| Site Name | Kimberley Mass Poisoning |
| Aboriginal Place Name | |
| Language Group | Multiple Kimberley |
| Present State/Territory | WA |
| Colony/State/Territory at the time | WA |
| Police District | Kimberley |
| Latitude | -17.167 |
| Longitude | 125.583 |
| Date | Between 1 Jan 1890 and 31 Dec 1890 |
| Attack Time | |
| Victims | Aboriginal People |
| Victim Descriptions | Aboriginal |
| Victims Killed | 20 |
| Victims Killed Notes | |
| Attackers | Colonists |
| Attacker Descriptions | Settler(s) |
| Attackers Killed | 0 |
| Attackers Killed Notes | |
| Transport | Horse |
| Motive | Opportunity |
| Weapons Used | Poison |
| Narrative | It was reported in the Sydney Morning Herald that WM Burton had spent four years in the Kimberley district of Western Australia and he recounted how a man with whom he camped admitted to murdering Aboriginal people (calling them 'rubbish') by giving them poisoned meat. ‘In Kimberley the native is merely a dog, and used by all classes of the community as a slave and rouseabout...But the atrocious way those poor blacks are driven' from pillar to post and accused of cattle killing, is appalling. One man with whom I camped for some time told me that to get rid of the rubbish he made them a present of a poisoned bullock, and then watched the corroboree. The blacks died in dozen’s round the camp fires’ (SMH, December 24, 1910, p 5). |
| Sources | SMH December 24, 1910, p 5 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article15216573;The Daily News, January 24, 1911, p 1 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article81758288 (Sources PDF) |
| Corroboration Rating | * |
