An Aboriginal History of Yarra

The Wurundjeri-willam people of the Kulin nation are the traditional owners of the land that is now known as the City of Yarra.Their relationship with the land extends back tens of thousands of years to when their creator spirit ‘Bunjil’ formed their people, the land and all living things.

The Wurundjeri’s connection to land is underpinned by cultural and spiritual values vastly different to those of the Europeans. The Wurundjeri did not ‘own’ the land in the European sense of the word, but belonged to, or were ‘owned by’ the land. They did not live in permanent settlements but, rather, camped for periods within defined clan boundaries where food was plentiful, and moved on when the land needed to rejuvenate. The land provided all the Wurundjeri needed – food, water, medicine, shelter – and they treated it with the respect due to such a provider.

The moment Europeans arrived in the area, they began changing the land to suit the European way of life. For the majority of settlers, the driving force was land ownership. For at least some of these settlers, underlying this drive was an imperial belief in British superiority combined with a desire to ‘civilize.’ Settler relationships with the Wurundjeri and other Aboriginal people in the area varied, but the settlement and development of Melbourne impacted heavily on the Wurundjeri. Dispossession of land, dislocation, frontier clashes and introduced diseases led to a dramatic decline in the population.

Despite the effects of colonization, Aboriginal people and culture survived, and the strong bonds between families and clans could not be broken.

The Aboriginal History of Yarra website explores the relationships between the traditional owners and settlers through the early years of Melbourne’s establishment. The following is a selection of excerpts from this new resource. It is not an easy history, but one that is essential in understanding where we have come from and where we are going – and for all its local detail, it speaks to a national history.

Pre-contact Wurundjeri

Australia’s state and territory borders have existed for a relatively short period. For thousands of years before European settlement, the country now known as Australia consisted of 500–700 Aboriginal nations, each with their own systems of government, cultural practices, religions and languages. Part of the area now known as the City of Melbourne and all of the City of Yarra (as well as land extending north into central Victoria) are the traditional lands of the Kulin nation. The City of Yarra area was looked after by the Wurundjeri- willam family group. They belong to the Wurundjeri-balluk clan, which is part of the larger Wurundjeri tribe. The Wurundjeri-willam mainly spoke Woi wurrung language, but also spoke other languages of their nation. Each clan was governed by a ngurungaeta (pronounced na-run-getta) or head-man.

All clan members knew their land in great detail, including the best times to visit each area according to weather and availability of food. In winter, the Wurundjeri-willam regularly camped in the higher areas, as the land near the river flooded. In spring and summer they travelled more frequently, moving between nine and sixteen kilometres a day, hunting and gathering food, and visiting sacred sites. According to historian Penelope Edmonds, ‘Spring and early summer were times of movement and change, for it was then that crops such as yam (mirr-n’yong) were ready for harvesting, birds’ eggs plentiful and wildfowl and game more accessible. As summer wore on the Aborigines visited fishing and eeling sites and camped for longer periods.’ (M.F. Christie, Aborigines in Colonial Victoria (Sydney: Sydney University Press,1979)

Land boundaries for each clan were clearly defined, with strict protocols governing access to the land of other clans. While each clan or family group travelled on its own, they still maintained relationships with others within their language group. Marriage played an important role in this, as people would not marry within their own clan. Instead, partners were chosen from different clans within the Kulin nation (Gary Presland, First People: The Eastern Kulin of Melbourne, Port Phillip and Central Victoria (Melbourne: Museum Victoria, 2010). Visiting the land of other clans was therefore an important and necessary right.

Ties were also cemented through gatherings and corroborees, where clans within the Kulin nation would meet, with sometimes hundreds of people together. Corroboree dances and storytelling performances were a focus of these gatherings, with different clans often competing to outdo each other. These gatherings were also an opportunity for a council of ngurungaeta to be formed to settle disputes or decide on punishment for those responsible for serious crimes against Aboriginal law (Penelope Edmonds, Urbanizing Frontiers: Indigenous Peoples and Settlers in 19th Century Pacific Rim Cities ( Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2010), 82.).

