The Battle of Fairy Meadow 1830

Between the Illawarra and Bong Bong Tribes

When interviewed by Archibald Campbell in 1897, Martin Lynch - who had arrived in the Illawarra in 1827 - described the Battle of Fairy Meadow - a tribal encounter which took place around 1830 between the Illawarra and Bong Bong Aborigines. The location was Fairy Meadow, just north of Wollongong. Lynch also included an account in a later letter to Mr Campbell. Both accounts are reproduced below - the first as recorded by Campbell in the original 1897 meeting with Lynch, and the second from the letter written by Lynch in 1898. These are the only extant records of the conflict.

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

Martin Lynch's Reminiscences 1897

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 other 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.

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In a letter written by Martin Lynch to Archibald Campbell in 1898 he states:

.....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.

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Aerial view of Fairy Creek, Fairy Meadow, 1938. Collection: Wollongong City Library.

 Map of Fairy Creek area. Collection: Wollongong City Library.

Discussion and Notes

The Aboriginal Doctor Ellis is listed in the Blanket Returns of 1836 and 1840 as a member of the Bong Bong & Berrima tribes, though he was in Illawarra in 1858 to receive a blanket. In the 1836 return taken at Bong Bong he his listed as 26 years old, with 2 wives and 2 children.

Bong Bong refers to a big swamp / many swamps / a watecourse lost in a swamp / many frogs, according to some translations of the original Aboriginal language.

The above account comes from the Archibald Campbell Papers held by the Illawarra Historical Society. Mr Campbell (right) was a former owner of the Illawarra Mercury andMember for Illawarra 1891-1903 in the New South Wales parliament. He was also a keen local historian, especially interested in the early history of the Illawarra, and his notes are full of information cleaned from interviews with people such as Martin Lynch.

References

Archibald Campbell Papers (manuscript), 1890s-1920s, Illawarra Historical Society.

Michael Organ, Illawarra and South Coast Aborigines 1770-1850, Aboriginal Education Unit, University of Wollongong, 1989. 

Mr Archibald Campbell, Parliament of New South Wales [webpage]. Accessed 18 June 2014.