After 1800 – a general overview of Indigenous Australia
For the first 100 -150 years of white occupation, some indigenous Australians were able to remain on their traditional country and work for and alongside the new pastoral industry that quickly penetrated the country. This was the situation for many Eastern and Central Arrernte people.
“These new pastoralists realized that they needed Aboriginal labour in the stock camps and that Aboriginal women were useful at the homesteads.” (Davis & Prescott 1992, p. 91). There were a number of benefits for Aboriginal people including: a safe haven from being wrongly accused of cattle theft and possibly killed; receipt of newly attractive rations in return for work; and stability for families who were able to stay together and continue to engage in traditional practices and look after country.
Many, people however were soon forced to move off their homelands or enticed into relinquishing some part of their former traditional life as a result of the introduction of the pastoral industry, migrated to new regional centers to access resources.
Later, others who had enjoyed some benefit of working on stations were also forced to regional centres as Cowlishaw (1988, p.78) points out.
Aborigines moved into the towns in the early part of the century as they continued to be forced off the land. Drought and depression as well as changing ownership and the processes of selection affected the Aborigines stock camps on the properties, although some camps remained until 1913.
Legislative controls including the establishment of communities by government, were factors that assisted the disintegration of a way life that has successfully kept a society in tact for tens of thousands of years.
As early as 1837, a protectionist policy was in place with directives from the House of Commons. “The House of Commons select committee of 1937 attempted to define imperial responsibilities and framed policies which were implemented in Australia in the late 1830’s and 1840’s.” Reynolds (1973, p.151) They recommended that “missionaries, protectors, reservations, schooling and special codes of law be established until Indigenous Australians were ‘civilized’. Cowlishaw (1988, p.75). From the mid 1800’s to the early 1900’s legislation was passed in all states and in 1910 commonwealth legislation, that saw the establishment of the Aboriginal Protection Acts and Boards which had immense power over the removal and placement of Aboriginal people across the country.
Clark (1994, p.15) comment
The rules varied with the state and times, but for the most part, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were rounded up to live on missions; lacked the right of free movement and free speech; were not entitled to vote; and were, legally, under the control of government officials with a status of that similar to that of a ward of the state…. Indigenous Australians were divided into ‘fullbloods’ and ‘half-castes’ and many of the latter were officially kidnapped from their families.
As a result of these catastrophic events, Aboriginal people have often found themselves living with groups other than those they would normally live alongside or closely associate with. Family groups that moved and lived together in their traditional country settings were often split up. People from different language groups or family clans were forced to live together in often strained relationships. In some communities people worked out a way to live alongside each other but in many instances it compounded the number of issues people have to deal with. Prentis (1988, p.28) comments, that “to make matters worse, the European invasion indirectly increased inter-tribal violence”.
In 1968, federal government legislation introduced of equal wages for indigenous Australians, most pastoralists were no longer willing nor able to support the large numbers they formerly employed using rations. Pearson comments that the referendum gave people nominal citizenship. “We got the right to equal pay but on those terms we were no longer able to find employment.” (2000, p.14). Many more people then moved to larger regional areas or to communities. More people were forced to move away from their traditional country settings to begin a new life based on handouts from the government welfare system. The negative impact of these policies was the beginning of many social and systemic problems which have not been resolved to date. Pearson (1999, p.3) comments that
in retrospect the removal of Aboriginal people from the pastoral industry was a monumental policy failure ……. With hindsight this choice has had tragic consequences. Firstly, the cultural impact of the removal of Aboriginal families from their traditional lands was obviously massive and today inestimable. Secondly, the removal of Aboriginal workers from work on the stations to no work on the settlements.
In 1976 the Fraser Government passed legislation that established a process “for granting land rights, …. in the Northern Territory, and only to reserve or vacant crown lands to which traditional attachment could be proven” Broome (1994, p.190). In 1994, as a result of the High Court Mabo decision federal legislation was passed that gave better options than ever before for other Indigenous Australians to claim title to their traditional lands although not as many.
One of the benefits of the land rights movement was the attainment and relocation by some back to traditional land. This move back to homelands has provided great promise for people to get out of the difficult social issues they face living in town or in larger community groups and build a more positive way of life for small family groups.
Displacement from their land has had monumental and dire consequences for the majority of Eastern and Central Arrernte people in Central Australia, and has left most with a third world quality of life.
Movement of Eastern and Central Arrernte people after the 1920’s
Many Eastern and Central Arrernte people had begun to gather around the Alice Springs Township in the early 1900’s. Many were beginning to show poor signs of health. The Catholic Church sent a permanent Parish priest, Father Long to Alice Springs in 1929. By 1930, a small church was built in Hartley Street. The second parish priest, Father Paddy Maloney, began the “Little Flower Mission” in the back yard of the presbytery in 1935.