Dispossession

Wurundjeri dispossession of land took place not just through displacement, but also through disconnection. Land was sold, bush was cleared for the creation of roads and buildings, and wetlands were drained. Over time, even the course of the Yarra River was changed. The disruption of sacred sites might be termed desecration. For the Wurundjeri, who had a spiritual connection to the land, these changes had a devastating impact on all aspects of their health and wellbeing. Prior to Melbourne’s settlement, European sealers and whalers had lived and worked along the Victorian coastline for decades, and the British had made attempts to establish settlements further out on Port Phillip Bay and Westernport Bay. The arrival of settlers during the 1830s was considered illegal under British law, but settlers came anyway, unable to resist the lure of prime pastoral land. The settlement grew through the early thirties and by the end of 1836, the British government conceded it couldn’t stop it. The settlement was officially named Melbourne by Governor Sir Richard Bourke in March 1837 (A.G.L. Shaw, ‘Foundation and Early History,’ in Andrew Brown-May and Shurlee Swain, eds., The Encyclopedia of Melbourne, online edition, www. emelbourne.net.au.). During the ceremony Bourke used William Buckley, an escaped convict who had lived with Watha wurrung people for thirty-two years, to tell the Aboriginal people present that he would be a friend as long as they were peaceable and obeyed the law.

As the settler population increased and the built environment developed, the European hold on the land was strengthened. The first land sales took place in Melbourne on 1 June 1837. The following year, forty-one allotments of twenty-five acres each were sold in the areas that would become Collingwood and Fitzroy. It was intended that they would be paddocks (Bernard Barrett, The Inner Suburbs: The Evolution of an Industrial Area (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1971). In the building boom of 1850, the allotments were subdivided and forest was cleared for firewood. The European population during this time rose from 600 people in 1841, to nearly 3000 people in 1850, and 3449 people in 1851 (Barrett, The Inner Suburbs, 20; Shaw, ‘Foundation and Early History).

Aboriginal people were pushed further and further out, and freedom of movement across the land became increasingly difficult. The settlers created new land boundaries with fences and often had guns to back them up.

For the Wurundjeri, finding food within traditional clan boundaries became increasingly challenging. The settlers hunted wildlife on an unprecedented level, for sport as well as for food, reducing the amount that was available (Christie, Aborigines in Colonial Victoria, 42.).

Introduced animals such as sheep and cattle trampled and killed vegetation that had been a staple of the Aboriginal diet (Richard Broome, ‘Aboriginal Melbourne,’ in Brown-May and Swain, eds., The Encyclopedia of Melbourne.). This sometimes forced Aboriginal people onto the land of other clans – a breach of protocol that sometimes led to inter-clan violence. Devastation from introduced diseases also influenced the willingness of Aboriginal people to return to former campsites, as happened at the confluence of the Yarra River and Merri Creek after the influenza epidemic of 1847 (Ian D. Clark and Laura M. Kostanski, ‘An Indigenous History of Stonnington – A Report to the City of Stonnington’ (2006), 83–4.).

The Wurundjeri-willam and other Aboriginal people of the Yarra and Melbourne area did not concede their land easily, but as the settlement grew and space to hunt and gather diminished, many of the dispossessed were eventually drawn to the settlement, where food and alcohol was available. As Melbourne developed into a town and then a city, there continued to be a strong Aboriginal presence in and around the settlement.

Treaty

On 6 June 1835, just under two years before Melbourne was officially recognised as a settlement, John Batman, the leader of the Port Phillip Association presented Wurundjeri Elders with a land use agreement.

This document, now referred to as the Batman treaty, was later given to the British government to claim that local Aboriginal people had given Batman access to their land in exchange for goods and rations. Today, the meaning and interpretation of this treaty is contested. Some argue it was pretence for taking Aboriginal land in exchange for trinkets, while others argue it was significant in that it sought to recognise Aboriginal land right.

