.

Lyndall and Johnathon will be producing new estimates of casualties by scrutinising archives, books, texts, newspapers, and stories recording the massacres – any sources they can get their hands on from the time – to produce a collaborative and coherent assessment, which will be made accessible online in the form of an interactive map.
“Sadly, there is still so little known, especially in NSW. There are snippets of information but no one has yet pieced together the overall picture.”
“The stories are not dead either. They exist today in a profound way and it is our job to bring those to stories to light in a way that people are prepared to look at it. That’s the challenge: finding a way to present this ever so critical information in a way that engages people and encourages them to learn more,” she shared.

“It is also significant for Aboriginal communities and the healing process. They want the past to be acknowledged and we have a distinct role to play in creating opportunities for justice.”

Discussing career climaxes, Lyndall shares of a steep learning curve that rocked her reputation and research some ten years ago. “I was accused of fabricating frontier massacres in my research and my career was severely under the gun. It was a traumatizing experience and generated enormous publicity. I thought for some time why I was in this line of work if I was going to be treated like this. But it taught me that you have to be prepared to be crticised as a historian because you are exposing information and truths many do not want to hear.”

Looking ahead, Lyndall is diligently juggling multiple projects in different stages of development.
Along with director Professor Philip Dwyer and Professor Roger Markwick, Lyndall established the Centre for the History of Violence within the Faculty of Education and Arts three years ago. One of the trio’s motivations was to address the blanket of silence that surrounded the topic of massacre..
Lyndall says that it wasn’t until the July 1995 Srebrenica massacre, which claimed the lives of more than 7000 Bosnian Muslims, that European scholars were awoken to the importance of massacre as a subject of study. Since then important new research has appeared, including by Professor Dwyer and herself.

One important ARC-funded collaborative research project coming to fruition is titled Colonisation and Massacres 1780-1820, with Lyndall covering Australia and Oceania; Philip investigating the Napoleonic spread into Eastern Europe; Nigel Penn from the University of Cape Town focusing on South Africa; and Native American Professor Barbara Mann from the University of Toledo, Ohio, investigating the frontiers of Michigan and Ohio – then outside the boundaries of the new American republic.

Comparing and contrasting these four areas of investigation, the group expects to produce a book in the coming year.
“There are important differences and interesting similarities, it is a very exciting project,” Lyndall says, adding that the remoteness of history helps soften the blow of what can be gruesome subject matter.
“The distance of the past gives you a sense that you can stand back and look at it. As historians, we have the luxury of working outside the heat of the moment, and it allows us to be sceptical, to look at things with a piercing eye.
“It’s more like detective work and it’s always very interesting to explore the context in which these incidents occurred. It is the past, and that helps, and once you’ve found a few clues, of course, you have to stay on the scent.”

A new project to be led by Lyndall is also in development involving six scholars from three universities who aim to determine the links between intimacy and violence in white settler societies on the Pacific Rim (including Australia, New Zealand, Canada and western USA) from 1830 – 1930.
“We are trying discover how well people on both sides of the frontier actually knew each other. It appears that, they knew each other quite well before, during and after the violence,” said Lyndall.

mollwollfumble said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

And there we have it.
That’s ugly stuff, Moll. People are on the receiving end of what you are promoting. Good people. This is not just in the past, this is in the present too.

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

dv said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

Arts said:

dv said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

Or, rather, he erroneously thinks that other people erroneously think that.

dv said:

Arts said:

dv said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

Or, rather, he erroneously thinks that other people erroneously think that.

or it could all be just moll weird sense of humour at play.

dv said:

Arts said:

dv said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

Or, rather, he erroneously thinks that other people erroneously think that.

Once you go down the rabbit hole of Windschuttle and Bolt and Sky News, truth suffers and propaganda gets ugly.

ruby said:

mollwollfumble said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

And there we have it.
That’s ugly stuff, Moll. People are on the receiving end of what you are promoting. Good people. This is not just in the past, this is in the present too.

And as of last week I read of an aboriginal woman who had a baby that was immediately taken from her because she was homeless. They had known of her status all through her pregnancy but preferred to do nothing about it and take the kid within hours of it being born. This is happening now. But not to white people.

moll, if you are still about..I sent you an email earlier in the week. Did you get it?

sarahs mum said:

ruby said:

mollwollfumble said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

And there we have it.
That’s ugly stuff, Moll. People are on the receiving end of what you are promoting. Good people. This is not just in the past, this is in the present too.

And as of last week I read of an aboriginal woman who had a baby that was immediately taken from her because she was homeless. They had known of her status all through her pregnancy but preferred to do nothing about it and take the kid within hours of it being born. This is happening now. But not to white people.

In Tasmania, Premier Hodgeperson has said that being homeless is not a criteria to have your children taken away. Because…he doesn’t know what to do with the homelessness problem? And the homeless are white?

mollwollfumble said:

What caused the accelerating violent reaction of the Tasmanian Aborigines against British settlement in the early years leading up to 1826?

• Ryan’s first hypothesis (1981)
  The whites in Tasmania were racist genocidal bastards, who systematically wiped out the Tasmanian aborigines because they were black.
  Ryan had abandoned this hypothesis completely by 2012.

• Ryan’s second hypothesis (2012)
  The whites in Tasmania took the Aborigines food and land.
  This hypothesis fails completely because the whites, rather than depriving the Aborigines of food, supplied them with food, and because through the rest of Australia the aborigines and white farmers were happy to live adjacent to one another on the same land in a wary truce.

• mollwollfumble’s hypothesis (2019)
  Some of the whites in Tasmania were the scum of the Earth, former maximum security prison inmates including multiple murderers, psychopaths and career criminals. These criminals committed atrocities against the aborigines, the worst of the atrocities being hunting aborigines for sport and torturing aborigines for fun. Collins was wise to them by Arthur wasn’t.

• Windschuttle’s hypothesis (2002)
  (Not a clue because I haven’t read Windschuttle yet).

To test mollwollfumble’s hypothesis, would need to look into the prison histories and court records of white settlers, Ryan doesn’t delve that far.

Have been reading more. Came to the conclusion that “mollwollfumble’s hypothesis (2019)” is total crap. Still haven’t discovered Windschuttle’s hypothesis.

The war between the British and the aborigines around Hobart and further north was centred around the years 1824 to 1831. During that period, 187 whites were killed (I have no idea how many aborigines yet) in 729 separate incidents. That is a massively huge number of incidents.

Certain hypotheses can be ruled out. The aborigines were not starving, there was so much food that they were eating wastefully. The aborigines were not out to kill sheep or destroy crops, this was seldom done and they never ate the sheep. The aborigines were not fenced out of their own land, because there were exceedingly few fences.

This still eliminates Ryan’s second hypothesis.

But I notice that Ryan and Windscuttle have both missed a possibility. Ryan implies, without actually saying it, that fences were everywhere. Windscuttle explains that the evidence doesn’t support this, and says quite plausibly that the lack of fences is due to the lack of wire and nails. But that misses the reason for the lack of wire and nails. There are plenty of anecdotes from mainland Australia about tribal aborigines stealing every nail they can lay their hands or feet on. Some (but definitely not all) native tribes valued iron above women, and would sell women for iron. Why, because iron tools in general and iron spear tips in particular are vastly superior to wood and stone spear tips.

To put it another way, any fences the British settlers would put up with nails or wire would be torn down ASAP by the aborigines in the search for nails. And that, together with a statement written by Captain Arthur in 1930, allows me to put forward another hypothesis for the war of 1824 to 1831.

• mollwollfumble’s hypothesis (2019)
  Simple straightforward jealousy. Aborigines were jealous of the riches that the whites had, stole what they could of what they valued, and killed for more.

This leads to a further disturbing possibility for the death of the Tasmanian aborigine. This is too new and tentative to be called a hypothesis. And too shocking to contemplate. But perhaps, just perhaps, the Tasmanian aborigines were killed off by the Tasmanian aborigines. The arrival of rich white settlers on the East and Northern sides of Tasmania brought iron and dogs that the local tribes quickly obtained. That gave them an enormous but temporary military superiority over the adjacent tribes, and they were not slow to take advantage, killing them off. As the wave of military technology headed west, more and more tribesmen were killed. We already know that there was a major war between north-central and north-east aboriginal nations.

Other hypotheses for the estimated loss of 2,000 or so Tasmanian Aborigines between 1804 and 1818 don’t work. Nearly everyone agrees that that huge loss of numbers can’t explained by disease, starvation, attacks by whites, stealing of women or alienation of land. An arms race, on the other hand, can’t be ruled out quite so quickly.

This is too soon to be considered a hypothesis. At the moment it still qualifies as a ridiculous idea.

ruby said:

dv said:

Arts said:

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

Or, rather, he erroneously thinks that other people erroneously think that.

Once you go down the rabbit hole of Windschuttle and Bolt and Sky News, truth suffers and propaganda gets ugly.

Thanks for the warning. I’m old enough to have already seen political revisionist propaganda as it relates to aboriginal history. Starting in the late 1930s with the rise of aboriginal activism, and lies that were spread then about, for example, aboriginal missions and aboriginal protection. Then every 20 to 25 years after that as the new guard aboriginal activism rejects and maligns the previous generation of aboriginal activism.

