CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Harass Them if They Cannot Be Taken

1830, October–November

East Coast

Interception

Walpole’s skirmishing party left the stationary line on Sunday 24 October just as the Colonel Commanding had ordered.¹ Arthur had given up any pretence that Sundays were for rest. On what he described as ‘the extreme left of Lieut Aubin’s division’, Walpole’s party made their way toward the coast, as far as the Sandpit River. There Walpole temporarily based the party at Captain Glover’s hut. This was about halfway between the line and the small neck of land that connected the two peninsulas to the mainland. On the other side of this neck was the Forestier Peninsula, then the Tasman Peninsula after another small neck of land. Through local intelligence Walpole learned that some Aboriginal people were further south, near Bream Creek, but were heading in a northwesterly direction – away from the peninsula and back towards the line. He decided to try to intercept them.

‘I stationed half my party at Capt Glovers Hut’, Walpole later explained, ‘where the Natives are in the habit of appearing, and with the remainder, went on the tiers to reconnoitre’. After travelling for about 5 miles Walpole’s party ‘heard the Natives hunting’ in the early afternoon. Creeping closer, the party soon saw their target. They watched the Aboriginal group for a few hours and waited till they had made camp for the night. Walpole then got the rest of his men from Glover’s. During the night the team returned to the campsite and advanced to ‘within 300 yards’ of the Aboriginal huts.

At dawn Walpole ‘crept to one of the Natives without being perceived’. He grabbed the sleeping figure by the leg, who immediately gave alarm. Four more men, Walpole said, ‘rushed out through the bark while some of my party were stooping to catch them. One of these was caught while jumping into the Creek and two others shot.’ As Walpole explained later, there were other escapees from this raid:

There were five other huts across the Creek in the centre of a very thick scrub. I had fully intended to attack the main body but I found it impossible to get near enough with[out] being heard. The hut with the 5 Men appeared to have been a look out, it being in a clear spot about two yards from the creek and scrub. The Natives in the other huts fled on hearing the shots and left most of their plunder and property the greater part of which I destroyed.

In addition to the mostly colonial items that Walpole listed were ‘30 Spears’.

A few days later a correspondent penned an account of the raid for the Hobart Town Courier which offered some details not included in Walpole’s own account to the Lieutenant Governor.² In this version, Walpole’s captive ‘tried to make his escape by twisting his legs and biting:

[He] would have succeeded had Mr. Walpole not drawn a small dagger from his belt and inflicted a slight wound, which so frightened him that he was secured. The other taken, was a boy of about 15 years of age, and appears to be the son of a chief from the ornaments upon his body, cut with flints or some sharp instrument into the skin. … The boy, when taken, wished them to let him go, as he said there were ‘plenty more black fellows in the scrub,’ pointing to it.

The differing versions again highlight that events could be told in different ways for different audiences. As with many conflicts, the affray reveals the limitations of descriptive documentation in wartime, which is generally written after the fact and not always for the public record. Walpole’s encounter was relatively unusual in this regard for being a subject of public notice. While Walpole was later remembered for ‘only’ having caught two people, at the time the information was most likely taken as an early signal to future accomplishments. The line had closed, attempted escapes had been thwarted, and the first skirmishers were having some success.

Skirmishing Auxiliaries and a New Insurgency

But there was more to the story. Returning towards Camp Sorell with his captives, Walpole ‘met a civilized Black Boy in Kirby’s party’. Kirby’s skirmishing party had been sent out at the same time as Walpole’s. Unlike the main line with its daily reports to headquarters, these skirmishing parties mostly engaged in remarkably ill-documented activities in front of the static line. This unnamed ‘Boy’ enabled Walpole to extract useful intelligence about the movements of the escapees, which he passed on to headquarters:

their number consists now of Twenty six Men, Nine Women and six lads and children … their intended course was through Prossers Plains to the Lake, but the name of which I am not able to inform Your Excellency.