The exact location of the meeting between Batman and the Kulin ngurungaeta, with whom he made the treaty, is unknown. According to historian Meyer Eidelson, it is generally believed to have occurred on the Merri Creek near modern-day Rushall Station.

Opinions around why Kulin ngurungaeta signed the treaty (if in fact they did) are open to speculation. One opinion is that ‘the clan-heads may have made a very informed decision’ to ‘limit the number of settlers in Port Phillip’ in an attempt ‘to at least curtail the destruction’ they had heard about happening elsewhere.

In attempting to understand Batman’s intentions, it’s worth noting that the Port Phillip Association’s principal aim ‘was to depasture stock as profitably as possible.’ The aim of the Association as given to the British authorities, however, was to establish a nucleus ‘for a free and useful colony, founded on the principle of conciliation, of philanthropy, morality and temperance ... calculated to ensure the comfort and well being of the natives.’ It is unlikely that these two aims could peacefully coexist.

Batman’s treaty was deemed invalid. It was also noted that ‘if it was acknowledged that the Aborigines had the right to dispose of their land as they saw fit, then the Crown’s claim to all Australian lands would be in doubt.

Ultimately, Batman’s treaty had no legal significance in the European settlement of Melbourne and the taking of Aboriginal land. However, it was an important first step in this process, and also holds significant symbolism. It is symbolic of European relations with the Kulin, in that self-interest and deceit were central to colonisation. To this day, Batman’s treaty is the only land use agreement that has sought to recognise European occupation of Australia, and pre-existing Aboriginal land rights.

The Protectorate

At an official level, an important influence on policy makers and political leaders was Enlightenment thought and what was known as the ‘Exeter Hall movement’ in Britain.

This humanitarian influence, well- intentioned but imperialistic, is evident in such things as the establishment of the Aboriginal Protectorate. ‘Protection’ was a key idea of the early settlement years, and had a strong influence on government policy. In many ways William Thomas was the epitome of this idea of protection, and the contradictions it contained.

In his role as Assistant Protector, Thomas had good intentions. He made efforts to learn the ways of the Wurundjeri, learning both Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language. But he was an Englishman and fervent Christian, and his ultimate goal was to ‘civilise’ the local Aboriginal people by settling them in villages and converting them to Christianity.

In 1837, prior to the protectorate’s establishment, a mission and school had been set up on the south side of the Yarra River at a meeting place and corroboree site that is now occupied by Melbourne’s Royal Botanic Gardens. The mission and school failed, however, because the people of the Kulin nations refused to give up cultural practices of traveling and hunting at certain times of the year.

The Aboriginal Protectorate was established to replace the mission. Under orders from the Chief Protector George Robinson, William Thomas established a station at Narre Warren in 1840 and based himself there from 1841. However, he was not successful in convincing the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung to move so far from Melbourne and, by 1843, Thomas had moved to the popular camp site at the confluence of the Yarra River and the Merri Creek. At this time, the Merri Creek School was established for Aboriginal children, with some success.

As the settlement grew, the Wurundjeri found themselves faced with a variety of requests and demands from the European settlers. The protectors wanted to keep Aboriginal people out of the town, to ‘civilise’ them and eventually enable them to be part of society. The merchants wanted Aboriginal people to continue coming to the town so they could profit from them. The general public and colonial officers simply wanted the protectors to remove the Aboriginal people from the area and ensure they did not return. There were also some who saw the injustice of dispossession (although this was only because the Europeans had taken the land without allocating an area for the Aboriginal people to go).

The protectorate system was seen as a failure and, unsupported by the government or the public, it was dismantled in December 1849. Thomas was named Guardian of the Aborigines on 1 January 1850. His instructions were nearly identical to when he was appointed Assistant Protector, except Superintendent Charles La Trobe now emphasised that Thomas was ‘to keep the blacks out of Melbourne.’ With Thomas the sole authority looking after the welfare of the Aboriginal people, as Penelope Edmonds has noted, ‘the 1850s have been described as a period of almost complete government neglect of Aboriginal peoples.

