1810s

Lachlan Macquarie, with his wife Elizabeth and a large party travel by horse carriage from Parramatta to the Cow Pastures, guided by John Warby, a constable based at the Government Hut on the Nepean River. At John Macarthur’s property at Camden , Benkennie (now Belgenny), they meet the Murringong (Cow Pastures Clan) Aborigines, Dharawal Chief Koggie, (Goggey) his wife Nantz, Mudbury and his wife Mary, their friends Bootharrie, (Budbury), Yungbundle, (Young Bundle) Billy and their wives. They perform "an extraordinary sort of dance". Source: www.cahs.com.au/massacre-at-appin-1816 Macquarie, Diary, 16 November, 1810, MS A778: 12, Mitchell Library, Sydney. In 2010 Auntie Glenda Chalker, on behalf of her ancestors, welcomes NSW Governor Marie Bashir at the same billabong on the McArthur estate.

Vengeful warriors spear and kill stock-keeper William Baker and his de facto wife Mary Sullivan on the property run by Elizabeth Marsden at Camden. Source: HRNSW Vol. V:496, 503; www.k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/files/hsie/back09b.pdf

Macquarie sends John Warby, John ‘Bush’ Jackson and four native guides to search for the Gundungurra men whom he holds responsible for the murders at Mulgoa. They fail to locate Goondel, Bitugally, Murrah, Yellaman, or Wallah. Source: Macquarie, Proclamation, 20 July, 1814, HRA Vol. 1X: 365. www.k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/files/hsie/back09b.pdf

Dual, ‘a native of Appin’, accompanies explorer Hamilton Hume on an expedition from Appin to bush country in the area of today’s Berrima and Bong Bong, New South Wales. Source: Rev. W. Ross of Goulburn, Preface to Hamilton Hume, A Brief Statement of Facts, 2nd edition, Yass, 1872:18; J. P. McGuane, Centenary of Campbelltown, handwritten account, 1920, Mitchell Library, Sydney. www.k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/files/hsie/back09b.pdf

James Ruse an ex-convict who arrived in NSW in 1787, is given several land grants including one at Bankstown (100 acres at Salt Pan Creek). In 1823 he sells this and his grants at Riverstone to the Reverend Samuel Marsden. The estates of Marsden and his son Charles are worked with convict and local Aboriginal labour.

Macquarie acknowledges the Indigenous names of several places while boating down the Nepean and Warragamba Rivers. He writes that ‘One of the Natives born near this part of the Country, and who made one of our Party on this day’s Excursion, tells us that the real and proper native name of this newly discovered River that we are now exploring is the Warragombie, by which name I have directed it to be called in future. Source: Macquarie, Journal, 29 November, 1811, MS A778, ML.

Governor Macquarie grants large tracts of land in the Camden district to farmers.

Appin. Surveyor George William Evans takes Young Bundle on the Lady Nelson to Jervis Bay. They walk to the Shoalhaven River and return north through the bush, crossing the entrance to Lake Illawarra and passing through Kangaroo Valley. The expedition ends on 15 April at William Broughton’s farm at Appin. Source: [George W Evans], 25 March – 13 April 1812, Journal of an exploration overland From Jervis Bay to Mr. Broughton’s … MS C709, FM3/482, ML

Some of the earliest sites to be lost to the Gandangara people are their clearings created by regular burning on the best soil. These become the earliest sites of dispossession. J. Smith, ‘Gundungurra Country’, PhD thesis, 2008, p. 474.

The explorer Hamilton Hume makes the first of a number of long exploratory trips southwards, in company with a young Aboriginal friend named Doual (Duall). www.cahs.com.au/massacre-at-appin-1816

It is reported that Aborigines from Jervis Bay have joined with the ‘mountain tribes’ (Gundungurra) and say they will kill the white settlers ‘when the moon shall be as large as the sun’ (ie full moon). Cogie (Kogie), the Murringong (Cow Pastures) chief stays on friendly terms with the settlers, fleeing to Broken Bay. He alleges that the mountain clans are cannibals. Source: Sydney Gazette 4 June 1814.

Aborigines attack settlers at Bringelly, Airds and Appin to avenge the murder of an Aboriginal woman and two children. Source: SG 14 June 1814.

In a General Order, Governor Macquarie regrets ‘the unhappy Conflicts’ between the ‘natives of the Mountains’ and settlers at Bringelly, Airds and Appin, allegedly caused by the Aborigines stealing maize. He promises to punish anyone involved in hostilities on either side. Sources: SG 18 June 1814; 7 July 1814.

Aborigines kill the wife of James Daly and two of her children in their hut at ‘Mulgowey’ (Mulgoa). Daly leaves his farm and the mountain clans retreat into the rough mountain country. Source: SG 23 July 1814.

John Warby and Cow Pastures trackers guide soldiers to the hideout of bushranger Patrick Collins, who has been robbing settlers in the Hawkesbury area. Cogy (Koggy) spears Collins in the leg when he tries to escape. ‘All the natives of the Cow Pastures came in a body to claim the reward,’ writes Surgeon Joseph Arnold. Source: Joseph Arnold, Journal, 1810-15, MS C720, 19 June - 13 July 1815, ML.

A militia formed of ex-soldiers fires on a large group of Gundungurra feasting on corn at Milehouse’s farm at Appin, 70 kilometres south-west of Sydney, killing a boy. The clansmen flee after they kill veteran trooper Isaac and cut off his hand, and kill a woman and two children at nearby Butcher’s farm. Source: SG 14 May 1814.

