The Coniston massacre, which took place from 14 August to 18 October 1928 near the Coniston cattle station, Northern Territory, Australia, was the last known massacre of Indigenous Australians. People of the Warlpiri, Anmatyerre and Kaytetye groups were killed. The massacre occurred in revenge for the death of
dingo hunter Frederick Brooks, killed by Aborigines in August 1928 at a place now known as Yukurru, (also known as Brooks Soak).
Official records at the time stated that 31 people were killed. The then-owner of Coniston station, Randall Stafford, was a member of the punitive party for the first few days and estimated that at least twice that number were killed between 14 August and 1 September. Historians estimate that at least 60 and as many as 110 Aboriginal men, women and children were killed. The Warlpiri, Anmatyerre and Kaytetye believe that up to 170 died between 14 August and 18 October.
For administrative reasons, from 1927 to 1931, the Federal Government divided the Northern Territory into North and Central Australia . By July 1928, Central Australia was in its fourth year of a particularly severe drought with fewer than 25 millimetres (0.98 in) of rain falling in the previous seven months. Overgrazing by stock had denuded the country of its vegetation, leaving little feed for wildlife. Waterholes were drying up and even the most experienced Aborigines were finding game and
water almost unobtainable. Almost all the permanent waterholes and soaks were on station properties and as Aborigines began to die from thirst and hunger they moved to the stations for the
water where they became an "aggravation" by begging for food and spearing cattle. The pastoralists were forced to chase the Aborigines away to ensure the survival of their cattle.
Sixty-seven year old Fred Brooks had worked as a station hand on Randall Stafford's Coniston station, 390 km north-west of
Alice Springs, since the end of World War I, but due to the drought had not been paid for some time. In July he bought two camels and on 2 August, left with two 12 year-old Aboriginal children, Skipper and Dodger, to trap dingoes for the 10s bounty on their scalps. Approaching a soak 23 km from the
homestead, he found around 30 Ngalia-Warlpiri people camped. Brooks knew some and decided to
camp with them. The first two days were uneventful and Brooks caught several dingoes. On 4 August,
Charlton Young and a companion who were exploring the area for a mining company, stopped by and warned Brooks that the Aborigines had been getting "cheeky" lately by visiting the mining camps heavily armed, demanding food and tobacco. Brooks had been approached several times to trade but had so far refused. On 6 August, Bullfrog with his wife Marungali asked him to trade and Brooks offered some food in exchange for Marungali washing his clothes. Bullfrog camped nearby but Brooks neither paid him the promised food nor did he return his wife. In the morning Bullfrog became enraged when he found his wife in bed with Brooks and attacked him, severing an artery in his throat with his boomerang. Bullfrog, his uncle Padirrka and Marungali then beat Brooks to death. Aboriginal elders fearfully banished Bullfrog and Padirrka and ordered Brooks' two boys to return to the
homestead and say that he had died of natural causes. The following day an Aborigine named Alex
Wilson camped at the now deserted soak and finding the body rode back to the station, where he described hysterically how Brooks had been "chopped up" by 40 Aborigines and the parts stuffed in a rabbit burrow.
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Randall Stafford had been in
Alice Springs requesting police to attend to prevent the spearing of his cattle. He returned to be told of the murder and "dismemberment" of Brooks but chose to wait for the police. No one returned to the soak and no one attempted to retrieve the body. On 11 August, the Government Resident J.C. Cawood sent Constable William Murray, the officer in charge at
Barrow Creek who also held the post of Chief Protector of Aborigines, to Coniston to investigate the complaints of cattle spearing. Told of the murder, Murray drove back to
Alice Springs and telephoned Cawood who refused to send reinforcements, telling Murray to deal with the Aborigines as he saw fit. Returning to Coniston, Murray questioned Dodger and Skipper who described the circumstances of the murder and named Bullfrog, Padirrka and Marungali as the killers. According to his own report, Murray also obtained the names of 20 accomplices (he never recorded the names, or explained how his informants, who were not eye-witnesses, knew them; nor were these inconsistencies ever questioned at later proceedings). Murray organised a posse consisting of tracker Paddy, Alex
Wilson, Dodger, tracker Major (elder brother of Brooks boy Skipper), Randall Stafford and two white itinerants Jack Saxby and Billie Brisco.
