| Site Name | Kurundi Station This massacre is part of a group of massacres |
| Aboriginal Place Name | Jarra Jarra |
| Language Group | Warlpiri |
| Present State/Territory | NT |
| Colony/State/Territory at the time | NT |
| Police District | Hatches Creek |
| Latitude | -20.5 |
| Longitude | 134.676 |
| Date | Between 1 Aug 1928 and 31 Oct 1928 |
| Attack Time | |
| Victims | Aboriginal People |
| Victim Descriptions | Aboriginal |
| Victims Killed | 10 |
| Victims Killed Notes | |
| Attackers | Colonisers |
| Attacker Descriptions | Police |
| Attackers Killed | 0 |
| Attackers Killed Notes | |
| Transport | Horse |
| Motive | Opportunity |
| Weapons Used | Firearm(s) |
| Narrative | Bowman (2015, p 90) records the story told by Sonny Curtis Jappanangka: "All the bad things had been happening at Jarra Jarra, Hanson River way, before I was born. People been driven away by the murderers, they came to Dad, frightened. They run away and some stopped at Greenwood [Station] and some kept going to Tennant Creek. Dad said, ‘Go into that yard, they won’t shoot you here.’ And then he told them to move on, in case something else worse might happen. They went through Hatches Creek. Dad’s father was there too. He was a policeman, and so Dad went with them. Dad didn’t like the idea, but he went with his dad. The police and all, one lady, Kitty Napangardi, showed the police trackers where to go. They used that lady, to show the police where the Aboriginal camps were. They dressed her up like a man, haircut like a man. She was from Barrow Creek side. It was cruel that the people used her. They collected my old man at Greenwood and they travelled to Hatches Creek, police and all. Dad was driving the packhorses and somewhere through, Kurundi Station, he was telling me, some of our people were cutting sugarbag by the side of the road, mind their own business hunting. My old man looked over and saw people, and told the woman, ‘Don’t tell them they are there.’ But she did, she went up the front and told the police – and they shot the poor buggers. They were killing anybody, they weren’t looking for people that did the damage over there. They were killing anyone, the government people were. Old people who lived along the Hanson Creek, they were happy, then after the shooting they scattered. But I tell you right now, today even, people are still living in the fear. They are not sure of white people, no trust for them still today. People are not sure what is going to happen. You wonder why our young people are getting stuck into grog – it is to calm their fear, which is the real truth." |
| Sources | Bowman, M (Ed), 2015, "Every Hill Got a Story: We Grew Up in Country", Hardie Grant Books: Richmond, Vic. (Sources PDF) |
| Corroboration Rating | ** |
Colonial Frontier Massacres
in Australia, 1788-1930
