William Todd has been growing frustrated over the past few days and, if truth be told, a little nervous. He can’t quite put his finger on it but in this place heavy with the scent of wood smoke and eucalyptus, he can sense something else in the cold air, a vaguely menacing threat.
For the past two weeks the number of Aboriginals coming to the camp on the edge of Port Phillip Bay has been growing and no amount of pleading – let alone bribing with food and trinkets – has managed to get them to leave. Just two days earlier he had cooked up a large batch of damper bread – 60 pounds of valuable flour he’d used – and they consumed it all. And that had followed a batch of 100 pounds a week earlier. There seems to be no end to their appetite, nor any inclination to leave.
Todd and the rest of the crew have done everything they can to encourage them to go. Two mornings ago everyone went without breakfast to try and show them they had run out of food. But if men like Joe the Marine, Pigeon, Bullet – some of the Sydney Aboriginals hired by Todd’s master – cannot persuade them to go, then what chance has he?
The locals seem to be having a fine old time, singing each night, staging corroborees, encouraging their children to stay with the white men. They have laughed and smiled and all the while set about stealing everything of value. Axes have gone missing and food supplies are running dangerously low; the 90 square yards of freshly turned earth Todd and others have just sown will not be producing any onions, turnips and carrots for months. They have caught fish and the odd kangaroo. But if this keeps up – if this small encampment of eight men continues to be expected to feed a village – then Todd is starting to wonder what will happen when the food runs out.
Each night he takes out his brown calf leather journal and dutifully records the day’s events, a diary the man he serves, John Batman, has asked him to keep. The past month has been extraordinary, even for those accustomed to life with Batman. The voyage from Van Diemen’s Land had been hard enough; strong winds and heavy seas pushing them back for a fortnight each time they tried to cross Bass Strait. And then, after making their way into Port Phillip Bay, came that historic day when Batman signed his treaty with representatives of several tribes, leasing more than 600,000 acres of the best grazing land anyone had seen. And the price? An annual rental of 40 blankets, 30 axes, 100 knives and some handkerchiefs and flour! Had anyone ever struck a deal like it?
Batman, intoxicated by this triumph, has returned to Launceston to replenish supplies and inform his partners and backers about the deal. His own journal flows with praise for this new country. Everywhere he has looked Batman has seen endless pastures and grass-filled plains. On the Keilor Plains he spies ‘the most beautiful sheep pasturage I ever saw in my life. I am sure I can see 50,000 acres of land in one direction and not 50 trees.’
A few days after this, on Saturday 6 June, Batman and his crew had fallen in with a family of local Aboriginals and, after shaking hands, ‘and my giving them tomahawks, knives &c – they took us with them about a mile back where we found huts, women and children. After some time and full explanation, I found eight Chiefs amongst them who possessed the whole of the country near Port Phillip – three brothers, all of the same name, are the principal chiefs, and two of them men of six feet high and very good looking; the other not so tall but stouter. The other five chiefs were fine men – and after a full explanation of what my object was, I purchased two large tracts of Land from them about 600,000 Acres more or less and delivered over to them, Blankets Knives, looking Glasses, Tomahawks, Beads Scissors, flour &c &c.’
Batman has met with elders of the Wurundjeri and Boonwurrung people, including the towering Billibellary, a ngurungaeta of the Wurundjeri-willam clan. Controversy will swirl around this ‘treaty’ for centuries. It will be the only formal document ever offered by Europeans to Aboriginal people and many will doubt if the eight Aboriginal men who leave their mark on it fully understand they are signing away ancient tribal lands, believing instead that it forms part of a tanderrum – a ceremony allowing safe passage to visitors travelling through their territory.
No-one will even be sure of the exact location where the signing takes place. But Batman notes that nearby there is a river that strikes him as being ‘the place for a village’. And then, mission accomplished, he leaves to spread the good news back in Van Diemen’s Land, leaving his Sydney Aboriginals and servants – Todd, Alec Thompson and Jim Gumm – to form a supply depot at Indented Head, just a few miles north of the entrance to the bay.
As usual Batman has left explicit instructions, too. The men are to go straight to work erecting a hut, making a garden, establishing a rapport with the local tribes and ‘to put off any person or persons that may trespass on this land I have purchased from the natives’.
