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George Augustus Robinson

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George Augustus Robinson
Robinson in 1853
Born(1791-03-22)22 March 1791
London, England
Died18 October 1866(1866-10-18) (aged 75)
Bath, Somerset, England
Occupation(s)Builder, Protector of Aborigines
Known for
  • removing Aboriginal Tasmanians into exile
  • documenting Aboriginal society and frontier conflict
  • leading role in enacting both protective and genocidal policies
Spouses
Maria Evans
​
​
(m. 1814; died 1848)​
Rose Pyne
​
(m. 1853)​
Signature

George Augustus Robinson (22 March 1791 – 18 October 1866) was an English born builder and self-trained preacher who was employed by the British colonial authorities to conciliate the Indigenous Australians of Van Diemen's Land and the Port Phillip District to the process of British invasion and colonialisation.[1]

In 1830, Robinson, with the guidance of Aboriginal Tasmanians such as Truganini and Woureddy, led what became known as "the friendly mission" around Van Diemen’s Land, which was organised to establish contact with the surviving Indigenous clans during the Black War. The mission later evolved into a series of further expeditions to round-up these survivors and place them into enforced exile at the Wybalenna Aboriginal Establishment on Flinders Island. From 1835 to 1839, Robinson became the superintendent of this facility, where his mismanagement resulted in the deaths of many of those exiled.[2]

He was appointed Chief Protector of Aborigines by the Aboriginal Protection Board in Port Phillip District, New South Wales in 1839, a position he held until 1849. His documentation of his many travels around what is now the state of Victoria are still a uniquely significant source of historical and cultural information about the Indigenous people of this region and their destruction by British colonists.[2]

Robinson is remembered as a complex and controversial individual who played an important role in both preserving a record of Aboriginal society and also profiteering from enacting genocidal policies against these same people. He is also remembered today for his enthusiastic role in the supply of Aboriginal skeletal remains to English 'collectors'.[3][4][5]

Early life

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Robinson was born on 22 March 1791 in London, England, to William Robinson, a construction worker, and Susannah Robinson (née Perry). He followed his father into the building trade, married Maria Amelia Evans on 28 February 1814, and had five children over the next ten years. He worked as a bricklayer at the Chatham Dockyard and had some involvement with the construction of martello towers along England's coast.[6] Robinson then became a builder in London manufacturing bricks and tiles.[2]

In 1823, Robinson was involved in a financial scandal with a religious institution which resulted in him fleeing England. He made for Scotland, leaving his wife and family under the care of his brother. He sought to leave Britain altogether, initially purchasing a ticket to the Mosquito Coast as part of Gregor MacGregor's fraudulent Poyais scheme. But after hearing that it was a swindle, he instead purchased a steerage berth on a ship to Australia. Robinson failed to convince his wife to come with him and sailed in September 1823 alone.[2]

Van Diemen's Land

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Robinson with Tasmanian Aborigines

Robinson arrived in Hobart in January 1824. He established himself as a builder and was soon employing several men. He was secretary of the Bethel Union and was a committee member of the Auxiliary Bible Society, also helping to found the Van Diemen's Land Mechanics' Institution. He was allocated a block of land in the township upon which he built a house and was joined by his wife and children in April 1826.[6]

The "friendly mission"

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Bloody conflict between the colonists and the Aboriginal Tasmanians had vastly increased during the 1820s, which evolved into what is known as the Black War. In 1829, Governor George Arthur ordered the establishment of ration station on Bruny Island as a token gesture of goodwill toward the local Nuenonne people who had remained at peace with the British. Robinson had expressed a strong interest in preaching Christianity to the Aborigines and Arthur appointed him as manager of this station where he quickly became familiar with the Nuenonne people, language and customs. However, by the end of the year, almost all of these Aboriginal people had died from introduced disease and violence.[2]