But while this intelligence was tactically useful, it is probably Walpole’s passing mention of Kirby that is of most historical significance, for it highlights an element of Arthur’s campaign almost entirely forgotten – the deployment of Aboriginal people with colonial forces. Although claiming he personally ‘never saw a Black all the time he was out’, William Coventry also asserted that ‘they had a Black who was forced to help them’.³ And, among the lists of parties, there was at least one ‘Black Jack’.⁴ He was the only ‘free’ man attached to a party of prisoners from the Richmond police district led by one ‘G. Robinson’, almost certainly George Robinson, the son of George Augustus Robinson.⁵

In fact, only a few days before these skirmishers were deployed, Arthur arranged for Eumarrah to join the campaign.⁶ As it turned out, the ‘Boy’ attached to Kirby’s skirmishers enabled Walpole to better interrogate his captives, thereby learning that Eumarrah’s tribe was among their enemies:

they belong to the Oyster Bay and Big River tribes which are united … they have been at Pittwater and speared as well as stealing knives and Blankets … five of the tribe have been shot by White Men … they have fought the Stony Creek tribe and killed a great number.

These passing remarks again point to the complex political realities within and between the tribes, and hint at the possibility that Arthur was knowingly utilising intertribal enmities to prosecute the war. The more captives the colony held, the better its leaders understood these animosities. Early in the campaign, Arthur had recorded that his goal was to target specific tribes, in part to stave off political developments among his enemies:

I determined not to employ any Force to the North East until a great effort had been made to capture the Oyster Bay and Big River Tribes w[hic]h are by far the worst & have evidently endeavoured to excite the other Tribes to cooperate with them.⁷

This unusual explanation was part of a longer letter, ordering the settler James Cox to call back a party led by his son, which he had sent eastwards on his own initiative. Arthur was worried such a mission could compromise his broader strategy. Cox’s son’s party had arrived at St Patricks Head in mid-October, while the line was still moving.⁸ Cox’s idea was that they could range northwards instead of joining the southward-moving divisions.

Arthur explained to Cox that his plan for those tribes beyond the area of the line was to try negotiation before force, which was by then being deployed in the main settled districts. Referring to the mission of the Aboriginal women sent out from Batman’s farm and the extended peregrinations of George Augustus Robinson, who was now focusing on the far northeast, Arthur explained:

By the time the movements against these Tribes to the Southward had taken place the period would have fully expired during which the women had engaged to bring in their mob & Mr Robinson would have had a reasonable period allowed him for negotiating, & failing in the attempt then my arrangements were made for proceeding with the whole force & occupying the Position from George Town to Ben Lomond & from there to St Patricks Head, preparatory to advancing towards Cape Portland, for altho’ one or two parties may fall in with the Tribes & destroy some of them nothing, we know from experience, but a very large force is capable of capturing them w[hic]h is the object every one must have most at heart.

While stating that his plan was technically to remove Aboriginal people by capture rather than destruction, Arthur’s explanation also made it plain that he was prepared to order another line to clear the northeast of the island after the southeast was clear. By this point his objective was clearly to extirpate the tribes from the entire colony, one region after the other.

Unfortunately for Arthur, Cox’s retrieval party got co-opted into serving the colony en route.⁹ But this brought good news for Arthur, because the retrieval party ‘were on their calling at Mr Batmans Farm detained by Capt Grey to assist taking care of some Natives who had surrendered themselves’. The women sent out from Batman’s farm on a second excursion had met with success. Reporting the news only a few days before Walpole’s raid, the Hobart Town Courier captured details of intertribal warfare when describing the women’s return to Batman’s farm:

bringing with them 9 men, the whole that now remain of their once numerous tribe excepting one man, who was in so bad health as to be unable to accompany them. They however returned with some men dispatched by Mr. Gray, then at Mr. Batman’s, who found the man lying sick by the fire, and carried him home, where proper attendance it is hoped will restore him to health. None of these poor people shew any inclination to return to the bush, at least at present, though closely watched. They state, that their tribe has suffered much of late from the cruel and hostile attacks of the Oyster bay tribe, led on by their sanguinary chief Neumarrah, who has succeeded in reducing them to the present small number, with the exception of Eumara, who has for some time been domesticated at the Aboriginal establishment formerly at Brune island, but latterly on the New town road.¹⁰

Apparently once they learned of Arthur’s campaign, they welcomed ‘the idea of a stop being put to the attacks of their enemy’. The report suggested that it was this intelligence that encouraged Arthur to send for Eumarrah ‘who has readily joined the levy and is now assisting the parties in their movements.’ The newspaper then went on to inform the public that Robinson ‘with his domesticated Blacks is now exploring the region round George-town and Cape Portland with the same conciliatory views’. It was classic division and conquest.

