Yilbung (c.1815 – 6 November 1846), also known as Millbong Jemmy, was an Indigenous Australian of the Turrbal people who was a major figure in resisting British colonisation during the 1840s around what is now the city of Brisbane.
[1] His name of Millbong or Yilbung is a reference to the fact that he had only one functional eye, the other suffering a destructive burn injury when he was a child.
[1] According to the local colonial press, Yilbung began violent resistance to British colonisation of his lands while still a teenager.
In 1832, he was allegedly part of a group of Aboriginal men who attacked and severely injured two members of a boat crew near the Moreton Bay penal settlement but further evidence for this is scant.
[3] In March 1842, Yilbung robbed the German mission of its supplies of corn, sugar and rice and feasted on this for several days with his band of followers.
Later that month, he brought news to the mission of the deliberate mass poisonings of Aboriginal Australians at Mount Kilcoy which killed around 40 people.
Finally in 1843, he and followers abandoned the missionaries altogether and became associated with the local Indigenous people who were living a more traditional lifestyle in the bush, often in conflict with the colonists.
In October 1846, around thirty or so Aboriginal men attacked the Forgie run, killing Andrew Gregor and his pregnant servant Mary Shannon.