CHAPTER SEVEN
1829, Spring
East and West
Batman’s Captives
On 15 September 1829 John Batman and his party were ‘on the Sea Coast’.1 The next evening they came to a farm, where they learned that Aboriginal people ‘had attempted to Spear’ the occupants earlier that week. Leaving two men behind at this farm with knapsacks and blankets, Batman headed off in rapid pursuit the following morning. Before midday they ‘captured one woman that had remained behind the Tribe’, and pushed on. After another day and night the party could ‘see a number of Natives approaching’, so Batman ‘ordered the men to lay down and not to fire upon them’. He would give the order ‘to rush forward and seize them’ at the right time.
By Batman’s account the plan worked perfectly. ‘I gave the signal,’ he said, ‘we all ran forward and secured three women, two young children, three Boys, and Two young men,’ although six others did manage to ‘escape into a thick scrub’. Pigeon then tried to communicate to the captives that the party’s ‘intentions towards them were most peaceable and friendly’.2 Seemingly prompted by this, ‘One of the women stood upon a Hill, looking down into a thick Scrub’ and ‘spoke for several minutes’ for the benefit of what Batman assumed were hidden friends or relatives. He was unsure of the message, but he recognised that she was ‘seeming by her gestures to be earnestly impressing something of import upon those whom she addressed’. Nobody emerged from the bush.
The party ‘shot 17 large Dogs’ and forwarded the 11 captives to Campbell Town. By 23 September these captives had been forwarded to Oatlands, where Anstey described them as ‘The most interesting group of Savages I have ever seen’. When the news was conveyed to Hobart, the Colonial Secretary recorded that ‘the Lieut Governor is highly pleased at the capture of the Natives, and the manner in which it has been accomplished.’3 The same day the Colonial Secretary also advised that Arthur had finally examined the circumstances of Batman’s earlier mission, and was now satisfied that ‘not the slightest blame attaches to Mr Batman’ for its less pacific resolution and the death of the men in Batman’s custody.4 Batman had distanced himself from the executions by a convoluted explanation about his writing style and sense of responsibility for the team.
Meanwhile Batman’s party continued ranging, and the new captives were conveyed further south to Richmond. They travelled ‘under an escort of a party of the 63d [sic] regiment and constables’.5 A witness to their arrival on 29 September penned a description for the Hobart Town Courier:
Two of them are very young men, the remainder women and children (some of them at the breast). They halted at the court house. A native man and women taken by a party of the 40th regiment with Mr. Robertson’s party in the month of November last, and a woman taken lately by Mr. Batman were sent for from the gaol, immediately on their coming in sight of the newly arrived party, the cry of welcome was evinced, and on coming near each other the feelings portrayed on either side would have done honour to the most civilized – the two women long confined clasped to their arms children and grandchildren each shedding floods of tears of joy.
Then they were put in the gaol and given blankets.
When captured, the 11 Aboriginal people already possessed blankets, as well as jackets and other colonial items. Because these goods were apparently ‘robbed’ from settlers they were taken away, meaning the group was sent into captivity in a state of practical nudity. This in some ways exacerbated notions of primitiveness and savagery in the public reports. Although probably not deliberate, the contrast between redcoat guards and naked captives was more a product of the process of capture than a reflection of an absolute frontier distinction. Whether choreographed or not, the imagery of gaoling spoke to the paternalism of empire.
In a parallel way, the Bruny Island Establishment encouraged a growing segregation, even though it was ostensibly about ‘civilising’ Aboriginal people. Only a few weeks earlier Arthur had authorised ‘a boat being built’ for a ‘native youth’ as an ‘example of industry’.6 Arthur also wanted to ‘confer upon him an allotment of ground’ near the Bruny Island Establishment as a ‘means of support’, hoping that the gardening and boating ‘may perhaps have the effect of gradually inclining those Natives who frequent the Establishment at Bruné Island to relinquish their wandering habits’. The youth concerned was ‘late in the service’ of a settler in the interior, meaning he already lived within the body of colonial society before he was considered for his exemplary potential.