Well, giving orders like that might be one thing. But with more than 60 Aboriginals gathering around the camp, what sort of persuasion might one employ to get them to leave?
You can sense the growing alarm and exasperation in Todd’s journal. An educated Irishman, his handwriting is neat and even, sloping gently to the right. Monday 29 June begins well: ‘Three hands gone kangarooing; as usual returned with a large forester [a big grey kangaroo]. Natives still with us. Find it very difficult to get them to leave us, they having taken such a particular liking to the bread. We are obliged to use none ourselves, on account of their distressing us, they being of such a greedy disposition that they would take it all from us. Stopped all night. Watching as usual.’
The next day brings no change. ‘Tried all we could to get them to leave us, but find it impossible. Three hands obliged to go again kangarooing … returned home with two kangaroos. Remained all night quiet and well satisfied, but seem to have no idea of leaving us, which makes us exceedingly uncomfortable, not being able to get a meal of victuals in comfort, and always obliged for our own safety to keep watch.’
On 4 July everyone is woken at four in the morning after hearing cries and whistles. ‘At daylight … sent two men to see who it was but they returned home without seeing them, which we imagined was no more than to frighten us. We told them we would not be afraid of 100 of them …’
Two days later, nothing has changed. Early in the morning Pigeon goes hunting with the natives and with two shots kills two kangaroos ‘which surprised the natives much. They returned home well satisfied.’
And then, early in the afternoon on this cold day, the Union Jack fluttering overhead from a makeshift flagpole, a dead man walks into camp, out of the bush and in from the past, and takes a seat next to their fire.
Twenty years living among white people as William Buckley and you always struggled to find the right words. Thirty years living as Murrangurk and now you have none at all.
You open your mouth to say something and … nothing comes out. Sitting there with your spears and waddy between your legs, a crowd gathering, staring in disbelief, and not a single word comes to mind. Ridiculous, isn’t it? For one of the first times in your life you have so much to say but no way to say it.
You point to the tattoo on your arm – those faded initials, ‘W.B’. Perhaps that might help. But they keep staring and you can tell what they are thinking; this man with his long matted hair and thick beard and animal skin cloak, this mute who keeps moving his lips without uttering a sound, is clearly … one of us. Tanned and wild and more than a little intimidating, but he is one of us. One of them reaches for that fast disappearing damper and hands you a piece. You take it, turning it over in your hands and a word slowly forms from the fog in that head of yours.
‘Bread?’
It’s as if a spell is broken. Over the next few hours more words will come back to you. But it’s your size, your overwhelming presence, they find most compelling. Jim Gumm, a pardoned convict, will measure your height at close to six feet and seven inches and that night Todd has much to write in his journal.
‘He seemed highly pleased to see us. We brought him a piece of bread which he eat very heartily and told us immediately what it was. He also informed us that he has been above 20 years in the country, during which time he has been with the natives … He then told us that his name was William Buckley, having the following marks on his arm – W.B and marks like a crab, half-moon, and small man. Being a long time with the natives he has nearly forgot the English language, but the native language he can speak fluently. We then brought him to our tent, clothed him with the best we had and made him share the same as we.’
But even with fragments of English returning, and with so much to tell these men, you remain cautious. After 32 years of living free, the last thing you want is to return to His Majesty’s custody. Best not disclose your whole story; not yet, anyway.
Todd: ‘After he had got his dinner he informed us that he was a soldier in the King’s Own, and a native of Macclesfield in Cheshire and was wrecked off Port Phillip Heads. The vessel’s name he has forgot, but she had come from England with transports and was bound for Van Diemen’s Land, being the first vessel that brought prisoners out for there. She struck on a rock and all hands perished with the exception of him and three others, who swam ashore, one of which was the captain of the vessel, who could not swim.’
Not a bad story, William. So much for all those critics in future years who will complain you are a simple dolt lacking any sort of imagination. If only they were here now, the flames of the camp fire flickering and casting shadows across your bearded face as you hold your audience in thrall. Not a bad feeling, is it? Just hours out of the bush and here you are spinning stories like a man on a stage, something you would never have dreamed of doing in the past.
