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The Risdon Cove Massacre was an affray between the first British settlers in Van Dieman's Land (Tasmania) and the local Aboriginal people (believed to the Oyster Bay tribe). It occurred on 3 May 1804. Risdon Cove was situated on the Derwent Rover in southern Van Diemen's Land, about

Location

Risdon Cove, on the far side of the Derwent.

Background

The buildup of the British settlement at Risdon Cove began when in 1803 Lieutenant John Bowen (1780-1827) was sent by Governor King from Sydney to establish a settlement in Van Diemen's Land, at the site of Risdon Cove. Ostensibly this was to thwart the French under Nicolas Baudin who had been exploring the nearby islands of Bass Strait.^[1]

John Bowen's party arrived on two ships, Lady Nelson and Albion on 8 September and 12 September 1803 respectively. The total party of 49 people consisted of soldiers, sailors, settlers and convicts^[2]. A further reinforcement party under the command of Lt William Moore arrived in November 1803. This brought the contingent of British at Risdon Cove to approximately 100 ^[3]

In February 1804 another much larger contingent of about 400 under the command of Lieutenant Colonel David Collins arrived in the Derwent on the Ocean. Cite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page).

The original records show that a large group of Aborigines walked into the fledgling settlement. The settlement's guards mistakenly thought they were under attack and killed some of the intruders. About 300 aboriginals, men, women and children, who had banded together approached the Risdon Cove settlement whilst occupied on a kangaroo hunt. The Aborigines had arrived at the settlement and some were justifiably upset by the presence of the colonists.

The Events of 3 May 1804

There are only three accounts of the 'affray or 'massacre' that are generally accepted as eye-witness accounts. The first is the by teh Camp Surgeon and Magistrate, Dr Jacob Mountgarret, written within hours of the affray. The second is the official report written by Lieutenant William Moore who was camp commandant on teh day (Lt Bowen was absent). Moore's report was written ...days after the events. The thir account was recorded some 26years fter the evnet by the convict Edward White who claims he wa sthere on the 3 May 1804 at Risdon Cove where he saw aa fgreat ...slaughtered. All the other accounts, some ...in total.. are by by people who were not there at the time and are based largely on hearsy and speculation. There are no recorded Aboriginal accounts, either written or by reliable oral history

Dr Jacob Mountgarret's Account

Lieutenant William Moore's Account This was an enclusre in the despatch of....by Lt Governor david collins to Governer King insydney.

Convict Edward White's Account

Current Historiography

There are a number f conflicting interepretations by historians of the events of 3 May 1804. This has lead to considerable controversy and in the early 2000s the Risdon Cove 'massacre' was on eof the topics ate the centre of teh History wars in Australia.

There are two main views hesld by historians as to what happened. One group of historians believe the two official accounts (Mountgarrett's and Moore's) and of a death toll of three Aborigines killed, an unkknown number wounded and a small orphaned Aboriginal child (later chritenefd as Robert Hobart May) abandoned by the fleeing Aborigines. This group does not consider the events to be a 'massacre' by the commonly accepted definition of University of Newcastles, Professor Lyndall Ryan of 'six or more killed'.(Ref https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/introduction.php#definition ) This group includes historians Keith windschuttle (Ref Fabric) , Henry Reynolds (Tongerlonget) , Manning Clark and others (Nick Brodie, Ian McFarlane and Murray johnson). These historiand differ however on how uch emphasis to place on the convict Ewwards whites testimony, given that it was recored some 26 years after the event. Windschuttle gives White;s testiny little credence, Reynold's considerbly more, whereas Clark and brodie fail tro cite irt in their accounts of the Risdon cove affray. McFarlane and Murray causioiusly cite White's account but they o raise the pobbibility that White might hasve been lying - he might not have even been there.

The second main group of historians place a much greater, if not a primary, reliace on the tstimony of the conviuct Edward wghite, They believe thathis account is reliable, some even gping so far to imply that it was more accurate than the two official accounts by Mountgarrett and Moore, who it is implied had wanted to downplaty the extent of the killings. Historian Phillip Tardif wrote, "We will never know for sure how many were killed that day. Certainly it was more than two or three. Probably it was fewer than 50. Somewhere in between lies the "great many" spoken of by Edward White, whose poignant testimony remains for me the most credible description of this sorry episode." (Ref So who's fabricating the history of Aborigines? The Age April 6, 2003).