Similarly, in March 1829 Arthur ordered an investigation into two Aboriginal women ‘forced away from Bruné Island’ by a ‘man of Colour, a sealer named Baker or Barker’, revealing the ways that the government was looking further than the war in the midlands.7 Such individual measures were clearly about more than mere protection or vague notions of ‘conciliating’ combatant tribes. The government wanted Aboriginal people to adopt the colonists’ way of life – on the government’s terms and under its instruction.
All the while, warfare and frontier violence continued. In September, reports were sent to Hobart of the shooting of an Aboriginal woman by servants of the Van Diemen’s Land Company at Emu Bay in the northwest of the island.8 But even within the long-contested ‘settled districts’ there were distinctly shifting landscapes of conflict. Settler homesteads and stock huts were not the only sites of contestation, because the roving parties deliberately pushed into the cultural landscapes of various tribes. During late September William Grant maintained his party’s close watch on the flint quarry east of Oatlands, for instance, precisely because it was a site of cultural significance.9 Other parties did likewise to the west. On 7 September, while Batman was writing about executing wounded men, one of ‘Jorgenson’s parties of Rangers’ under the command of Field Policeman George Lucas was at another location of note:
where the great numbers of Native huts, the Trees marked by the Natives hunting the Opossum, and Trees stripped for bark, sufficiently shew that the Aborigines resort to this place in number at certain seasons of the year.10
Only because it appeared to have been abandoned for several months did Lucas move his party on, but he clearly marked its significance for future reference. Some of the parties even left their own cultural relics like ‘a very large Bush Hut by the Big lagoon there that had been made by Mr Batman and his party’. One of Grant’s supply parties found this structure in an isolated stretch of bush, part of the reformation of landscape effected by the roving parties themselves.
Intense Westwards Roving
While Grant maintained a vigil in the east, to the west the parties were still mainly on the move. After leaving the Aboriginal camping ground, Lucas’ party followed the creeks and gullies as best they could, and then turned towards some smoke. But it was only some lime burners, who were ‘terribly alarmed at first’ because they thought the approaching armed party were bushrangers.
While the war was being prosecuted, the bushranging phenomenon was still real – a threat to colonists and Aboriginal people alike. Lucas got another illustration of the tensions of this period when, a few days after encountering the lime burners, his party was again suspected of bushranging. Mr Clark, a local farmer, intercepted the roving party, and questioned the six of them intently. Covering the exchange were ‘no less than sixteen persons under Arms concealed in various places ready to pour their vollies into us’, Lucas later wrote. It is a passing revelation of the paramilitary power wielded by some landowners.
Fortunately, Lucas managed to allay Mr Clark’s concerns, and was recognised by some of his servants, after which all suspicions evaporated. The party asked about the habits of Aboriginal people in the area, and then moved on to a predetermined rendezvous point a little west of Ross. Danvers met them there and took charge of the party, while Lucas returned to Oatlands to help organise Jorgenson’s third party and make his report.
Danvers guided the party into the Western Tiers. From these heights, they ‘had a very extensive view of the surrounding Country, and could see a very long way to the Eastward and the Westward, but could observe no signs of the Natives’.11 Now well-practised in tracking and ambushing, Danvers led his party to Lake Sorell, ‘and encamped for the night in a very convenient place for watching Native fires’. But while pressing further into the highlands over subsequent days, the men learned of recent raids by bushrangers, and got on their trail instead as another form of public service. They chased the bushrangers for several days and gradually closed the distance, but other authorities made the arrest before the chase ended. By then in Norfolk Plains, in the northwestern midlands, Danvers and his party spent a few more days out without event before returning to Oatlands.
