Introduction

Mitchell Library, State Library of New Southward Wales (a9333001)

In 1788 British ships carrying some 1,500 people landed on the shores of Sydney Cove in Australia. That expedition, called the First Fleet, was the beginning of the British colonization of the continent. This occupation had a monumental impact on Ancient and Torres Strait Islander peoples, their lifestyle, and their native lands.

Before the arrival of the Outset Fleet, the Ethnic peoples were the only people to have lived in Australia. They belonged to hundreds of different nations or groups, each with its own language or dialect, laws, behavior, and customs. European contact brought a sudden and swift disruption to this traditional manner of life. Early on relations were typically friendly, and the British authorities instructed the colonists to respect Ethnic rights. Only as the colony spread inland from the coast, contest for land and resources bred conflict.

The consequences of colonization on Indigenous Australians were devastating. Virtually scholars take estimated that the Indigenous population before European settlement was betwixt 300,000 and 750,000 people . Between 1788 and 1900 their numbers were reduced by every bit much as 90 percent. This desperate decline was the consequence of several factors. Ane was the loss of their traditional territory, or Country, which had sustained Ethnic peoples for many thousands of years. Some other was exposure to new diseases brought past the colonists. However some other factor was violent conflict with the colonists. The Indigenous peoples who survived colonization saw their lives forever changed.

Cultural Disruption

Before Europeans arrived, Ancient and Torres Strait Islander peoples lived every bit hunter-gatherers. Each clan had it own Country, which it relied on for food, shelter, medicine, and tools. Indigenous people did non call back of land in terms of budgetary value, and they did not believe that they "endemic" the land. Instead, they felt a deep spiritual connection to their Country. Because of this close relationship, they took great care of the country and its resource. (See also Indigenous Australians and the environment.)

With no signs of land ownership, such every bit fences, crops, stock animals, or buildings, the Europeans who came to Australia believed the state was free to claim. They chosen it terra nullius, or country belonging to no one. The settlers cleared state for farming and to build towns forth the e coast. They fenced off the state, which restricted access to clean h2o, hunting grounds, and food supplies for Indigenous communities. As British settlement expanded to other parts of Commonwealth of australia, more Ethnic groups were forced off their traditional lands. Indigenous peoples struggled to survive, and a large number died from starvation and malnourishment.

Gwen Wilson, www.gwenwilson.com.au

The survivors suffered other kinds of trauma. Ethnic peoples saw many of their sacred sites destroyed by the colonists. Ethnic men and women were taken from their homes and forced to work for the colonists. The Australian cattle industry, for example, was congenital on the labor of Aboriginal men. Aboriginal women were forced into domestic work in settlers' homes. Both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were used to do the risky work of diving in the pearling industry. Pregnant Indigenous women were preferred as divers considering it was believed that they had a larger lung capacity. Another abuse faced by Indigenous women was rape.

Disease

The introduction of new diseases by the colonists had a devastating impact on Indigenous communities. The Europeans brought many diseases with them, including bronchitis, measles, crimson fever, craven pox, smallpox, and whooping cough. Whereas the Europeans had built upwardly a resistance to these diseases, the Indigenous population had never been exposed to them. The result was deadly for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Within weeks of exposure, the diseases spread quickly among Indigenous communities. It was reported that smallpox killed half of the Ancient people in the Sydney surface area within just over a year of the British inflow. In the Port Phillip (Melbourne) surface area, diseases acquired up to 60 percentage of Aboriginal deaths.

Conflict

Robert Ingpen, National Library of Australia, nla.obj-138210565

The first Europeans to land in Commonwealth of australia were Dutch sailors in the 1600s. In 1606 Dutch captain Willem Janszoon (also spelled Jansz) and his ship Duyfken sailed along the western coast of Cape York Peninsula in search of new trading areas. Captain Janszoon and his crew landed at a identify they named Cape Keerweer, which means "turn around" in Dutch. Some of his crew came across the Wik, the local Aboriginal people. According to Wik oral history, a fight broke out betwixt the Dutch sailors and the Wik, which resulted in deaths on both sides. This was the get-go known conflict between Europeans and Aboriginal peoples. As a outcome of the disharmonize and because at that place were few tradable items, the Europeans "turned effectually" and sailed back to Indonesia.

Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales (a128112)

The adjacent Europeans to make contact with Aboriginal peoples were the British settlers who arrived in the 1700s. Some of the Eora—the Aboriginal peoples of the Sydney surface area—welcomed the newcomers. The leader of the British colony, Arthur Phillip, directed the colonists to care for the Aboriginal peoples respectfully. Before coming to Commonwealth of australia, Phillip had been instructed by the British male monarch to open up communication with the local people.

The governor saw benefits in interacting with the Aboriginal peoples. He wanted the colonists to larn the local language and to teach English to some of the local people. With the ability to communicate, he hoped the colonists could persuade the Aboriginal people to take colonization peacefully. In improver, he wanted to learn nearly the area's natural resource. Knowledge of local plants could help the colony deal with food shortages.

Mitchell Library, Country Library of New Due south Wales

Governor Phillip put his plan in movement past ordering the capture of an Aboriginal man in Dec 1788. The man, named Arabanoo, was held as a prisoner, simply he became friendly with the colonists. In April 1789 Arabanoo was freed from his restraints and allowed to move freely around the settlement. He died but a month later on. In November 1789 the colonists captured 2 more Aboriginal men, Bennelong and Colebee. Colebee soon escaped, but Bennelong stayed and developed a friendship with Governor Phillip. He learned English and adopted some British community. In 1792 Bennelong even traveled with the governor to England, where he met Male monarch George Three.

As the colony expanded, friendly relations between settlers and the Aboriginal peoples gave manner to conflict. Angered past the invasion of their Country, Aboriginal people fought back. I of the primeval incidents of Aboriginal resistance happened in May 1788, when two Europeans were killed well-nigh Rushcutters Bay (at present a suburb of Sydney).

The commencement conflict to be called a war began on the frontier due west of Sydney in 1795. Settlers along the Hawkesbury and Nepean rivers had been especially cruel to the local Darug people. The Darug struck dorsum, and over the next 20 years the two groups fought in a series of conflicts known equally the Hawkesbury and Nepean Wars. An of import Aboriginal leader of this period was Pemulwuy, of the Bidjigal clan. He led many attacks on European cattle stations, killing livestock and burning crops and buildings. Pemulwuy was shot and killed past a settler in 1802.

The offset British settlement on the island of Tasmania, then chosen Van Diemen's Land, was established in 1803. The next year European soldiers fired on an Aboriginal hunting party, starting time a long menstruum of conflict known equally the Black War. As the settlers occupied hunting areas to enhance sheep and killed great numbers of kangaroos, the Aboriginal Tasmanians struggled to discover food. The settlers also harassed Tasmanian women and children, taking them confronting their volition. The Tasmanians, armed only with spears and clubs, could not match the firearms of the Europeans. Therefore they resorted to attacks on pocket-sized groups of settlers. During the 1820s the fights became especially intense. The Blackness State of war continued until 1830. Information technology claimed the lives of more than than 200 Europeans and 600 Ancient people—virtually the entire Ancient population of the isle.

George Hamilton, State Library of New South Wales, Mitchell Library, Five/89

Some of the incidents betwixt European settlers and Indigenous peoples are more properly called massacres instead of battles. One such event occurred at Myall Creek in New S Wales. On June x, 1838, a group of heavily armed European settlers rounded upward and shot 28 Aboriginal men, women, and children near Myall Creek Station. Information technology is believed that the settlers were seeking revenge for the theft of cattle. Hundreds of attacks similar to this one occurred during Australia'due south settlement. The Myall Creek Massacre is particularly significant, however, because information technology was the first time that Europeans were tried and hanged for killing Indigenous people. Still, the threat of punishment did not stop the massacres, which continued well into the 20th century. In afterward incidents, settlers took greater care to destroy evidence of the killings.

More than than a century of frontier violence took the lives of an estimated ii,000 European settlers, but Indigenous Australians paid a far greater toll. Between the 1790s and the 1930s, battles and massacres killed an estimated 20,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.