The captivity and cooperation of some Aboriginal people even seemed to herald a broad colonial success. During that phase of the General Movement when it had little news from the front to report, the Hobart Town Courier gave a long description of ‘Peletega, the chief lately apprehended at the Shannon’, whose chained journey to Hobart had caused such controversy.¹¹ Peletega, confined in the Hobart Gaol, supposedly ‘displays the most perfect good humour and cheerfulness’:

for a small reward of sugar or other desirable food [he] will sing and dance to entertain the donor. He has a method of clapping the palms of his hands and soles of his feet simultaneously on the ground, and immediately making his frame rebound in a perpendicular position 4 or 5 feet in the air, and then dancing and singing round and round in a rotary motion.

The report continued by giving two examples of Peletega’s spear-throwing abilities, one of which was undertaken with ‘an old broom stick’.

But the colonial command of its captives was not entirely secure. All seemed well when Batman was detached from the line to head home and oversee the Aboriginal people at his farm. They initially ‘seemed quite at home, enjoying every comfort’, but quietly left the property in the early hours of 24 October.¹² The departing group comprised ‘eleven stout men, three women, and one child’. Naturally the story caused some alarm, especially because they reportedly took ‘about twenty knives and tomahawks’, and some ‘had learned the use of a musket, and as might be expected from the keen unerring eye of these savages, were excellent shots’. Almost more worrying, this group now included ‘the lad Mungo who has so long been domesticated with Mr. Batman, and was in a great measure inured to civilized habits’. Mungo-Jack apparently discarded his shoes as he left.

The departure of Mungo-Jack was a particular setback for the colonists, as it seemed to mark the beginning of a counter-insurgency campaign in the northeast of the island just as it was ostensibly becoming a target for diplomatic efforts. By early November there were reports reaching Hobart of repeat attacks on farms, including attempts by the attackers to take firearms.¹³ One correspondent claimed that ‘guns appear to be the chief objects of their visits’.¹⁴ Another settler wrote of a roving party catching up with these people, which potentially included Mungo-Jack, at Talbot’s farm.¹⁵‘They commenced by spearing one of the party through the thigh,’ the settler reported, ‘but he fired at the moment and shot his assailant dead.’ The wounded rover was sent to Campbell Town; apparently ‘the spear was half through his thigh and remained fast in it’. Another report had the fellow differently wounded, but also reported another Aboriginal man being shot dead further afield while fleeing. Back on the farm, the man’s corpse was left be. ‘The dead Black was left as a decoy to his friends, who saw him fall, and as no doubt they will return for the body it is hoped they may be captured.’

Holding the Line

Meanwhile, the static line still occupied most of Arthur’s attention. During the late morning of 27 October, according to one correspondent, ‘a party of 6 men made their appearance on a rocky hill occupied by part of the Richmond force’ and speared a sentry just as he was putting a log of wood on his fire.¹⁶ As he turned and threw the log at his attacker, another spear struck him from a different angle. While he quickly raised the alarm, the attackers escaped into the area in front of the line. ‘Several small parties were immediately formed and sent in pursuit,’ while the wounded man was conveyed to hospital where the spears were removed.

About this time Emmett also had a close encounter. ‘During the detention of the Line,’ he recalled, ‘one day, I heard dogs barking in front of my position, which I thought very unusual.’ He took three men with him to investigate. As he ‘started up a very pretty grassy valley’, into the area in front of the line, he encountered evidence of the skirmishing:

I saw almost immediately on the top of a hill a man who coo=ed [sic] that the blacks had run up the valley 12 in number and threw a spear at him, which actually struck his cap, knocking it off his head and pinning it to the ground. This man was one of Mr Walpoles, who had been sent down to the Line with a message. On proceeding a little further I came upon the Natives Camp, it seems that they had only just come evidently to watch an opportunity of escape. My appearance had started them off suddenly[,] evidenced, by my finding a fresh kangaroo on a small fire not skinned.

Emmett followed their tracks as best he could, finding a waddy and a puppy abandoned in their flight, before returning to the line. He thought he might have caught them if allowed to pursue them properly – perhaps a reflection of the way this event was later remembered, because he also mentioned an account of it recorded in Bonwick’s 1870 history.¹⁷ Emmett concluded his story of a close encounter by noting that ‘Colonel Arthur & Judge Montagu visited me the next day, and inspected the trophies secured.’

Emmett then described the inaction of the daily line routine. He quipped that the task of gathering sufficient firewood for the night fires meant his party ‘must have cleared ten acres of land for some ones benefit, for which we got no reward’. But soon enough his routine changed. The early skirmishing probes and repulsions along the line had proved encouraging. Arthur firmly believed the line was working. Moreover, the arrival of the reserve line under Donaldson meant that Arthur could soon advance with greater force, and Emmett was quick to volunteer. So too did Lawrence when he arrived with the reserves.