In 1858, a ‘Select Committee of the Legislative Council on the Aborigines’ was formed by the Victorian Government, to enquire into the state of the Aboriginal population at this time. The committee published a report in 1859 that recommended the establishment of government reserves for Aboriginal people. The result of this was the creation of the Central Board for the Protection of Aborigines in 1860 to establish a series of reserves, onto which the Aboriginal people would be ‘more vigorously compelled’ to move. These reserves included Ebenezer, Lake Tyers, Framlingham, Lake Condah, Ramahyuck, Coranderrk and Yelta. Many of the Wurundjeri moved to Coranderrk, which was created by a group of Kulin in 1863, and retroactively approved by the government.

Disease

One of the biggest impacts on the Aboriginal population in the City of Yarra area was the introduction of diseases previously unknown to the Wurundjeri. It has been estimated that disease accounted for up to sixty per cent of the Aboriginal deaths across the Port Phillip area.22 Even before Europeans began arriving in the Melbourne area, up to a third of the population of the eastern Australian tribes had been killed by an epidemic of smallpox that spread from Sydney.

While the European population had a strong resistance to diseases such as bronchitis, measles, scarlet fever, chicken pox and even the common cold, exposure to these diseases was often fatal to Aboriginal populations. Added to this were other diseases such as smallpox, tuberculosis and venereal disease (such as syphilis) that were deadly for European and Aboriginal populations alike.

Changes to diet also became a source of ill health and disease. Some changes were caused by restricted access to traditional food – from land being fenced off, native animals being shot for sport and the introduction of hoofed animals such as sheep (which trampled and destroyed native plants that had served as staple foodstuffs). For some, these changes led to starvation, for others this led to the adoption of a European style diet including refined sugar, flour and offal, replacing what had been a high-protein diet. The impact of a diet based on these introduced foodstuffs was made worse by the provision of rations that consisted of the worst quality and cheapest grains and meats available.

Movement away from a nomadic life also had a massive impact on the Wurundjeri’s health. Constant availability of European food led to gatherings of more Aboriginal people, which in turn facilitated spread of disease.26 One of the reasons for travelling in small bands was to ensure there was adequate food available and to enable an area to regenerate once it had been exhausted. Moving camp after they had exhausted supply also prevented issues with natural waste – ‘mobility gave them a sewerage system.’ By making permanent camps, the Aboriginal people had a greater exposure to germs, leading to a number of outbreaks of dysentery.28 Even the adoption of European dress caused the Aboriginal people harm, preventing their skin from absorbing the sunlight that had previously aided in the destruction of bacteria. Furthermore, Geoffrey Blainey argues they ‘had no tradition of washing clothes,’ ‘they often had no access to soap and to clean running water,’ and ‘they did not realise the danger of sleeping in a wet dress or damp blanket. In putting on clothes they were often putting on burial garments.

The other big lifestyle-based cause of ill health and disease that came with the European population was alcohol.

As stated by Megan Goulding and Mary Menis, ‘by the 1850s alcoholism was endemic across the Victorian Aboriginal population and contributed greatly to population decline.’30 Issues with alcohol were made worse by the fact that spirits were the primary form of drink in this period. William Thomas reported: ‘At the Merri Creek, one morning at daybreak, there were four or five lying bedded in the mud, drunk, not dead; cold comes on, and as soon as disease touches a black man’s chest you cannot save him.’

In June 1847, an epidemic of influenza hit the large encampment at the confluence of the Yarra River and Merri Creek particularly hard. Those who survived the initial impact of disease had to live with the grief and devastation within their community. In the wake of this, what had once been a popular and significant camping spot for the Wurundjeri was no longer used to any great extent. This then acted as yet another force to drive the Wurundjeri from their land.