A leaing authority on massacres of Aboriginal people in colonial Australia is Tasmanian scholar Professor Lynall Ryan of the university of newcastle. She leas a team that establishedand maintains the Colonial Frontier Massacres in Australia Map (Ref https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/colonialmassacres/map.php )

The Risdon Cove entry of the Massacre Map summarises the affary as

a defined massacre (> 6 killed)
with '20 victims killed' (but possiblly 30 - 50 killed) and 'a 2-year-old boy taken prisoner'.
the attackers are 'Colonisers' consisting of 'Settler(s), Convict(s), Soldier(s)'
the motive was 'Reprisal' and
the weapons Used were 'Firearm(s), Musket(s), Cannon(s), Bayonet(s), Blade(s)'

This summary is given the the highest corroborating evidence rating of 3-stars, according to the Massacre Maps definitions, indicating 'High quality corroborating evidence drawn from disparate sources'

Professor Ryan has also written extensively on the Risdon Cove Massacre, in each of the three editrions of her book The Aboriginal Tasmanians and in a definitive paper in 2004 (ref Risdon Cove and the Massacre of 3 May 1804: Their Place in Tasmanian History January 2004) where she reviews all 17 accounts of teh affray or massacre. Ryan concludes in her ppaer that Risdon Cove was ‘the site of the first British settlement and first recorded massacre … this massacre at Risdon quickly became a founding story … and part of the national and international literature on the colonial encounter.’ Nevertheless, in the same paper Ryan admits that 'in 2004 Risdon Cove remains a sit eof contested narratives of possession and dispossession. Are we any closer to tehtruth of what happend on 3 May 1804? We will never know.'

Debate and Controversy

The Risdon Cove event of 3 May 1804 formed one of the focal points in the early 2000s for the History Wars in Australia. On one side was historian Keith Windschuttle and his book The Fabrication of Aboriginal History. Volume One: Van Diemen's Land 1803-1847. Chapter One was titled 'The Killing Fields at Risdon Cove' in which Windschuttle provides a detailed examination of teh affray at Risdon Cove and concludes that, on the recorded evidence, the Risdon Cove affray was ‘a defensive action by the colonists in which three Aborigines were shot dead and at least one, though possibly more, wounded … To fabricate a death toll of “close to a hundred”, as descendants of the Tasmanian Aborigines have done, is to abandon any semblance of veracity in order to milk the event for maximum political gain.’ In coming to that conclusion, Windshuttle dismissed the evidence given by Edward White as appearing to derive ‘more from the common gossip of 1830 than from direct observation’.

On the other side of the debate are historians such as Lyndall Ryan, James Boyce (author) and Phillip Tardif. In an article in teh The Age newspapaer the year after the publication of Windschuttles book Tardif outlined his opposition to Windschuttles thesis where he accuses Windschuttle of seeking,

'to reinterpret the May 3, 1804, massacre of Aborigines by settlers at Risdon Cove in Tasmania. To Windschuttle, the way this event has been recorded in the past is a metaphor for his broader thesis. It shows, he says, "how the conflict between Aborigines and settlers has long been exaggerated by people far removed from the scene and by rumours and myths". Windschuttle argues that historians of the Risdon massacre have been led astray by the testimony of those who were not there. He says that if we stick to the "facts" as told by the eyewitnesses, we see that the incident was merely an unfortunate misunderstanding in which just two or three Aborigines lost their lives.

Yet Windschuttle seems to find some "facts" less convenient than others. While he accepts the word of two of only three eyewitnesses whose memories of that day were recorded, he goes to extraordinary lengths to wish away and discredit the testimony of the third. Is it a coincidence that this eyewitness, Edward White, claimed that "there were a great many of the Natives slaughtered and wounded"? White, an Irish ex-convict, left the most extensive account of the massacre under cross-examination before a committee of inquiry in 1830. He had no interest in embellishing or playing down the truth. The other witnesses, Lieutenant William Moore of the NSW Corps and Surgeon Jacob Mountgarrett, were active participants.

Windschuttle's attempts to wish away the inconvenient evidence of the Risdon massacre began two years ago in a National Press Club debate with Henry Reynolds. According to the transcript published on his website, Windschuttle implied that the reports of Moore and Mountgarrett were the only first-hand accounts. White's evidence about the number killed was not mentioned at all. Similarly, in The Fabrication of Aboriginal History, Moore's and Mountgarrett's accounts are reproduced in full. White's is not. White's testimony about the peaceable intentions of the Aborigines is ignored by Windschuttle. According to White, "the natives did not threaten me; I was not afraid of them; (they) did not attack the soldiers; they would not have molested them; they had no spears with them; only waddies". On the contrary, the language in three accounts admits to aggression on the part of the Europeans. According to White, "the soldiers came down from their own camp to the creek to attack the Natives".

Elsewhere, Windschuttle uncritically accepts Moore's explanation of events...Having accepted the stories told by Moore and Mountgarrett at face value, Windschuttle picks at the tiniest threads of White's evidence to try to show him as a mere peddler of gossip. First, he claims White could have only seen a very small part of the action. On the contrary, it is clear from White's statement that he was familiar with the entire incident.

Next, Windschuttle says that the soldiers would not have been physically able to kill as many Aborigines as White claims, because they only carried single-shot muskets. Yet this was a clash that lasted three hours - plenty of time to reload. There were between 74 and 80 Europeans at Risdon that day.

Finally, White's claim that Mountgarrett sent the bones of some of the murdered Aborigines to Sydney in two casks is further proof of his unreliability, according to Windschuttle, because he was a convict and therefore wouldn't be aware of what members of the "colonial elite" were doing...

Keith Windschuttle has erred by weighting the facts to suit his thesis about what happened at Risdon Cove. The rest of his work warrants similar scrutiny. We will never know for sure how many were killed that day. Certainly it was more than two or three. Probably it was fewer than 50. Somewhere in between lies the "great many" spoken of by Edward White, whose poignant testimony remains for me the most credible description of this sorry episode.'

