William Nicolas Dawes (1762–1836) was an officer of the British Marines, an astronomer, engineer, botanist, surveyor, explorer, abolitionist, and colonial administrator.
The British authorities considered the attack unprovoked and planned to carry out a punitive expedition against the Aborigines.
Dawes felt that the game-keeper was to blame for the attack and refused to take part in the expedition, disobeying direct orders from Gov.
[3] Dawes refused to retract his statement or to apologize for either incident, and was shipped off in December 1791 on HMS Gorgon with the first group of Royal Marines to return to England.
[3] At the time he told Astronomer Royal Nevil Maskelyne that he harbored hopes of one day returning to Australia and serving under different leadership.
[3] He applied at some point to return to the colony as a settler, but nothing came of recommendations that he be appointed as superintendent of schools or as an engineer.
Just a few months later, in August 1792, he was then chosen to join John Clarkson in Sierra Leone, a colony founded as a home for Black Loyalists, African-Americans who had been promised their freedom if the served for the Britain in the American War of Independence.
One of the Methodist ministers, Henry Beverhout, referred to Dawes as "Pharaoh", invoking the story of Moses to encourage the people of Sierra Leone to resist his governance.
[9] At one point the colonists actually staged a false raid in an effort to obtain guns that Dawes believed they intended to use against members of the colonial government.
[10] Dawes was motivated by the desire to help the people of Sierra Leone, but his religious zeal, his opposition to the local Methodist ministers, and what they considered his overbearing nature alienated him from many of the colonists and even from other colonial officials such as Thomas Clarkson.
In spite of his earlier difficulties with the colonists, Dawes was sent back to serve a second term as governor of Sierra Leone in January 1795, remaining until March 1796.
Whilst serving in this position, he gave evidence before a committee of the House of Lords in June 1799, who were then considering a bill to regulate the slave trade.
[3] In the early months of 1801, Dawes returned to serve his third and final term as governor of Sierra Leone, remaining there until February 1803.
By December 1826, his financial situation had become so precarious that he petitioned the Secretary of State for the colonies, making claims for extra services rendered in New South Wales on account of his being in "circumstances of great pecuniary embarrassment".
[3] Dawes was described as “...outstanding in ability and character.” Gillen states that “...he was never given proper recognition, nor given financial compensation equal to the value of his work”.
Judith Dawes, born 22 June 1795, baptised at St Mary Magdalene, Woolwich, on 4 September 1795[14] and named for her mother.
[3] William Rutter Dawes, born 17 December 1797, baptised 11 February 1798, St Mary, Portsea.
[17] William Rutter Dawes, was born on 19 March 1799[18] at Christ's Hospital[19] then in the City of London (it moved to Horsham, West Sussex in 1902).
The translation of Yininmadyemi - Thou didst let fall (the title given to a piece of public art in Sydney's Hyde Park) is from Dawes' notebooks.