ABORIGINAL HISTORY Volume forty-one 2017 ABORIGINAL HISTORY Volume forty-one 2017 Published by ANU Press and Aboriginal History Inc. The Australian National University Acton ACT 2601, Australia Email: [email protected] This title is also available online at press.anu.edu.au All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. Aboriginal History Incorporated Aboriginal History Inc. is a part of the Australian Centre for Indigenous History, Research School of Social Sciences, The Australian National University, and gratefully acknowledges the support of the School of History and the National Centre for Indigenous Studies, The Australian National University. Aboriginal History Inc. is administered by an Editorial Board which is responsible for all unsigned material. Views and opinions expressed by the author are not necessarily shared by Board members. Members of the Editorial Board Maria Nugent (Chair), Tikka Wilson (Secretary), Rob Paton (Treasurer/Public Officer), Ingereth Macfarlane (Co-Editor), Liz Conor (Co-Editor), Luise Hercus (Review Editor), Annemarie McLaren (Associate Review Editor), Rani Kerin (Monograph Editor), Brian Egloff, Karen Fox, Sam Furphy, Niel Gunson, Geoff Hunt, Dave Johnston, Shino Konishi, Harold Koch, Ann McGrath, Ewen Maidment, Isabel McBryde, Peter Read, Julia Torpey, Lawrence Bamblett. Editors: Ingereth Macfarlane and Liz Conor; Book Review Editors: Luise Hercus and Annemarie McLaren; Copyeditor: Geoff Hunt. About Aboriginal History Aboriginal History is a refereed journal that presents articles and information in Australian ethnohistory and contact and post-contact history of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Historical studies based on anthropological, archaeological, linguistic and sociological research, including comparative studies of other ethnic groups such as Pacific Islanders in Australia, are welcomed. Subjects include recorded oral traditions and biographies, narratives in local languages with translations, previously unpublished manuscript accounts, archival and bibliographic articles, and book reviews. For more information please visit aboriginalhistory.org.au Contacting Aboriginal History All correspondence should be addressed to the Editors, Aboriginal History Inc., ACIH, School of History, RSSS, 9 Fellows Road (Coombs Building), Acton, ANU, 2601, or [email protected]. Sales and orders for journals and monographs, and journal subscriptions: Thelma Sims, email: Thelma.Sims@anu. edu.au WARNING: Readers are notified that this publication may contain names or images of deceased persons. Cover design and layout by ANU Press This edition © 2017 ANU Press and Aboriginal History Inc. ISSN 0314-8769 (print) ISSN 1837-9389 (electronic edition) Contents Preface . ix Ingereth Macfarlane Contributors . xix Articles Other picture boards in Van Diemen’s Land: The recovery of lost illustrations of frontier violence and relationships . 3 Nicholas Dean Brodie and Kristyn Harman The murder of Melaityappa and how Judge Mann succeeded in making ‘the administration of justice palatable’ to South Australian colonists in 1849 . 23 Skye Krichauff Mobilising across colour lines: Intimate encounters between Aboriginal women and African American and other allied servicemen on the World War II Australian home front . 47 Karen Hughes Deaconess Winifred Hilliard and the cultural brokerage of the Ernabella craft room . 71 Diana J .B . Young ‘The happiest time of my life …’: Emotive visitor books and early mission tourism to Victoria’s Aboriginal reserves . 95 Nikita Vanderbyl Two Victorian corroborees: Meaning making in response to European intrusion . 121 Janice Newton The homestead as fortress: Fact or folklore? . 151 Heather Burke, Lynley A . Wallis, Bryce Barker, Megan Tutty, Noelene Cole, Iain Davidson, Elizabeth Hatte and Kelsey Lowe Book Reviews Settler Colonialism and (Re)conciliation: Frontier Violence, Affective Performances and Imaginative Refoundings . 179 by Penelope Edmonds Gumbaynggirr Yuludarla Jandaygam: Gumbaynggirr Dreaming Story Collection . 183 edited by Steve Morelli, Gary Williams, Dallas Walker Yijarni: True Stories from Gurindji Country . 185 edited by Erika Charola and Felicity Meakins Pictures from My Memory: My Story as a Ngaatjatjarra Woman . 189 by Lizzie Marrkilyi Ellis, introduced and edited by Laurent Dousset Fragile Settlements: Aboriginal Peoples, Law, and Resistance in South-West Australia and Prairie Canada . 193 by Amanda Nettelbeck, Russell Smandych, Louis A. Knafla and Robert Foster Photography, Humanitarianism, Empire . 197 by Jane Lydon ‘Every Mother’s Son is Guilty’: Policing in the Kimberley Frontier of Western Australia 1882–1905 . 