Bolt is just quoting Windschuttle? You think? Perhaps?

From what I’ve read of Windschuttle so far, his work has two main faults – gotta go, be back later.

My timeline of aboriginal history shouyld finish with this:

Arts said:

dv said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

But that is what happened in many cases.

PermeateFree said:

Arts said:

dv said:

Honestly. who would steal an aboriginal child? If you wanted to steal a child, you’d at least choose a white one.

I dunno, moll. I’ve long considered you an odd fellow but I think that your denialism has stepped a bit beyond what would consider a normal difference of opinion.

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

But that is what happened in many cases.

And is still happening.

sarahs mum said:

PermeateFree said:

Arts said:

I think he might be misunderstanding the word ‘stolen’. Instead of being a widespread practice of Government policy to assimilate in a manner to allow ‘natural elimination’, it seems he thinks people just went round and stole individual children off the street.

But that is what happened in many cases.

And is still happening.

I think this is the most racist govt we have seen for some time. But credit where it is due. They don’t like lots.

>>Every morning our people would crush charcoal and mix that with animal fat and smother that all over us, so that when the police came they could only see black children in the distance. We were told always to be on the alert and, if white people came, to run into the bush or run and stand behind the trees as stiff as a poker, or else hide behind logs or run into culverts and hide.<<

Confidential evidence 681, Western Australia: woman ultimately surrendered at 5 years to Mt Margaret Mission for schooling in the 1930s.
———————————————————————————————————-
>>The children were still being removed in bulk, but it wasn’t because they were part white. They had social workers that’d go around from house to house and look in the cupboards and things like that and they’d say the children were neglected <<

(Molly Dyer evidence 219, speaking of the practice of the Victorian Aborigines Welfare Board in the 1950s).

——————————————————————————————————-

>>Dr Max Kamien surveyed 320 adults in Bourke NSW in the 1970s. One in every three reported having been separated from their families in childhood for five or more years (cited by Hunter 1995 on page 378). Dr Jane McKendrick’s findings are almost identical. She surveyed Victorian Aboriginal general medical practice patients in the late 1980s, 30% of whom reported having been removed: 20% to children’s homes and another 10% to foster and adoptive families (cited by Hunter 1995 on page 378). <<

https://www.humanrights.gov.au/our-work/bringing-them-home

>>Between 1910-1970, many Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families as a result of various government policies. The generations of children removed under these policies became known as the Stolen Generations. The policies of child removal left a legacy of trauma and loss that continues to affect Indigenous communities, families and individuals.

The forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families was part of the policy of Assimilation. Assimilation was based on the assumption of black inferiority and white superiority, which proposed that Indigenous people should be allowed to “die out” through a process of natural elimination, or, where possible, should be assimilated into the white community.

Children taken from their parents as part of the Stolen Generation were taught to reject their Indigenous heritage, and forced to adopt white culture. Their names were often changed, and they were forbidden to speak their traditional languages. Some children were adopted by white families, and many were placed in institutions where abuse and neglect were common.

Assimilation policies focused on children, who were considered more adaptable to white society than Indigenous adults. “Half-caste” children (a term now considered derogatory for people of Aboriginal and white parentage), were particularly vulnerable to removal, because authorities thought these children could be assimilated more easily into the white community due to their lighter skin colour.

Assimilation, including child removal policies, failed its aim of improving the lives of Indigenous Australians by absorbing them into white society. This was primarily because white society refused to accept Indigenous people as equals, regardless of their efforts to live like white people.<<

https://australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/stolen-generations

>>Every morning our people would crush charcoal and mix that with animal fat and smother that all over us, so that when the police came they could only see black children in the distance. We were told always to be on the alert and, if white people came, to run into the bush or run and stand behind the trees as stiff as a poker, or else hide behind logs or run into culverts and hide.<<

Confidential evidence 681, Western Australia: woman ultimately surrendered at 5 years to Mt Margaret Mission for schooling in the 1930s.<<

There is a children’s book about this I bought 25 years ago. It was widely praised. But apparently not widely used.

https://www.anthonyhillbooks.com/TBSmain.html

>>The forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families had a profound impact that is still felt today.

For the children who were taken:

Many were psychologically, physically, and sexually abused while living in state care or with their adoptive families.
Efforts to make stolen children reject their culture often caused them to feel ashamed of their Indigenous heritage.
Many children were wrongly told that their parents had died or abandoned them, and many never knew where they had been taken from or who their biological families were.
Living conditions in the institutions were highly controlled, and children were frequently punished harshly, were cold and hungry and received minimal if any affection.
The children generally received a very low level of education, as they were expected to work as manual labourers and domestic servants (see Unfinished Business).
Medical experts have noted a high incidence of depression, anxiety, post traumatic stress and suicide among the Stolen Generations

For their families:

Many parents never recovered from the grief of having their children removed.
Some parents could not go on living without their children, while others turned to alcohol as a coping mechanism.
The removal of several generations of children severely disrupted Indigenous oral culture, and consequently much cultural knowledge was lost.
Many of the Stolen Generations never experienced living in a healthy family situation, and never learned parenting skills. In some instances, this has resulted in generations of children raised in state care. <<

https://australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/stolen-generations

>>The Stolen Generations are the Noongar and other Aboriginal children who, over one and a half centuries, were taken away from their families and placed in institutions and missions. Most often it was the lighter skinned children who were taken to be assimilated into white society. Sometimes children were on their way home from school or visiting their siblings when they were taken.<<

https://www.noongarculture.org.au/stolen-generations/

>>The “Stolen Generations” is the name given to at least 100,000 Aboriginal children who were forcibly removed or taken under duress from their families by police or welfare officers between 1910 and 1970, as stated in in the Bringing Them Home Report.

Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

1869

The Aborigines Protection Act (Vic) establishes an Aborigines Protection Board in Victoria, giving the Governor the power to order the removal of any child from their family to a reformatory or industrial school.

1883

The NSW Aborigines Protection Board is established to manage the lives of 9,000 people.

1897

The Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act (Qld) allows the Chief Protector to remove local Aboriginal people onto and between reserves and hold children in dormitories. The Director of Native Welfare is the legal guardian of all ‘aboriginal’ children whether their parents are living or not until 1965.

1905

The Aborigines Act (WA) is passed. Under the act, the Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 16 years old. In the following years, other states and territories enact similar laws.

1909

The Aborigines Protection Act (NSW) gives the Aborigines Protection Board power to assume full control and custody of the child of any Aborigine if a court found the child to be neglected under the Neglected Children and Juvenile Offenders Act 1905 (NSW).

1911

The Aborigines Act (SA) makes the Chief Protector the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child. The Chief Protector is replaced by the Aborigines Protection Board in 1939 and guardianship power is repealed in 1962.

The Northern Territory Aboriginals Ordinance (Cth) gives the Chief Protector power to assume custody of any Aboriginal or ‘half-caste’ if it is deemed ‘necessary’ or ‘desirable’.

1915

The Aborigines Protection Amending Act (NSW) gives power to the Aboriginal Protection Board to separate Indigenous children from their families without the need to establish neglect in court.<<

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/timeline-stolen-generations

>>Stolen Generations

The Stolen Generations are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who, when they were children, were taken away from their families and communities as the result of past government policies. Children were removed by governments, churches and welfare bodies to be brought up in institutions, fostered out or adopted by white families.

The removal of Aboriginal children took place from the early days of British colonisation in Australia. It broke important cultural, spiritual and family ties and has left a lasting and intergenerational impact on the lives and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

Government policies concerning Aboriginal people were implemented under different laws in the different states and territories of Australia. These laws meant nearly every aspect of the lives of Indigenous people was closely controlled by government: relationships and marriage, children, work, travel, wages, housing and land, and access to health care and education.

Records about the Stolen Generations and their families were kept by governments, as well as by churches, missions and other non-government agencies. Many records have been lost as the result of poor recordkeeping practices, fires, floods, and in some cases, due to deliberate destruction. Changes to the structure of government departments and within non-government organisations can also make it very difficult to trace records to assist with finding family connections.<<

https://aiatsis.gov.au/research/finding-your-family/before-you-start/stolen-generations

I’ll leave it here but there is heaps of material available on this subject. All you need do is google!

PermeateFree said:

>>Stolen Generations

The Stolen Generations are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who, when they were children, were taken away from their families and communities as the result of past government policies. Children were removed by governments, churches and welfare bodies to be brought up in institutions, fostered out or adopted by white families.

The removal of Aboriginal children took place from the early days of British colonisation in Australia. It broke important cultural, spiritual and family ties and has left a lasting and intergenerational impact on the lives and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

Government policies concerning Aboriginal people were implemented under different laws in the different states and territories of Australia. These laws meant nearly every aspect of the lives of Indigenous people was closely controlled by government: relationships and marriage, children, work, travel, wages, housing and land, and access to health care and education.

Records about the Stolen Generations and their families were kept by governments, as well as by churches, missions and other non-government agencies. Many records have been lost as the result of poor recordkeeping practices, fires, floods, and in some cases, due to deliberate destruction. Changes to the structure of government departments and within non-government organisations can also make it very difficult to trace records to assist with finding family connections.<<

https://aiatsis.gov.au/research/finding-your-family/before-you-start/stolen-generations

I’ll leave it here but there is heaps of material available on this subject. All you need do is google!