Despite this catastrophe, Robinson conveyed to Governor Arthur the idea his travelling to the uncolonised regions of western Van Diemen's Land where he would conciliate the local Aboriginal clans to be at peace with the British invaders. Arthur accepted this idea and in 1830 Robinson led what became known as the "friendly mission". Robinson had befriended Truganini and Woureddy, two of the few surviving Nuenonne people, and with several other Aboriginal people, they acted as guides for Robinson on the trek through the rugged west coast.[2]

Robinson investigated the Cape Grim massacre that had occurred in 1828 and reported that 30 Aborigines had been massacred. Robinson was to be brought in as a "conciliator" between settlers and Aboriginal people.[7] His mission was to round up the Aboriginal people to resettle them at the camp of Wybalenna on Flinders Island.

With Truganini, Robinson succeeded in forging an agreement with the Big River and Oyster Bay peoples, and by the end of 1835, nearly all the Aboriginal people had been relocated to the new settlement.

Robinson's involvement with the Aboriginal Tasmanians ended soon after this, though, and the Wybalenna settlement became more akin to a prison as the camp conditions deteriorated and many of the residents died of ill health and homesickness. Because of this, Robinson's place in history is generally viewed as negative, especially within the current Aboriginal community. Some historians agree that his initial intentions were genuine, but his abandonment of the community is viewed as a turning point for the worse for the Tasmanian Aboriginals. Moreover, his promises of providing a place where Aboriginal people could practise their cultural traditions and ceremonies never came to fruition.[citation needed]

Chief Protector of Aborigines in Port Phillip District

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George Augustus Robinson

Robinson became Chief Protector of Aborigines in March 1839, managing the Protectorate of Port Phillip with the help of four Assistant Protectors, William Thomas, James Dredge, Edward Stone Parker and Charles Sievwright. Maria, Robinson's wife died in 1848.

During his decade of service as Chief Protector he made more than 20 expeditions into the four districts of the Aboriginal Protectorate.[8]

Robinson was paid a total of £8000 in his role as protector of Aborigines. He built a small community that included a church and coined the area 'Point Civilisation'. Many of the Aborigines who lived at the port had been removed under false pretenses from their true home in Tasmania.[9]

In 1841 and 1842, Robinson traveled to western Victoria with Tunnerminnerwait where he investigated and reported on the Convincing Ground massacre that had occurred in 1833 or 1834.[10] In 1841 he investigated a gunshot incident, and whilst travelling came across the aboriginal aquaculture site of Lake Condah, recording its dimensions.[11]

His journals are regarded as amongst the most important documents on the early years of European settlement in Victoria. They offer significant observations on Koorie culture, early Melbourne personalities, the landscape and settler society.

Later life

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The Port Phillip Protectorate was abolished on 31 December 1849, with Robinson receiving a pension. He returned to England in 1852 and the following year married Rose Pyne, with whom he had another five children. The couple spent five years living in Europe, mostly in Paris and Rome. In 1859 they settled in Bath, England, where Robinson died on 18 October 1866 at the age of 75.[6]

Robinson in contemporary culture

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Semi-fictional accounts of Robinson's travels are included in Matthew Kneale's book English Passengers and in T. C. Boyle's short story "The Extinction Tales", and Robinson is a major character in Richard Flanagan's 2008 novel Wanting. There is a reference to Robinson in the book The Lost Diamonds of Killiecrankie by Gary Crew and Peter Gouldthorpe, and in Following the Equator, by Mark Twain.[12] Robert Drewes' 'Savage Crows' also incorporates the work of Robinson into the plot. See also Mudrooroo's critical portrayal of Robinson in Doctor Wooreddy's Prescription for Enduring the Ending of the World, Master of the Ghost Dreaming and his Vampire Trilogy: The Undying, Underground and The Promised Land. Additionally, Cassandra Pybus' 2020 biography of Truganini, entitled Truganini: Journey Through the Apocalypse provides a detailed account of Robinson's personal relationship with Truganini and the traumatic psychological and cultural shifts experienced by Aboriginal Tasmanians.