Although they made no captures, Anstey was impressed with Danvers and his men, commenting that their ‘very extraordinary exertions … have given me the highest satisfaction’. Arthur agreed that Danvers ‘deserves great commendation for his conduct.’ These notes on Danvers’ report were among numerous exchanges between Oatlands and Hobart during the spring of 1829, which detailed all manner of administrative matters from rations and clothing to the appointment of an armourer in Oatlands to maintain and repair weapons.12 A shoemaker was even attached to Batman’s party because of the heavy toll his exertions kept taking on their footwear.13 Even more men were attached to the various roving parties.14
Meanwhile, Kickerterpoller also contributed to the administrative correspondence, raising concerns about the treatment of the captives in Richmond Gaol. He did this through Robertson, who relayed the information to the government.15 An ‘insufficiency of food’ was part of the problem, but there was also ‘great cause for complaint’ with the quality of the meat issued to the captives. ‘Tom has also complained’, Robertson wrote, that the gaoler ‘had confined the Native calld [sic] the Lawyer, handcuffed in a Cell’. Arthur responded by ordering they receive regular visits ‘two or three times a week, and see that they are taken good care of’.16
While addressing Kickerterpoller’s concerns, Arthur was also frustrated with Robertson’s general proximity to Richmond, which meant he was clearly not roving. Arthur was ‘very glad’ when he learned Anstey intimated to Robertson ‘the propriety of his leaving the Coal River District’. It was one of a number of signs that Robertson was attracting the Lieutenant Governor’s displeasure. When referring the dispute between Jorgenson and Robertson back to Anstey, Arthur thought that Robertson’s ‘want of success seems to have ruffled his temper!’17
Mr Clark’s Farm and the Soldier-Settler Reality
In late October Robertson was sent west towards Bothwell, at Arthur’s suggestion.18 The Bothwell district was being pressed by Aboriginal people making attacks around the Clyde River, again shifting the weight of strategic focus from east to west. Seeking help from Arthur in mid-September, Williams was told he might get a party from Anstey, or could raise one of his own.19 Williams even ‘got a party of mounted orderlies and goes out with them himself’ one report noted.20 But while Williams had military forces at his disposal, could expect roving parties from Oatlands, and was forming further parties locally, he was also having trouble with the settlers in his district. Some of them failed to offer much help to the military and roving parties, and took surprisingly little care for their own protection. Arthur was tired of settlers writing in with complaints about Aboriginal raids and repeated calls for help. As the Colonial Secretary advised:
His Excellency has also desired me to state, that it is only reasonable, that the more respectable class of Settlers, who can afford it, should in some degree provide for the security and protection of their own families, and that it would be advisable for you to ascertain, how far this is attended to throughout your District; not that it should in any way abate the activity of the Military.21
Clearly some settlers took more precautions than others. Mr Clark, who had surrounded Lucas’ roving party with armed men, certainly did. He wrote a short treatise for the Colonial Times, detailing strategies for making properties safer.22 Clark basically suggested siting huts in cleared ground, so there was no cover for approaching raiders, and advocated using a ‘stockade’ to provide a defensive firing position. But other settlers were less active in this regard. In a subsequent letter the Colonial Secretary told Williams to ‘see every Settler of any respectability, and animate all to take precautions for their own preservation’.23 Far from discouraging frontier violence, the government was actively encouraging settlers to be prepared for it.
Unsurprisingly, given these sorts of concerns, Arthur helped military men to settle in the colony. In 1826 the British Government had issued instructions seeking to encourage ‘Officers of the Army, more especially those on Half-pay, to become Settlers in New South Wales and Van Diemen’s Land’.24 Shortly after receiving this instruction in early 1827, Arthur forwarded to London a testimonial of a ‘late Captain of the 6th Regiment of Foot’.25 This man had 24 years of military experience, sold his commission to settle in Van Diemen’s Land, and was what Arthur characterised as ‘the kind of Settler that deserves encouragement’. This ‘faithful old Soldier’ was William Clark, Justice of the Peace in the Bothwell district, and by 1829 commander of a private militia capable of surrounding and outnumbering a field police roving party.