In time of drought Gandangara people move eastwards towards the rivers. This is seen to be threatening to some settlers. Sensing hostilities, Goggey moves his family onto a friendly property owned by Charles Throsby at Glenfield. Goodall and Cadzow, Rivers and Resistance, p. 52.

Violence erupts on the colony’s southwestern frontier near present day Appin. Aboriginal people are seen razing a maize field. Soldiers fire on them and a boy is killed. One of the soldiers is hit with a spear. A soldier revenge party for the killing of the soldier marches out and kills an Aboriginal woman and three children. In retaliation, William Baker, Elizabeth’s Carlton’s stock keeper and his wife Mary Sullivan, as well as the children of James Daley, are killed.

The hostile people of Jervis Bay are believed to be combining with the “Mountain Tribes” to mount a full attack on the settlers. Macquarie goes to talk with the Muringong people in Cowpastures. He tells them they must desist from all acts of violence. Karskens, The Colony, pp. 492-3.

Warby ‘and others’ are paid £40.5.0 (forty pounds and five shillings) for capturing the tribesman Collins. Source: Police Fund, 30th September 1814, Colonial Secretary, R 60381/ S2758:554, SRNSW.

30 or 40 Koori people descend upon the farm of G.T Palmer. 4 white men are killed and another speared. The next day another farm is attacked. A white man inside the hut recognises David Mudburree amongst the warriors. (Mudburree met Macquarie in 1810). They appeal to him and he calls back that he will not be killed this time. A week later the Gandangara and their allies strike again to the south of Camden. The settlers form a posse and Mudburree as a guide. The warriors have learnt that when they see the guns presented for firing, they should drop down to the ground, then get up and dance. While dropping and dancing they hurl spears and stones with great abundance upon the heads of the whites below. These strategies have become sophisticated and often effective. Many alliances are formed and sometimes warriors move in to protect the Appin farms from hostile attack. Karskens, The Colony, pp. 504-5.

As wider conflict breaks out, Cogie (Gogy) again takes refuge at Charles Throsby’s farm at Glenfield, near Liverpool, or goes fishing with his friend William Charles Wentworth, son of Surgeon D’Arcy Wentworth. Source: Charles Throsby to D’arcy Wentworth, 5 April 1816, MS A752: 183-6, Wentworth Papers, ML. www.k6.boardofstudies.nsw.edu.au/files/hsie/back09b.pdf

In retaliation to attacks upon farms, Macquarie sends out three detachments of the 46th Regiment to 'chasten these hostile tribes, and to inflict terrible and exemplary punishments on them...'. They head southwest towards the Cowpastures (Camden), from Liverpool to Airds and Appin, and to Windsor, Richmond, Kurrajong and the Grose River. Macquarie orders that any Aboriginal adults killed are to be ‘hanged up on trees in conspicuous situations, to strike the survivors with the greatest Terror.’ Source: Lachlan Macquarie, Governor’s Diary & Memorandum Book Commencing on and from Wednesday the 10th. Day of April 1816.— At Sydney, in N. S. Wales. Lachlan and Elizabeth Macquarie Archive, Macquarie University Library. Linked with permission.

Captain Wallis’s detachment marches 12 miles along the Wingecarribee River; Colebee, acting as guide, reports that the hostile Aborigines are two days ahead. Source: Wallis, Journal, 28 April 1816.

The main military party is based at Camden. The soldiers terrorise many Aboriginal people, shoot several and take half a dozen prisoners. They are unable to inflict Macquarie's 'terrible and exemplary punishments' until they come upon a camp at Appin one night. There they massacre 14 Tharawal and Gundungurra men, women and children, and take five surviving women and children prisoner. www.camdenhistory.org.au/chhistoryofcamden; www.cahs.com.au/massacre-at-appin-1816 (See videos by Glenda Chalker, Gavin Andrews, Frances Bodkin)

Several south-western Sydney Aborigines are descended from those caught up in Macquarie’s expedition.

Further repressive measures follow the Cataract River slaughter. Macquarie forbids armed Aborigines to appear within one mile of any settlement carrying warlike weapons including ‘Spears, Clubs, or Waddies’. No more than six Aborigines may ‘lurk or loiter’ near any farm and assemblies for ritual battles are ‘wholly abolished’. Source: Macquarie, Proclamation, SG 4 May 1816. He outlaws 10 Aboriginal men ‘well known to be the principal and most violent instigators of the Late Murders’. They are Murrah, Myles, Wallah (alias Warren), Carbone Jack (alias Kurringy), Narrang Jack, Bunduck, Kongate, Woottan, Rachel and Yallaman. A reward of £10 is offered for anyone bringing any of them in, dead or alive. Source: Macquarie to Bathurst, 1 April, 1817, HRA 1X: 362-4.

Each of the Aboriginal guides is given a ‘Complete Suit of Slops - Blanket, 4 Days Provisions, Half Pint of Spirits and Half Pound of Tobacco. Source: Macquarie, Journal, Tuesday, 7 May 1816, MS A773, ML.

The Gundangara elder William Russell writing in 1914, recalls “My grandfather was killed by the soldiers at Rosa Bay, through the efforts of a native who was head of the Camden Tribe helping [them] to track grandfather to his hiding place which was in a tree. However, my stepfather, I heard, got his revenge later by tomahawking the native some years later at South Creek.” Smith, p. 43.

Birth of Nanny (Annie) Murringong of the Cowpastures Clan. She is born at Camden Park, this information comes from St John’s Church, Camden. Murringong means many swamps.

Nanny Muringong is taken to the Parramatta Native Institution as a small child but later it is written on the records that she is ‘taken by her father’. Brook and Kohen 1991.