| Narrative | Following an alleged killing of two settlers by Bediagal people in May 1795, Capt Paterson of the NSW Corps despatched two subalterns and 66 soldiers to the Hawkesbury with orders to, 'drive the natives to a distance' and, in the hope of striking terror, 'to erect gibbets in different places, whereon the bodies of all they might kill were to be hung.' (Collins in Fletcher 1975, p 348) According to military historian John Connor, 'on their arrival the detachment forced an Aboriginal boy to reveal the location of a Darug group, probably members of the Bediagal. That night the soldiers made contact with the Darug in the forest not far from the farms. The roar of muskets filled the night air, followed by the screams of the wounded and dying. The soldiers saw seven or eight of the [Bediagal] fall down in the undergrowth, but when they went out next morning to find the bodies and string them up they found that the [Bediagal] had carried away their comrades' bodies during the night.' (Connor 2002, p 38) |
