The Battle of Fairy Meadow 1830

Australian Aboriginal / Indigenous / First Nations Archive

Joseph Lycett, Contest with spears, shields and clubs, c.1820, watercolour, National Library of Australia.

Contents

1. Introduction
2. Martin Lynch account
3. Discussion
4. References 

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1. Introduction

Martin Lynch (1821-1905) arrived in the Illawarra in March 1827, and as a young boy observed a tribal fight which took place around 1830 between the Illawarra and Bong Bong Australian Aboriginal (Indigenous / First Nations) tribes. When the 76 year old Lynch was interviewed by parliamentarian and local historian Archibald Campbell (1834-1903) on 22 February 1898, he described the encounter in some detail. He later expanded upon this description in a letter to Campbell dated 20 April of that year. Both the letter and interview accounts are reproduced below. They are the only extant records of the conflict. A relevant summary abstract from the letter reads as follows:

.....Recollect to see the fight between the Bong Bong Aboriginal tribe and Wollongong tribe. Both tribes in number wood be fully 15 hundred. 1000 500. The number killed would be over 100. This was originated by Aboriginal Dr Ellis taking a gin away from the Bong Bong tribe. The fight was on Mr James Towensend paddock, which is actually Para Meadow. They buried the dead at the bottom on Towensend paddock on an arm of Fairy Creek.

The location of the battle was Fairy Meadow, a extensive swampy area on the northern edge of Wollongong, the main town in the Illawarra at that time. It was intersected by meandering creeks and back-beach lagoons, densely wooded and flat, thereby offering the local people an area where they could reside and also fish. It was also obviously an area of ceremony and meetings, often referred to as a corroboree ground. 

Like many aspects of Australian Indigenous society, much was kept hidden from the European settlers, both in regard to cultural norms and personal experiences. First and second hand accounts by non-Indigenous settlers were also rare during the early colonial period, prior to the 1850s. After this time much of traditional custom and lore had been affected by British law and taking of the land, and with it the livelihood of the local people. The often brutal nature of conflicts within Australian Aboriginal society was looked down upon by the British, though their treatment of that society by them was, in turn, extremely brutal and amounted to cultural genocide in many areas where they settled. The following account is therefore significant as it brings to light this aspect of Illawarra and Southern Highlands Indigenous culture, with the 1830 event one of the last - if not the last - such tribal encounters.

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2. Martin Lynch's account

Local settler Martin Lynch recorded a fulsome account of the Battle of Fairy Meadow in an interview and letter from 1898. The following is a transcript of the interview between Archibald Campbell and Martin Lynch which took place on 22 February 1898:

Mr [Martin] Lynch in his early boyhood - about 1830 - witnessed a battle at Fairy Meadow, between the Illawarra blacks and the Bong Bong blacks, over something in the lady line.

The battle took place in a naturally clear spot - the real Fairy Meadow - situated immediately on the north and east of what is now the junction of the Main Road and Mt Ousley road. Mr Lynch declares that several hundred men on each side took part in the battle, which consisted of a series of intermittent onslaughts, which extended over three days and nights.

During the continuance of the battle some of the men and women would go abroad hunting for food.

The battle was won by the Illawarra blacks. Many blacks on both sides were killed and more wounded. The killed were buried in the tea tree scrub between the site of the battle and the sea (between two arms of Fairy Creek). The weapons were mostly spears, "nullah nullah's", and "waddies" of one shape or another.

Joseph Lycett, Aboriginal Warriors, c.1820, watercolour, National Library of Australia.

Mr Lynch explained that the dead of both parties were buried along the northwest bank of Fairy Creek, east of the North Illawarra Council Chamber. About 70 men were killed in the battle, including both sides, and all the corpses were buried by the victorious Illawarra tribe.

The graves were dug along the bank of the creek, which was somewhat sandy, the depth of each being about three or four feet. The blankets, tomahawks, "billy" cans and all other articles owned by each of the deceased were buried with them, some wood also being placed on top of the corpse. The explanation given by the survivors was that the wood and other articles would be required by the departed "in another country".

He (Mr Lynch) witnessed the burial of several of the men killed in the battle. The place of the burial was not the usual locality for interment by the blacks - the slain in battle only being placed there. The usual burial place in that quarter was in the sandy bush land on the south side of Fairy Creek - now Stuart Park - east and west of the Pavilion. The sand banks, near Tom Thumb Lagoon, Bellambi, and Towradgi, were likewise burial places, where many bodies were interred from time to time. He had witnessed nearly twenty blacks buried in the spot near Fairy Creek already mentioned. As a rule they did not desire white people to know where they (the blacks) buried their dead, but after the district became somewhat settled their burials could not be kept secret.

The blacks carrying out the burials and the deceased's relatives used to stripe their bodies and heads and necks and limbs with pipeclay, as marks of mourning for the departed.

Regarding the battle, he had witnessed it each of the three days over which it extended - hostilities being suspended at nightfall. His mother and step-father also viewed it each day from the elevated ground between Mr Bate's brickyard and Mrs Aquila Parsons's residence.

The Illawarra tribe fought on the north side of the Meadow, and the Bong Bong tribe on the south. Spears were thrown thick and fast between the combatants, and repeatedly he had seen men struck with them on both sides, sometimes causing the man struck to fall mortally wounded, while in some instances the wounded person would struggle to withdraw the spear - not always successfully.

In close quarters "nullah nullahs" and other hand to hand weapons were used furiously in the mortal combat - one of the persons so injured not infrequently having his skull crushed or limbs broken.

Robert Marsh Westmacott, Natives, c.1848, lithograph, National Library of Australia. Captain Westmacott resided in the Illawarra between 1837-47.

