Thylacine (29 page)

3
. Clark, Julia,
The Aboriginal People of Tasmania
, Hobart, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, 1986, p. 55.

4
. George Augustus Robinson, a self-educated Londoner, migrated to Van Diemen's Land in 1824, working in Hobart Town as a builder, philanthropist and active Christian. In the wake of the devastation caused to the Aborigines through settler clashes and Governor Arthur's declaration of martial law, Robinson was appointed by Arthur to bring about conciliation with the remnant population. He took to the task with extraordinary zeal, spending four years in the bush. By methods including inducement and capture for reward, he rounded up 135 Palawa and had them relocated to Flinders Island, there to ‘save' and convert them. Unfortunately, disease, hunger and dislocation all but destroyed the pitiful group; only 47 survivors were moved back to Oyster Cover south of Hobart Town.

5
. Cotton,
Touch the Morning
, p. 18.

6
. Cotton,
Touch the Morning
, pp. 17–18. It is worth noting that, both in context and expression, the written, Anglicised Cotton stories undoubtedly differ from the original Aboriginal oral versions.

7
. ibid., p. 23. Taraba's ‘sneaky and wicked ways' are eventually punished when little bush elves make him ugly, whining and growling, then blow snowy white clematis leaves all over him to make him spotted, and rub wildcurrant juice on his ears to make them rosy red, as a sign that everyone speaks unpleasantly of him.

8
. Unlike the bands, the tribes were not named and so have been given geographical titles. A band was made up of a number of hearth groups, each of these being a close-knit, extended family cooking around a single fire. A typical band might comprise 50 people, or seven or eight families.

9
. Paddle,
The Last Tasmanian Tiger
, pp. 45–6.

10
. Ryan, Lyndall,
The Aboriginal Tasmanians
, 2nd edn, Sydney, Allen & Unwin, 1996, pp. 34 and 38.

11
. Barrett, Charles,
Isle of Mountains: Roaming Through Tasmania
, Melbourne, Cassell & Company, 1944, p. 28.

12
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, p. 72.

13
. Lourandos, Harry,
Continent of Hunter-Gatherers
, Cambridge University Press, 1997, p. 264.

14
. ibid, p. 265.

15
. Letter of Adam Amos, dated 20 April, 1826, quoted in Barrett,
Isle of Mountains
, p. 132.

Chapter 7

1
. Jeffreys, C. H.,
Geographical and Descriptive Delineation of the Island
of Van Diemen's Land
, London, Richardson, 1820.

2
. Robson, Lloyd,
A History of Tasmania Volume 1
, Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 1983,. p. 86.

3
. Evans,
Description of Van Diemen's Land
, p. 28.

4
. West, John,
The History of Tasmania Volume 1
, Launceston, Henry Dowling, 1852, p. 59 (Angus & Robertson reprint 1971).

5
. Robson,
A History of Tasmania
,
Volume 1
, p. 95.

6
. ‘Woorady belonged to the Nuenone, a band of the South East tribe whose land was on Bruny Island. He was a very knowledgeable man and was renowned for his skills as a doctor, storyteller and boat builder. In 1829 his wife and one of his three sons died from illnesses introduced by Europeans. In 1830 he married Truganini and joined George Robinson. In 1835 he went with Truganini and his sons Myunge and Droyer-loinne to live at Wybalenna [on Flinders Island]. He was on the mainland of Tasmania from March 1836 to July 1837 searching for Aborigines who remained in the northwest. He returned to Wybalenna and in 1839 went to Victoria with George Robinson. Woorady died of old age in July 1842 while on board ship returning to Wybalenna from Victoria.' (
Living With the
Land, Book Two: Resistance
, Hobart: Department of Education and the Arts, 1989, p. 38.) The name has various spellings.

7
. ‘Umarrah's tribal names were Kanneher Largenna and Molteher Largenna. He adopted the name Umarrah (an abbreviation of Hugh Murray) when he worked for Europeans who took over land near Campbell Town. He was a member of the Tyerer-note-panner, a band of the North Midlands Tribe and was an outstanding resistance leader. He was captured in November 1828 near the Eastern Marshes by Gilbert Robertson, the police chief from Richmond, whose roving party was guided by Kickerter-poller. Umarrah joined the group of Aborigines with George Robinson in January 1830 but left a few months later. In September he was either recaptured or surrendered and for a short while worked as a guide on the Black Line. He escaped and carried out raids on settlers along the Tamar River, before being recaptured in August 1831. He rejoined George Robinson's search party but died of dysentery in Launceston on 24 March 1832.' (ibid., p. 38.)