The scheme for encouraging soldier-settlers expanded relatively quickly.26 The British Government allowed soldiers to keep their half-pay, and gave them a stepped scale of financial advantage, freeing them from quit rents on a sliding scale based on length of military service. In effect, soldiers were given significant financial incentives to settle in Van Diemen’s Land. This would, it was thought, ‘secure to the public the Services of a valuable and intelligent class of persons’.27 In December 1827 a scheme for encouraging naval settlers was also implemented.28 Soon, immigrant soldier-settlers were taking advantage of these schemes, acquiring land during the Vandemonian War, and seemingly getting deployed by Arthur for strategic ends. Typical of the phenomenon, in 1828 Arthur ordered land surveyed per terms of ‘the Regulations of the General Military Order’ for a ‘Capt Spotswood, late of the 98th Foot’.29
These grants were part of the process of occupying Aboriginal territory. John Spotswood’s grant particularly highlights this, because he came to occupy part of the Tasman Peninsula on what was, in his own words, ‘commonly known as Blackman’s plains’ and bounded in part ‘by Blackman’s river’.30 Spotswood was not alone in his post-military frontier deployment, with several other soldier-settlers immigrating during the late 1820s and attracting the Lieutenant Governor’s personal attention.31
In November 1829, during a time of considerable hostilities, Arthur also authorised the construction of huts at government expense for 10 discharged members of the Veteran Company.32 Such moves went beyond merely rewarding old soldiers. These policies were also about populating the settled districts with militarily experienced civic leaders. Like the police magistrates, the civilian settlers were not quite what they seemed.
This militarised settlement was not just about the war as such. It was also a defence against bushranging and any potential convict uprising. While soldiers protected chain gangs from Aboriginal harassment, they also guarded the convicts against escape. But as more settlers occupied ground, they thereby also denied its occupation by others, specifically Aboriginal people.
Similarly, while the roving parties were mainly directed for military action against Aboriginal people, they were sometimes diverted to other ends. This included more regular police duties, and Danvers briefly attracted public notice during October 1829 for such a mission. ‘Two parties of black rangers under the direction of constable Danvers and Richard Tyrrell closely pursued the murderer,’ reported the Hobart Town Courier.33 Convict James Brown had absconded from custody, was recaptured but escaped again by striking a constable. The constable regained consciousness enough to report the assault, but died of his head injury. When Danvers and Tyrrell’s chase failed, the government offered £20 reward for Brown’s recapture, and within a few weeks he was caught trying to cross the Derwent in a small boat.34 Brown was later sentenced to be hanged, but was apparently reprieved.35 But by then Danvers and Tyrrell were prosecuting the war again.
The Rangers and Aboriginal Relics
In response to the hostilities near the Clyde River, during October and November 1829 several parties of ‘black rangers’ from Oatlands operated throughout the Bothwell district, and their overlapping movements reveal Jorgenson’s operational mechanics were maturing. On 20 October Richard Tyrrell reported to Bothwell for instructions, and Williams sent him ‘to proceed over the River Ouse, and to remain in that part of the country three weeks’.36 Over coming days Tyrrell learned from local stockmen ‘of the continual attacks by the Natives on the neighbouring huts’, proof of which was found on 24 October when his party found some blankets taken from one of the earlier raids.
As Tyrrell’s party examined the blankets, Danvers was leading a party westwards from Oatlands.37 The next day they arrived at Bothwell, before heading up into the tiers. On 27 October Danvers’ party ‘found a tolerable good blanket and a number of broken spears’ at a place he called the Gibraltar Marsh. They also located a ‘a Bag marked GT. which the Aborigines had carried off full of Flour’. Like Tyrrell’s find, such artefacts of raiding showed Aboriginal people were in the general area, although neither party had yet seen fires or tracks.