There was a recent case of a woman who would not sign/activate the Indue card. She went to a charity for food and they went away and came back and told her that she had access to the Indue card and so she should use it and buy food. They turned her away. So charities have access to these files still/again.

sarahs mum said:

PermeateFree said:

>>Stolen Generations

The Stolen Generations are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who, when they were children, were taken away from their families and communities as the result of past government policies. Children were removed by governments, churches and welfare bodies to be brought up in institutions, fostered out or adopted by white families.

The removal of Aboriginal children took place from the early days of British colonisation in Australia. It broke important cultural, spiritual and family ties and has left a lasting and intergenerational impact on the lives and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

Government policies concerning Aboriginal people were implemented under different laws in the different states and territories of Australia. These laws meant nearly every aspect of the lives of Indigenous people was closely controlled by government: relationships and marriage, children, work, travel, wages, housing and land, and access to health care and education.

Records about the Stolen Generations and their families were kept by governments, as well as by churches, missions and other non-government agencies. Many records have been lost as the result of poor recordkeeping practices, fires, floods, and in some cases, due to deliberate destruction. Changes to the structure of government departments and within non-government organisations can also make it very difficult to trace records to assist with finding family connections.<<

https://aiatsis.gov.au/research/finding-your-family/before-you-start/stolen-generations

I’ll leave it here but there is heaps of material available on this subject. All you need do is google!

There was a recent case of a woman who would not sign/activate the Indue card. She went to a charity for food and they went away and came back and told her that she had access to the Indue card and so she should use it and buy food. They turned her away. So charities have access to these files still/again.

Europeans have a poor reputation in their handling of indigenous peoples. I think it is because they think themselves vastly superior.

PermeateFree said:

>>The forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families had a profound impact that is still felt today.

For the children who were taken:

Many were psychologically, physically, and sexually abused while living in state care or with their adoptive families.
Efforts to make stolen children reject their culture often caused them to feel ashamed of their Indigenous heritage.
Many children were wrongly told that their parents had died or abandoned them, and many never knew where they had been taken from or who their biological families were.
Living conditions in the institutions were highly controlled, and children were frequently punished harshly, were cold and hungry and received minimal if any affection.
The children generally received a very low level of education, as they were expected to work as manual labourers and domestic servants (see Unfinished Business).
Medical experts have noted a high incidence of depression, anxiety, post traumatic stress and suicide among the Stolen Generations

For their families:

Many parents never recovered from the grief of having their children removed.
Some parents could not go on living without their children, while others turned to alcohol as a coping mechanism.
The removal of several generations of children severely disrupted Indigenous oral culture, and consequently much cultural knowledge was lost.
Many of the Stolen Generations never experienced living in a healthy family situation, and never learned parenting skills. In some instances, this has resulted in generations of children raised in state care. <<

https://australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/stolen-generations

when we studied this, they showed us a video of a woman who was part of the stolen generation. Even though she was one of the ‘lucky’ ones. She was placed in a well to do Sydney family, her adoptive parents were kind and thoughtful and gave her all the decent things and good education.. in the interview she said that even though she had a ‘lovely’ life, she always felt like something was missing inside her.. she always felt not quite complete.. and so she sought out her family as an adult.. and once she met them she felt ‘whole’ again. In essence it doesn’t matter how wonderful a life you can give someone, the idea of still feeling loss is trauma and assimilation, even in the best scenario, isn’t the answer.

Arts said:

PermeateFree said:

>>The forcible removal of Indigenous children from their families had a profound impact that is still felt today.

For the children who were taken:

Many were psychologically, physically, and sexually abused while living in state care or with their adoptive families.
Efforts to make stolen children reject their culture often caused them to feel ashamed of their Indigenous heritage.
Many children were wrongly told that their parents had died or abandoned them, and many never knew where they had been taken from or who their biological families were.
Living conditions in the institutions were highly controlled, and children were frequently punished harshly, were cold and hungry and received minimal if any affection.
The children generally received a very low level of education, as they were expected to work as manual labourers and domestic servants (see Unfinished Business).
Medical experts have noted a high incidence of depression, anxiety, post traumatic stress and suicide among the Stolen Generations

For their families:

Many parents never recovered from the grief of having their children removed.
Some parents could not go on living without their children, while others turned to alcohol as a coping mechanism.
The removal of several generations of children severely disrupted Indigenous oral culture, and consequently much cultural knowledge was lost.
Many of the Stolen Generations never experienced living in a healthy family situation, and never learned parenting skills. In some instances, this has resulted in generations of children raised in state care. <<

https://australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/stolen-generations

when we studied this, they showed us a video of a woman who was part of the stolen generation. Even though she was one of the ‘lucky’ ones. She was placed in a well to do Sydney family, her adoptive parents were kind and thoughtful and gave her all the decent things and good education.. in the interview she said that even though she had a ‘lovely’ life, she always felt like something was missing inside her.. she always felt not quite complete.. and so she sought out her family as an adult.. and once she met them she felt ‘whole’ again. In essence it doesn’t matter how wonderful a life you can give someone, the idea of still feeling loss is trauma and assimilation, even in the best scenario, isn’t the answer.

*nods

So I posted this on a Facebook thread…

>>Ros Meeker I’m more worried about

The Say NO Seven

🌿#HEADS_UP_EVERYONE We have first person testimony from a resident elder from the Western Desert region that up to 150 people not 70 as reported by the ABC, have been placed on Indue Cards by the DSS in their region, after VISITING Kalgoorlie.

This is occurring in full breach of the Social Security Act and CDCT legislation therein. People are returning home from Kalgoorlie and finding the card in their letterboxes, some with some without DSS letters. This is a SERIOUS breach of the law.

This is occurring at the same time as Kalgoorlie CEO’s bring shepherd attack dogs ( drug dogs are normally beagles and spaniels etc) into the community and have added over one million dollars to ramp up policing hours and numbers there.

Wilson can find no money for reliable bus services, no money for water, housing, legal aid or shelters, yet he can fund tools of terror.

First Nations people from Alice Springs – now flooded with armed tactical squads – to Kalgoorlie, are expressing desperate fears for their future.

This comes after elders in both regions have asked that weapons be removed from police officers on country, so it is a blatant disrespect and slap in the face to the Aboriginal communities by the Morrison government.

Combined with recent closures of several Aboriginal health and key DV, legal and other services over the last two months, Something very shifty is going on. We feel these increases in policing activity are not just tied to recent events on country, they may in fact be preparatory events for an expected backlash in the event of forced Indue Card roll outs if the current bill passes Senate.

Please stay awake and alert. You wont hear this on Murdoch press.

SNS stands with ALL First Nations communities.

and the response was this…

>>>Ros Meeker if your dumb enough to go community without a weapon then we might go looking for your body next century…, but we won’t find it 🤣so good luck with them odds

PermeateFree said:

>>The “Stolen Generations” is the name given to at least 100,000 Aboriginal children who were forcibly removed or taken under duress from their families by police or welfare officers between 1910 and 1970, as stated in in the Bringing Them Home Report.

Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

1869

The Aborigines Protection Act (Vic) establishes an Aborigines Protection Board in Victoria, giving the Governor the power to order the removal of any child from their family to a reformatory or industrial school.

1883

The NSW Aborigines Protection Board is established to manage the lives of 9,000 people.

1897

The Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act (Qld) allows the Chief Protector to remove local Aboriginal people onto and between reserves and hold children in dormitories. The Director of Native Welfare is the legal guardian of all ‘aboriginal’ children whether their parents are living or not until 1965.

1905

The Aborigines Act (WA) is passed. Under the act, the Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 16 years old. In the following years, other states and territories enact similar laws.

1909

The Aborigines Protection Act (NSW) gives the Aborigines Protection Board power to assume full control and custody of the child of any Aborigine if a court found the child to be neglected under the Neglected Children and Juvenile Offenders Act 1905 (NSW).

1911

The Aborigines Act (SA) makes the Chief Protector the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child. The Chief Protector is replaced by the Aborigines Protection Board in 1939 and guardianship power is repealed in 1962.

The Northern Territory Aboriginals Ordinance (Cth) gives the Chief Protector power to assume custody of any Aboriginal or ‘half-caste’ if it is deemed ‘necessary’ or ‘desirable’.

1915

The Aborigines Protection Amending Act (NSW) gives power to the Aboriginal Protection Board to separate Indigenous children from their families without the need to establish neglect in court.<<

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/timeline-stolen-generations

100,000 – screams with laughter. I suppose a decade from now they’ll multiply the number by another factor of 10.

What really disturbs me is that the records are now all locked – as of recently. All records of children who are claimed to have been stolen are now locked away in the Aborigines Department in Canberra and whites are prohibited from looking at them. This allows claims of the number involved to be expanded without limit.

> Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

Excellent. Thank you Permeate-Free :-)

I’ve got a better list of legislation than that, compiled mostly from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_laws_concerning_Indigenous_Australians, but that list misses out two very important ones that I found in Manning Clarke’s books. This list isn’t complete because it misses major updates, such as the 1915 update to the Aborigines Protection act in NSW.