8
. Extracted from N. J. B. Plomley (ed.),
Friendly Mission: The Tasmanian
Journals and Papers of George Augustus Robinson 1829–1834
, Hobart, Tasmanian Historical Research Association, 1966.

9
. Meredith, Louisa Anne,
My Home in Tasmania, During a Residence of
Nine Years
, London, John Murray, 1852 (quoted in Vivienne Rae-Ellis,
Louisa Anne Meredith: A Tigress in Exile
, Sandy Bay: Blubber Head Press, 1979, p. 146–7).

Chapter 8

1
. Robson, Lloyd,
A Short History of Tasmania
, Melbourne, Oxford University Press, 1985, p. 33.

2
. Report by Lt James Hobbs RN, 1824, quoted in Kerry Pink,
And
Wealth For Toil: A History of North-West and Western Tasmania
1825–1900
, Burnie, Advocate Marketing Services, 1990, p. 23.

3
. Letter of Edward Curr, 16 April 1830, quoted in Paddle,
The Last
Tasmanian Tiger
, p. 110.

4
. So-called necker snares ‘consist of a noose of wire or hemp placed around a hole in a fence or a constriction in an animal trail in such a way as to strangle the animal when it became caught in the noose. The removal of one of the palings from the wire fences allowed game to pass through and at the same time provided an ideal snaring site'. (Guiler,
Thylacine: The Tragedy of the Tasmanian
Tiger
, p. 95.)

5
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, p. 105.

6
. Robson,
A Short History . . .
, p. 30.

7
. Gunn, Ronald, in West,
The History of Tasmania
, pp. 245–6.

8
. Gould, John, in
The Best of Gould's Mammals
, Sydney, Macmillan, 1977, p. 48.

9
. Robson,
A Short History . . .
, p. 51.

10
. Fenton, James,
A History of Tasmania from its Discovery in 1642 to
the Present Time
, Hobart, J. Walch & Sons, 1884, pp. 401–2.

11
. Paddle,
The Last Tasmanian Tiger
, p. 143.

12
. The wedge-tailed eagle, distributed throughout continental Australia, is one of the world's largest eagles. Tasmania's endemic subspecies is listed as ‘endangered', having fewer than 200 breeding pairs. Wedge-tails feed on both live prey and carrion, with rabbits their preferred diet. Lambs make up only a small part of their total prey, but they have long been persecuted by sheep farmers and illegal poisoning and shooting continues in Tasmania.

13
.
The Mercury
, 26 August 1884, p. 2.

14
.
The Tasmanian Mail, Supplement,
30 April 1887. Paddle has extensively researched this critical period; the Messrs French in particular he finds greatly exaggerated their thylacine kill claims.

15
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, p. 22.

16
.
The Tasmanian News,
6 September 1887.

17
.
The Mercury
, 8 October 1886.

Chapter 9

1
.
The Tasmanian
, 13 June 1885.

2
.
Hobart Mercury
, 5 December 1891.

3
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, pp. 23 and 58.

4
.
Weekly Courier
, 7 December 1911.

5
. Robson,
A Short History . . .
, p. 70.

6
.
Hobart Mercury
, 9 May 1893.

7
. Atkinson, Henry Dresser,
The Woodpecker Papers: Talks with a
Naturalist; Tales of Tasmania in the late 1800s
, [prepared by] Mary Hume, and Minnie Stein, Launceston, Bookprint, 2001, p. 44.

8
. Smith, Geoffrey,
A Naturalist in Tasmania
, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1909, pp. 95, 96–7.

9
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, pp. 24–5.

10
. Norman Laird, article in
The Mercury
, 7 October 1968.

11
.
The Mercury
, 11 August 1908.

12
. Cubit, Simon,
Snarers and Cattlemen of the Mersey High Country
, Launceston, Regal Press, 1987.

13
. ibid., p. 34.

14
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, p. 115.

15
. Hogan, T. M. and Gye, Hal,
The Tight Little Island
, Hobart, J. Walch & Sons, [1914?], pp. 59 and 61.

16
. Article by Norman Laird in
The Mercury
, 7 October 1968.

17
. Lord, Clive E., ‘Notes on the mammals of Tasmania', in
Royal
Society of Tasmania Papers and Proceedings
, 1917.