Meanwhile, Tyrrell was gaining information. He spent some of 27 October in conversation with Mr Young, who told him about various battles in the district:
They had attacked Clark’s hut three miles from the River, had speared a woman in the breast and side, and set fire over her. The poor woman came out of the hut her clothes all a fire. She was met by one of the Native chiefs. She held her hands up to him and said to him ‘Oh spare my life for God’s sake.[’] He ran to her, put out the fire and shook her by the hand, and led her away from the other natives who were in the act of throwing Spears at her. I believe the woman was in the last stage of pregnancy. The Tribe then turned their attention to the hut, murdered a man of the name of Clark, and cut his head off, and then put the head and body in the fire. … On this same day the natives met Constable Williams from the Clyde, conveying a female convict servant of Mr Triffitts, to some other place. The natives murdered this woman and speared Two other men.
The district was, as one report put it, ‘in a state of considerable alarm’.38 Many settlers and servants suffered from raids, and reports and rumours circulated throughout the districts, sometimes even reaching the colonial press. Earlier that month, for instance, another of Mr Triffitt’s servants was the victim of a tale of frontier woe. This man ‘was found dead in the bush’, made more interesting for the press because a sheep dog had kept a two-day guard over the body.39
But not all reports were accurate. Captain Clark was surprised to read an account of his own house being attacked when no such thing had occurred, which is what prompted him to write the detailed account of his defensive arrangements – proof that he could take care of himself.40 The roving parties were sometimes thwarted in their operations because of such incorrect reports. On one mission Tyrrell spent several fruitless days chasing what turned out to be ‘a false hood’.41 But unless they saw fires or found tracks, local reports were still often the rangers’ best leads.
Up near Lake Echo, Danvers gradually got on an Aboriginal trail, finding two butchered kangaroo, areas of burnt grass, and ‘three very large Natives huts’ built by the lake only days earlier. But Danvers found nothing else and turned back.
On 1 November Danvers received orders from Williams to proceed towards the Shannon River. Over the next few days Danvers’ party remained unable to see any Aboriginal fires, despite routinely camping on high ground and keeping night watches. As Danvers shifted directions in accordance with orders, Tyrrell heard of another attack. Aboriginal people apparently ‘attempted to rob a man’s hut named Burn, who most manfully, with the assistance of his Dog, beat a Tribe off’.
By now Robertson was also in the district, and he too was listening to local reports, including one ‘that the Natives had attacked Mr Clarke’s shepherd’s hut’.42 Courtesy of Jack’s guidance, Robertson managed to find their tracks and their campsite, and was met there by Grant’s party, which had also heard of the attack and diverted to that direction. The two parties combined, and most of them headed up towards the lakes, while a few remained behind to defend the settlers. On the way, they met one of Danvers’ men, who had diverted to the chief district constable for further orders while Danvers headed to the ‘Soldiers Marshes’. A few days afterwards, on 9 November, Tyrrell’s party ‘fell in with one of Mr Gilbert Robertson’s parties’.
While these parties scoured the tiers, watched for fires, followed rumours and were led astray by ‘false reports’, another party led by Peter Scott was detached from Oatlands. This party headed towards the tiers and lakes, scouring the country while veering towards Bothwell. Two of Jorgenson’s three parties reached Bothwell, made their reports, and then returned to the bush on 19 and 22 November respectively. In the meantime, Danvers’ party returned to Oatlands on 20 November. Just as Jorgenson had instructed, two of his parties were always in the field, in addition to the various parties directed by Robertson and others.