201 by Chris Owen Mistress of Everything: Queen Victoria in Indigenous Worlds . 205 edited by Sarah Carter and Maria Nugent Into the Heart of Tasmania: A Search for Human Antiquity . 209 by Rebe Taylor The Aboriginal People of the Burragorang Valley: ‘If we left the valley our hearts would break’ . 213 by Jim Smith Making a Difference: Fifty Years of Indigenous Programs at Monash University, 1964–2014 . 217 by Rani Kerin Indigenous Australians, Social Justice and Legal Reform: Honouring Elliott Johnston . 219 edited by Hossein Ismaeili, Gus Worby and Simone Tur Constitutional Recognition of First Peoples in Australia: Theories and Comparative Perspectives . 219 edited by Simon Young, Jennifer Nielson and Jeremy Patrick Treaty and Statehood: Aboriginal Self-determination . 219 by Michael Mansell Wanarn Painters of Place and Time: Old Age Travels in the Tjukurrpa . 225 by David Brooks and Darren Jorgensen Hidden in Plain View: The Aboriginal People of Coastal Sydney . 229 by Paul Irish A Handful of Sand: The Gurindji Struggle, After the Walk-off . 233 by Charlie Ward Atomic Thunder: The Maralinga Story . 235 by Elizabeth Tynan Information for authors . 237 Aboriginal History Monograph Series . 239 Preface Ingereth Macfarlane 1977–2017: Aboriginal History journal celebrates 40 years of publication The first volume of the journal Aboriginal History was published in 1977, 40 years ago. The cultural tenor of that time is evoked by remembering other events of ’77 – the publication of Helen Garner’s first novel, Monkey Grip; the first Star Wars film; the release of the Ranger Uranium Inquiry report; Premier Bjelke-Peterson’s ban on street protest in Queensland; the formation of the Australian Democrats by Don Chipp; and the passing of the NSW Heritage Act. It was the year the Apple II computer and the Voyager satellite were launched. It was a time of innovation, upheaval and consolidation of postwar social changes. Tom Stannage, on Aboriginal History’s first Editorial Board, saw the establishment of both Aboriginal History and the feminist journal Hecate in 1977 as part of a shift in the questions being asked by historians, a ‘rejection’ of ‘the older established ways of presenting Australian history’.1 Our 40th anniversary offers an opportunity to reflect on the history and future of the journal, and to celebrate the landmark of its foundation and its continuance. This chance was embraced on 27 October 2017, in the form of a masterclass on writing and publishing for early career researchers in the field, and a symposium of past contributors. Their insights and perspectives will be published in a future volume of the journal. 1 Stannage 1979: x. This can be seen to be building on the pioneering historical work of Beckett 1958 [2005]; Inglis 1962; Barwick 1963; Reay 1964; Corris 1968; Gale 1972; Curthoys 1973; Markus 1974; Reece 1974; and the landmark publication in 1970 of Charles Rowley’s The Destruction of Aboriginal Society, Outcasts in White Australia and The Remote Aborigines. ix ABORIGINAL HISTORY VOL 41 2017 Bain Attwood has previously written an extensive account of the origins of the journal.2 As one of the journal’s editors, I add some reflections here on what I think are principles and perspectives that have guided the journal’s ethos, approach and content. The possibilities for the foundation of a new journal were laid out by its prime initiator, Pacific historian Niel Gunson in 1975: Foundation of the Board and general policy meeting Thursday 4 September 1975, Staff Centre ANU The first object of the Journal is to provide a much-needed vehicle for the publication of articles and information in the area of Australian ethnohistory … The Journal will serve as a publication outlet for the increasing number of scholars working in the field of Aboriginal history, bringing together material which now tends to be scattered and to go unnoticed in more general periodicals. The existence of the Journal could stimulate further interest and research in Aboriginal history … considerable importance will be attached to Aboriginal oral tradition, vernacular writings etc. Through its Notes and Documents section – with unpublished MSS, oral traditions, archives, bibliographies – the Journal will also serve as a means of recording Aboriginal history from its source. Another important object will be to provide Aboriginals with readily accessible information on Aboriginal history … Finally, there is increasing public interest in Aboriginal history, both in schools and in the media. In this way the Journal is likely to achieve a wider readership than other scholarly periodicals and will thus serve a valuable social function.3 Hence, the primary