Aboriginal Protection Act 1869 Victoria
Aborigines Protection Act 1886 (WA)
Half-Caste Act 1886 (Vic)
Half-Caste Act 1886 (WA)
Aboriginal Protection and restriction of the sale of opium act 1897 Queensland
1905 – in Western Australia (from Manning Clarke)
Aborigines Protection Act 1909 New South Wales
Aborigines Act 1910 Victoria
1910 – in Northern Territory (from Manning Chark)
Aborigines Act 1910 South Australia

In particular, you missed the Half-Caste act in Victoria and Western Australia of 1886. IMHO this is the worst legislation for aboriginal children ever, and comes closest of all to any government endorsement of stolen children. The Wikipedia entry explains: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-Caste_Act. There was never any such similar legislation in other states.

By 1911, all Aborigines throughout Australia were protected by legislation. If you want to know the background to this, there were a series of garbled complaints about the condition of aborigines and mistreatment of Aborigines by, whites, Chinese and Malays in the Kimberleys starting with a complaint about an aborigine being flogged in 1901. In 1902, this and other complaints led to a royal commission in Western Australia headed by Walter Roth. The Royal Commission reported in 1905 and was extremely critical of the condition of and maltreatment of aborigines. The Royal Commission led almost immediately to protection legislation in WA, and following that in all other states and in the Northern Territory before 1911

Some time in future, I want to read the results of that WA Royal Commission of 1905. If any report is critical of the treatment of aborigines by whites then this one would be.

The protection acts included things such as closure of Chinese sweat shops with aboriginal workers, banning Malays from stealing Aboriginal women, etc.

Complaints against the protection of aborigines legislation of 1905 to 1910 occurred because of demographic shift. In 1910, the aboriginal population in NSW was split 50:50 between pure blood and mixed race, by the late 1930s the ratio was more like 1:100. So by then some mixed race aborigines wanted to be treated as whites, exempt from protection by the legislation. That meant that aborigines were now able to out of the free housing, free food, and free medical care provided by the 1905-1910 legislation.

The aboriginal activists of 1937 to 1940 campaigned long and hard (with plenty of lies and political backstabbing) against segregation and in favour of assimilation, referring to the 1905 to 1910 legislation as paternalistic. And in all that very long period of aboriginal activism from 1937 to 1980, not a single complaint can be found in NSW that was what we now call “stolen generation”.

Aboriginal children left home for exactly the same reasons as whites: boarding school, to go to employment, arrested for violent crime, taken to hospital, taken away from child prostitution, removed from repeated incidents of domestic violence, orphans, homeless and starving, ran away from home. All the same reasons as whites. Mothers, where mothers were able to be discovered, always went with the children. So for example mothers would board alongside their children in boarding school and missions, though not normally in cases of child prostitution and domestic violence.

Also, aboriginal mothers had protection via the court system.

————

Anyway, back to Ryan and Windschuttle in Tasmania. It’s definitely best to read them together, both have faults.

Windschuttle has three obvious faults that I’ve seen so far:

• Relies far too much on the adage “absence of evidence is evidence of absence”.
• Far too ready to reject any contemporary evidence that has a political motive.
• Gets his logic tied up in knots so convoluted that he ends up contradicting himself multiple times.

Ryan, on the other hand, also has three obvious faults that I’ve seen so far.

• Ignores the three most important contemporary pre-1931 references.
• Has a style typified by 11 references for 14 largely unrelated facts in a single paragraph, with no hint as to which reference goes with which fact.
• Uses a style of putting unrelated facts next to one another, letting the reader jump to an inference not supported by the evidence.

They are both excellent scholars. But neither delves into the extant documentation of the criminal history of the white colonists, a good historian should. So far in my reading, neither has mentioned the difference between a war spear and a hunting spear, mentioned the aborigines’ theft of iron nails and wire, said anything about the theft of tobacco, or mentioned the aborigines metal-working skills used in making weapons from iron, so perhaps all these only occurred on mainland Australia not Tasmania, or perhaps these are important things that major Tasmanian historians have missed.

Aboriginal History Incorporated
The Committee of Management and the Editorial Board
Peter Read (Chair), Rob Paton (Secretary), Peter Grimshaw (Treasurer/Public Officer), Neil Andrews, Richard Baker, Ann Curthoys, Brian Egloff, Geoff Gray, Niel Gunson, Luise Hercus, Bill Humes, Ian Keen, David Johnston, Harold Koch, Isabel McBryde, Diane Smith, Elspeth Young.
Correspondents
Jeremy Beckett, Valerie Chapman, Ian Clark, Eve Fesl, Fay Gale, Ronald Lampert, Campbell Macknight, Ewan Morris, John Mulvaney, Andrew Markus, Bob Reece, Henry Reynolds, Shirley Roser, Lyndall Ryan, Bruce Shaw, Tom Stannage, Robert Tonkinson, James Urry.
Aboriginal History aims to present articles and information in the field of Australian ethnohistory, particularly in the post-contact history of the Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders. Historical studies based on anthropological, archaeological, linguistic and sociological research, including comparative studies of other ethnic groups such as Pacific Islanders in Australia will be welcomed. Issues include recorded oral traditions and biographies, narratives in local languages with translations, previously unpublished manuscript accounts, resumes of current events, archival and bibliographical articles, and book reviews.
Editors 1996
Isabel McBryde, Editor and Luise Hercus, Review Editor
https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p72561/pdf/book.pdf

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>The “Stolen Generations” is the name given to at least 100,000 Aboriginal children who were forcibly removed or taken under duress from their families by police or welfare officers between 1910 and 1970, as stated in in the Bringing Them Home Report.

Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

1869

The Aborigines Protection Act (Vic) establishes an Aborigines Protection Board in Victoria, giving the Governor the power to order the removal of any child from their family to a reformatory or industrial school.

1883

The NSW Aborigines Protection Board is established to manage the lives of 9,000 people.

1897

The Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act (Qld) allows the Chief Protector to remove local Aboriginal people onto and between reserves and hold children in dormitories. The Director of Native Welfare is the legal guardian of all ‘aboriginal’ children whether their parents are living or not until 1965.

1905

The Aborigines Act (WA) is passed. Under the act, the Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 16 years old. In the following years, other states and territories enact similar laws.

1909

The Aborigines Protection Act (NSW) gives the Aborigines Protection Board power to assume full control and custody of the child of any Aborigine if a court found the child to be neglected under the Neglected Children and Juvenile Offenders Act 1905 (NSW).

1911

The Aborigines Act (SA) makes the Chief Protector the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child. The Chief Protector is replaced by the Aborigines Protection Board in 1939 and guardianship power is repealed in 1962.

The Northern Territory Aboriginals Ordinance (Cth) gives the Chief Protector power to assume custody of any Aboriginal or ‘half-caste’ if it is deemed ‘necessary’ or ‘desirable’.

1915

The Aborigines Protection Amending Act (NSW) gives power to the Aboriginal Protection Board to separate Indigenous children from their families without the need to establish neglect in court.<<

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/timeline-stolen-generations

100,000 – screams with laughter. I suppose a decade from now they’ll multiply the number by another factor of 10. I’ll let you know as I read more if the total number ever exceeded 10.

What really disturbs me is that the records are now all locked – as of recently. All records of children who are claimed to have been stolen are now locked away in the Aborigines Department in Canberra and whites are prohibited from looking at them. This allows claims of the number involved to be expanded without limit.

> Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

Excellent. Thank you Permeate-Free :-)

I’ve got a better list of legislation than that, compiled mostly from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_laws_concerning_Indigenous_Australians, but that list misses out two very important ones that I found in Manning Clarke’s books. This list isn’t complete because it misses major updates, such as the 1915 update to the Aborigines Protection act in NSW.

Aboriginal Protection Act 1869 Victoria
Aborigines Protection Act 1886 (WA)
Half-Caste Act 1886 (Vic)
Half-Caste Act 1886 (WA)
Aboriginal Protection and restriction of the sale of opium act 1897 Queensland
1905 – in Western Australia (from Manning Clarke)
Aborigines Protection Act 1909 New South Wales
Aborigines Act 1910 Victoria
1910 – in Northern Territory (from Manning Chark)
Aborigines Act 1910 South Australia

In particular, you missed the Half-Caste act in Victoria and Western Australia of 1886. IMHO this is the worst legislation for aboriginal children ever, and comes closest of all to any government endorsement of stolen children. The Wikipedia entry explains: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-Caste_Act. There was never any such similar legislation in other states.

By 1911, all Aborigines throughout Australia were protected by legislation. If you want to know the background to this, there were a series of garbled complaints about the condition of aborigines and mistreatment of Aborigines by, whites, Chinese and Malays in the Kimberleys starting with a complaint about an aborigine being flogged in 1901. In 1902, this and other complaints led to a royal commission in Western Australia headed by Walter Roth. The Royal Commission reported in 1905 and was extremely critical of the condition of and maltreatment of aborigines. The Royal Commission led almost immediately to protection legislation in WA, and following that in all other states and in the Northern Territory before 1911

Some time in future, I want to read the results of that WA Royal Commission of 1905. If any report is critical of the treatment of aborigines by whites then this one would be.

The protection acts included things such as closure of Chinese sweat shops with aboriginal workers, banning Malays from stealing Aboriginal women, etc.

