A post in Catholica by Keiran Tapsell reminds us that on 14 April there will be a memorial service for the Appin Massacre of 1816. The post links to some information put out by Campbelltown Council about the service. The Council also holds a flag-raising on 17 April.
Keiran Tapsell writes:
One of the most disgraceful military actions against the aboriginal people occurred in 1816 under the otherwise much admired Governor Lachlan Macquarie, who issued instructions to attack the Aborigines at Appin on the outskirts of the Sydney settlement, “so as to Strike them with Terror against Committing Similar Acts of violence in the future.” His instructions were to punish “the guilty” with as little injury “to the innocent” as possible. He also instructed Captain James Wallace and his soldiers to give the Aborigines the opportunity to surrender and to open fire only after meeting “resistance”. These instructions were ignored, and at least 14 Aborigines were shot and killed at Appin as they fled their campsite at night time. However, in his report back to his superiors in England, Macquarie wrote that his men had acted “perfectly in Conformity to the instructions I had furnished them”. In accordance with Macquarie’s instructions, the bodies of two men and probably one woman were hung “on a conspicuous part of a range of hills”. Their heads were later hacked off and sent to Edinburgh University.
