Black War
The Black War refers to a violent conflict that occurred in Tasmania, Australia, between British colonists and the Indigenous Aboriginal Australians during the early 19th century. The war was ignited when colonists opened fire on an Aboriginal hunting party, leading to escalating violence as the British attempted to seize land crucial for Aboriginal survival and culture. With tactics including kidnapping and armed assaults, the colonists aimed to drive the Aboriginal peoples from their ancestral lands, leading to significant loss of life and culture within the Indigenous population.
Despite their resistance through guerrilla warfare strategies, the Aboriginal Australians, facing overwhelming colonial military force and devastating diseases brought by the colonists, saw their numbers dwindle. The situation culminated in the creation of the "Black Line," a military operation intended to forcibly remove the remaining Aboriginal peoples from Tasmania, which ultimately failed to achieve its goal.
By the end of the conflict, only about two hundred Aboriginal individuals remained on the island, a population that had been decimated by violence and disease. The Black War is recognized as a tragic chapter in Australian history, often regarded as a genocide that nearly eradicated the Tasmanian Aboriginal population. Today, however, the Aboriginal community in Tasmania has seen a resurgence, with the 2016 census reporting over twenty-three thousand individuals of Aboriginal descent living in the region.
Black War
The Black War was a violent conflict between the British colonists in Tasmania, Australia and the Aboriginal Australians who originally inhabited the island. When Tasmania was first colonised by the British, they seized many of the best hunting lands, killing off animals that were important to the Aboriginal peoples’ way of life. When a group of colonists opened fire on an Aboriginal hunting party, a violent conflict ensued.
As the Black War escalated, the British colonists tried to drive the Aboriginal Australians off their land. Their tactics included including kidnapping, raping, poisoning and shooting. The Aboriginal peoples did not a population large enough or the weapons needed to resist the larger colonial force, so they instead engaged in guerrilla warfare by burning homes and crops and killing livestock.
When the violence between the two groups peaked, the colonists formed the Black Line, a large military gathering designed to force the few remaining Aboriginal Australians to leave the island. The Black Line was a failure, however. Only about two hundred Aboriginal peoples had remained on the island and they were guerrilla fighters who adapt at hiding. Over time, the government managed to convince them to go to another island.
British Arrival in Australia
Before the British arrived in Australia, more than 750,000 Aboriginal Australians in more than 500 groups lived there. Then in 1770, James Cook claimed a large portion of Australia for Great Britain. The British government decided to create a penal colony in the area, which would relieve some of Britain’s overcrowded prisons. It would also serve to expand British interests in the region, making it more difficult for other colonial powers to dispute Britain’s control of the continent.
As soon as they arrived in Australia, British colonists began seizing land that was occupied by the Aboriginal peoples. They inadvertently brought new diseases to Australia for which the Aboriginal peoples had no immunity. Many of the Aboriginal Australians died from smallpox, influenza and measles. The British also engaged in violent conflicts with the land’s inhabitants, further reducing their population.
Conflicts and War
Britain first colonised Tasmania in 1803, building outposts on both the Derwent and Tamar rivers. Initially, these outposts remained small, with just a few thousand colonists within them. Because of this, the Aboriginal peoples retained control of most of the island. They did not feel threatened by the small number of colonists, so there was little conflict between the two groups.
In 1804, violent exchanges between the British and the Aboriginal Australians began to occur. The British had claimed some of the island’s best hunting land. When the Aboriginal Australians continued to use the land, they were met with violent resistance from the colonists. In May of that year, a colonial military detachment opened fire on an Aboriginal hunting party, sparking the Black War. This was further enflamed when colonists began hunting kangaroos, an important food in Aboriginal culture.
The Aboriginal Australians were not strong enough to fight the European colonial military. There were not enough of them and they lacked the weapons needed to succeed in battle. Instead, they resorted to guerrilla tactics, attacking small groups of colonists before retreating.
In the mid-1820s, the British colonists began to press towards the centre of the island. This caused a great deal of tension between them and the Aboriginal peoples. Additionally, members of the colonial groups began raping female Aboriginal Australians, leading to calls for retribution. Soon, the number of violent encounters between the Aboriginal peoples and colonists increased. In 1824, the Aboriginal guerrilla fighters attacked the colonists about twenty times. By 1830, they had attacked them 259 times. Additionally, Aboriginal war parties destroyed property, killing livestock and burning down homes.
Over time, the Aboriginal Australians began losing ground in the Black War. They kept on killing colonists and destroying property, but new colonists continued to arrive on the island. Furthermore, as the Aboriginal peoples continued to die in military conflict and from disease, the number of guerrilla fighters began to dwindle.
In 1830, Lieutenant Governor George Arthur attempted to end the conflict by segregating Aboriginal Australians, making them stay on the island’s South-eastern peninsula. The colonists banded together to force them to abandon their homes. This large military group, called the Black Line, used violence to force the Aboriginal Australians to relocate. In general, however, the Black Line failed and resulted in more violence between the two groups. However, eventually, the government convinced the small number of remaining Aboriginals to relocate to the island of Flinders, away from the colonists. This ended the Black War, with the colonists retaining complete control of the island.
However, despite the European colonists’ attempts to force the Aboriginal peoples out of Tasmania, they continued to thrive. Near the end of the Black War, the Aboriginal population in Tasmania was estimated at roughly two hundred individuals. According to the 2016 census, more than twenty-three thousand Aboriginal Australians lived in Tasmania.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the six Aboriginal Australian colonies merged into one federated Australian Commonwealth. At this point, the Australian government was an independent state and no longer a colony of Great Britain. During the next century, Australia gradually eliminated all of Britain’s legal authority within its borders.
Bibliography
“British Settlement Begins in Australia.” History.com, 2020, www.history.com/this-day-in-history/australia-day. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
“Colonial period, 1788 – 1901.” Australian War Memorial, 2020, www.awm.gov.au/articles/atwar/colonial#:~:text=British%20settlement%20of%20Australia%20began,colonies%20with%20little%20local%20assistance. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
“Colonisation.” Australians Together, 2020, australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/colonisation/. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
“First Australian Penal Colony Established.” History.com, 2020, www.history.com/this-day-in-history/first-australian-penal-colony-established. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
Harmon, Steph. “Murders, Massacres, and the Black War: Julie Gough’s Horrifying Journey in Colonial Genocide.” The Guardian, 27 Jan. 2019, www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/jun/27/murders-massacres-and-the-black-war-julie-goughs-horrifying-journey-in-colonial-genocide. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
“The Black Line.” National Museum Australia, 2020, www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/the-black-line. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
“Tasmania's Black War: A Tragic Case of Lest We Remember?” The Conversation, 24 Apr. 2014, theconversation.com/tasmanias-black-war-a-tragic-case-of-lest-we-remember-25663. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.
“The Black War: Tasmania Still Torn By Its History.” NITV, 20 Apr. 2018, www.sbs.com.au/nitv/nitv-news/article/2018/04/19/black-war-tasmania-still-torn-its-history. Accessed 8 Dec. 2020.