Soldiery on the Western Front
The Oatlands rangers and local Bothwell parties were not the only forces in the field. They were just the best documented. Even before learning the outcome of these roving missions, Arthur was sending further reinforcements to the Bothwell district. As well as encouraging settlers to defend themselves, authorising the formation of locally raised roving parties, and sending in forces overseen by Robertson and Jorgenson, Arthur sent in more of the army. On 13 November the Colonial Secretary wrote to Williams at Bothwell, and his counterpart in New Norfolk:
The Lieut Governor having learnt with extreme regret that repeated outrages of the most barbarous nature, have recently been perpetuated in your District by the Natives has been pleased to direct that Lieut Gibbons and a Detachment of Military, should proceed tomorrow morning to Hamilton at the Lower Clyde, there to encamp, in order to check the atrocities and expel the Aborigines from that, and the surrounding Country; you will therefore be pleased to co-operate by every means in your power, with the Officer commanding the troops, for the attainment of these very important objects.43
Details about the military operations are scarce, but Arthur’s orders were clearly followed relatively swiftly. ‘A detachment of 100 strong’ left for ‘the Clyde station’ within a week.44
A week later, a report mentioned some of the dispositions of soldiers stationed at Bothwell:
Besides the parties of rovers sent in pursuit of the natives, four parties of military composed of six men each, set out from Bothwell this morning to scour the country. A number of soldiers are now stationed in various stock huts from under the Western tier, down the Great river, and the Shannon.45
This was the type of ‘decisive, combined, and simultaneous exertion’ that the Colonel Commanding demanded.46
Military operations were further strengthened in November 1829 when Captain Vicary replaced Lieutenant Williams as Bothwell police magistrate. It was not intended as a slight to Williams (he was being transferred with his regiment to India), but the appointment of a more senior officer as a replacement likely reflects intensified conflict in the foothills of the high country. Vicary was a recent promotion, and a relatively new arrival in the colony, but had already demonstrated a fighting spirit. One correspondent commended his ‘measures adopted’ against Aboriginal people.47Another praised Vicary for parties under his command in the midlands, because ‘nothing could exceed the alacrity with which they performed their disagreeable duty’.48 The experience of combined operations to protect and clear the central midlands were now being turned more fully towards the western high country.
The immediate impact of Vicary’s new force is hard to discern. Certainly, it bolstered defensive arrangements. This increased the colony’s capacity for offensive operations to clear the area of Aboriginal people, and freed the rangers to rove further from the settlements. Moreover, it probably helped regional morale. While some settlers appeared recalcitrant and lax in their own defence, others enthusiastically joined the war effort. Incensed by his son being speared, one settler went ‘to join a party of military under the command of Capt. Vicary, with a determination to scour the hills’.49
New Norfolk and the Southern Flank of the Western Front
The Bothwell district was not the only theatre of conflict. Further south and west, the adjoining district of New Norfolk was also under attack. Earlier in the year Arthur had instructed the police magistrate that the ‘deep gully’ was an ‘important station for the residence of a Military Officer’.50There was a convict chain gang there, guarded by ‘a strong Military Party’, but Aboriginal people could still raid with impunity. In late October there were reports of a series of attacks, including the spearing of a stock-keeper among ‘the hills behind Lieut Fry’s house’ near Macquarie Plains.51 While Lieutenant Fry took ‘a party of soldiers in pursuit’, Aboriginal people attacked his house. While ‘a soldier stationed there fired upon them’, they broke in, and ‘plundered it of every thing they had time to carry off’. A correspondent noted that ‘[t]hey escaped notwithstanding a party of soldiers quickly arrived from the Gully’ and that ‘[t]he greatest promptitude was shewn by every settler in the district on the first alarm. No less than ten different parties, well armed, have been scouring the bush.’52 But the results of these sorts of scouring missions were rarely reported in the colonial press.