After marching to Bothwell, Lawrence and his fellow reserves were ‘drawn up and ordered to march on the road to Richmond’. Apparently this proved a disorderly advance, and there was ‘a great deal of squabbling among the men’ over the speed they should walk. Because they were using the colonial roads, they now had access to various inns, and within a few days Lawrence was recording the result: ‘Many of the people nearly drunk’. Soon, however, they were dining at Richmond, which Lawrence described as ‘one of the prettiest and most english-like [sic] settlements’. But it was also a staging ground. Other reserve forces from Launceston and Norfolk Plains arrived, and all marshalled together to ‘march in for the Governors camp in good order’. Lawrence was surprised by the good behaviour of the men, pleased when Arthur reviewed the volunteers, and soon took up his position on the line. Like Emmett, Lawrence also reported a close encounter on 3 November:

In the course of the morning the cry of Look out came down the line, preceeded [sic] by several shots – We were all immediately on the alert. Capt Donaldson sent me with two soldiers to ascertain the source of the firing … It proved to be a Mr Glover and a constable, who had fallen in with a single native, at whom they fired several times without effect. He ran away and left his blanket. It is supposed he had been sent by the tribe to which he belonged to examine the strength of our part of the line.

The line was holding, but it was being probed for weak spots.

Skirmishing Out Front

Anticipating the arrival of Donaldson’s reserves, Arthur had spent the final days of October planning to advance the line. He ordered a change in the maintenance of the static line, requesting that five-man patrols should ‘continually during the day move along the front of their respective Corps at a distance of one mile from the Line’.¹⁸ These were to ‘make as much shew & noise as possible, & will leave a few fires at night to induce the Natives to believe that this advanced ground is also occupied’. By this Arthur hoped to give the impression that the line was impassable. The sentries were now posted between the ‘double line of fires’ instead of quietly out in front.

Arthur also changed the rationing arrangements to better reflect the circumstances. He inspected the lines personally, and commented approvingly of the cleared ground and various obstacles constructed along its length, but also pointed out that the line could be modified to better cover ground in some situations. He instructed the colonial surveyors to examine parts of the line and authorised partial advances if needed ‘so as to make the most of every man in the Force’.

Douglas’s daily reports reflect this focus on force maintenance.¹⁹ He repeatedly claimed there was ‘nothing extraordinary’ to report to the Colonel Commanding in the first few days of November. He mainly dealt with a range of rationing matters – including noting the skirmishers who returned to the lines for rations and reports – and reported the situations of certain divisions or parties, including mentioning some deserters. After weeks of campaigning, some of the volunteers and conscripts were skulking away.

Various accounting documents survive from this period, in part because Arthur wanted to better understand the strength of the force at his disposal. From one of these reports of the size and composition of parties, which is undated but certainly made after the arrival of the reserves to the main line, it is possible to see that Donaldson’s force comprised 307 men – including 80 soldiers. Moreover, it detailed that the party led by Lawrence consisted of 14 other men, needed seven pairs of shoes, had 47 rounds of ammunition, and wanted an additional 60 rounds.²⁰ This was just a small part of the needs of Donaldson’s whole division, which required 899 rounds of ammunition and 180 shoes. But while this force did need material resupply, and was experiencing some issues with morale, it allowed Arthur to contemplate a final drive towards the neck.

With the arrival of the reserves Arthur was able to increase the numbers of skirmishing parties.²¹ Arthur relieved some of the civil division leaders from their command, replaced them with soldiers, and put them on duties out front. This included Robertson, who Arthur delicately asked for his ‘services as Leader of one of the scouring parties’. Arthur also made sure these parties had expert support, ordering ‘Peter Scott to proceed to the Oatlands Division & attach himself to one of the scouring parties to whom he will act as Guide – Peter Scott will take his horse & deliver it over to Lt Pedder for his use’. This remarkable instruction reveals the way that Arthur had clearly ensured that some of the rangers had been given mounted duties during the main drive. But it also pointed to the ways in which Arthur was trying to put his most experienced men out front.

Arthur instructed Douglas to form ‘22 parties of seven men each’, whose leaders he named. They were to be placed ‘50 paces in front of the Line’, and Arthur even provided a diagram of where the parties were to be placed in relation to the main line. Among the chosen leaders were Walpole, Batman, Fortosa and Robertson. ‘It is to be understood,’ Arthur affirmed after stipulating the terms of composition and provision, ‘that every man of these scouring parties is to be armed.’