The main reason the Aranda Aborigines were living on the edge of Alice Springs was because they had lost their land. It was not really that they preferred ‘handouts’ although no doubt the wonders of the white people, good and bad, attracted them. Before Father Maloney started the Mission at Charles Creek, the Aboriginals were getting rations supplied by the government – food, calico, blankets and essentials. This was all done through the police stations of the Northern Territory and in the case of the Eastern Arrernte people, around Alice Springs, at the Old Police Station at the Gap. So what attracted them to Father Maloney’s mission ? It would have been two things, the spiritual – all Aborigines, as those who know them well will testify, are very spiritual people, also they were finding friendship and acceptance from their pale-faced neighbours. Donovan (1988, p.5)
Frank McGarry, a lay missionary from Manly NSW, joined father Maloney in 1935 and they moved the mission to Charles Creek, after threats from the local town’s folk who were not happy about the number of Arrernte people gathering behind the presbytery.
Pastoral ministry with the Aboriginal people in and around Alice Springs began in 1936 when a mission was established by Fr. Maloney M.S.C at Charles Creek. In 1938 the OLSH sisters arrived in Alice Springs. They went each day to teach at the Little Mission school, masses were held regularly and back at the Convent, children from outback cattle stations were accommodated. MSC and OLSH sisters continued to give the gospel message to Arrernte people here until 1942.
Reynolds (1989, p.1)
There were many discussions between the church and government about the need to move the Mission and Arltunga was chosen as an option. Frank McGarry had convinced Vincent White, then the second in charge of the Native Affairs Department to provide a government grant of 2000 pounds and Bishop Gsell, despite the opposition from pastoralists and squatters, successfully applied for a Mission lease on this land called Paddy’s Plain. In 1942, some Arrernte people accompanied by Frank McGarry went out to Arltunga to commence well digging.
While Frank and a few Arrernte men were still in the process of digging a well and well before they had a chance to finish any infrastructure the army forced the mission to move to Arltunga. Frank McGarry’s letters recount the events (1977, p.78)
In mid-September 1942 a convoy of military trucks arrived. These came without warning and brought Father Eather, two nuns, all the mission blacks, rations, clothing, beds, bags, dogs and cats – in fact everything from the Alice Springs mission. The official reason was that one of the children at the mission had contracted meningitis and everything had to be moved. Frank guessed the real reason. He knew the army authorities were opposed to the Mission being so close to their camps. They hadn’t the patience to wait for the new set-up to be completed.
This move to Arltunga left 176 Arrernte people and Frank McGarry to create a new Mission from scratch. There was no water and shelter and the people initially camped at the Crossroads Well. The old Mission at Charles Creek was left deserted.
Arltunga was located 100km East of Alice Springs. Although the Church was offered other locations including Ti-Tree, Arltunga was chosen because it was traditional country for some of the people the mission had attracted. Arltunga had previously been a mining site but was abandoned due to poor water.
The poor health situation at this time can be seen in the following statements from O’Grady’s recount of McGarry’s letters of which 157 people were examined by a doctor who found that “ two definitely had tuberculosis and twenty – one were suspects. Practically every adult was suffering from trachoma and many from infected gums.” (1977, p.83). Fourteen people had died on the mission in a short period of time – less than eight months. This was nearly ten percent of this small group. These were hard times for this group of people. They had to re-establish infrastructure and establish a way of living. Traditional customs were often challenged by a new religious code which took a strong hold on the way this community ran.
Water shortage remained an ongoing problem at Arltunga for the ten years people lived there. To solve the water crisis the Church accepted a parcel of land 80km South east of Alice Springs to set up a new mission.
In 1953 there was another move, this time to Santa Teresa where there was a plentiful underground water supply. Over the years a number of families have moved away from the mission and now live in Alice Springs. For some of these people, the Alice was their first home, for many this is the traditional country of their parents, and for all Arrernte people, Alice Springs is the tribal land of their ancestors. The sacred sites belong to the Yeperenye, the Caterpillar Dreaming. The move into Alice is probably constant, but very gradual and it must also be noted that ‘town’ families quite often move back to the Mission for varying lengths of time. Reynolds (1989, p.1)
The community at Santa Teresa was also established in quite harsh circumstances. It was very dusty and had little vegetation. Over the years a small township of 500 people has been established and is now run by a local community council. Most of the services established by the mission, including the hospital, shop, pool and school, have been handed over to the community to run. Although the church still has a major role in the school it is not directly overseen by the mission. Many Eastern and Central Arrernte people have continued to live at Santa Teresa and some have moved back to Alice Springs. Some people live on town camp communities and others live in houses in town. A few have managed to relocate back to their traditional homelands after receiving excisions of the Pastoral leases occupying their traditional country. Many more have dreams of returning to their traditional country and are working towards this goal as part of the community development process at Irrkerlantye. Most people have maintained a connection with the Catholic Church in some way and many continue to practice the Catholic faith.