Tasmanian artist Julie Gough referenced Robinson and his work in her recent exhibition Tense Past at Tasmania Museum & Art Gallery.[13]

Robinson and museum collections

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During Robinson's time in Tasmania and Victoria, he collected a large number of objects and artworks from the Aboriginal communities there. He also collected human skulls[3] and other Aboriginal remains.[4] After his death, his widow Rose sold the items to many museums. The British Museum has 138 items relating to Robinson's time in Australia, including Aboriginal artefacts, prints and drawings.[14] Joseph Barnard Davis acquired many from Robinson's widow in the 1860s, and it may be through his activities that objects subsequently found their way into other collections, for example at the British Museum.[15] Leeds Discovery Centre has two spears he collected. The Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford holds nineteen objects relating to Robinson's time abroad.[16] The collection at Pitt Rivers includes several paintings and prints describing individual people from Aboriginal communities, including: Truggernana,[17] Jenny,[18] and Fanny,[19] amongst others.

Notes

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  1. ^ Ryan, Lyndall (2012). Tasmanian Aborigines. Crows Nest: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 9781742370682.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Rae-Ellis, Vivienne (1988). Black Robinson. Carlton: Melbourne University Press. ISBN 0522847447.
  3. ^ a b Paul Thomas. Austl. Indigenous Law Rev. 92 (2007). Scientific Theft of Remains in Colonial Australia. 92: 92-103
  4. ^ a b https://www.britishmuseum.org/sites/default/files/2019-11/Final_Dossier.pdf [bare URL PDF]
  5. ^ Pybus, Cassandra (2024). A Very Secret Trade. Crows Nest: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 9781761066344.
  6. ^ a b c "Robinson, George Augustus (1791–1866". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Vol. 2. Canberra: National Centre of Biography, Australian National University. 1967. ISBN 978-0-522-84459-7. ISSN 1833-7538. OCLC 70677943. Retrieved 20 May 2020.
  7. ^ Howarth, Carla (5 October 2019). "Planned dig at George Augustus Robinson historical site sparks Aboriginal concerns". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 5 October 2019.
  8. ^ Clark, Ian D., ed. (1998). The journals of George Augustus Robinson, Chief Protector, Port Phillip Aboriginal Protectorate, Volume Four: 1 January 1844 – 24 October 1845 (First ed.). Melbourne: Heritage Matters. p. vi. ISBN 1-876404-04-3.
  9. ^ BBC Four, Racism: A History, Part two of three, 'Fatal Impacts', Broadcast on Thursday 27 September 2007
  10. ^ Ian D. Clark, pp17-22, Scars on the Landscape. A Register of Massacre sites in Western Victoria 1803-1859, Aboriginal Studies Press, 1995 ISBN 0-85575-281-5 Excerpt also published on Museum Victoria website Archived 5 September 2012 at the Wayback Machine, accessed 26 November 2008
  11. ^ "Aboriginal Aquaculture". Lapham's Quarterly. 6 August 2018. Retrieved 16 August 2019.
  12. ^ Mark Twain, (Samuel Clemens) (18 August 2006) [First published 1897]. "Chapter 27: Man is the Only Animal that Blushes. Or needs to.". In Widger, David (ed.). Following the Equator (EBook #2895 ed.). Retrieved 7 January 2022 – via Project Gutenberg. The Conciliator
  13. ^ Harmon, Steph (27 June 2019). "Murders, Massacres and the Black War". The Guardian. London.
  14. ^ "Collection Search – George Augustus Robinson". The British Museum. Retrieved 16 August 2019.
  15. ^ "George Augustus Robinson". The British Museum. Retrieved 16 August 2019.
  16. ^ "Collection Search – George Augustus Robinson". Pitt Rivers Museum. Retrieved 16 August 2019.
  17. ^ "Truggernana". Pitt Rivers Museum. Retrieved 16 August 2019.
  18. ^ "Jenny". Pitt Rivers Museum. Retrieved 16 August 2019.
  19. ^ "Fanny". Pitt Rivers Museum. Retrieved 16 August 2019.

References

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