Our fifth treasure is an account of the life of a shipwrecked European man, who was adopted by the Bindal and Juru peoples of the Townsville region. From the Rare Book Collection comes James Morrill's Sketch of a Residence Among the Aboriginals of Northern Queensland for Seventeen Years.
Dr Daniel Lavery answers the question "why is this significant?"
Published in 1863, 'Sketch of a Residence among the Aboriginals of Northern Queensland for Seventeen Years' is one of the more important documents in Queensland's early colonial history. Queensland was carved out of New South Wales only a handful of years earlier and it was still very much a frontier. James Morrill was on both sides of this colonial frontier and, uniquely, his account is from 'the other side'. It is told not from the perspective of those doing the shooting, but from those being shot at.
Morrill, an Essex-born mariner, survived the shipwreck of Peruvian in early 1846 and washed ashore with six others at Cape Cleveland, just south of the future Townsville. Near to death after six weeks adrift, the then-21 year old Morrill was tended by members of the local Bindal People, and began to reside with them around nearby Mount Elliot. He later went south to reside with the Juru People south of the Burdekin River on and around Cape Upstart but returned within two years to live with the Bindal.
He remained with the Bindal and had no contact with - and very limited reports of - other Europeans for over 10 years. Leichhardt's inland exploration in 1845 had reported good pasturage on the upper Burdekin. On 1 January 1861, the Kennedy District was opened up through the new township of Bowen and there was an increasing incursion by Europeans seeking pasture for their stock, initially sheep, then cattle. There came 'reports' of repeating rifles. After many shootings of his adoptive kinspeople in the early 1860s, Morrill approached a shepherds' hut at Airville in the Burdekin delta in late January 1863, and shouted, "Don't shoot mateys, I'm a British object."
Morrill was taken to Bowen where his bona fides as a shipwrecked mariner was established; he then sailed to Brisbane where there was an instant curiosity about him. Weary of re-telling his remarkable story of survival, and in order to secure an income, he produced 'Sketch of a Residence' with the assistance of a scribe. It was first published in 21 April 1863, and was put on sale immediately for one shilling.
Morrill's intentions in coming out of the bush will never be fully known. Certainly, he spoke of the great personal danger of being mistakenly shot by the invading pastoralists. In his 'Sketch' pamphlet, Morrill mentions four episodes of frontier violence, two of which would meet the modern definition of a massacre. He lost 'a friend of mine' when Spitfire anchored in Cleveland Bay and men on board fired on a group of Bindal, a 'brother-in-law' was shot dead in another incident. He writes of learning of the 'shooting down the [Juru] tribe I had been living with' near Cape Upstart by 'a lot of white and black men on horseback'. (This may be the same episode George Elphinstone Dalrymple referred to in correspondence to Governor Bowen where he and a few locals on horseback 'met a party of armed natives' north of the township and 'at once dispersed them'.) Finally, Morrill mentions 'about 15 blackfellows' in a fishing party 'belonging to the [Bindal] tribe I was living with' being 'shot down dead'.
Morrill was, at first, bewildered by the repeating rifle and the concept of 'black men on horseback'. Back on the European side of the frontier he came to understand the advances in weaponry and also learned of the Native Mounted Police. A platoon of these 'police' had been stationed at Bowen since its establishment. If there was any resistance by the Indigenous locals, particularly if preventing pastoralisation in any concerted manner, then a contingent of the Native Mounted Police would be dispatched from Bowen to the locale and, usually, an indiscriminate pogrom 'to disperse the blacks' would quieten the frontier. The Native Mounted Police and their European leadership had an unwritten licence to kill. In 1863, while Morrill was in Brisbane, the pacification of the Kennedy District was continuing.
But Morrill also emerged from the bush with a plan to save his kinspeople from the catastrophic ethnocide that was enveloping them. It had been endorsed by the leadership of the Bindal (and maybe others) prior to Morrill leaving them. Leave the coastal wetlands to his brothers, he urged, it was unsuitable for pasturing sheep or cattle. The pastoralists could have the open woodlands and grasslands where these animals could graze. They could co-exist peacefully.
The plan was barely listened to by those in authority. Why would they? Land titles were being lawfully issued in Brisbane with no consideration given to any Indigenous inhabitants. On this conciliatory mission, Morrill failed miserably. It was the Juru and the Bindal – and other Indigenous peoples – who had become the British objects.
For James Morrill the Juru and Bindal were not objects, they were kin. He returned to kith, what he called 'my country'; working in Bowen, buying land, building a cottage, marrying and fathering a son. In 1864, he accompanied Dalrymple on the expedition to Rockingham Bay (Cardwell) and was instrumental to founding Townsville. Indeed, in mid-1865, Morrill bought the first block of land auctioned there (in Flinders Street, a rood knocked down to him for £4) but he died suddenly later that year before a title deed was issued, aged 41 years.
Morrill's 'Sketch' was republished soon after his death – perhaps opportunistically and with amendments for dramatic effect – with another now claiming authorship.