Declining birthrates was another issue. The diseases mentioned above impacted the young more than the elderly, causing a decline in the number of people of childbearing age. Depression also may have had a role to play. Both Billibellary, Elder of the Wurundjeri, and Derrimut, Elder of the Yalukit-willam, are repeatedly quoted as stating that there was no point having children as the Europeans had taken all the land. On top of this, the European introduction of syphilis caused sterility. Similarly, a decline in health from dietary and other changes also affected fertility.

Ultimately, the introduction of European diseases and lifestyle-related health problems had a devastating and ongoing impact on the Aboriginal people of Victoria.

Violence

Violence was a common issue in frontier history across Australia, and Victoria was no exception. While many British colonists and officials ‘were benign if sanctimonious ... a large proportion of colonists moved from a sense of superiority to a feeling of contempt ... Contempt, combined with greed for the land, fear and insecurity, led to violence.’

In the Yarra area of Melbourne, reports of Wurundjeri-willam violence against Europeans are limited, despite intense provocation and a number of confrontations. In part, this was because the rapid increase of the European population in and around Melbourne limited the ability of the local Aboriginal population to form a resistance. It would be wrong, however, to state that there was no violence in the Melbourne region. Relations between the Wurundjeri and Europeans were influenced by the guerrilla warfare that was occurring in outlying areas. Word of this conflict accentuated fears in the city area, and influenced the attitudes of many colonialists.

While the official British policy towards the Aboriginal population was one of protection, instances of institutional violence still occurred, particularly as a result of police inaction. There were many who did not like the Aboriginal camps being close to the town, and in April 1840, when there was a gathering of six or seven hundred Kulin, their mia mias (bark huts) were burnt and the camp dismantled. Other acts of violence, harassment and indignities frequently occurred on the streets of Melbourne. Such acts included beatings and horse whippings, often in response to acts that the European population ‘perceived as begging.’38 Such acts of violence were perpetrated by Europeans of all classes. Violence against the Aboriginal people served only to increase the number of infractions against British law committed by them. While the police were quick to enforce laws against Aboriginal people in the town, they often refused to take action in response to crimes committed against Aboriginal people, referring them to the protectorate as their responsibility.

Official violence also came in the form of criminal executions, with the first executions in the district being two Aboriginal men, Tunnerminnerwait and Maulboyheenner. These men were among the group of Aboriginal men and women who were brought over from Van Diemen’s Land by Robinson, but broke away and engaged in a campaign of resistance against the Europeapeans.

Sexual violence against Aboriginal women was common throughout the Victorian frontier. One of the first acts of the Port Phillip Association, following the creation of Batman’s treaty, was assisting with the return of Aboriginal women abducted from Victorian coastline areas by sealers and whalers. William Thomas also recorded a number of instances of rape in his reports.

Such instances would often occur at the Aboriginal camps on the borders of the growing town of Melbourne. These were seen by the European population as a place of curiosity; ‘a(chǎn) place of entertainment, drunkenness, gunfire, violence, and interracial sex.’

Not all violence was interracial. There were ongoing feuds between different clans within the Kulin, and established enmity between members of the Kulin and those outside, such as the Gunai/ Kurnai from the Gippsland area.

These conflicts were exacerbated by the sprawl of European settlement pushing Aboriginal groups outside their traditional boundaries. The introduction of alcohol into Aboriginal society also fuelled domestic violence. When asked about murder among the Aboriginal people by the Select Committee of the Legislative Council on the Aborigines in 1859, William Thomas stated that the only murder that occurred within the Wurundjeri while he was with them was brought about by intoxication.

Between 1836 and 1844, an estimated 40 European and 113 Aboriginal people were officially recorded as killed in conflicts in the Port Phillip area. It is worth noting, however, that ‘officials routinely tried to obscure the high rate of Aboriginal deaths.’