While passing through Gippsland in 1844, George Augustus Robinson wrote in his diaries that "the natives of Gippsland have killed 70 of the Boongerong [Bunurong] at Brighton". His informant was Munmunginna (transcribed by Robinson as "Mun mun jin ind"), whose father was from the Yowengerre clan.^[4]

According to Fels (2011), the massacre was "well known to early settlers, is mentioned in histories of Brighton, and pioneers' accounts – it was commonplace information in early Melbourne history".^[5] Cooper states:^[6]

The aboriginals told the settlers of a tradition which they had of a great tribal fight in the vicinity of Landcox Park. Large numbers of those engaged were killed. Settlers in the early days found bones, & evidences of camp fires having been numerous on the place pointed out as the scene of the fight.

Based on accounts from early settlers, Fels (2011) identifies this location with two parks in present-day Brighton East. John Butler Cooper's history of Brighton states that the first European settlers found bones in the area and were told of "a great tribal fight in the vicinity of Landcox Park". Another account held by the Brighton Historical Society mentioned bones being ploughed up in Hurlingham Park. According to Fels, the two parks are "practically contiguous" and "before being renamed separately by Europeans, they would have been the same place or space".^[7] The pioneers' accounts state that the tree Thomas mentioned stood until the 1860s when it was felled by lightning.^[8]

Related incidents and aftermath

In his letter to La Trobe, Thomas recorded two other mass killings inflicted on the Bunurong by the Kurnai. In the first, which he dated to about 1820, "nearly half the tribe were killed" at Buckkermitterwarrer (Baggamahjarrawah) near Arthurs Seat.^[9] The second was at Kunnung near Koo Wee Rup, where he was told twelve women, children and elderly were killed. The Kunnung massacre was also recorded by James Maxwell Clow, who gave the number of dead as 25.^[10] Thomas also recorded in 1840 a revenge expedition by the Bunurong which resulted in the deaths of nine people.^[11]

In 1844, Robinson noted that the Yowengerre "once powerful are defunct and the country in consequence is unburnt having no native inhabitants ... this is the reason why the country is so scrubby". He stated there were only two survivors of the clan, Munmungina and Kurburra (also Kaborer or Carborer).^[12]^[13] However, Robinson's hypothesis about unburnt country as evidence of depopulation has been challenged by Ian Clark, who believes it was based on a false analogy with other areas.^[14] By 1844 the Borro Borro had permanently relocated into what had previously been Yowengerre country. According to Wilson & Ellender (2002), the "push factors" for the move would have been overpopulation, inter-Aboriginal conflict and conflict with Europeans, particularly Angus McMillan who had taken over their lands to establish his "Bushy Park" estate.^[15]

References

^ Margaret Cameron-Ash (2021). BEATING FRANCE TO BOTANY BAY-The Race to Found Australia. p. 40.
^ Philip Tardif (2003). John Bowen's Hobart. p. 40.
^ Philip Tardif (2003). John Bowen's Hobart. p. 40.
^ Fels 2011, pp. 255–256.
^ Fels 2011, p. 255.
^ John Butler Cooper (1925). History of Brighton, 1842–1925. p. 83.
^ Fels 2011, p. 256.
^ Fels 2011, p. 255: "[T]he corroboree tree on which stick figures were incised detailing the events was still standing in the 1860s. It eventually fell after a lightning strike, according to early Brighton pioneers' accounts."
^ Fels 2011, p. 260.
^ Fels 2011, pp. 259–260.
^ Fels 2011, p. 250.
^ Clark 2014: "With the exception of two men, Kurburra and Munmungina, Robinson noted in 1844 that the Yowengerre clan was defunct. According to Robinson, the clan had been exterminated by the neighbouring Ganai clan, the Boro Boro Willum. He noted that because of the practical demise of the Yowengerre, their country had become scrubby because it was not periodically burned."
^ Wesson 2001: "In 1844 G.A. Robinson was told that a man named Kaborer was one of two survivors of a battle with the Borro borro willum (the Boon wurrung name for the Bushy Park people of Gippsland)..."
^ Fels 2011, p. 280.
^ Wilson & Ellender 2002, pp. 60–61.

Sources

Clark, Ian (2014). "The Tara-Waragal and the Governor's levee in Melbourne, 1863 – a reinterpretation of Woiwurrung local group organisation". Australian Aboriginal Studies (1): 33–54.
Fels, Marie Hansen (2011). 'I Succeeded Once': The Aboriginal Protectorate on the Mornington Peninsula (PDF). Australian National University E Press. ISBN 978-1921862137.
Wesson, Sue (2001). Aboriginal Flora and Fauna Names of Victoria: As Extracted From Early Surveyors' Reports (PDF). Victorian Aboriginal Corporation for Languages. ISBN 0957936001.
Wilson, Lyell; Ellender, Isabel (2002). "Aboriginal versus European perspectives on country". PAN: Philosophy Activism Nature (2): 55–62. doi:10.4225/03/57D899F7E3805.