18
. Lord, Clive E., ‘Existing Tasmanian marsupials', in
Royal Society of
Tasmania Papers and Proceedings
, 1926–28.

19
. Le Souef, A. S. and Burrell, Harry,
The Wild Animals of Australasia
, London, Harrap, 1926, pp. 318–19

Chapter 10

1
. Robson, Lloyd,
A Short History . . .
, pp. 123, 126.

2
. Paddle,
The Last Tasmanian Tiger
, p. 174.

3
. ibid., p. 181.

4
. Graves, Kathleen E., ‘The rarest animal in the world', in
Walkabout
magazine, 1 April 1958, pp. 15–16.

5
. Bell, E. A., ms paper NS 463/2, p. 7, Archives Office of Tasmania.

6
. ibid., p. 11.

7
.
The Mercury
, 22 January 1923.

8
.
The Mercury, 70th Anniversary Special Issue
, 5 July 1924.

9
. Bailey, Col,
www.maydena.tco.asn.au/Colbail/tiger
[accessed 11 January 2001.

10
. Guiler,
Thylacine: The Tragedy of the Tasmanian Tiger
, p. 55.

11
. Paddle, op cit., p. 191.

12
. Beresford, Quentin, and Bailey, Garry,
Search for the Tasmanian
Tiger,
Hobart, Blubber Head Press, 1981.

13
. Paddle, op. cit. p. 195.

14
. Guiler,
Thylacine: The Tragedy of the Tasmanian Tiger
, p. 29.

15
. Conversation with the author, 2 October 2002.

Chapter 11

1
. Letter of 30 May 1946, by N. J. B. Plomely, Director, Queen Victoria Museum, Launceston, to Mr Charles Rainbow, Nabowla, N. E. Coast, Tas.

2
. Troughton, Ellis,
Furred Animals of Australia
, Sydney, Angus & Robertson, 6th edn., 1957, p. 52.

3
. ibid., p.51
.

4
. Brogden, Stanley,
Tasmanian Journey
, Melbourne, Morris & Walker for Pioneer Tours, 1948 (repr. 1949), p. 79.

5
. Robson, Lloyd,
A Short History . . .
, p. 172.

6
. Guiler, Eric, and Godard, Philippe,
Tasmanian Tiger: A Lesson to be
Learnt
, p. 190.

7
. Guiler,
Thylacine
, p. 146.

8
. Bell, E. A.,
Thylacine Reports—Queen Victoria Museum—Launceston
, unpublished ms, Archives Office of Tasmania NS 896/1–39.

9
.
The Mercury
, 15 April 1966.

10
.
The Mercury
, 23 September 1966.

11
.
Burton, Bob, ‘Wilderness and Unreasonable People', in Cassandra Pybus and Richard Flanagan (eds),
The Rest of the World is
Watching: Tasmania and the Greens
, Sydney, Pan Macmillan, 1990, p. 80. (At the time of the article Bob Burton was a research officer for The Wilderness Society.)

12
.
Giants of the Styx Forest State Forest in the Styx Valley and the Big Tree
Reserve: A Guide for Visitors
, Forestry Tasmania pamphlet, March 2002.

13
. Gee, H. M., ‘The Evolving Consciousness', in Helen Gee and Janet Fenton (eds),
The South West Book: A Tasmanian Wilderness
, Sydney, Australian Conservation Foundation, 1978, p. 242.

14
. Kiernan, Kevin, ‘I Saw My Temple Ransacked', in Pybus and Flanagan (eds),
The Rest of the World
, p. 30. (Speliologist Kevin Kiernan helped found The Wilderness Society. He is also noted for rediscovering the Kuti Kina cave.)

15
. Brown, Robert, ‘Has the Thylacine Really Vanished?', in
Animals
15, 1973, p. 419.

Chapter 12

1
. Beresford, Quentin, and Bailey, Garry,
Search for the Tasmanian
Tiger
, Sandy Bay, Blubber Head Press, 1981.

2
.
Tasmanian Mail
, 18 August 1981, p. 2.

3
. Brown, Bob, ‘Revelations of a Green Senator', in Helen Gee (ed.),
For the Forests: A History of the Tasmania Forest Campaigns
, Hobart, The Wilderness Society, 2001, p. 334.

4
.
The Mercury
, 18 June 2002, p. 13.

5
. Law, Geoff, interview with the author, 30 July 2002.