Complaints against the protection of aborigines legislation of 1905 to 1910 occurred because of demographic shift. In 1910, the aboriginal population in NSW was split 50:50 between pure blood and mixed race, by the late 1930s the ratio was more like 1:100. So by then some mixed race aborigines wanted to be treated as whites, exempt from protection by the legislation. That meant that aborigines were now able to out of the free housing, free food, and free medical care provided by the 1905-1910 legislation.

The aboriginal activists of 1937 to 1940 campaigned long and hard (with plenty of lies and political backstabbing) against segregation and in favour of assimilation, referring to the 1905 to 1910 legislation as paternalistic. And in all that very long period of aboriginal activism from 1937 to 1980, not a single complaint can be found in NSW that was what we now call “stolen generation”.

Aboriginal children left home for exactly the same reasons as whites: boarding school, to go to employment, arrested for violent crime, taken to hospital, taken away from child prostitution, removed from repeated incidents of domestic violence, orphans, homeless and starving, ran away from home. All the same reasons as whites. Mothers, where mothers were able to be discovered, always went with the children. So for example mothers would board alongside their children in boarding school and missions, though not normally in cases of child prostitution and domestic violence.

Also, aboriginal mothers had protection via the court system.

————

Anyway, back to Ryan and Windschuttle in Tasmania. It’s definitely best to read them together, both have faults.

Windschuttle has three obvious faults that I’ve seen so far:

• Relies far too much on the adage “absence of evidence is evidence of absence”.
• Far too ready to reject any contemporary evidence that has a political motive.
• Gets his logic tied up in knots so convoluted that he ends up contradicting himself multiple times.

Ryan, on the other hand, also has three obvious faults that I’ve seen so far.

• Ignores the three most important contemporary pre-1931 references.
• Has a style typified by 11 references for 14 largely unrelated facts in a single paragraph, with no hint as to which reference goes with which fact.
• Uses a style of putting unrelated facts next to one another, letting the reader jump to an inference not supported by the evidence.

They are both excellent scholars. But neither delves into the extant documentation of the criminal history of the white colonists, a good historian should. So far in my reading, neither has mentioned the difference between a war spear and a hunting spear, mentioned the aborigines’ theft of iron nails and wire, said anything about the theft of tobacco, or mentioned the aborigines metal-working skills used in making weapons from iron, so perhaps all these only occurred on mainland Australia not Tasmania, or perhaps these are important things that major Tasmanian historians have missed.

> So far in my reading, neither has mentioned the difference between a war spear and a hunting spear, mentioned the aborigines’ theft of iron nails and wire, said anything about the theft of tobacco, or mentioned the aborigines metal-working skills used in making weapons from iron, so perhaps all these only occurred on mainland Australia not Tasmania

Nup.

More reading.

In Tasmania, aborigines had lost many mainland skills before the Europeans arrived. That includes the ability to make fire (they borrowed fire from one another), they’d lost the ability to make stone tools, and bone tools including fish hooks. Apparently mainland Australians were shocked to find that Tasmanian aborigines didn’t recognise “fish” as food. So probably they had no metalworking skills and little if any use for iron nails and wire. No boomerangs.

However, I do notice that early Tasmanian cottages and fences were all made without nails and wire.

The difference between a war spear and a hunting spear would just be weight and length, not tip design.

Tasmanian aborigines definitely did steal tobacco from whites. I’ve no idea yet whether tobacco addiction added to the incidence of violent theft – it definitely did in the Kimberleys.

From reading I can completely rule out any possibility of an arms race between Tasmanian aboriginal tribes and extinction from tribal fighting. So scrap that ridiculous idea.

Windschuttle has some really weird ideas. One of his is that the “thin black line” was not a fiasco at all, because it’s primary purpose was to stop the war between blacks and whites and the war did stop fairly quickly after that. I don’t buy it. The other part of that idea is that its aim was to remove just two of the nine aboriginal nations out of white territory, not a wholesale clearing of Tasmania. That’s possible.

——

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

mollwollfumble said:

What really disturbs me is that the records are now all locked – as of recently. All records of children who are claimed to have been stolen are now locked away in the Aborigines Department in Canberra and whites are prohibited from looking at them. This allows claims of the number involved to be expanded without limit.

Do you have a reference for this?

sibeen said:

mollwollfumble said:

What really disturbs me is that the records are now all locked – as of recently. All records of children who are claimed to have been stolen are now locked away in the Aborigines Department in Canberra and whites are prohibited from looking at them. This allows claims of the number involved to be expanded without limit.

Do you have a reference for this?

No. I went looking for a reference and didn’t see it. It’s probably two years since I read it. I was trying to track down the names of children claimed to be from stolen generation and hit a brick wall. I’d have to go right back to the beginning and look again. I might run across it again in the next two weeks. Probably will.

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

AwesomeO said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

Yes, but the reason he won the case is because of common law, nothing newly developed just for aboriginal land rights.

That’s my understanding anyway.

If I’m wrong, no doubt someone will correct me.

The Rev Dodgson said:

AwesomeO said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

Yes, but the reason he won the case is because of common law, nothing newly developed just for aboriginal land rights.

That’s my understanding anyway.

If I’m wrong, no doubt someone will correct me.

From what I have read, that is correct. And it was this decision that stoked the fires of the so called Culture Wars. Which led to some questionable things in the Howard years (and onwards) as people panicked that they would be dispossessed of their land and culture (oh the irony)

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

I don’t think the black fellas had any paperwork, formal or otherwise.

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Aye. The change that led to the increase in successful native title claims was not primarily new legislation, but a finding on the basis of factual information under the existing legal framework by the High Court.

The Rev Dodgson said:

AwesomeO said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

Yes, but the reason he won the case is because of common law, nothing newly developed just for aboriginal land rights.

That’s my understanding anyway.

If I’m wrong, no doubt someone will correct me.

Yes. It was common law that caused the setting up of the pastoral lease where Aboriginal people were recognised as the original owners though nobody ever paid them rent, they couldn’t stop them walking across the land unless they shot them and hid the evidence. It is this that allowed Eddie Mabo’s case to proceed.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>The “Stolen Generations” is the name given to at least 100,000 Aboriginal children who were forcibly removed or taken under duress from their families by police or welfare officers between 1910 and 1970, as stated in in the Bringing Them Home Report.

Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

1869

The Aborigines Protection Act (Vic) establishes an Aborigines Protection Board in Victoria, giving the Governor the power to order the removal of any child from their family to a reformatory or industrial school.

1883

The NSW Aborigines Protection Board is established to manage the lives of 9,000 people.

1897

The Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act (Qld) allows the Chief Protector to remove local Aboriginal people onto and between reserves and hold children in dormitories. The Director of Native Welfare is the legal guardian of all ‘aboriginal’ children whether their parents are living or not until 1965.

1905

The Aborigines Act (WA) is passed. Under the act, the Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 16 years old. In the following years, other states and territories enact similar laws.

1909

The Aborigines Protection Act (NSW) gives the Aborigines Protection Board power to assume full control and custody of the child of any Aborigine if a court found the child to be neglected under the Neglected Children and Juvenile Offenders Act 1905 (NSW).

1911

The Aborigines Act (SA) makes the Chief Protector the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child. The Chief Protector is replaced by the Aborigines Protection Board in 1939 and guardianship power is repealed in 1962.

The Northern Territory Aboriginals Ordinance (Cth) gives the Chief Protector power to assume custody of any Aboriginal or ‘half-caste’ if it is deemed ‘necessary’ or ‘desirable’.

1915

The Aborigines Protection Amending Act (NSW) gives power to the Aboriginal Protection Board to separate Indigenous children from their families without the need to establish neglect in court.<<

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/timeline-stolen-generations

100,000 – screams with laughter. I suppose a decade from now they’ll multiply the number by another factor of 10.

What really disturbs me is that the records are now all locked – as of recently. All records of children who are claimed to have been stolen are now locked away in the Aborigines Department in Canberra and whites are prohibited from looking at them. This allows claims of the number involved to be expanded without limit.

> Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations.

Excellent. Thank you Permeate-Free :-)

I’ve got a better list of legislation than that, compiled mostly from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_laws_concerning_Indigenous_Australians, but that list misses out two very important ones that I found in Manning Clarke’s books. This list isn’t complete because it misses major updates, such as the 1915 update to the Aborigines Protection act in NSW.

Aboriginal Protection Act 1869 Victoria
Aborigines Protection Act 1886 (WA)
Half-Caste Act 1886 (Vic)
Half-Caste Act 1886 (WA)
Aboriginal Protection and restriction of the sale of opium act 1897 Queensland
1905 – in Western Australia (from Manning Clarke)
Aborigines Protection Act 1909 New South Wales
Aborigines Act 1910 Victoria
1910 – in Northern Territory (from Manning Chark)
Aborigines Act 1910 South Australia

In particular, you missed the Half-Caste act in Victoria and Western Australia of 1886. IMHO this is the worst legislation for aboriginal children ever, and comes closest of all to any government endorsement of stolen children. The Wikipedia entry explains: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-Caste_Act. There was never any such similar legislation in other states.

