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Elders paving the way to reconciliation at Myall Creek

By Emma Gibbs

11 June 2004 - Reconciliation will be the main objective of the annual memorial service for those who died in the Myall Creek massacre.

The Saturday service will allow all that attend to remember the unprovoked murder of 28 Wirrayaraay Aboriginal women, children and old men by stockmen in 1938.

Foundation member of the Myall Creek memorial committee Ted Stubbins said the service would be very important to the healing process for both indigenous and non-indigenous.

"In Australia we have to acknowledge the fact that the Aboriginal people were here first and their land was taken from them,” Mr Stubbins said.

"They suffered terribly and the effects of that are still being felt today.

"It's important to realise they were treated very badly in those times.

"These stories of their treatment have been passed down, but most of us white people haven't known about it until recently.

"We have to acknowledge the truth of the past so we can then move forward as an Australian people.”

The service will start at Myall Creek Hall, and attendants will walk to the sight.

Guests will walk along the winding track and read plaques of the story of the massacre. Guest speaker for the occasion will be Senator Aden Ridgeway.

Mr Stubbins said the story of the massacre was unique to Australian history because it was the first time in Australia where a settler was tried and judged for crimes against an Aboriginal person.

"There were two trials,” Mr Stubbins said.

"For the first trial there were 10 men charged and all were acquitted.

"Seven men were tried again and they were all condemned and executed.

"It was one of the few times when these atrocities against Aboriginal people were brought to trial.”

Source: Inverell Times

related links :

• The Myall Creek massacre
  "If by one decisive step the Aborigines are shown their own weakness, and convinced that it is useless for them to contend with Europeans, they will submit and cease their outrages, and much bloodshed may be spared. Unless prompt measures are adopted, these dusky 'lords of the soil' will fairly drive the pale faces from their territories."
  Myall Creek Memorial
• Frontier: Stories From White Australia's Forgotten War
• The Forgotten War
  This website aims to give an overview of the warfare and resistance in during the invasion/settlement of New South Wales, Australia, from 1788 to the1850's. This is a war which has been covered up, barely recorded and conveniently forgotten by white Australia.
• History of Aboriginal Resistance
  "Most white people seem to imagine that the native inhabitants of Australia melted away magically before the tide of European settlement like fairy floss, but the hard reality is that we killed them."
• Genocide in Australia
  Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies

Further information: history issues page - includes news index and external links

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