Trudy has kept us informed about this but it's valuable to have the
indigenous press account as well.
..................
Koori Mail, No.196 (10.3.1999):3
‘Genocide ‘ site returned to Tas Aborigines
Australia's oldest Aboriginal land claim has been settled with the
handover to Tasmanian Aborigines of an 1830s 'genocide' site on Flinders
Island.
"It's come to pass at last," Aunty Ida West, 79, one of Tasmania's most
prominent Aboriginal EIders, said after a ceremony at Wybalenna on the
foreshores of the Bass Strait island.
Tasmanian Premier Jim Bacon, who came to the island for the handover,
said the area had been ‘a site of genocide'.
"While we can't change history and what happened at Wybalenna, we can
attempt to redress past injustices," he said.
Wybalenna is regarded as one of the worst stains in indigenous history.
In the 1830s, in what was the virtual end of the so-called 'Tasmanian
land wars', Aborigines were rounded up and shipped to Wybalenna. From
1833-1847 about 250 people were sent to what amounted to a concentration
camp.
By 1847 when it was closed, only 44 people remained alive. Today,
Aboriginal people across Tasmania can trace their ancestry to people
buried at Wybalenna.
In 1845, the Wybalenna Aborigines petitioned Queen Victoria for the
land. Nothing came of it until now.
And even now, according to Flinders Island mayor Lynn Mason, there is
still opposition from a minority of Flinders Island's white population
to the handover. Mrs Mason hopes the site can become a national centre
for reconciliation.
Mr Bacon said he hoped the handover would end an issue that had divided
the community for more than 160 years.
In legislation to be brought into State Parliament, title will be
transferred to the Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania. The council in
turn will give day-to-day running to the Flinders Island Aboriginal
Association, which will set up a management committee including country
representatives.
The cemetery at Wybalenna is regarded as a place of ghosts. About 110
Aboriginal people were buried there in unmarked graves.
"It spooks me," Mrs Mason said.
"There's so much blood on the ground here, but there's hope as well."
Mrs West recalled coming as a child with her father for mutton birds and
at midnight a clock that didn't exist would strike and the dogs would
bark. It was the ghosts from a massacre, she said.
'This should lay the ghosts to rest," she said at the handover.
"I've been waiting a long, long time for this."
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Les & Dot Harsant
Goorngalang, 10-12 Nagoondie Lane, Healesville, Vic. 3777, Australia
Phone & Fax: +61 3 5962 5363.
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
We are Australians for Native Title & Aboriginal Self-Determination
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