Deerubbin

The Hawkesbury River flows through the traditional lands of the Dharug (or Darug) people who call the river “Deerubbin”. The Dharug people occupied the western reaches of the river in a large area stretching from outside Parramatta to the foothills of the Blue Mountains. Their neighbours, the Guringai (Kuring-gai) people occupied Broken Bay and the mouth of the Hawkesbury River and the Darkinjung people occupied the area on the northern bank of the river between First Branch (near Wisemans Ferry) and Wilberforce.

The Dharug people are the largest language group of the 29 clans that lived in the Sydney area at that time of the arrival of the First Fleet and they relied on the river as a source of food; principally for fish, eels, water birds - and also yams, one of their staple foods. Governor Arthur Philip investigated the river in 1788 and in 1789 but, because he felt settlement in the area would overstretch the colony, he limited expansion to areas with good soil around Parramatta. However, Phillip did recognise the Hawkesbury’s rich farming land and its potential to provide food to the struggling colony in Sydney that was at that time in the grip of starvation [i]. In 1792, the first land grants were made near present-day Windsor to 22 settler families by Governor Philip’s successor, Lt-Governor Major Francis Grose. However, the impact of white settlement was probably felt much earlier in the region with the outbreak of smallpox.

Smallpox

A smallpox epidemic decimated the aboriginal population in the Sydney area and beyond shortly after the arrival of the First Fleet. In a letter to his father, Midshipman Newton Fowell of HMS Sirius noted that “every boat that went down the harbour found (aborigines) laying dead in the Beaches and in the Caverns of the Rocks, forsaken by the rest as soon as the Disease is discovered in them. They are generally found with the remains of a Small fire on each side of them and some water left within their reach”. Sadly, fleeing in this way helped to spread the disease to other aboriginal groups further afield. 

The source of the infection is still a widely debated topic but curiously, nobody on the First Fleet was known to have arrived in Sydney with smallpox and approximately 60 under-nourished young children in the colony, who had no prior exposure to the virus, were unaffected by the outbreak that decimated the aborigines. According to diarist Lt. Watkin Tench, medical staff on the First fleet carried bottled “variolous matter” for inoculation purposes but he regarded the idea that the epidemic arose from this cause as “a supposition so wild to be unworthy of consideration”.

Governor Phillip’s official orders from King George III were to live in amity and kindness with the native people of Australia and that any person harming them was to face the full impact of the law [ii]. By all accounts, Phillip and his officers took this injunction seriously and they also had a strong desire to learn from friendly connections with local aborigines. Phillip ordered that the aborigines should be well-treated and that anyone who killed or harmed them would be hanged. However, despite this, it remains at least possible that smallpox was released in Sydney in about April 1789, either accidentally or with deliberate intent.

It is widely accepted that between 50-70% of the aboriginal population in the Sydney area died within 2 years of the First Fleet’s arrival in mid-January 1788. Most affected by the smallpox virus were mature adults (which must have included many clan elders), pregnant woman and children under 5 years. Least affected were young people from 5-14 years. Woollarawarre Bennelong (1764-1813), who grew up on the southern shore of the Parramatta River, and who had himself survived smallpox, told Governor Phillip that half of the people from his home area had died from the disease. Smallpox was evident in the Hawkesbury River by April 1791 but may have been present earlier.

Indigenous resistance

While most of the raids and skirmishes by the native people were hit and run “guerrilla’ strikes, some were pitched battles. One such conflict was what became known as the Battle of Richmond Hill, on 7 June 1795, where about 50 aboriginal warriors led by Pemulwuy faced off against about 70 troops from the NSW Corps under Captain William Paterson.  Casualties on the British side were not recorded but 7 or 8 of Pemulwuy’s fighters were killed, several wounded and 6 were captured. After a guerilla campaign of about 12 years, Governor King declared Pemulwuy an outlaw in May 1801 and offered a reward for his death or capture. Pemulwuy was shot dead in June 1802 and his severed head was sent to London.

“Branch Jack” led a series of raids in the area of the Colo River from early 1805 that resulted in the deaths of a number of settlers and the burning of crops and buildings [iii]. Branch Jack was shot and killed in an attack on a local boat, Hawkesbury, it lay anchored off Mangrove Creek in September 1805.

At least in the early years, resistance to white settlement by the aborigines was often very effective and conflicts were more evenly matched than might be imagined. The aborigines were experts at concealment and melted into and out of the bush with ease. Their spears were accurate and lethal at close quarters. On the British side, the firearm of the time, the “Black Bess” flintlock musket, although a formidable weapon, could only be discharged effectively at a rate of about 3 or 4 shots a minute, even in experienced hands. Variations in humidity also made the flintlock musket notoriously unreliable. In September 1790 when Governor Phillip was wounded by a spear at Manly Cove, four marines fired their muskets to protect the Governor but only one of the four firearms discharged effectively. Notwithstanding this, aborigines in the Sydney area wisely gave troops and settlers holding a musket a wide berth.

