Hawkesbury River 1795-1800
Settlement near the Hawkesbury River increased to over 400 people by 1795, leading to cycles of raids and violence. Acting Governor Paterson ordered a military detachment which resulted in the first recorded massacre of Aboriginal people by the military in 1795. Governor Hunter responded to the violence by ordering settlers to assemble and assist each other and by forbidding Aboriginal people and settlers to be together.
From June 1789, Governor Phillip and others began exploring the Hawkesbury River, north of Sydney (, , ). By this time, smallpox had reached the Hawkesbury and killed many Aboriginal people (, ).
Ex-convict settlers began settling near the Hawkesbury River from late 1793 or early 1794, drawn by the fertile river soils, with the first official land grants made (retrospectively) in 1794 (, , , ).
By June 1795, after a road was made from Sydney to the settlement, the number of settlers living at the Hawkesbury increased to over 500 and by the end of 1799, 1,008 people lived at the Hawkesbury (, ).
From at least 1794 there were reports of violence between Aboriginal people and settlers in the area. Settlers in the Hawkesbury reported groups of Aboriginal people killing some of the settlers and engaging in raids on farmland to take crops (, , ). This was met with violence including settlers firing at Aboriginal people, kidnapping or killing them (, , ). There were also attempts at diplomacy ().
Detachments to the Hawkesbury
In May 1795, Acting Governor Paterson sent a detachment of 62 soldiers to ‘drive the natives to a distance’ and to secure for the settlers the ‘peaceful possession of their estates’ on the banks of the Hawkesbury River, which was the ‘most fertile spot which has yet been discovered in the colony’ (). This resulted in ‘the first recorded massacre of Aboriginal people by the military in Australian history’ ().
According to David Collins, the first Judge Advocate and Secretary of the colony, the detachment was sent to ‘destroy as many as they could meet with of the wood tribe… in the hope of striking terror, to erect gibbets in different places, whereon the bodies of all they might kill were to be hung’ ().
The Acting Governor reported that ‘a large body of natives’ had been ‘fired upon and pursued’ with ‘seven or eight natives’ killed and five Aboriginal people ‘taken prisoners’. He expressed his ‘concern to have been forced to destroy any of these people’ and wrote ‘I have no doubt of them having been cruelly treated by some of the first settlers who went out there’ ().
Following a further fatal attack on a settler and his child in May 1795, Governor Paterson sent a permanent detachment to the area. (, ).
Settlers ordered to assemble and assist each other
Despite the military presence, the raids and attacks by Aboriginal people on farms, and on boats on the river, continued (). During 1796, many farms had been left vacant due to settlers leaving in response to Aboriginal people’s attacks (, , ). There were also attacks that were likely payback for the murder of Aboriginal people and other crimes against Aboriginal Law (, ).
In February 1796, the new Governor Hunter ordered the settlers living on the banks of the Hawkesbury River to assist each other whenever ‘any numerous body of the natives’ were known to be ‘lurking about the farms’. The settlers were also directed to ‘not wantonly fire at or take the lives of any of the natives’. The order stated such an act would be ‘considered a deliberate murder’ and subject to ‘such punishment as (if proved) the law might direct’ ().
This order also strictly forbade settlers from encouraging Aboriginal people to ‘lurk about their farms’ ().
Living with Aboriginal people
There was growing concern that some white men were assisting Aboriginal people with attacks and in his February 1796 order, Governor Hunter recommended ‘all persons in the settlement’ to ‘use every means in their power to secure’ two white men frequently seen amongst the Aboriginal people (, ).
In May 1797, Governor Hunter issued an order naming four people living with ‘the natives’ as having ‘lost the protection of the law’ if they did not turn themselves in ().
The following month (in June 1797), Governor Hunter wrote to the Duke of Portland reporting the ‘worst characters’ among the settlers had been ‘placed at the greatest distance from head-quarters’ (the banks of the Hawkesbury)’. The Governor referred to many of the settlers being ‘a public and very dangerous nuisance’. He wrote:
being too idle to work, they have join’d large bodys of the natives, and have taught them how to annoy and distress the settlers…I am therefore oblig’d to arm the herds, and it distresses me to say that I fear that I shall be under the necessity of sending arm’d parties in all directions to scower the country ().
A few months later in November 1797, Governor Hunter issued a further order about people who had run away from their work, allowing them to be ‘fired at’ if they could not be ‘immediately secured’. The Order also allowed Aboriginal people ‘to be fired at if white men are seen amongst them’ ().
Murders and raids
There were further raids by Aboriginal people in 1799 following the murder of an Aboriginal woman and child (, ). Settlers also ‘most barbarously murdered’ two Aboriginal boys. They were later tried and found guilty but released because the Court wanted the King to decide about the appropriate punishment (, , ). In 1802, the men were pardoned, but a proclamation was made warning ‘an instance of injustice or wanton cruelty towards the Natives will be punished with the utmost severity of the law’ (). This case and the operation of the legal system at this time is discussed further in SUB0251.
After this, ‘warfare along the Hawkesbury dissipated and there was little conflict for several years’ (, ).
For more information
Towards Truth focuses on the Government orders made during the frontier wars and does not tell the whole story of frontier violence (see SUB0546: Introduction for more). For further detail and commentary on these events, see Discussion and Analysis documents including , , )
See SUB0534 and SUB0548 to find out about the Government’s actions in the Hawkesbury from 1801-1805 and 1814-1816.