By 1911, all Aborigines throughout Australia were protected by legislation. If you want to know the background to this, there were a series of garbled complaints about the condition of aborigines and mistreatment of Aborigines by, whites, Chinese and Malays in the Kimberleys starting with a complaint about an aborigine being flogged in 1901. In 1902, this and other complaints led to a royal commission in Western Australia headed by Walter Roth. The Royal Commission reported in 1905 and was extremely critical of the condition of and maltreatment of aborigines. The Royal Commission led almost immediately to protection legislation in WA, and following that in all other states and in the Northern Territory before 1911

Some time in future, I want to read the results of that WA Royal Commission of 1905. If any report is critical of the treatment of aborigines by whites then this one would be.

The protection acts included things such as closure of Chinese sweat shops with aboriginal workers, banning Malays from stealing Aboriginal women, etc.

Complaints against the protection of aborigines legislation of 1905 to 1910 occurred because of demographic shift. In 1910, the aboriginal population in NSW was split 50:50 between pure blood and mixed race, by the late 1930s the ratio was more like 1:100. So by then some mixed race aborigines wanted to be treated as whites, exempt from protection by the legislation. That meant that aborigines were now able to out of the free housing, free food, and free medical care provided by the 1905-1910 legislation.

The aboriginal activists of 1937 to 1940 campaigned long and hard (with plenty of lies and political backstabbing) against segregation and in favour of assimilation, referring to the 1905 to 1910 legislation as paternalistic. And in all that very long period of aboriginal activism from 1937 to 1980, not a single complaint can be found in NSW that was what we now call “stolen generation”.

Aboriginal children left home for exactly the same reasons as whites: boarding school, to go to employment, arrested for violent crime, taken to hospital, taken away from child prostitution, removed from repeated incidents of domestic violence, orphans, homeless and starving, ran away from home. All the same reasons as whites. Mothers, where mothers were able to be discovered, always went with the children. So for example mothers would board alongside their children in boarding school and missions, though not normally in cases of child prostitution and domestic violence.

Also, aboriginal mothers had protection via the court system.

————

Anyway, back to Ryan and Windschuttle in Tasmania. It’s definitely best to read them together, both have faults.

Windschuttle has three obvious faults that I’ve seen so far:

• Relies far too much on the adage “absence of evidence is evidence of absence”.
• Far too ready to reject any contemporary evidence that has a political motive.
• Gets his logic tied up in knots so convoluted that he ends up contradicting himself multiple times.

Ryan, on the other hand, also has three obvious faults that I’ve seen so far.

• Ignores the three most important contemporary pre-1931 references.
• Has a style typified by 11 references for 14 largely unrelated facts in a single paragraph, with no hint as to which reference goes with which fact.
• Uses a style of putting unrelated facts next to one another, letting the reader jump to an inference not supported by the evidence.

They are both excellent scholars. But neither delves into the extant documentation of the criminal history of the white colonists, a good historian should. So far in my reading, neither has mentioned the difference between a war spear and a hunting spear, mentioned the aborigines’ theft of iron nails and wire, said anything about the theft of tobacco, or mentioned the aborigines metal-working skills used in making weapons from iron, so perhaps all these only occurred on mainland Australia not Tasmania, or perhaps these are important things that major Tasmanian historians have missed.

I’ll repeat an earlier post of mine and what you refer:

PermeateFree said:

>>The “Stolen Generations” is the name given to at least 100,000 Aboriginal children who were forcibly removed or taken under duress from their families by police or welfare officers between 1910 and 1970, as stated in in the Bringing Them Home Report. Here are some key dates and events in the history of the Stolen Generations. 1869 The Aborigines Protection Act (Vic) establishes an Aborigines Protection Board in Victoria, giving the Governor the power to order the removal of any child from their family to a reformatory or industrial school. 1883 The NSW Aborigines Protection Board is established to manage the lives of 9,000 people. 1897 The Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act (Qld) allows the Chief Protector to remove local Aboriginal people onto and between reserves and hold children in dormitories. The Director of Native Welfare is the legal guardian of all ‘aboriginal’ children whether their parents are living or not until 1965. 1905 The Aborigines Act (WA) is passed. Under the act, the Chief Protector is made the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child under 16 years old. In the following years, other states and territories enact similar laws. 1909 The Aborigines Protection Act (NSW) gives the Aborigines Protection Board power to assume full control and custody of the child of any Aborigine if a court found the child to be neglected under the Neglected Children and Juvenile Offenders Act 1905 (NSW). 1911 The Aborigines Act (SA) makes the Chief Protector the legal guardian of every Aboriginal and ‘half-caste’ child. The Chief Protector is replaced by the Aborigines Protection Board in 1939 and guardianship power is repealed in 1962. The Northern Territory Aboriginals Ordinance (Cth) gives the Chief Protector power to assume custody of any Aboriginal or ‘half-caste’ if it is deemed ‘necessary’ or ‘desirable’. 1915 The Aborigines Protection Amending Act (NSW) gives power to the Aboriginal Protection Board to separate Indigenous children from their families without the need to establish neglect in court.<< https://www.sbs.com.au/news/timeline-stolen-generations

Did you actually read it other than the first line, of which (your major concern of 100,000 children removed) covers a period in excess of 100 years.

Anyway, had you read the text you would see that State Governments had legislation to the effect, “The Director of Native Welfare is the legal guardian of all ‘aboriginal’ children whether their parents are living or not until 1965.” and “gives power to the Aboriginal Protection Board to separate Indigenous children from their families without the need to establish neglect in court.” This means the States can do what they like with Aborigine children!

The Aboriginal Protection Boards were established to stop white from the indiscriminate killing of them. Doesn’t that raise any questions about our treatment of them?

AwesomeO said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

Ian said:

AwesomeO said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

you’ll get a letter now from RoboDemo asking for you to explain.

Ian said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

By the way. Who invented “aboriginal land rights”, and when?

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

I don’t think the black fellas had any paperwork, formal or otherwise.

They’d have some pretty good songs though.

A reference moll has used to help prove his opinion is from Manning Clark. However there is considerable criticism concerning Clark’s handling of the Australian Aborigine and of which he stated himself that he wished he had investigated them more.

>>Manning Clark’s six-volume series, A History of Australia, is one of the masterpieces of Australian writing. It is also one of the most passionately debated visions of Australian history, in which the struggle to realise an Australian nation is played out on an epic scale.

This is not a general Australian history-it does not attempt to cover all aspects-and it is not a definitive or quantitative analysis. It is a work of art, a living and breathing account of the remaking of a primitive continent, history come alive.<<

https://www.mup.com.au/books/a-history-of-australia-volumes-3-4-electronic-book-text

Ian said:

AwesomeO said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

It’s British Common Law, which I presume has been adopted by Australia.

If people occupy a parcel of land, and have done so for some appreciable time, and if no-one else has a valid claim to that land, then they are considered to have a continuing right to occupy that land, even if they don’t have any formal paperwork to prove ownership.

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

ruby said:

Ian said:

AwesomeO said:

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

“Quiet Australian” = stupid bigot

ruby said:

Ian said:

AwesomeO said:

Pretty sure it was the Eddie Mabo case that set the precedent in Australia for crownlands.

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

sibeen said:

ruby said:

Ian said:

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Probably Dutton?

sibeen said:

ruby said:

Ian said:

From little things… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_Hill_walk-off was pivital.

Went to one of those demos. It got more than a little violent.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

ruby said:

sibeen said:

ruby said:

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

Hate to declare a war and have no one show up Scomo…

ruby said:

sibeen said:

ruby said:

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

I don’t know if the Australian Army has ever been mobilised in such a manner. I have a vague memory that there was something in the 20s. I suspect that the government of the day may get a bit of a shock if they tried to implement such a plan now days.

sibeen said:

ruby said:

sibeen said:

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

I don’t know if the Australian Army has ever been mobilised in such a manner. I have a vague memory that there was something in the 20s. I suspect that the government of the day may get a bit of a shock if they tried to implement such a plan now days.

Aye.

ruby said:

sibeen said:

ruby said:

The more things change, the more they stay the same. My morning beach walkers discussed the government wanting to mobilise the army to break up protests. I am hearing quiet Australians getting a bit fed up with not being able to have a quiet say in things.

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

If some government member, minister or lackey even breathed such a comment in their sleep the press would be on it like flies on shit.

sibeen said:

ruby said:

sibeen said:

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

I don’t know if the Australian Army has ever been mobilised in such a manner. I have a vague memory that there was something in the 20s. I suspect that the government of the day may get a bit of a shock if they tried to implement such a plan now days.

Wasn’t that when they sent them out to shoot emus? And the emus won?

sibeen said:

ruby said:

sibeen said:

Where does this mobilising the army thing come from?

Don’t know. I’ll ask where he got it from on Monday. I expect twitter, he follows reliable people. I expect it could be one of those throw away things the government likes so much. ‘Don’t make us mobilise the army now, you know we don’t want to do that….’

I don’t know if the Australian Army has ever been mobilised in such a manner. I have a vague memory that there was something in the 20s. I suspect that the government of the day may get a bit of a shock if they tried to implement such a plan now days.

they’d probably ask for volunteers and all the rightwingers would take one step forwards. more than enough to control those damn hippies.