James Morrill's original 'Sketch' is a seminal document in the revision of Australia's frontier history and critical to the writings of Noel Loos and Henry Reynolds, both of whom led that revision. Without 'Sketch of a Residence among the Aboriginals of Northern Queensland for Seventeen Years' we may never have imagined what it meant to be on 'the other side' of the Queensland frontier.
Over the course of 2020, JCU Library's Special Collections will be unveiling 50 Treasures from the collections to celebrate 50 years of James Cook University.
Author Biography:
Dr Daniel Lavery is Adjunct Research Fellow in the College of Business, Law and Governance at James Cook University. His PhD focussed on Indigenous sovereignties re-emerging in the Australian landscape in the native title era.
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| Wood engraving of James Morrill by Samuel Calvert, dated 1863, Source: State Library of Victoria |
Published in 1863, 'Sketch of a Residence among the Aboriginals of Northern Queensland for Seventeen Years' is one of the more important documents in Queensland's early colonial history. Queensland was carved out of New South Wales only a handful of years earlier and it was still very much a frontier. James Morrill was on both sides of this colonial frontier and, uniquely, his account is from 'the other side'. It is told not from the perspective of those doing the shooting, but from those being shot at.
 |
| Sketch of a Residence by James Morrill, Rare Book Collection. |
He remained with the Bindal and had no contact with - and very limited reports of - other Europeans for over 10 years. Leichhardt's inland exploration in 1845 had reported good pasturage on the upper Burdekin. On 1 January 1861, the Kennedy District was opened up through the new township of Bowen and there was an increasing incursion by Europeans seeking pasture for their stock, initially sheep, then cattle. There came 'reports' of repeating rifles. After many shootings of his adoptive kinspeople in the early 1860s, Morrill approached a shepherds' hut at Airville in the Burdekin delta in late January 1863, and shouted, "Don't shoot mateys, I'm a British object."
Morrill's intentions in coming out of the bush will never be fully known. Certainly, he spoke of the great personal danger of being mistakenly shot by the invading pastoralists. In his 'Sketch' pamphlet, Morrill mentions four episodes of frontier violence, two of which would meet the modern definition of a massacre. He lost 'a friend of mine' when Spitfire anchored in Cleveland Bay and men on board fired on a group of Bindal, a 'brother-in-law' was shot dead in another incident. He writes of learning of the 'shooting down the [Juru] tribe I had been living with' near Cape Upstart by 'a lot of white and black men on horseback'. (This may be the same episode George Elphinstone Dalrymple referred to in correspondence to Governor Bowen where he and a few locals on horseback 'met a party of armed natives' north of the township and 'at once dispersed them'.) Finally, Morrill mentions 'about 15 blackfellows' in a fishing party 'belonging to the [Bindal] tribe I was living with' being 'shot down dead'.
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| Newspaper clipping from the Telegraph, Thursday 8 August 1963, James Morrill Archive. |
But Morrill also emerged from the bush with a plan to save his kinspeople from the catastrophic ethnocide that was enveloping them. It had been endorsed by the leadership of the Bindal (and maybe others) prior to Morrill leaving them. Leave the coastal wetlands to his brothers, he urged, it was unsuitable for pasturing sheep or cattle. The pastoralists could have the open woodlands and grasslands where these animals could graze. They could co-exist peacefully.
The plan was barely listened to by those in authority. Why would they? Land titles were being lawfully issued in Brisbane with no consideration given to any Indigenous inhabitants. On this conciliatory mission, Morrill failed miserably. It was the Juru and the Bindal – and other Indigenous peoples – who had become the British objects.
For James Morrill the Juru and Bindal were not objects, they were kin. He returned to kith, what he called 'my country'; working in Bowen, buying land, building a cottage, marrying and fathering a son. In 1864, he accompanied Dalrymple on the expedition to Rockingham Bay (Cardwell) and was instrumental to founding Townsville. Indeed, in mid-1865, Morrill bought the first block of land auctioned there (in Flinders Street, a rood knocked down to him for £4) but he died suddenly later that year before a title deed was issued, aged 41 years.
Morrill's 'Sketch' was republished soon after his death – perhaps opportunistically and with amendments for dramatic effect – with another now claiming authorship.
James Morrill's original 'Sketch' is a seminal document in the revision of Australia's frontier history and critical to the writings of Noel Loos and Henry Reynolds, both of whom led that revision. Without 'Sketch of a Residence among the Aboriginals of Northern Queensland for Seventeen Years' we may never have imagined what it meant to be on 'the other side' of the Queensland frontier.
Over the course of 2020, JCU Library's Special Collections will be unveiling 50 Treasures from the collections to celebrate 50 years of James Cook University.
Author Biography:
Dr Daniel Lavery is Adjunct Research Fellow in the College of Business, Law and Governance at James Cook University. His PhD focussed on Indigenous sovereignties re-emerging in the Australian landscape in the native title era.
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