While military forces and police magistrates had to contend with a general state of conflict that spilled over district borders, and an enemy that was exceedingly difficult to track, coordinated military and paramilitary action had clearly become the main colonial strategy by the spring of 1829. About the time that Vicary replaced Williams at Bothwell, Arthur also replaced the police magistrate at Richmond. When James Gordon confirmed his arrival and assumption of office, Arthur advised him of his responsibilities:
to consider in what manner, with the force at present at your disposal, the extensive District under your care can be protected from the attacks and aggressions of the Aborigines. It will be necessary for you, to look to all the distant stock huts, animate the Settlers generally, to adopt judicious measures for their defence.53
Jorgenson opined that good reconnaissance was crucial to such strategies:
Our knowledge of the Country, the Mountains, the passes, and fording places, render us in these respects a match for the Aborigines and I hope that by patience and perseverance we shall before the end of the Summer put an end to the war.54
But despite his optimism, Jorgenson still wanted more help. He drew Anstey’s attention to the way that he had organised a party under Robert Hyett ‘to remain in ambush’ and ‘if occasions require it, receive assistance from the military and the Shepherds’, among other cooperative manoeuvres with various groups of soldiers. This plan was done ‘in conformity with some suggestions offered by His Excellency when I was last in town’, Jorgenson noted, again highlighting Arthur’s intimate knowledge and very personal direction of the war’s prosecution. Jorgenson also made a point of drawing Anstey’s and therefore Arthur’s focus to a strategic request ‘in a separate letter dated the Clyde’, where Jorgenson ‘expressed my hope that my parties may be supplied with the assistance of one Native at least’.
In this letter Jorgenson described his expectations of imminent success, but also mentioned that ‘we find it extremely difficult to continue in the tracks of the Aborigines when having moved over rocks or grass’. It was this inability to track Aboriginal people effectively that made the rangers so reliant on local intelligence, or reduced to climbing hills and looking for signs of smoke or fire – albeit now with the aid of a telescope in Jorgenson’s case. Asking Anstey if he could ‘obtain for me some clever man or lad of the native race to accompany that one of my parties which shall be most actively engaged in pursuit’, Jorgenson observed that both Batman and Robertson has such auxiliaries attached to their parties.55 Anstey ultimately agreed, suggesting to Arthur that augmenting Jorgenson’s force with Aboriginal men would increase the chances of his ‘falling in with the predatory Hordes’. Arthur approved the effective conscription of a captive, and Jorgenson was authorised to take one of those held at Richmond.56 Accordingly, a young man known as Mungo was attached to Jorgenson’s rangers.
As the army moved into the high country in November, Jorgenson assessed his parties and prepared for further roving operations.57 Noting that Tyrrell’s party ‘has been found useful in protecting the settlements’, Jorgenson sent Tyrrell and his men ‘to his former station’ by the Ouse River, and Peter Scott ‘to scour the Abyssinia Tiers, the hunting grounds, Cockatoo Valley etc.’. Both of these parties were strengthened by Hyett and John Reynolds, previously occupied with ambush missions, but now freed from that duty because ‘the Soldiers are roving’. James Hopkins was brought in to temporarily take over Danvers’ party, who Jorgenson commended as ‘indefatigable’. Danvers was redeployed to make ‘preparations for a long and arduous journey from the Extreme Western Bluff, down along the whole line of demarcation as far as the Peak of Teneriffe’. As Jorgenson explained:
The Black native Mungo and myself will accompany Danvers on this journey, and our party will then be eight strong. We have hitherto found it impracticable to spare a detachment for the purpose of taking a great circuitous route, so to get the Aborigines between the parties and the settlements, but now that a number of military is roving over the Country we shall be able to accomplish our wish.
Now that his complement of roving parties was growing in strength and operating in a coordinated fashion across multiple districts, Anstey was aware that the gaze of the Colonel Commanding and the wider colony were upon his missions. ‘The time is now nearly arrived,’ Anstey informed Arthur about a month earlier, ‘for trying the real merits of the present system’. But by the end of the year Anstey opined that ‘[t]he want of success of the Roving Parties is much to be deplored.’ In late November Anstey threatened the roving parties could be disbanded, which had what Jorgenson described as ‘very salutary effects’ upon the rangers.58 But the roving parties continued to go out, and auxiliaries like Mungo proved to be often enthusiastic and good at what they were increasingly employed to do.