The dead were left unburied until the battle was over, after which the victors carried the bodies to the place stated and buried them there as already mentioned.

The cause of the battle was the taking away from the Bong Bong blacks a young "jin" of their tribe by an Illawarra black designated "Dr Ellis" by the whites. He induced her to leave her tribe with him, and carried her away captive unknown to them, and hence the rupture between the two tribes, resulting in the battle and bloodshed narrated. The captive maid was in the immediate vicinity of the hostilities all the time as were the "jins", the latter carrying about and supplying to the male warriors the deadly weapons and requirements of the ongoing engagement.

The young jin who was the cause of all the bloodshed did not hide her desire to flee to her own tribe, even while the battle was proceeding, but from doing so she was forcibly prevented, and beaten again and again most brutally, until her head was almost in a state of jelly and was covered in gore - the brutality being inflicted mainly by her captor ("Dr Ellis"). So frightfully was she beaten and battered that his (Mr Lynch's) mother took compassion on her and took her to her own home and doctored her there for some time until she recovered sufficiently to rejoin her lord and master and his tribe.

The Bong Bong blacks came down the mountain range from their own country, making the descent opposite Dapto, to wage war with the Illawarra tribe, at whose hands they sustained defeat in the pitched battle as stated - the survivors returning again by the same route over the mountain to Bong Bong to tell their tales of blood and daring deeds by the way.

The young woman, or "jin", concerning whom the battle took place, remained in Illawarra all the remainder of her life and passed away, as did the whole of her race, from time to time in rapid diminution, unknowing and unknown in an historic sense. Sanguin was the mortal tribal conflict that had taken place regarding her, and numerous as were that slain that bled or fell in her interest.

Her remains, like those of the sable warriors who died concerning her, were interred in the usual crude grave in Illawarra soil, without a stone or any other sign to show her last resting place.

Mr Lynch states that he never remembered the blacks having actually murdered any white persons in the district, though several were scared by them now and again. He mentioned however that Mr Hicks, subsequently of Bulli, was decoyed into the bush in the Shoalhaven district under the plea of showing him some cedar, and that he narrowly escaped being killed by his false guide or guides. He saved his life by jumping over a precipice, falling on suspended vines and thereby being saved from being smashed in the fall.

In a letter written by Martin Lynch to Archibald Campbell in 1898 he states the following in regard to the fight between the Illawarra and Bong Bong tribes:

.....Recollect to see the fight between the Bong Bong Aboriginal tribe and Wollongong tribe. Both tribes in number wood be fully 15 hundred. 1000 500. The number killed would be over 100. This was origanated by Aboriginal Dr Ellis taking a gin away from the Bong Bong tribe. The fight was on Mr James Towensend paddock, which is accultiry Para Meadow. They buried the dead at the bottom on Towensend paddock on an arm of Fairy Creek.

The full text of the letter is reproduced in an appendix below.

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4. Discussion and Notes

The Illawarra and Bong Bong tribe encounter is likely typical of such conflicts which took place in areas of south-eastern Australia and beyond over the millenia. Supporting evidence for this is seen in the following video, which is an illustrated account of such conflicts as experienced by German explorer and naturalist Ludwig Leichhardt (1813-48) and recorded in one of his diaries during 1843:

 

Mungo Manic, Tribal Warfare in Aboriginal Australia - Eyewitness Report 1843, Mungo Manic, 17 July 2025, YouTube, duration: 11.26 minutes.  

Local history research also adds to the story. For example, instigator of the conflict - the Aboriginal man referred to as Doctor Ellis (born 1810) - is listed in official New South Wales Blanket Returns of 1836 and 1840 as a member of the Bong Bong & Berrima tribes. In the 1836 return taken at Bong Bong he his listed as 26 years old, with 2 wives and 2 children. He was later present in Illawarra during 1858 to receive a blanket.

In discovering the meaning of the word Bong Bong, it should be noted that in the Indigenous language repetition infer plural, or multiple. Some of the meanings that have been given it over time include: a big swamp / many swamps / a watercourse lost in a swamp / many frogs. It can be seen that the term Bong Bong refers to a physical locality - a section of Country - that has special meaning to the local people.

The 2025 Mungo Manic video is significant as it not only presents a first hand observation of Indigenous conflict on the individual, personal level, but also at the tribal level. It also does this with supporting graphic material, such as paintings, drawings and prints from the early colonial era. This adds weight to the video, and supports Martin Lynch's account. 

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4. References

Campbell, Archibald, Archibald Campbell Papers (manuscript), 1890s-1920s, Illawarra Historical Society Collection, University of Wollongong Archives.

-----, Interview with Martin Lynch 22 February 1898, Illawarra Historical Society Bulletin, September 1994, 66-72. 

-----, Mr Archibald Campbell, Parliament of New South Wales [webpage]. Accessed 3 August 2025. 

Leichhardt, Ludwig, [Diaries 1842-44], Queensland Museum, accessed 3 August 2025. 

Lynch, Martin, Letter to Archibald Campbell 20 April 1898, Illawarra Historical Society Bulletin, September 1994, 62-65.

Mungo Manic, Tribal Warfare in Aboriginal Australia - Eyewitness Report 1843, Mungo Manic, 17 July 2025, YouTube, duration: 11.26 minutes.  

Organ, Michael, A Documentary History of the Illawarra and South Coast Aborigines 1770-1850; including a Chronological Bibliography 1770-1990, Aboriginal Education Unit, Wollongong University, December 1990, 646p.

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Last updated: 3 August 2025

Michael Organ, Australia