Arthur gave a similar instruction to Wentworth, requesting him to form 15 similar parties for the line’s right wing. Among the leaders was Emmett, who was posted near the centre of the whole line. Emmett had volunteered for the role. He was up for ‘any thing to get away from the line’, he recalled. Arthur’s plan was that at noon on Monday 1 November, once Donaldson’s forces had plugged the line, all of the scouring parties would ‘advance towards the S.E. driving the Natives in the direction or capturing them’. On the fourth day he expected them to be at East Bay Neck, thereby sealing the peninsulas. The main line was kept in place, and Arthur warned the linesmen to be on their strictest guard because ‘the Tribes will naturally redouble their attempts’ at escape. Once Donaldson’s force was in place Arthur wanted an immediate report on ‘the quantity of Ammunition’ carried by each party.²² Arthur also ordered a further ‘2000 Rounds of Ball Cartridges’ be sent from Hobart to the line.²³

Donaldson’s force was a day late, but at noon on 2 November the scouring commenced. Arthur was cautiously confident, writing that ‘it ought to be successful; but these miserable Savages are not readily dislodged from the Tiers & Gullies where they secret themselves in a way that is quite extraordinary’.²⁴

These operations were poorly recorded. ‘That several of the Natives have already been killed’, the Colonial Times claimed a few days into the movement, ‘there is no doubt’.²⁵ But this was a mix of rumour and supposition, mainly intended to introduce the punchline that ‘many, like our negligent Correspondent, G. A. WIDLIKINS, [were] most monstrously frightened’. Surviving documentation does not do a great deal to illuminate the movements, although it highlights the methodical nature of the intended advance. Among Assistant Surveyor Scott’s papers is a sketch of the intended lines of daily movements, reportedly drawn by his colleague and superior, Surveyor General Frankland.²⁶ Emmett too highlighted the role of the survey department in planning the manoeuvres of these skirmishers. ‘Mr Surveyor Sharland visited the parties,’ he recalled, ‘and instructed me in my course.’

Emmett also recalled that he ‘had an interview with his Excellency and no doubt he spoke to all the Leaders of the advanced guard’ as Emmett later styled his mission.

He told me to proceed quietly, not to hurry, but to be very careful & watch for the Natives, not a shot was fired or word spoke and we proceeded in as extended a line as possible just in sight of each other.

But again the weather was against the colonists, as Emmett related:

After starting about 24 hours it came on to blow rain a regular downpour for 48 hours, we were there on the top of very high land, and considered it useless to travel in such weather and from His Excellencys [sic] instructions not to hurry, we remained encamped, looked to our fires, arms &c. On the sixth morning we again started, when one of my men suddenly dropped from fatigue which caused a slight detention, until he revived somewhat. I was directed to examine on my journey down to the Neck, the numerous little projections of land in case the natives might have gone into any of them which greatly retarded the travelling of my party.

Eventually his party arrived at the neck without having spotted any Aboriginal people.

Others had closer encounters. George Lloyd, who had been one of those tasked with keeping the guidance bonfires burning during the drive, subsequently went ahead of the line during this skirmishing sweep. Lloyd did not form part of the skirmishing line as such. Like several other parties – including Kirby’s – Lloyd’s men were instead deployed on a variety of roving duties, some behind the line, others out front.²⁷ Lloyd narrated his experiences in a book detailing his time in the colonies, and from his own account ‘was instructed to fit out eight of my best men as a roving party, and to scour the country between the advancing cordon and Tasman’s Peninsula’.²⁸ With some flair and a bit of literary licence he described heading off ‘into the wildest and most unfrequented country, famed and dreaded as the favourite haunt of the formidable Oyster Bay tribe of savages, known as Bream Creek’ – the area of Walpole’s raid.

Aware of his parallel with Walpole – whose encounter he mentioned – and a by-then established narrative of the campaign, Lloyd described a close encounter during this roving expedition when ‘Mr. Tyro, my sagacious Newfoundland dog’ alerted the party to nearby Aboriginal people. Carefully searching the area, Lloyd claimed that ‘I caught sight of a sleek savage, partly enveloped in a new blanket’. But as the party advanced, one of his companions precipitously fired his gun, causing the man to flee. He outran his pursuers – including the dog – with almost implausible ease.