Pollution

One of the more pervasive aspects of European settlement was the pollution of the air and water. While the Wurundjeri lifestyle had a low impact on the environment, the European lifestyle took a heavy toll. A particular problem for the Wurundjeri was pollution around the confluence of the Merri Creek and the Yarra River – an important meeting place for the Wurundjeri and visiting Aboriginal people, and also the base for the Merri Creek School, Native Police and Protectorate Station. Noxious trades established along the river, particularly in Collingwood, Abbotsford and Richmond, were some of the worst offenders. Historian Bernard Barrett states that settlers were attracted to these areas ‘because of the free water supply for washing skins and wool and as a sewer and garbage dump.’ This dumping ground was the drinking water supply for both Europeans and Aboriginal people.

The process for fellmongery and woolwashing involved soaking animal hides in the river for days, then in hot water, soap and soda that was later dumped back into the river (along with pelts, heads and legs of the animals). Tanneries also soaked the animal hides in the river, then in lime water, then river water again. Sometimes they also soaked the hides in a mix of water and fowl or pigeon dung, which, along with the hair that was scraped off, was later dumped into the river. Soap and candle- making from boiled down animal fat also contributed to the air pollution, which could be smelt for miles around.

The result of an 1851 enquiry by the Melbourne City Council was to prohibit any new fellmongers or tanners. However, a second enquiry in 1854 showed that the number had increased, and that combined they were handling 5000 sheepskins and 200 cattle hides per week.

The everyday lifestyle of settlers living in suburbs such as Fitzroy and Collingwood also had impacts on the landscape. There was no general garbage collection service, so household waste was simply thrown into yards and trampled underfoot. Anything not eaten by household animals such as dogs, chickens, goats, cows and pigs, was then dumped in the laneways, streets, swamps or drains. Rubbish dumped in drains would flow downhill to the flat, and eventually to the Yarra. The other issue associated with drains was sewerage. Most households used a cesspit, frequently not water tight, so waste would filter through the ground, and overflow would go out in the gutter. Waste from those living on the Fitzroy hill would travel down to the Collingwood flat, meaning the cesspits there also gathered this waste. Barrett notes that ‘Often the contents, augmented by rainwater, overflowed around, and even under, buildings.’ By the late 1850s, nightmen were employed to collect sewage, but many simply dumped it, with most ending in the Yarra.

The Wurundjeri’s experience of this pollution has not been recorded, but it cannot be doubted that this would have had an extremely negative impact. Their drinking water was fouled, noxious smells polluted the air and the land was littered with the by-products of life in the settlement.

Establishment of municipal government and the impact on the Wurundjeri

In 1836, Governor Bourke received authorisation from the Colonial Secretary in London to allow private settlement in the Melbourne area, stating it was for the protection of the Aboriginal people and the establishment of law. William Lonsdale was appointed police magistrate of the Port Phillip District in September that year. The first move towards establishment of a local government, however, occurred at a public meeting three months earlier. One of the decisions reached at this meeting was: ‘that all subscribing parties pledge themselves to afford protection for the Aborigines to the utmost of their power and further that they will not teach them the use of firearms or allow their servants to do, nor on any occasion allow the Aborigines to be in possession of any firearms.’

While there are few references to the Aboriginal people in official notices of motion, by-laws were created that directly affected Aboriginal people. The Dog Act of 1844, for example, ‘ensured that the “hoards” of diseased dogs, if unregistered, were routinely killed in the streets.’ Assistant Protector William Thomas stated that the women in camps ‘cried for their dogs.’ A week later, this Aboriginal group that included these women left the settlement ‘on account of their dogs being killed.

The bulk of items for consideration by newly formed councils during this time are concerned with public works – the development of streets, drainage, buildings, and locations for bathing houses, manure deposits and so forth. This in itself is telling regarding the post-contact story of the Aboriginal people, as it is the story of the land being taken over and reshaped, pushing out Aboriginal people. While the European population was reshaping the landscape and overlaying their ideas of order onto it, the Aboriginal people continued to occupy the land, inscribing their own ideas onto it. It was a simultaneous occupation of the land underpinned by disparate understandings of what it meant to occupy the land.