Governor Davey's Proclamation is a misnomer for an illustrated proclamation issued in Van Diemen's Land by the British colonial authorities after 1 November 1828. Although occasionally attributed to Governor Thomas Davey, it was first authorised by Lieutenant Governor George Arthur. [2] Several illustrated narrative versions of the proclamation were created over time. [3] Many of these four-strip pictograms [4] were originally painted onto Huon pine boards using oil paints. [5] Of approximately 100 proclamation boards produced there are seven known to survive in public collections. [6]
The proclamation was intended to explain martial law during the period in Tasmanian history referred to as the Black War. [7]
The pictogram scenes that depict Aboriginal Tasmanians and white settlers were based on drawings by surveyor and artist George Frankland, who suggested in a letter to Lieutenant Governor George Arthur that they should be tied to trees in remote areas of the island. [8] [9] The proclamation boards were designed to communicate to the Aboriginal Tasmanians that anyone in Van Diemen's Land would be treated equally under colonial law. [4] Historian Penelope Edmonds notes that the boards "were made after the 1829 declaration of martial law against Tasmania's Aboriginal people, and the hangings from trees actually depict moments of summary justice and retribution on a violent frontier." [10]
The proclamation boards were reproduced by convict artists. [11] The drawing was mass-produced by pricking the outline of a drawing with a pin, in a technique known as pouncing or spolvero. [11] Charcoal was then dusted through the pinholes and pounded to make an outline. [11]
The editor reported in the Hobart newspaper on 5th March 1830 that "We are informed that the Government have given directions for the painting of a large number of pictures to be placed in the bush for the contemplation of the Aboriginal inhabitants." [12] [11]
A ceramic cup made by Tasmanian potter Violet Mace in 1934 is sometimes described as the 'proclamation cup' as it is hand-painted with a series of images that are derivative of those found on the proclamation boards. The cup is held in the collection of the National Museum of Australia. [10] [13]
Tasmania is an island state of Australia. It is located 240 kilometres (150 miles) to the south of the Australian mainland, separated from it by the Bass Strait, with the archipelago containing the southernmost point of the country. The state encompasses the main island of Tasmania, the 26th-largest island in the world, and the surrounding 1000 islands. It is Australia's least populous state, with 569,825 residents as of December 2021. The state capital and largest city is Hobart, with around 40 percent of the population living in the Greater Hobart area. This makes it Australia's most decentralised state.
The Aboriginal Tasmanians are the Aboriginal people of the Australian island of Tasmania, located south of the mainland. For much of the 20th century, the Tasmanian Aboriginal people were widely, and erroneously, thought of as being an extinct cultural and ethnic group that had been intentionally exterminated by white settlers. Contemporary figures (2016) for the number of people of Tasmanian Aboriginal descent vary according to the criteria used to determine this identity, ranging from 6,000 to over 23,000.
Truganini, also known as Lallah Rookh was an Aboriginal Tasmanian woman. She was one of the last native speakers of the Tasmanian languages and one of the last individuals solely of Aboriginal Tasmanian descent.
George Augustus Robinson was a British-born colonial official and self-trained preacher in colonial Australia. In 1824, Robinson travelled to Hobart, Van Diemen’s Land, where he attempted to negotiate a peace between European settlers and Aboriginal Tasmanians prior to the outbreak of the Black War. 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.
The Black War was a period of violent conflict between British colonists and Aboriginal Tasmanians in Tasmania from the mid-1820s to 1832. The conflict, fought largely as a guerrilla war by both sides, claimed the lives of 600 to 900 Aboriginal people and more than 200 British colonists. The near-destruction of the Aboriginal Tasmanians and the frequent incidence of mass killings have sparked debate among historians over whether the Black War should be defined as an act of genocide.
The history of Tasmania begins at the end of the Last Glacial Period when it is believed that the island was joined to the Australian mainland. Little is known of the human history of the island until the British colonisation of Tasmania in the 19th century.
Sir George Arthur, 1st Baronet was Lieutenant Governor of British Honduras from 1814 to 1822 and of Van Diemen's Land from 1823 to 1836. The campaign against Aboriginal Tasmanians, known as the Black War, occurred during this term of office. He later served as Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada from 1838 to 1841, and Governor of Bombay from 1842 to 1846.
John Batman was an Australian grazier, entrepreneur and explorer. He is best known for his role in the founding of Melbourne.
The history of Australia from 1788 to 1850 covers the early British colonial period of Australia's history. This started with the arrival in 1788 of the First Fleet of British ships at Port Jackson on the lands of the Eora, and the establishment of the penal colony of New South Wales as part of the British Empire. It further covers the European scientific exploration of the continent and the establishment of the other Australian colonies that make up the modern states of Australia.
Thomas Davey was a New South Wales Marine and member of the First Fleet to New South Wales, who went on to become the second Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemen's Land.
Campbell Town is a town in Tasmania, Australia, on the Midland Highway. At the 2021 census, the town had a population of 823.
Mount Barrow is a mountain in the northern region of Tasmania, Australia. With an elevation of 1,406 metres (4,613 ft) above sea level, the mountain is located 22 kilometres (14 mi) east-north-east of Launceston. The mountain habitat is a mixture of temperate old growth rainforest, subalpine and alpine landscapes.
Andrew Bent was a printer, publisher and newspaper proprietor, active in Australia. He established the first successful newspaper in Tasmania, was the first Australian newspaperman to print a newspaper free from government control, and the first Australian printer to be imprisoned for libel.
William Buelow Gould was an English and Van Diemonian (Tasmanian) painter. He was transported to Australia as a convict in 1827, after which he would become one of the most important early artists in the colony, despite never really separating himself from his life of crime.
The Roving Party is a 2011 novel written by Tasmanian author Rohan Wilson. Wilson's first book, it is published by Allen & Unwin. The Roving Party won the 2011 Vogel Award. The novel was also shortlisted for the 2011 Victorian Premier's Literary Awards Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction.
Bruny Island Tasmanian, or Nuenonne ("Nyunoni"), a name shared with Southeast Tasmanian, is an Aboriginal language or pair of languages of Tasmania in the reconstruction of Claire Bowern. It was spoken on Bruny Island, off the southeastern coast of Tasmania, by the Bruny tribe.
Henry Saxelby Melville Wintle, commonly referred to as Henry Melville, was an Australian journalist, author, occultist, and Freemason best remembered for writing the play The Bushrangers, his historical work The History of Van Diemen's Land From the Year 1824 to 1835, and his occult philosophical work Veritas: Revelation of Mysteries, Biblical, Historical, and Social by Means of the Median and Persian Laws. His life was dramatized in the 1882 Princess Theatre (Bendigo) production Found, or Found Drowned.
The 1828 Proclamation of Demarcation was issued by George Arthur, governor of Tasmania, and ordered the white colonial populations and Tasmanian Aboriginal populations be temporarily separated from each other. Arthur clarified that the proclamation would not limit Aboriginals from traveling through Tasmania to shellfish hunting territories, provided a passport was coordinated with their leaders. The proclamation was justified as protecting Aboriginals from violence from colonists, and to protect the colonists from "repeated and wanton barbarous murders and other crimes" by the Aboriginals.
Douglas Thomas Kilburn was an English-born watercolour painter and professional daguerreotypist who operated in Melbourne 1847–49, producing some of the earliest portrait photographs of indigenous Australians