Concluding this recollection, Lloyd described the situation at East Bay Neck:

Party after party arrived, all eagerly asking the question: ‘Have the natives passed over the Neck?’ Each inquiry, however, was met with a jeering negative; nor had a single black been seen – with the exception of the two captured by Mr. Walpole.²⁹

He then went on to give an account of he and Walpole throwing spears for fun, whereby Walpole was injured in his knee.³⁰ Like Emmett’s, Lloyd’s remembrance of the event focused on parties reaching the neck without having captured anybody or even seeing them pass the commissariat ration station located in that vicinity.

Arthur visited East Bay Neck to see how these operations went.³¹ Upon returning to Camp Sorell he set about addressing the security of some parts of the line. The poor weather, difficult duties, often inadequate rations and failing footwear were all affecting the vigilance and enthusiasm of the linesmen.

Ammunition was also running low, and some of the guns were in a poor state. ‘Except the roving parties,’ Jorgenson informed Arthur, ‘the men in the Oatlands line have only about one ball cartridge each.’³² The damp weather was also affecting the musketry. Jorgenson noted ‘that few pieces would even so far strike a light as to kindle a fire, and few would go off’.³³ He went on to comment that ‘the Sentries throughout the lines are not sufficiently vigilant’. He commented on one part being ‘most unguarded’ near the centre, and by suggesting the use of stone bases for fires on damp ground indicates that the linesmen may have been having trouble maintaining their fires during the wet nights. This was most worrying for Arthur, because as Jorgenson related, ‘the Natives have made their appearance five miles up from here’. Jorgenson subsequently referred to ‘firing in the lower part of the line’ on Saturday 6 November because of ‘a Knowledge the Natives were in front’.³⁴ He thought it was probably the tribe which he understood was ‘pursued by Sergeant Kirby’. As Douglas reported to Arthur, ‘Kirby’s independent roving party’ had been sent that day to investigate a reported sighting of ‘six or seven’ Aboriginal men.³⁵

Jorgenson also explained that ‘great numbers of Native Dogs have been seen and heard in front of the line’.³⁶ This was widely assumed to indicate the proximity of Aboriginal people, who were believed to be approaching the line rather than East Bay Neck. ‘None could be caught,’ Jorgenson explained, ‘till Andrew Colbert and Black George went to them, and a fine bitch and its mother came to him, seeing he was a black man’. The captive dogs proved a source of some intelligence in a roundabout way:

One of the Bitches had a string round her neck, and was so exhausted that she fell down before the fire in a state of excessive weakness, a clear indication that the Natives are driving away, and getting rid of their dogs, that they may not with their noise betray them should they succeed in getting through the line.

Furthering Jorgenson’s impression that Aboriginal people were close, getting desperate, and attempting to break out, he mentioned how a few nights earlier ‘the Natives passed along the Tier in front of Mr Pedders with fire sticks in their hands’.

Arthur got other reports that confirmed the skirmishing parties had failed to drive Aboriginal people over the East Bay Neck. On 8 November Arthur learned ‘that a large Tribe of Natives were in the scrub w[hic]h extends from the Tiers before the Cherry Tree opening’.³⁷ He directed that ‘the roving Parties w[hic]h have come in’ should go and investigate, and instructed Donaldson and Wentworth to detach a further ‘50 or 60 Men & form them into parties to aid in the examination of this extensive scrub’. He also ordered Aubin to ‘keep a particularly good look out’ at the Three Thumbs Hills, where Aboriginal people would likely flee if flushed out of the scrub, and ‘continue to harass them if they cannot be taken’. Arthur may have still hoped to capture Aboriginal people, but he was also fully prepared to engage them.

Arthur was also receiving fresh volunteers and conscripts, even while struggling with morale and provisions on the line. One person to arrive about this time was John Danvers, who Anstey had sent from Oatlands.³⁸ Knowing the ranger’s experience, Jorgenson thought Arthur would wish Danvers ‘be engaged in some special Service of more profit than being placed in the Line’, and suggested one of the roving parties that currently lacked a guide. But Jorgenson also informed Arthur that ‘the Oatlands bands were distressed for certain stores’, and this was part of a broader phenomenon that seems to have motivated Arthur to make another push. Referring to the impatience of men ‘to return to their Homes’, Arthur recognised it was ‘impossible to continue much longer to hold the present position’.³⁹ It was time for one last push.

