The Convict Valley by Mark Dunn

Author:Mark Dunn [Dunn, Mark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Published: 2020-04-08T00:00:00+00:00

James wrote a second letter to his friend Andrew Kettie, also in Scotland, the same day as that to his brother. Here he explained the situation further:

Although the Black natives are by no means hostile, yet are always very revengeful when injured by any white person, the first that they meet with are sure to meet with their resentment. I am sorry to inform you that Mr Robert Greig of Lochgelly has fallen a victim to their resentment.16

Evidence of Greig’s poor treatment of his Aboriginal neighbours was reinforced with later accounts of his behaviour. Robert Scott, in his magistrate’s report written eight months later, noted that Greig’s ‘noted aversion to having the Natives about him, may have excited their hatred’, while Reverend Threlkeld told the attorney-general, Saxe Bannister, that he had heard from his Aboriginal informants that Greig had struck an Aboriginal man and tried to drive them off the land.17 Peter Cunningham, settler and explorer, writing a year later, added more detail. Cunningham claimed that the man who killed Greig was called Nullan-Nullan—probably a derivative of nulla-nulla, the word for club—who had approached in a friendly manner while Greig was reading Robert Burns, then sliding behind him, had struck him down.18

The combination of versions and evidence illustrates some of the complexities of the frontier in the Hunter Valley. Regarding James’s version, although he was the settler, it was his cousin who was the target. James was away on business in Sydney at the time and, as Henry Reynolds has argued, raids on isolated properties, particularly those carried out as retribution or payback, were often preceded by periods of close surveillance.19 Further, although Robert and the shepherd were killed, James’s sheep were left alone, found later with his Scotch collie watching over them. Maybe the attack was postponed until James was away as, from his letters, James appeared to have an understanding of local law and was on friendly terms with at least some Aboriginal people—one having given him the details of Robert’s behaviour that led to the attack.

Following the attack on Greig, the Aboriginal raiders withdrew into the mountains to the south, a move that the magistrates and Cunningham described as a retreat made in dread of British reaction. Two more shepherds were attacked, one being killed and the other badly lacerated near Mr Laycock’s farm at Putty. The magistrate’s report said that the group had joined forces with another group they referred to as the ‘Wallumbi tribe’, a group associated with the Wollombi and Wollombi Creek area. The potential for an escalation of the violence was not helped by a party of soldiers sent from Windsor to Putty to intercept the raiders. Instead, they encountered and killed several members of what was later discovered to be a friendly Aboriginal group.20 Indiscriminate killings by settlers, soldiers and constables were a recurring feature of the violence and one that fuelled further troubles.

The attacks around Putty may have been quite separate to those playing out in the Hunter, events with roots reaching back to earlier encounters.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.