Tactics used by the aboriginal raiding parties were often very effective also. With access to food sources such as fish and yams denied to them, the corn crops planted by the settlers made an ideal and necessary substitute. Raiding parties waited until the crop was ripe and them carried it off in well-coordinated raids in outlying areas where they often met little practical resistance.  The raided corn had the added advantage that it could be stored so there was less of a requirement for the aborigines to break off hostilities to hunt for food. The raiders often burned wheat crops and farm buildings, and killed livestock during the raids, which was an ongoing deterrent to settlement in the early years.

White settlement

Once the road from Sydney to Windsor was opened in 1794, settlement on the Hawkesbury was unstoppable and the area developed some of the features of a lawless frontier with killings on both sides occurring on a spiral of retribution. Some of the settlers were guilty of acts of kidnapping and murder [iv] and the Dharug fighters killed settlers on many isolated properties. In 1795, after killing the crew, they captured a boat in the river loaded with corn destined for Sydney. Lieutenant-Governor William Paterson sent a detachment of the NSW Corps to the Hawkesbury during 1795, which remained as a permanent garrison until 1800. Dharug attacks forced the British to abandon the lower reaches of the Hawkesbury River (downstream from Portland Head) during 1796. Settlers returned to this area in about 1805 but hostilities and frequent flooding in the river kept numbers of new settlers low.

Sarah Everingham (Richard Woodbury's wife), had personal experience of such a raid on her parent’s property at Portland Head (Sackville Reach) in May 1804 when she was only 11 years old. The incident was typical of the raids at the time and was reported in the Sydney Gazette of 3 June 1804. Matthew Everingham, his wife, Elizabeth, and their servant Larry Byrnes were all wounded during the raid. Their corn and food stores were carried off and their hut and storehouse burned to the ground.

Shortly after this incident, troopers were sent to the area and by Government proclamation, all settlers granted land in the area were directed to occupy their grants – to provide mutual protection. Tedbury, the son of Pemulwuy, led a series of raids in the Hawkesbury River between 1805–1808, however most hostilities ceased in the area in November 1809 when Dharug fighters were pardoned in exchange for a promise to cease further attacks. At that stage, disease and ongoing warfare had probably reduced numbers of indigenous fighters to a level that made further resistance unsustainable. Corn harvests in the Hawkesbury in 1809-1814 were not attacked although conflict continued further south on the Nepean River.

There is no record of any indigenous attacks on properties held by Richard and Sarah Woodbury. They lived in the town of Windsor near Richard’s brewing interests until 1813 and their first move to a river farm property was to the 80 acre property at Half Moon Reach near Leet’s Vale in 1814 – largely after hostilities in the river had ceased. However, while major coordinated attacks had stopped, sporadic attacks still occurred from time to time. As late as 1820, at the time of the Woodbury’s move to a more isolated property at Laughtondale, a neighbour, Thomas Dillon, was forced to flee with his eight children from persistent attacks (see Richard’s Story on this site).

Following Richard’s resignation as District Constable in January 1829, Richard and his family moved to Mangrove Creek, a remote tributary of the Hawkesbury, where contact with indigenous Australians must have been much more common. 

REFERENCE NOTES

[i] Starvation in the colony was not relieved until 29 June 1790 when the store-ship Justinian arrived bringing supplies from England. 

[ii] Orders to Governor Phillip, from George III R. 25 April 1787:  “You are to endeavour by every possible means to open an Intercourse with the natives and to conciliate their affection, enjoining all of Our Subjects to live in amity and kindness with them. And if any of Our Subjects shall wantonly destroy them, or give them any unnecessary Interruption in in the exercise of their several occupations. It is our pleasure that you do cause such offenders to be brought to punishment according to the degree of the offence”. 

[iii] On 10 April 1805, Branch Jack went to the farm of John Llewellyn in the Leets Vale area where he was invited by Llewellyn to share a meal in the field with him and his labourer. During the meal, Branch Jack jumped up and made off with Llewellyn’s musket and powder horn. He returned moments later with a party of warriors who attacked Llewellyn and the servant with tomahawks and spears. Llewellyn was killed and his servant’s body was thrown down the riverbank. On the same day, Thynne Adlam, on a neighbouring property, was attacked. The property was set on fire and Adlam was hacked to pieces. The remains of his severed limbs were found scattered in the ashes of his hut.

[iv] In September 1799, settlers at Green Hills (Windsor) tortured and murdered two aboriginal boys, Little Jemmy and Little George, who worked at Edward Powell’s farm. A third boy escaped by jumping into the river. This was said to be in retaliation for the death of Thomas Hodgkinson in the bush around Windsor. The settlers were brought to trial and found guilty but they were released while their case was referred to London. They were never sentenced.

Page created on 1 January 2017.