Further Drives and Problems at the Rear

The advance was scheduled for Sunday 14 November, which Arthur hoped would provide sufficient time for the ground to be prepared. He wanted surveyors to map out the whole operation, trees marked in advance to help guide the parties, and bush cleared to create lines in predetermined daily positions. He even ordered a bugle for one of the divisions. The roving parties were placed under the command of Captain Moriarty and given dedicated lines of movements.⁴⁰ The main divisions would then similarly follow. It was close to the grand movement in microcosm, intending to methodically sweep Aboriginal people towards and then through the Neck.

On the day of the advance Douglas informed Arthur ‘that uninterrupted tranquillity continues to prevail’ along the line.⁴¹ Reports continued to come in affirming that Aboriginal people were still before the line. One such report, sent to Douglas the day beforehand, referred to discoveries made by ‘the party under the orders of Mr Lloyd’ while returning to the main line from the Neck.⁴² While it did not make it into his own book, Lloyd’s party had ‘traced the Natives in four different places moving in the direction of the three thumbs’. Apparently near one of the local farmhouses Lloyd’s party ‘found parts of Blankets, shirts, some waddies and three different Huts’.

As the line began moving the documentation slowed, but the operational plans survive, as do some of Douglas’s daily briefings to Arthur. Two days in, Douglas again noted ‘the same tranquillity’ and ‘there is nothing extraordinary to report’.⁴³ In a terse style he affirmed various divisions ‘had completed the movement … moving slowly … agreeable to orders’, with only a minor exception.

Arthur did not keep the new line in position for long. He planned another series of manoeuvres from Wednesday 17 November, with the divisions moving in a series of alternating lines, supported by roving parties, maintaining the advance.⁴⁴

Unfortunately for Arthur, Eumarrah absconded during these movements, which was a cause of some concern. As one correspondent put it:

Nu Marrah the black chief, who has been so long under tuition and on such friendly terms, was attached to Mr. Robertson’s party in search of the blacks, has thought proper to decamp. This is bad; as the fellow knows the whole of our plan and operations. Mr. Massey has the young boy (taken the other day), with him for the same purpose.⁴⁵

While the young captive was still in the field, the older of those taken by Walpole had been sent ‘to Hobarton jail’ at Arthur’s insistence.⁴⁶ Surveyor General Frankland relayed this message to the relevant officer, noting that ‘His Excellency entirely disapproves of the manner in which the elder Native, captured by Mr Walpole, has been suffered to walk about, unshackled, and behind the Constable who was supposed to be guarding him.’

By now there were numerous reports of Aboriginal people behind the line, but continued sightings in front of the advancing forces encouraged Arthur to continue the push. On Thursday 18 November, a farmer’s son near Bream Creek claimed to have seen ‘a black with his hair covered with red ochre, peeping at him from behind a tree, and … 6 or 7 more creeping among the bushes’.⁴⁷ Apparently Arthur was near enough to join a roving investigation:

His Excellency, as soon as the intelligence reached him, proceeded to the spot with some parties, led by the black boy lately taken by Mr. Walpole, who on arriving near the spot speedily pointed out the tracts [sic], which he followed up like a dog on the scent. He led the party 3 miles in this manner towards Bream Creek, when night coming on obliged them to desist.⁴⁸

Referring to this in an official report to London, which he wrote on Saturday 20 November, Arthur mentioned that these people ‘were traced with great facility by one of the two blacks who had been recently captured’.⁴⁹ He did not mention that during this searching the parties reportedly found the body of an Aboriginal man who had been killed by having a pitchfork thrust into his chest on a prior confrontation at that farm. In fact, this official account of the campaign and the manoeuvres was surprisingly terse, written while ‘in full hopes of success’ while the forces were still moving forwards.

At the time of his hope-filled message to London, Arthur was ready for a final drive towards the Neck, aiming for the combined forces to converge there by Thursday 25 November.⁵⁰ Yet by this point the parties were in some disarray. Jorgenson wrote of how during this final stage one of the nearby units suddenly began moving on 21 November, ‘and the Oatlands civil forces had to throw away their Tea etc – pack up – and hurry on in great confusion’.⁵¹ As they marched forward the parties were drifting into each other or too far apart. By evening Jorgenson reported ‘a vacancy of about 3 miles’ between two groups, patchily resolved by his having ‘lit 27 large fires … for the purpose of deception’. On the next day the story was similar. ‘My little band of 15 now entered a thick, and sometimes, nearly impervious scrub’, Jorgenson wrote, making them ‘obliged to march one after the other’. They took turns at leading their group, ‘clearing away the scrub before us’. As they camped by a creek that night, they were joined by a ‘lost’ group, and upon investigating a nearby noise discovered an injured man and two companions left to tend to him. Again they lit fires to plug a gap between the divisions.