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On 15 August,
dingo trapper Bruce Chapman arrived at Coniston and Murray sent Chapman, Paddy and Alex
Wilson to the soak to find out what happened. The three buried Brooks on the bank of the soak. the afternoon two Warlpiri, Padygar and Woolingar arrived at Coniston to trade
dingo scalps. Believing them to be involved with the murder Paddy arrested them but Woolingar slipped his chains and attempted to escape. Murray fired at Woolingar and he fell with a bullet wound to the head. Stafford then kicked him in the chest breaking a rib. Woolingaar was then chained to a tree for the next 18 hours. The next morning the posse, with Padygar and Woolingar following on foot in chains, set out for the Lander River where they found a
camp of 23 Warlpiri at Ngundaru. With the posse encircling the
camp, Murray rode in and was surrounded by Aborigines yelling, Brisco started shooting with Saxby and Murray joining in. Three men and a woman, Bullfrog's wife Marungali, were killed with another woman dying from her wounds an hour later, a search of the
camp turned up articles belonging to Brooks. Stafford was furious with Murray over the shooting and the next morning returned to Coniston alone.
During the night, Murray captured three
young boys who had been sent by their tribe to find what the police party was doing. Murray had the boys beaten to force them to lead the party to the rest of the Warlpiri but had they done so, they would have been punished by their tribe. To resolve the dilemma, the three boys smashed their own feet with rocks. Despite the injuries Murray forced the now crippled boys to lead the party. By nightfall they reached Cockatoo
Creek where they sighted four Aborigines on a ridge. Paddy and Murray captured two but one ran with Murray firing several shots at him which missed, Paddy then knelt and fired a single shot hitting the fleeing man in the back and killing him instantly. After questioning the other three and finding they had no connection with the murder Murray released them. The next two days saw no contact with Aborigines at all as word had spread with many Aborigines heading into
the desert, preferring to risk dying of thirst, rather than face the police patrol. Returning to Coniston, Murray left Padygar, Woolingar and one of the three boys, 11 year-old Lolorrbra (known as Lala, he became a chief witness at the enquiry), whose crushed feet had become infected, in Stafford's custody before heading north to continue the search.
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Following tracks, the patrol came upon a
camp of 20 Warlpiri, mostly women and children. Approaching the
camp Murray ordered the men to drop their weapons, not understanding English the women and children fled while the men stood their ground to protect them. The patrol opened fire killing three men, three injured died later of their wounds and an unknown number of wounded escaped. By Murray's account, he met four separate groups of Warlpiri, and in each case was obliged to shoot in self-defense – a total of 17 casualties. He later testified under oath that each one of the dead was a murderer of Brooks. The Warlpiri themselves estimated between 60 and 70 people had been killed by the patrol.
On 24 August, Murray captured an Aborigine named Arkirkra and returned to Coniston where he collected Padygar (Woolingar had died that night still chained to the tree) and then marched the two 390 km to
Alice Springs. Arriving on 1 September, Arkirkra and Padygar were charged with the murder of Brooks while Murray was hailed as a hero. On 3 September, Murray set off for
Pine Hill station to investigate complaints of cattle spearing. Nothing has been recorded about this patrol, but he returned on 13 September with two prisoners. On 16 September, Henry Tilmouth of Napperby station shot and killed an Aborigine he was chasing away from the
homestead, this incident was included in the later enquiry. On the 19th, Murray again departed, this time under orders to investigate a non-fatal attack on the person of a settler, William Nuggett Morton, at Broadmeadows Station by what Morton described as a group of 15 Myall Warlpiri people who were also in the same area.
From the station, on 24 September, a party consisting of Murray, Morton and half-castes Alex
Wilson and Jack Cusack, embarked on a series of encounters, (three incidents were later described by Murray in which 14 more aborigines were killed, but it is likely there were more). At Tomahawk
waterhole four were killed, while at Circle
Well one was shot dead and Murray killed another with an axe. They then moved east to the Hanson River where another eight were shot. Morton identified all of them as his attackers. The party now returned to Broadmeadows to replenish their supplies before travelling north. No records of this patrol were kept. According to the Warlpiri, this patrol encountered Aborigines at
Dingo Hole where they killed four men and 11 women and children. The Warlpiri also recount how the patrol charged a corroboree at Tippinba, rounding up a large number of Aborigines like cattle before cutting out the women and children and shooting all the men. There is anecdotal evidence that there were up to 100 killed in total at the five sites.
After the Inquiry Constable Murray was quietly removed from his position and moved to
Adelaide where he died in the 1960s. William Morton moved out of the area several years after the massacre. Bullfrog was never arrested and moved to
Yuendumu where he died of old age in the 1970s.
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The seventy-fifth anniversary of the massacre was commemorated on 24 September 2003 near
Yuendumu organised by the Central Land Council.
This link is to a PDF file, you'll find some info and some photo's on the subject, a very moving story.
PDF file
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