| Narrative | 'On 12 August 1840, a further ten Aborigines were shot by Wedge and his brothers near the Grampians.' (Reece 1974, p 22, cited in Clark, p 157). In a list of killings of Aboriginal people, in the entry for 'Collisions with Messrs. Wedge' which records 10 deaths, Reece notes 'Depends partly on statements of Aborigines' (p222, Reece, 1974). This is a copy of 'Return of Aboriginal Natives killed by the Whites in the District of Port Phillip, distinguishing the numbers East and West of the River Hopkins' (V&P, 1844, 718).
In a letter to Governor Latrobe, Charles Wedge wrote,
"I, with my brothers, removed our stock to the country at the foot of the Grampians, now known as the Grange, on the creeks forming the river Wannon in the Australia Felix of Major Sir Thomas Mitchell... Up to this time we had but little trouble with the aborigines, but they now began to attack our shepherds, whom they drove from their flocks, which they took into the mountains known as the Victoria Range, where they disposed of many hundreds of them by killing, maiming by breaking three of their legs, and otherwise mutilating them in a cruel manner to prevent their escape, and resisting (their numbers giving them confidence) recovery. At this time they also killed a valuable horse and cow belonging to me, and drove away the whole of my milking cattle and working bullocks, some of which returned with spears in them ; and these depredations did not cease till many lives were sacrificed, and, I may say, many thousands of sheep destroyed." (Bride, 1899, p 163)
See also the 'Victoria Valley' massacre. |
