Site NameBlack Camp Creek (Spring Gully Creek), Williams River
Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander Place Name
Language Group, Nation or PeopleWorimi
Present State/TerritoryNSW
Colony/State/Territory at the timeNSW
Police DistrictRaymond Terrace
Latitude-32.447
Longitude151.681
DateBetween 1 Jan 1841 and 31 Dec 1841
Attack TimeEvening
VictimsAboriginal or Torres Strait Islander People
Victim DescriptionsAboriginal
Victims Killed20
Victims Killed NotesMen, women and children.
AttackersColonists
Attacker DescriptionsMounted Police
Attackers Killed0
Attackers Killed NotesM
TransportHorse
MotiveReprisal
Weapons UsedFirearm(s)
NarrativeIn 1841, two stockmen employed by settler Timothy Nowlan of 'Walleroba' station on the Williams River, were killed by Worimi warriors. In reprisal, a detachment of mounted police proceeded to pursue the culprits. They came up with a group of Worimi at Black Camp Creek and in the encounter killed all but one of the group and according to local historian RL Ford (1995, p 128), Mundiva (Mundiba) was the sole survivor. According to Clarke and Irwin, the biographers of the Gorton brothers who lived nearby, Nolan was also speared (Clarke and Irwin 1977, p.15). Irwin said that her uncle EDF Gorton was shown the massacre site by his father and grandfather, that the reprisal massacre took place in the evening and that as a lad, the grandfather 'chopped musket balls from the trees, in which it is said that the fearful Aborigines had attempted to find a refuge' (Clarke and Irwin 1977, p.16).
SourcesFord 1995, p 128; Clarke and Irwin 1975, pp15-16. (Sources PDF)
Corroboration Rating**