A note on Structure
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- 16 th of March, 1816
- March, 1816
2nd of March, 1816Bringelly District lay between the Nepean River and South Creek. Apart from the use of firearms by Aboriginal people, the account is important in that it signals a degree of co-ordination not previously recorded in Aboriginal attacks. The spearing of William Bagnell and Mrs. Wright is further evidence that Aboriginal violence was discriminate. ‘Unpleasant accounts are received from the farm of Captain Fowler, in the district of Bringelly, of the murder of several persons by the natives frequenting that quarter. The above farm was occupied by Mr. Edmund Wright; whose account of the transaction states that on Saturday last the Servants' dwellings of G. T. Palmer, Esq. at the Nepean, were plundered by a groupe of 20 or 30 of the natives. On Sunday four of Mr. Palmer's men, namely Edw Mackey, Patrick M'Hugh, John Lewis, and --- Farrel, accompanied by John Murray, servant of John Hagan, Dennis Hagan, stock keeper to Captain Brooks, and William Brazil, a youth in the employ of Mr. Edmund Wright, crossed the Nepean in the hope of recovering the property that had been taken away the day before, and getting into a marshy flat ground nearly opposite Mr. Fowler's farm, about 200 yards distance from the bank of the river, they were perceived and immediately encircled by a large body of natives, who closing rapidly upon them, disarmed those who carried muskets, and commenced a terrible attack, as well by a discharge of the arms they had captured, as by an innumerable shower of spears. M'Hugh, Dennis Hagan, John Lewis, and John Murray, fell in an instant, either from shot, or by the spear, and William Brazil received a spear in the back between the shoulders, which it is hoped and believed will not be fatal. Some of the natives crossed the river over to Capt. Fowler's farm, and pursued the remaining white men up to the farm residence, but being few in number they retired, and re-crossing the river, kept away until the day following (Monday last), when at about ten o'clock in the forenoon a large, number, sixty it was imagined, crossed again, and commenced a work of desolation and atrocity by beginning to destroy the inclosures of the various yards. The house they completely stripped, and Mrs. Wright, with one of the farm labourers, having secreted herself in the loft in the hope of escaping the cruelty of the assailants, their concealment was suspected, and every possible endeavour made to murder them. Spears were darted through the roof from without, and through sheets of bark which were laid as a temporary ceiling, from which the two persons had repeated hair breadth escapes. William Bagnell, who was the person in the loft with Mrs. Wright, finding that their destruction was determined upon, at length threw open a window in the roof, and seeing a native known by the name of Daniel Badbury, begged for their lives; and received for answer, that "they should not be kill'ed this time.'' After completely plundering the house, they recrossed the river, very dispassionately bidding Mrs. Wright and Bagnell a good bye! Mr. Wright's standing corn has been carried away in great quantity and all provisions whatever were also carried off.’126 16th of March, 1816The following account of the spearing of a stock keeper at the Cowpastures and an attack on a cart on the western road confirms the widespread nature of Aboriginal hostility and the diminishing fear of firearms by Aboriginal people. The correction regarding the presence of Budbury in the attack on Wright’s farm points to the complicated nature of the presence of Aboriginal people on the farms. Alienating Budbury risked making an enemy of a friend. ‘We have to regret the death of another white person, a stock keeper at the Cow Pastures; who was a few days since speared by three natives, who are reported to have come from the mountains in very alarming force, to join the nearer hordes in plundering the maize fields.—A body of them has stopped and robbed a cart belonging to Government on its road to Bathurst Plains with provisions for the supply of the persons stationed there, and demonstrate considerably less apprehension than formerly from the effect of fire arms. In justice to those who do not engage in these mischievous acts, we should be at all times happy to receive corrected statements in favor of any whose names may have been erroneously reported as present on those occasions. — The Gazette of last week stated from information that Budbury was present at the attack on Mrs. Edmond Wright and her servant; which we are now convinced must have been a mistake, as we are requested to declare, upon the most undoubted authority, that he was far from the scene, and is perfectly a friendly and well-disposed native towards us. The report, which originated from the mistake of his person, under the circumstances of alarm and terror, we feel it our duty to correct, as a bad name in such a case might be attended with the most unhappy result to an innocent person, and become even doubly fatal, in making an enemy of a friend, and giving him to a condition of extremity that might justify hostility in him, as palpably an act of self defence. Mistakes of so serious a nature should carefully be avoided, and individual offenders pointed out in such cases only where their identity is undoubted — for it would be even better that the guilty should escape the rigors of a resentment they bring down upon themselves, than that the faultless should participate in those evils from which justice and humanity should alike defend them.’127 March, 1816In March 1816 Elizabeth Macarthur wrote to her friend Eliza: “Attempts have been made to civilise the natives of this country, but they are complete savages, and are as lawless and troublesome as when the Colony was first established. Our out settlements are constantly subjected to their depredations.”128 James Hassall, grandson of the missionary Rowland Hassall included two letters in his memoirs dealing with Aboriginal attacks in March 1816. The first, written on 16th March 1816, was from his uncle, Samuel Otoo Hassall (married to Lucy, daughter of the Hawkesbury magistrate, James Mileham) to his brother the Reverend Thomas Hassall (married to Anne, daughter of Samuel Marsden). The second letter was from Henry Byrnes who was in charge of the Hassall property Macquarie Grove. In the first letter Samuel described the arrival of a messenger at Macquarie Grove warning that warriors planned to attack the farms of Macarthur and Oxley and then move on to Macquarie Grove. Hassall went to the Magistrate, Mr. Lowe129 who gathered together troops and settlers and sent them to Macquarie Grove. On the following day, upon hearing that three of Macarthur’s stock keepers had been killed on the Upper Camden, Mr. Lowe led the settlers and soldiers out with some Aboriginal guides. The settlers approached the Aboriginal warriors who were stationed on a high rock. They displayed no fear of firearms, dropping to the ground when the weapons were fired. The warriors drove the settlers off with spears and stones. The settlers split. The majority went to Macarthur’s stockyard to defend three stock keepers there. Hassall and Scott returned to look after their women. Mr. Henry Byrnes, from Macquarie Grove, of which place he seemed to be in charge; also wrote a letter about the same time to Samuel Hassall informing him of the death of the shepherd, Bromby, and the failure of Mr Oxley’s party to track down the killers. Apart from a couple of ineffectual skirmishes reported by Watkins Tench the following two letters are to the best of my knowledge the only first-hand account of a military encounter between Aboriginal people and settlers from this period. They provide details such as Aboriginal warriors dancing in front of their enemies; diving to the ground when muskets were fired at them; and the confusion of the settlers in the face of a determined enemy. The most amazing aspect of the encounter described was that no one appeared to have been hurt. Directory: docs docs -> Application for acem docs -> Observational Assessment of Teaching Practices Teaching Assessment Initiative Proposal Submitted to The Teachers for a New Era project docs -> Traditional British values docs -> From Warfighters to Crimefighters: The Origins of Domestic Police Militarization docs -> Borzoi Club of America Register of Merit Program I. What is a Register Of Merit docs -> Protecting the rights of the child in the context of migration docs -> United Nations E/C. 12/Esp/5 docs -> 9th May 1950 the schuman declaration docs -> Getting To Outcomes® in Services for Homeless Veterans 10 Steps for Achieving Accountability Download 3.05 Mb. Share with your friends:
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