History

The Gugu Badhun People

Before the Europeans

The Gugu Badhun people are the traditional owners of the land around the headwaters of the Burdekin River, over the ranges and inland from Ingham.  Before the arrival of Europeans, the Gugu Badhun were not a nomadic people but travelled widely across a known area of country to which they belonged and for which they were responsible, attending to the physical and spiritual aspects of the land.  This was good country, with plenty of permanent water and abundant food, especially in the area around Valley of Lagoons, where the flowing lava met the Burdekin, creating lakes and spring-fed lagoons.

Their border with Warungu people was around Meadowbank, Glen Harding and Wairuna stations. Their southern border with Gudjal people was the Clarke River, near where it meets the Burdekin. There were strong language, ceremonial and marriage connections with these neighbouring groups.

During winter the Gugu Badhun camped around the Valley of Lagoons. Their travels took them as far afield as Mount Garnet, Fossilbrook, Einasleigh and Lyndhurst Stations - over 120 kilometres from the Valley of Lagoons to the domain of neighbouring tribes and linguistic groups. They were a collective society, with an order based on the general sharing of resources.

The name Gugu Badhun has been translated to mean "proper speech".

Colonization by Pastoralists

The arrival of Europeans was seen as an invasion by the Gugu Badhun people.  They were denied access to their usual sources of food and water and saw their land and watering places damaged by sheep and cattle grazing. They fought this invasion, killing stock and occasionally attacking the settlers.  Those people living in the lava country were particularly effective, emerging to undertake raids then retreating back into the lava to hide from the armed raiding parties of pastoralists and Native Police, secure in their spring-watered refuges.

The Native Mounted Police

The Native Mounted Police arrived in the mid-1860s with each troop usually consisting of a white officer and four to six Aboriginal "troopers", who were brought in from other parts of Queensland and had no loyalty to the Gugu Badhun. The Native Police were not really police at all, but the mounted army of colonization. There is no record of any Native Police swearing an oath to uphold the law, and arrests were rare.

When a station owner considered he had suffered property damage or loss of stock through the actions of Aboriginal people, he called in the Native Police who tracked the group down and "dispersed" them. The stories of massacres are part of the oral history of the Gugu Badhun people. While documentation of Native Police actions is almost non-existent, government archives as well as contemporary newspapers and the diaries and memoirs of pastoralists and other Europeans contain many references to the shooting of Aboriginal people by the Native Police.

Station Life

By the late 1890s the violence had eased and groups of Aboriginal people, their economy destroyed, came in and camped on the edges of friendly stations where they could access rations and be safe from the Native Police. Many took up work on the stations, often being paid only in flour, tea, sugar, beef, tobacco, opium and other goods, to share with their families in the camps.  They worked as shepherds and stockman and as domestic servants.  Despite the many hardships, station life was remembered with nostalgia by many of the people, who took pride in their work and their skills.

Aboriginal workers were often indispensable to pastoralists, with alternative labour scarce much of the time. Working on the stations allowed them to live on their country, with their older relatives and the spirits of their ancestors nearby.

The 1897 Act

The Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act (1897) was an attempt by the Government to "protect" Aboriginal people, in the belief that the race was dying out. Under this Act, the Protectors (police officers) had control over the lives of Aboriginal people, with some even restricting whom they could choose as marriage partners.  Wages were paid into Protector accounts and people had to ask permission to access their money.  Under the Act, Aboriginal people were not allowed to drink alcohol or enter a pub.  The Protectors had the power to remove people, at their discretion, and some were removed from their families and homes and sent to settlements and missions at places such as Palm Island, Yarrabah, Hull River and Cherbourg. The Protectors also had the power to grant exceptions from the Act, which basically meant the exempted person was no longer, considered as "Aboriginal" by the Government.  These exemptions could be revoked at any time.  Aspects of the 1897 Act remained in effect in Queensland until the 1970s.

Leaving Country - Greener Pastures

But the long hours, poor pay and lack of job and educational opportunities for the young would not continue to bind them to their stations when other opportunities arose. Although there were no towns on their country, many left for the better prospects for their families in the nearby towns of Malanda, Atherton, Ingham, Charters Towers and Townsville. Some went on to the mining centres of Mount Isa and elsewhere while others found jobs with reasonable hours in the developing infrastructure of the region, working for shire councils, state rail and road authorities or in agriculture and timber.

Their children went to schools and often on to tertiary education and skilled jobs in the bigger towns and cities. Many Gugu Badhun people spent their holidays back on their country, learning some of the knowledge of their culture. Some later returned to their country, a small Gugu Badhun community developing at the 1970s mining town of Greenvale after mining ceased in the 1990s.

Once in the towns, many Gugu Badhun became involved in politics, particularly the Indigenous politics of the 1960s and especially the 1970s, when a new Federal Government finally enacted one of the provisions of the landslide of the 1967 referendum and began to bypass the Queensland State Government, setting up Indigenous organizations for housing, health and legal services. One Gugu Badhun to get politically involved was Dick Hoolihan, who was President of the Townsville branch of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Advancement League, whose Secretary at the time was Eddie Koiki Mabo. Since then, many of the next two generations of Gugu Badhun people have been and are involved in Indigenous politics and administration.

Today

Since the 1990s, Gugu Badhun people have assembled each year for a week on their country, re-uniting with their far-flung relatives from all over Australia and re-acquainting themselves with their land and their culture. Young Gugu Badhun have been shown the ways and told the stories of their ancestors and everyone has language lessons in between fishing and swimming in the Burdekin River of their ancestors. They have instigated projects to look after their country, often in collaboration with pastoralists or government departments, re-establishing their stake in their country.

This account is based on information from the School of Indigenous Australian Studies at James Cook University and the Gugu Badhun People.