Cape Grim massacre

The Cape Grim massacre was an attack on 10 February 1828 in which a group of Aboriginal Tasmanians gathering food at a beach in the north-west of Tasmania is said to have been ambushed and shot by four Van Diemen's Land Company (VDLC) workers, with bodies of some of the victims then thrown from a 60-metre (200 ft) cliff.

[11] Ships then began arriving to offload livestock and labourers – mostly indentured "servants" or convicts who would work as shepherds and ploughmen on sheep stations at Cape Grim/Kennaook and Circular Head, occupying key Aboriginal kangaroo hunting grounds.

[9] Businessman Edward Curr was appointed as VDLC's Chief Agent, answering to a court of directors in London, but his position in the remote part of the colony also gave him the powers and authority of a magistrate.

Within a year of the company establishing a presence in the North West, employees under his direct control had gained a reputation for brutal treatment of the local Aboriginal population.

[13][14][15] Rosalie Hare, the wife of a ship's captain who arrived in January 1828 on board the Caroline and remained in the Curr household until March, noted in her journal the frequency of Aboriginal attacks on shepherds, but added: "We are not to suppose the Europeans in their turn take no revenge.

"[13] According to historian Nicholas Clements, the primary cause of conflict was sex: very few white women were in the colony generally, and the shortage was particularly acute in the North West, where only Curr's wife and one other woman lived.

"[1] The immediate catalyst of the February killings was an incident about the beginning of December 1827 during a visit to the area by the Peerapper clan from West Point in search of muttonbird eggs and seals.

John was taken back to Circular Head a fortnight later and Curr reported the injury to VDLC directors in London, stating that his shepherd had been speared in an extended conflict that had begun when "a very strong party of Natives" attacked the men.

Although there is no single definitive narrative, it is thought that the Aboriginal people, confronted by the armed Europeans, panicked and fled in different directions, with some rushing into the sea, others scrambling around the cliff and some fatally shot by the shepherds.

[7] In a dispatch to VDLC directors on 14 January Curr reported the voyage of the Fanny and the subsequent night time encounter with Peerapper at their camp by Frederick and the shepherds who had "gone in quest" of those who had slaughtered the sheep.

In Curr's account there were about 70 Peerapper in the encampment, but the shepherds watched and waited until dawn before retreating without a shot being fired, because "not a musket would go off" as a result of heavy rain during the night.

"[19] Curr reported nothing more on the incident or what had become of those who had been severely wounded, prompting the directors to write back to express extreme "regret" over the deaths and point out: "It does not appear from the account who were the aggressors.

[3] Goldie's letter to Arthur was one of confession of his own involvements in the killing of Aboriginals – notably the shooting and butchering with an axe a woman on a north-west beach two months earlier – and revealed: There have been a great many Natives shot by the Company's Servants, and several engagements between them while their stock was in that district.

On one occasion a good many were shot (I never heard exactly the number) and although Mr Curr knew it, yet he never that I am aware, took any notice of it although in the Commission of the Peace and at that time there was no proclamation against the Natives, nor were they (the Natives) at the time they were attacked at all disturbing the Company's flocks ..."[16]In a separate, scathing, 110-page letter to VDLC directors Goldie said Curr had personally encouraged the killing of other Aboriginals, offering rum on one occasion to any man who could bring him an Aboriginal head.

[3] Arthur responded to Goldie's accusations by asking Robinson to discover what he could about the incident when he ventured to the north-west region as part of his "friendly mission" to Aboriginal Tasmanians.

Some related the details of the spearing of Thomas John, the subsequent shooting of an Aboriginal chief and the return of tribe members a few days later to drive sheep off the cliff.

They had prepared their supply of birds, had tied them with grass, had towed them on shore, and the whole tribe was seated around their fires partaking of their hard-earned fare, when down rushed the band of fierce barbarians thirsting for the blood of those unprotected and unoffending people ...

I considered these things at the time for I had thought of investigating the case, but I saw first that there was a strong presumption that our men were right, second if wrong it was impossible to convict them, and thirdly that the mere enquiry would induce every man to leave Cape Grim.

Based on his visit to Cape Grim/Kennaook, Windschuttle, has disputed much of Robinson's description of events, concluding that the shepherds could not have launched a surprise attack if the Aboriginals had been sitting on the beach at Taneneryouer.

Windschuttle said the site's "extraordinarily difficult terrain" coupled with the limitations of 19th century muskets made it beyond belief that four shepherds could have killed 30 Aboriginal people.

McFarlane said surveyors' charts placed the shepherds' hut about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) to the northeast of Victory Hill, which allowed the company easy access from the sea via Davisons Bay.

[7] The hut was well beyond the range of spears thrown by Aboriginal people on the hill, and McFarlane has argued that abandoning the cover of a hut to engage a vastly greater force of Aboriginal people occupying the higher ground would have been "an act of gross stupidity", particularly given that one of the convicts, John Weavis, was a former soldier who had served in the 89th Foot Regiment and York Chasseurs, a regiment raised from military deserters.

"[24] Additionally, if the fatal encounter had taken place closer to the shepherds' hut they would have had to carry the bodies of their victims almost 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) – passing Victory Hill on the way – in order to throw them off the cliffs at Taneneryouer.

He concluded: "Curr's version of events is clearly implausible, without foundation and would appear designed to depict the Aborigines as aggressors by shifting the scene, and thus the nature of the crime, from Taneneryouer to Victory Hill.