That skipper of the boat, the one you were saying could not swim? What did you do when the ship capsized? Why, you placed the captain across those big shoulders of yours and in the pitch black of a swirling sea, began swimming toward land alongside a couple of other survivors.
It isn’t hard to imagine William Todd in his tent late in the night, candle burning, shaking his head at this incredible tale of courage and strength, making sure he gets down every detail. Folks back home will choke on their whiskey when he tells them this one.
‘He was 24 hours swimming before he reached the shore. When they got to the shore they were completely exhausted, with the exception of the captain, whose life Buckley saved. Shortly after, the captain left them, and proceeded where we cannot tell, not having seen or heard of him ever since. The other two died after a few days and Buckley was left to himself to the mercy of those savages, expecting every hour to meet with them and be put to death.’
Who do you think you are? Daniel Defoe? You tell them in your faltering English how you lived off mussels and roots and spent 40 days wandering on your own – oh, you’re Moses now – before you fall in with a local mob of Aboriginals ‘and has remained with them ever since, never having seen a white man and has only seen two vessels since he has been here. He is quite rejoiced to see his own native people once more, never having expected to meet with any.’
At 8 pm, Todd reports that a group of natives ‘came running down to our hut and told me that there was a mob of blacks coming down to kill both us and them. Prayed for our protection and made signals for us to shoot them if they came close …
‘Buckley cried out “We shoot them. I’ll shoot them.”
‘After they were quiet Buckley explained everything to them. It was most astonishing to see how amazed and pleased they were …’
You have told Todd and Gumm you want to remain with them, at least until John Batman returns on his chartered schooner Rebecca. Part of you wants to meet this man. But you are also trying to buy some time. In the next few days more warriors will arrive as word spreads of the plunder to be had by the shores of the bay. You might be able to stave off an attack by telling them that if they wait, a new ship carrying more riches will soon arrive.
It’s a tense time. One of the clans spreads a rumour that a vessel has just been seen entering the bay, a false claim Todd notes is for the purpose ‘of getting us all down to the water side so they might plunder the hut. But they found their plan of no avail … Buckley has again told the natives in their own language that we have no more provisions for them and they must retire in the bush until such time as the vessel arrives. They consented and retired for the night well pleased.
‘We find Buckley to be a most valuable man to us. He seems to get more attached to us every day. Always keeping a sharp lookout, he is a complete terror to the natives.’
A week later, Todd writes that you have overheard one of the Aboriginals saying ‘that they should wait for an opportunity to get one of us going for water so that they should spear us. He desired us to be on our guard and keep sentry day and night. We told him we should act according to his wish.
‘He then exclaimed “I shall lose my own life before I’ll see one of you hurted.”’
If they didn’t quite trust you before this, they do now. In Life and Adventures, you take up the story: ‘I told the white men to be on their guard. Arming myself with a gun I threatened in strong language the life of the first native who raised a hostile hand against the strangers, telling them that on the arrival of the vessel they should have presents in abundance. This pacified them and they turned their thoughts from mischief to fishing and hunting.’
This is how it really starts, isn’t it? This is where you will find yourself at the impact point between those two colliding worlds. For the past couple of weeks you have managed to delicately move between them, keeping this uneasy peace. But it will never be easy again.
There is no doubt in your mind any longer that you will remain with these white men. Your English is slowly returning – it will take a long time before you are fully fluent again – and the longer you spend with them makes you think it might be time to end all these years of wandering.
But it’s not as though you are not perplexed and more than a little suspicious about the motives of these men. They have told you about this deal Batman has struck with the people of the Kulin nation. Todd and the rest of them say they were there the day the deed was signed.
It doesn’t make sense. Who are these chiefs who have signed away hunting lands? What man, what warrior, would even dare contemplate giving up his ancestral home?
It’s a point that will remain a sore one many years later. ‘They have no chiefs claiming or possessing any superior right over the soil,’ you will say. ‘I therefore looked upon the land dealing as another hoax of the white man to possess the inheritance of the uncivilised natives of the forest, whose tread on the vast Australian continent will very soon be no more heard …’
Say what you like about William Buckley. But don’t say an old convict cannot smell a sham from a mile away.