| Site Name | Fighting Waterholes |
| Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander Place Name | |
| Language Group, Nation or People | Wulluwurrung or Nundadjali |
| Present State/Territory | VIC |
| Colony/State/Territory at the time | PPD |
| Police District | Geelong |
| Latitude | -37.47 |
| Longitude | 141.568 |
| Date | 1 Apr 1840 |
| Attack Time | Day |
| Victims | Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander People |
| Victim Descriptions | Aboriginal |
| Victims Killed | 20 |
| Victims Killed Notes | |
| Attackers | Colonists |
| Attacker Descriptions | Stockmen/Drover(s) |
| Attackers Killed | 0 |
| Attackers Killed Notes | |
| Transport | Horse |
| Motive | Opportunity |
| Weapons Used | Firearm(s) |
| Narrative | As reported in Clark (1995, 152), after the massacre at Fighting Hills on 8 March 1840, the Aborigines returned to the Whyte Brothers' Konongwootong station a month later, and stole 'a number of sheep'. After unsuccessfully searching for a trail, 'to teach the Aborigines a lesson', the Whyte brothers and their stockmen separated…The Whytes rode to the nearest station to 'drown their disappointment' and the station hands, including Henry Skilton, William Fox, and two others, Henry and Bassett, 'returned to the home station. En route they passed the waterholes at which were camped some old men, women and children. They shot the entire camp' (Clark 1995, p 153).
William Moodie settled in the region in 1853, not long after the massacre, and wrote in his memoirs, 'So far I have said very little about the blacks at Wando Vale. A few years before we went there they had received severe punishment and so had deserted that part of the country for a time. Reprisals were made after depredations committed at Konong Wootong and were carried out by a party organised by the Whyte brothers, first at the Fighting Waterholes and then by following the poor frightened creatures to the big ti-scrub in the Wando just below the station. A blackfellow told me about it years afterwards in his own way, "Blackfellow all runem along a scrub in creek, lubra look up scrub, white fellow shoot her down. Two hundred fine fat lubra shot". The number may not be reliable, as Jimmy when telling me, only held up his hands two or three times. Any way it was a rather inglorious victory for the Whyte brother's valiant army' (Moodie in Palmer, 1873, p 72). According to local historian ER Trangmar, 'The place where Coleraine's water supply comes from used to be known as the "Fighting Waterholes." There a pitched battle was to have taken place between the angry mounted stockowners, the station hands, and the blacks. Naturally the weapons of the whites would take heavy toll, so the blacks quickly dispersed by slipping through the cordon of mounted men. When the whites reached their objective there was not a blackfellow there. The squatters rode to the nearest homestead and the men told to go home. The station hands came across camp of the old men, picanninies and women. They shot the lot. There was a great outcry at the time but no legal action was taken. The squatters sacked the men. After the massacre at the "Fighting Waterholes" the survivors asked to be allowed to leave the district of Konongwootong and Coleraine; the name of the tribe was Tarer-bur-er and their last chief was named Cart-ware-rer-coot. They went to "Murndal" and joined the Wanedeets on the Wannon river; They stayed there until they died out or went to the Condah Mission Station.' (Trangmar, 1956, p 8). |
| Sources | Clark 1995, pp 152-155; Palmer, 1973, p 72; Trangmar, 1964, p 5. (Sources PDF) |
| Corroboration Rating | ** |
Colonial Frontier Massacres
in Australia, 1788-1930
