| Site Name | Mirki (2) |
| Aboriginal Place Name | Mirki |
| Language Group | Yolngu, Djinang |
| Present State/Territory | NT |
| Colony/State/Territory at the time | SA |
| Police District | Port Darwin |
| Latitude | -12.104 |
| Longitude | 134.911 |
| Date | Between 1 Jan 1889 and 31 Dec 1896 |
| Attack Time | Day |
| Victims | Aboriginal People |
| Victim Descriptions | |
| Victims Killed | 40 |
| Victims Killed Notes | Certainly dozens of Aboriginal people from a camp named Mirki. |
| Attackers | Colonists |
| Attacker Descriptions | Pastoralist(s) |
| Attackers Killed | 0 |
| Attackers Killed Notes | |
| Transport | Horse |
| Motive | Reprisal |
| Weapons Used | Firearm(s) |
| Narrative | Read and Read (1991, p 24) relate this story from an anonymous person at Milingimbi: “Aboriginal people from a camp at Mirki were killing cattle on Florida Station, near Milingimbi. After confessing to cattle killing, an Aboriginal person was murdered. In a surprise night attack, the adults at the camp were murdered and the surviving children were murdered the following day. The Aboriginal people at the camp hid in trees at the night and the ‘Balanda’ shot up at them - ‘And they all just went falling down onto the ground. Every one of them, just lying there, and not only a few, lots of them’. Gaunt said that Jack Waston was in that area at that time, along with Joe Bradshaw and others, 'Before closing this article I wish to say soon after Jack Watson left Florida Station he was at the Katherine.' and indicated that shooting Aboriginal people was common, 'The shooting of blacks in the early days was necessary to the men who opened up the country. Self-preservation is the first law of nature and with very little police protection we had to take the law in our own hands, or be massacred in cold blood by the abos.' (Northern Standard July 10, 1934, p 6) |
| Sources | Read and Read, 1991, p 24; Gaunt 1934, ‘Old Time Memories, The Lepers of Arnheim [sic] Land and Sketches’ Northern Standard July 10, 1934, p 6 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article48064622; van der Heide, 1985, p 16. (Sources PDF) |
| Corroboration Rating | ** |