PermeateFree said:

A reference moll has used to help prove his opinion is from Manning Clark. However there is considerable criticism concerning Clark’s handling of the Australian Aborigine and of which he stated himself that he wished he had investigated them more.

>>Manning Clark’s six-volume series, A History of Australia, is one of the masterpieces of Australian writing. It is also one of the most passionately debated visions of Australian history, in which the struggle to realise an Australian nation is played out on an epic scale.

This is not a general Australian history-it does not attempt to cover all aspects-and it is not a definitive or quantitative analysis. It is a work of art, a living and breathing account of the remaking of a primitive continent, history come alive.<<

https://www.mup.com.au/books/a-history-of-australia-volumes-3-4-electronic-book-text

Manning Clark’ s work is first and foremost a political history of Australia. 80% of the book is devoted to the Machiavellian politics. But Clark is sensitive to the fact that many readers will want to look at more specialist subjects, and devotes the remaining 20% to be shared between the history of aborigines, women, soldiers, entertainment, sport and technology.

—-

I’ve now got a tentative comparison of Ryan and Windschuttle, reduced to a single table. The numbers I’ve allocated to each category are approximate.

The whole political battle between the two is over the death rate of aborigines killed by whites, which is really only a battle over 10% of the deaths.

Ryan fails to find the explanation for the death of about 80% of the Tasmanian blacks. Windschuttle does too, so uses the hypothesis of death by influenza, other respiratory illness and loss of birth rate as a balance term without really having much evidence for it.

The one thing that is totally certain is that tribe sizes drop rapidly and drastically even in areas where no non-aborigine is visiting.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

A reference moll has used to help prove his opinion is from Manning Clark. However there is considerable criticism concerning Clark’s handling of the Australian Aborigine and of which he stated himself that he wished he had investigated them more.

>>Manning Clark’s six-volume series, A History of Australia, is one of the masterpieces of Australian writing. It is also one of the most passionately debated visions of Australian history, in which the struggle to realise an Australian nation is played out on an epic scale.

This is not a general Australian history-it does not attempt to cover all aspects-and it is not a definitive or quantitative analysis. It is a work of art, a living and breathing account of the remaking of a primitive continent, history come alive.<<

https://www.mup.com.au/books/a-history-of-australia-volumes-3-4-electronic-book-text

Manning Clark’ s work is first and foremost a political history of Australia. 80% of the book is devoted to the Machiavellian politics. But Clark is sensitive to the fact that many readers will want to look at more specialist subjects, and devotes the remaining 20% to be shared between the history of aborigines, women, soldiers, entertainment, sport and technology.

—-

I’ve now got a tentative comparison of Ryan and Windschuttle, reduced to a single table. The numbers I’ve allocated to each category are approximate.

The whole political battle between the two is over the death rate of aborigines killed by whites, which is really only a battle over 10% of the deaths.

Ryan fails to find the explanation for the death of about 80% of the Tasmanian blacks. Windschuttle does too, so uses the hypothesis of death by influenza, other respiratory illness and loss of birth rate as a balance term without really having much evidence for it.

The one thing that is totally certain is that tribe sizes drop rapidly and drastically even in areas where no non-aborigine is visiting.

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

A reference moll has used to help prove his opinion is from Manning Clark. However there is considerable criticism concerning Clark’s handling of the Australian Aborigine and of which he stated himself that he wished he had investigated them more.

>>Manning Clark’s six-volume series, A History of Australia, is one of the masterpieces of Australian writing. It is also one of the most passionately debated visions of Australian history, in which the struggle to realise an Australian nation is played out on an epic scale.

This is not a general Australian history-it does not attempt to cover all aspects-and it is not a definitive or quantitative analysis. It is a work of art, a living and breathing account of the remaking of a primitive continent, history come alive.<<

https://www.mup.com.au/books/a-history-of-australia-volumes-3-4-electronic-book-text

Manning Clark’ s work is first and foremost a political history of Australia. 80% of the book is devoted to the Machiavellian politics. But Clark is sensitive to the fact that many readers will want to look at more specialist subjects, and devotes the remaining 20% to be shared between the history of aborigines, women, soldiers, entertainment, sport and technology.

—-

I’ve now got a tentative comparison of Ryan and Windschuttle, reduced to a single table. The numbers I’ve allocated to each category are approximate.

The whole political battle between the two is over the death rate of aborigines killed by whites, which is really only a battle over 10% of the deaths.

Ryan fails to find the explanation for the death of about 80% of the Tasmanian blacks. Windschuttle does too, so uses the hypothesis of death by influenza, other respiratory illness and loss of birth rate as a balance term without really having much evidence for it.

The one thing that is totally certain is that tribe sizes drop rapidly and drastically even in areas where no non-aborigine is visiting.

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

sarahs mum said:

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

Manning Clark’ s work is first and foremost a political history of Australia. 80% of the book is devoted to the Machiavellian politics. But Clark is sensitive to the fact that many readers will want to look at more specialist subjects, and devotes the remaining 20% to be shared between the history of aborigines, women, soldiers, entertainment, sport and technology.

—-

I’ve now got a tentative comparison of Ryan and Windschuttle, reduced to a single table. The numbers I’ve allocated to each category are approximate.

The whole political battle between the two is over the death rate of aborigines killed by whites, which is really only a battle over 10% of the deaths.

Ryan fails to find the explanation for the death of about 80% of the Tasmanian blacks. Windschuttle does too, so uses the hypothesis of death by influenza, other respiratory illness and loss of birth rate as a balance term without really having much evidence for it.

The one thing that is totally certain is that tribe sizes drop rapidly and drastically even in areas where no non-aborigine is visiting.

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

The death from disease seems common from the new world meeting the old world tribes, I wonder why the reverse didn’t happen or were the tribal people relatively communicable disease free

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

A reference moll has used to help prove his opinion is from Manning Clark. However there is considerable criticism concerning Clark’s handling of the Australian Aborigine and of which he stated himself that he wished he had investigated them more.

>>Manning Clark’s six-volume series, A History of Australia, is one of the masterpieces of Australian writing. It is also one of the most passionately debated visions of Australian history, in which the struggle to realise an Australian nation is played out on an epic scale.

This is not a general Australian history-it does not attempt to cover all aspects-and it is not a definitive or quantitative analysis. It is a work of art, a living and breathing account of the remaking of a primitive continent, history come alive.<<

https://www.mup.com.au/books/a-history-of-australia-volumes-3-4-electronic-book-text

Manning Clark’ s work is first and foremost a political history of Australia. 80% of the book is devoted to the Machiavellian politics. But Clark is sensitive to the fact that many readers will want to look at more specialist subjects, and devotes the remaining 20% to be shared between the history of aborigines, women, soldiers, entertainment, sport and technology.

—-

I’ve now got a tentative comparison of Ryan and Windschuttle, reduced to a single table. The numbers I’ve allocated to each category are approximate.

The whole political battle between the two is over the death rate of aborigines killed by whites, which is really only a battle over 10% of the deaths.

Ryan fails to find the explanation for the death of about 80% of the Tasmanian blacks. Windschuttle does too, so uses the hypothesis of death by influenza, other respiratory illness and loss of birth rate as a balance term without really having much evidence for it.

The one thing that is totally certain is that tribe sizes drop rapidly and drastically even in areas where no non-aborigine is visiting.

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

No worries (as someone here is wont to say). Just bear in mind the era it was written in, and perhaps read up on the author a bit to find out where he stands in history.

Cymek said:

sarahs mum said:

mollwollfumble said:

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

The death from disease seems common from the new world meeting the old world tribes, I wonder why the reverse didn’t happen or were the tribal people relatively communicable disease free

Syphilis was introduced from the Americas to the old world. The Great Pox.

Witty Rejoinder said:

Cymek said:

sarahs mum said:

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

The death from disease seems common from the new world meeting the old world tribes, I wonder why the reverse didn’t happen or were the tribal people relatively communicable disease free

Syphilis was introduced from the Americas to the old world. The Great Pox.

OK thanks I didn’t know that

Cymek said:

Witty Rejoinder said:

Cymek said:

The death from disease seems common from the new world meeting the old world tribes, I wonder why the reverse didn’t happen or were the tribal people relatively communicable disease free

Syphilis was introduced from the Americas to the old world. The Great Pox.

OK thanks I didn’t know that

As was tobacco.

Tamb said:

Cymek said:

Witty Rejoinder said:

Syphilis was introduced from the Americas to the old world. The Great Pox.

OK thanks I didn’t know that

As was tobacco.

And possibly cocaine.

mollwollfumble said:

Hi buffy, The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands. When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things. One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Would it have helped if there were books written by Aboriginal people about how they lived their lives rather than books written by sad excuses for men who had little or no knowledge at all?

Tamb said:

Tamb said:

Cymek said:

OK thanks I didn’t know that

As was tobacco.

And possibly cocaine.

Most definitely cocaine, opium, cannabis and etcetera.

As was oft quoted by the Romans; The peoples of Britain were crawling on all fours when the sophisticated Romans arrived.

roughbarked said:

mollwollfumble said:

Hi buffy, The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands. When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things. One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Would it have helped if there were books written by Aboriginal people about how they lived their lives rather than books written by sad excuses for men who had little or no knowledge at all?

