Frank
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Even by standards of the time, there was retrograde behaviour, such as infanticide and violent cultural payback practices that often involved the slaughtering of men, women and children. The hard fact is that once modernity emerged across the globe, the hunter-gatherer life was not going to last long.
There is no alternative possible version of Australian history where Indigenous Australians would have been left alone to continue their way of life.
The only question was about colonisation by whom – and when, rather than if – and we are fortunate it was the British who arrived and not many of the other alternatives.
Few younger Australians are taught these days about the letter from King George to Governor Phillip instructing him to maintain friendly relations with the native people.
“You are to endeavour by every possible means to open an Intercourse with the Natives and to conciliate their affections, enjoining all Our Subjects to live in amity and kindness with them,” he wrote. “And if any of Our Subjects shall wantonly destroy them, or give them any unnecessary Interruption in the exercise of their several occupations, it is our Will and Pleasure that you do cause such offenders to be brought to punishment according to the degree of the Offence.”
Of course, the British settlers did not always live up to King George’s instructions, but that doesn’t change the fact the instructions were given.
Even in the moments in our history when barbaric crimes were committed against Aboriginal Australians, the civilising rule of law often played out. The infamous Myall Creek massacre in 1838 marks a dark and bloody moment in our history, when 28 Indigenous Australians were murdered by British settlers. But the activists have done a good job of playing down what happened after the massacre.
Contemporary sources indicate that while there were pockets of excuse-making for the perpetrators, there was also clearly an abiding desire of the colony as a whole to do the right thing. The attorney-general, John Plunkett, prosecuted the perpetrators and then – when they were acquitted on a technicality – he prosecuted them again. Seven white men were thus found guilty and hanged.
During the trial, Justice Dowling took care to remind the jury that the law made no distinction between the murder of an Aboriginal person and the murder of a European person. In the sentencing Justice Burton said: “The crime was, however, committed in the sight of God, and the blood of the victims cries for vengeance.”
A crime was committed and justice – to a large extent – was served. Notably, this was a civilised common law process that would not have happened pre-settlement. Violence between tribes and clans was previously simply met with more violence. It is also worth mentioning the violence during this early settlement period was not one-sided.
Crimes were committed, violence and injustice perpetrated by bad actors, but I don’t think it should be controversial to say that both black and white Australia were making the best of things by the standards of the times.
This is demonstrated by the fact that, out of these decades of disruption, something resembling a nation emerged.
So much so that when duty called our first Anzacs to serve in the Great War, more than a thousand Indigenous Australians signed up to fight. Many of these heroes went above and beyond. For example, Albert Knight and his two brothers. Albert was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal for conspicuous gallantry in an attack on the village of Bony.
Then there’s Bill Rawlings, who was awarded the Military Medal for leading a bayonet charge at Morlancourt, France. Rawlings was killed in action on August 9, 1918, and buried at Heath Cemetery, Harbonničres.
They are Australian heroes who fought for their country, but their stories of courage and gallantry are not often told by those who take the black armband view.
In the century since, we’ve seen well-intentioned efforts to integrate these two different parts of Australian society.
Again, it has not been perfect. But time and again, an honest examination of things finds Australians – both black and white – striving to find a way forward together under the standards and norms of the times in which they lived.
Even when misguided policies are pursued, like those that befell the Stolen Generation, we find that, over time, the efforts to integrate proved more frufgitful than policies of separation. Indeed, the records show many descendants of the Stolen Generations now enjoy greater prosperity and success than those generations who were simply neglected and left to live in poverty and squalor.
The ends don’t always justify the means, but honesty is required if we are to move forward and reconcile as a nation.
Similarly, we can see the mixed results in the more progressive project of Native Title. It should be seen as the beginning of a way forward, but too often it’s been used as a mechanism to lock up land and keep communities stuck in time.
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