As they advanced again on 23 November they found more men ‘separated from the rest’. Jorgenson disposed of the growing force as best he could. That evening Jorgenson ‘heard a shot fired’, and upon investigating found a fire. Around it were ‘3 or 4 huts occupied by the 27th and 29th of Capt Macphearson’s division, accompanied by Constables Benison and Lawrence’. They seemed out of place, as were other parties camped a few miles away. Even Jorgenson had trouble returning to his own camp once ‘the moon went down’. Confusion continued the following day. ‘We had received no specific instructions as to our movements,’ he noted, ‘except the vague order of steering SE two days, and South the other days.’ They camped on a mountain that night, and resumed their march on Thursday. Jorgenson’s account is telling of the final confusion and the dashing of Arthur’s hopes:

25th Nov. We started by daybreak in the morning, moving on very slowly, so to be able to take up our position about 11 of the forenoon. In passing along we met several parties from various divisions all endeavouring to make the neck and it was only then I formed a vague conjecture that all the forces were to run to the Neck. We met one John Stacey who told us that the masses were ordered to break up, and proceed to Sorell, and believing what he said we made the rest of our way to the head-quarters of the Colonel Commanding.⁵²

Other accounts similarly convey the disorganised state of the final stages of the campaign. Lawrence had joined the skirmishing operations in early November, met Emmett in the field and joined Batman for part of the operations, but got so confused about his position, dispirited and unwell, that he returned to Sorell on 17 November just as the final skirmishing drives began. He then simply stopped keeping his journal, only resuming it the next year.

But Lawrence was not the only one to leave a documentary gap. The later narratives of Emmett and Lloyd largely glossed the final stages of the operation, and even Arthur’s written instructions and Douglas’s daily reports ceased to be recorded as they had been weeks previously. The last memorandum in Arthur’s campaign copybook recorded and ordered the dispersal of the military to Hobart, Sorell, Oatlands, New Norfolk, Bothwell, Hamilton, Waterloo Point, Spring Bay and Launceston.⁵³ A small detachment of one sergeant and 12 men were left ‘to guard East Bay Neck until further notice’. Arthur returned to Hobart to see his infant son, born earlier that week. The rest of the Colonel Commanding’s campaign copybook is blank. The largest military ground offensive ever conducted on Australian soil was over.

Demobilisation and Discretion

On the same day that the military were dispersed, Arthur issued a government notice explaining that the volunteers were released because further service ‘would prove so detrimental to their Private Interests’.⁵⁴ He congratulated the volunteers, the conscripts, the military and the survey department for their good service, and affirmed that the movement mostly succeeded in driving the tribes as planned until ‘their untimely dispersion by a party who too hastily attacked them before a sufficient force could arrive to capture them’. He was able to temper this with good news, noting ‘that a body of natives have been captured without bloodshed on the northern coast’. This was a reference to Robinson, who with the aid of his companions, had some success capturing and removing some Aboriginal people to islands in Bass Strait.

Arthur also took the opportunity to briefly explain new measures. He referred to ‘recent treacherous conduct of a party of natives, who had been received and treated with every species of kindness’. By this he meant Mungo-Jack and the women and men who had left Batman’s farm. These people gave him proof, he claimed, ‘that it would be in vain to expect any reformation in these savages while allowed to continue in their native habits’. Although exile had already been considered, this now became the official excuse for the policy. The current cohort of ‘about 30’ Aboriginal captives, along with any future captives, were going to be put ‘upon an Island from where they cannot escape’.

But Arthur said little about the processes for making further captures. In referring to the dispersal of the forces from the field, the Colonial Secretary mentioned that this was ‘with the exception of a small body whom the Lieutenant Governor has judged it expedient to detain for the protection of the settlements and the further pursuit of the Natives’. Moreover, while the late campaign had been performed with great publicity, future operations would not be publicised:

The most active measures will be continued for vigorously pursuing the object in view, but as the Lieutenant Governor feels a strong persuasion that there are white men amongst the natives, His Excellency does not consider it prudent to detail any future operations in public notices.

Whether Arthur genuinely believed there were Europeans among the tribes was, like Mungo-Jack’s supposed ‘treachery’, less relevant than the excuse it provided.