It’s weird in that it’s recent history with the peoples in question still existing albeit with a somewhat different lifestyle that their ancestors and they didn’t ask those living at the time.

Cymek said:

roughbarked said:

mollwollfumble said:

Hi buffy, The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands. When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things. One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Would it have helped if there were books written by Aboriginal people about how they lived their lives rather than books written by sad excuses for men who had little or no knowledge at all?

It’s weird in that it’s recent history with the peoples in question still existing albeit with a somewhat different lifestyle that their ancestors and they didn’t ask those living at the time.

We who came from Europe missed a tremendous food opportunity by not asking questions.

• We who came from Europe missed a tremendous food opportunity by not asking questions.

Yet heaps of food from the new world, and other “exotic” places was quickly assimilated into European cuisine…

furious said:

• We who came from Europe missed a tremendous food opportunity by not asking questions.

Yet heaps of food from the new world, and other “exotic” places was quickly assimilated into European cuisine…

Weird, isn’t it. And still some folk find it icky to eat kangaroo.

sarahs mum said:

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

Manning Clark’ s work is first and foremost a political history of Australia. 80% of the book is devoted to the Machiavellian politics. But Clark is sensitive to the fact that many readers will want to look at more specialist subjects, and devotes the remaining 20% to be shared between the history of aborigines, women, soldiers, entertainment, sport and technology.

—-

I’ve now got a tentative comparison of Ryan and Windschuttle, reduced to a single table. The numbers I’ve allocated to each category are approximate.

The whole political battle between the two is over the death rate of aborigines killed by whites, which is really only a battle over 10% of the deaths.

Ryan fails to find the explanation for the death of about 80% of the Tasmanian blacks. Windschuttle does too, so uses the hypothesis of death by influenza, other respiratory illness and loss of birth rate as a balance term without really having much evidence for it.

The one thing that is totally certain is that tribe sizes drop rapidly and drastically even in areas where no non-aborigine is visiting.

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

PermeateFree said:

sarahs mum said:

mollwollfumble said:

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Mercury poisoning ?

Cymek said:

PermeateFree said:

sarahs mum said:

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Mercury poisoning ?

Can’t remember, only people died.

PermeateFree said:

Cymek said:

PermeateFree said:

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Mercury poisoning ?

Can’t remember, only people died.

I’d be thinking some sort of bacterial infection rather than mercury poisoning. Bad batch of fish.

buffy said:

PermeateFree said:

Cymek said:

Mercury poisoning ?

Can’t remember, only people died.

I’d be thinking some sort of bacterial infection rather than mercury poisoning. Bad batch of fish.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ciguatera_fish_poisoning

or too far south?

PermeateFree said:

Cymek said:

PermeateFree said:

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Mercury poisoning ?

Can’t remember, only people died.

Mercury levels increased via white men mining for gold and later manufacturing processes.

Had to be something else.

buffy said:

PermeateFree said:

Cymek said:

Mercury poisoning ?

Can’t remember, only people died.

I’d be thinking some sort of bacterial infection rather than mercury poisoning. Bad batch of fish.

Yeah. More likely.

PermeateFree said:

sarahs mum said:

mollwollfumble said:

Hi buffy,

The book Pearse (1960) “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” has arrived and I’ve read it twice so far. It’s brilliant, it’s blown out of the water more than a few of my misconceptions. Misconceptions about canoes, housing, appearance, bone tools, stone tools, etc. I particularly like the illustration of a wife clubbing her husband, I hadn’t heard a hint of that possibility, though have heard stories of two or three aboriginal wives who would gladly have clubbed their husbands.

When the book turned up, I wondered if it was going to agree with Ryan or Windschuttle. Very surprised to find out the answer is both, given that they disagree on so many things.

One instance where “The story of Tasmanian Aboriginals” outdoes Windschuttle is on the question of whether Tasmanian Aborigines ate fish. Windschuttle, paraphrased, is “archaeology has shown that Tasmanian aborigines used to eat fish, but they no longer did. One Tasmanian aborigine, when arriving on the mainland, didn’t recognize a fish as food”. Pearse (1960), paraphrased, is “some Tasmanian tribes, if not most, did eat fish. They had lost the ability to make fish hooks, but there are other ways to catch fish”. Score 1 for Pearse and 0 for Windschuttle.

Thanks a million.

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Interesting. Have since learnt that fish hooks arrived in Australia long after it separated from Tasmania. The fish traps are well known from Victoria, I haven’t yet heard of them being used elsewhere.

Am now reading “Chronicle of Australia”. Much much better than Manning Clark, for quite a few reasons. My BS detector has only gone off once in the first 200 pages of “Chronicle of Australia”. It seems a certain Aborigine died twice, so either the Chronicle got the names of two aborigines reversed, or it was more a title than a name, as in “the king is dead, long live the king”.

I have to eat my words about what counts as “corruption” in white courts. What I consider minor offences did indeed attract massive punishments.

I also have to eat my words about Hobart being a maximum security prison. Neither the prisoners in early Hobart nor those that went to Hobart from early Norfolk Island were real nasties. The first maximum security prison was Newcastle, and it was only much later that the worst prisoners were sent to Norfolk Island and Hobart.

One further point worthy of mention is the Chronicles (Unlike Clark, Windschuttle and Ryan) make it clear that there was just as much variation among the personalities of pre-European blacks as there were amongst whites. I’ve found three cases so far of near simultaneous humanitarian and violent anti-black reaction by whites.

Far too much about aborigines in Chronicles to describe here. The following is the index for aboriginal history. Ask me to elaborate if you spot anything interesting.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

sarahs mum said:

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Interesting. Have since learnt that fish hooks arrived in Australia long after it separated from Tasmania. The fish traps are well known from Victoria, I haven’t yet heard of them being used elsewhere.

Am now reading “Chronicle of Australia”. Much much better than Manning Clark, for quite a few reasons. My BS detector has only gone off once in the first 200 pages of “Chronicle of Australia”. It seems a certain Aborigine died twice, so either the Chronicle got the names of two aborigines reversed, or it was more a title than a name, as in “the king is dead, long live the king”.

I have to eat my words about what counts as “corruption” in white courts. What I consider minor offences did indeed attract massive punishments.

I also have to eat my words about Hobart being a maximum security prison. Neither the prisoners in early Hobart nor those that went to Hobart from early Norfolk Island were real nasties. The first maximum security prison was Newcastle, and it was only much later that the worst prisoners were sent to Norfolk Island and Hobart.

One further point worthy of mention is the Chronicles (Unlike Clark, Windschuttle and Ryan) make it clear that there was just as much variation among the personalities of pre-European blacks as there were amongst whites. I’ve found three cases so far of near simultaneous humanitarian and violent anti-black reaction by whites.

Far too much about aborigines in Chronicles to describe here. The following is the index for aboriginal history. Ask me to elaborate if you spot anything interesting.

Fish traps are evident right around all parts of Austtralia where fish could be caught, in rivers streams and coasts.

Look up Brewarrina Fish Traps. Long way inland. Many of the rocks used were carted great distances.

Michael V said:

Look up Brewarrina Fish Traps. Long way inland. Many of the rocks used were carted great distances.

It seems from reading this thread that people have quite good knowledge in various places, but it’s patchy and not collated over the whole country. Mind you, that would be one hell of a job.

buffy said:

Michael V said:

Look up Brewarrina Fish Traps. Long way inland. Many of the rocks used were carted great distances.

It seems from reading this thread that people have quite good knowledge in various places, but it’s patchy and not collated over the whole country. Mind you, that would be one hell of a job.

Much of what was here is long gone by now.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

sarahs mum said:

they ignored the fish that were caught in traps? I find that unlikely.

I discussed this point with a southern Victoria Aborigine who have ancient links with the Tasmanian Aborigine. She said the Tasmania Aboriginal did initially eat fish, but a catastrophic event killed a number of Aborigines (sorry can’t remember exactly what), but after that they never ate SCALED fish again.

Interesting. Have since learnt that fish hooks arrived in Australia long after it separated from Tasmania. The fish traps are well known from Victoria, I haven’t yet heard of them being used elsewhere.

Am now reading “Chronicle of Australia”. Much much better than Manning Clark, for quite a few reasons. My BS detector has only gone off once in the first 200 pages of “Chronicle of Australia”. It seems a certain Aborigine died twice, so either the Chronicle got the names of two aborigines reversed, or it was more a title than a name, as in “the king is dead, long live the king”.

I have to eat my words about what counts as “corruption” in white courts. What I consider minor offences did indeed attract massive punishments.

I also have to eat my words about Hobart being a maximum security prison. Neither the prisoners in early Hobart nor those that went to Hobart from early Norfolk Island were real nasties. The first maximum security prison was Newcastle, and it was only much later that the worst prisoners were sent to Norfolk Island and Hobart.

One further point worthy of mention is the Chronicles (Unlike Clark, Windschuttle and Ryan) make it clear that there was just as much variation among the personalities of pre-European blacks as there were amongst whites. I’ve found three cases so far of near simultaneous humanitarian and violent anti-black reaction by whites.

Far too much about aborigines in Chronicles to describe here. The following is the index for aboriginal history. Ask me to elaborate if you spot anything interesting.

You don’t need fish hooks to catch fish.