Albert, Alan and the Guṯkuṯ

A touching exploration of history, pain and reconciliation, ‘Albert, Alan and Guṯkuṯ‘ follows two families across generations to reveal how telling the truth can help heal even the deepest wounds in Australia’s past. Jim Kable writes.

IN JULY 2015, Independent A.Australia published an article titled ‘Vukidi! ‘The Reconciliation of McColl and Wirrpanda’Written by Joan McColl, one of the co-authors of this book.

The article was about a ceremony held at the High Court in Darwin in 2003. pasta A ceremony of reconciliation and apology to the Yolngu people, particularly their homeland of Dhuruputjpi in eastern Arnhem Land. This was your ancestors’ home Dhakiyarr (Tuckier) WirrpandaHe was said to have speared Albert McColl to death on Woodah Island, just off the coast of eastern Arnhem Land, in August 1933.

Dhakiyarr was then taken to Darwin to face a sentence that found him guilty, but that sentence was overturned for a number of different reasons. He was then ordered released and escaped from the compound where he was being held (or perhaps was shown the open door?) – disappearing, presumed killed by the police. The reason the police team was in Woodah was to investigate the killing of a group of Japanese trepangers who had violated certain protocols when “stealing” trepang (sea cucumber).

There is always a background: failure to comply with protocols or, in many cases, interference with local women and girls ( Hornet Bank 1857 And Springsure / Wills 1861 events).

So what was the story? Who was Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda? Who was Albert McColl and who are the McColl family?

This is the story told in Joan’s book. Albert, Alan and Guṯkuṯ. Aspects of this story I’m already familiar with (Ted Egan He sent me his master’s thesis a few years ago, Justice is Entirely His Ownin conjunction with other family history and connections I’ve traced from the NT) and also read this: Mark McKenna‘s powerful book, Return to UluruThe story of the murder of Yokunnuna of Arrernte from Mutitjulu (Uluru) in 1934 by a police officer and former colleague of Albert McColl. Bill McKinnon.

University of Sydney History academic Mark McKenna’s gripping book is a kind of cold case study that eventually reveals the truth and leads to a reconciliation between McKinnon’s grandchildren and Yokunnuna’s grandchildren. In general terms, it is no different from that of the McColl and Wirrpanda families.

This book comprehensively tells the story of the Scottish-Australian McColls in particular, going back to their Scottish roots – their arrival in Victoria in the mid-19th century, their land purchases and farming, boat-building etc. East Gippsland, Victoria, Sale and around the Lakes.

The book details the McColls’ lives and family through photographs, documentary records, and land purchase maps. This all leads up to Albert’s story, and there are various surprising and endearing developments in his story: a 21-year-old police constable in Victoria in 1923, a holiday in Tasmania, time spent in WA pursuing a land settlement plan near Eucla, before resigning from the Victoria Police Force on 29 May 1927 to do so, followed by a transfer to the Central Australian Police Force based at Mparntwe (Alice Springs) on 25 May 1929. joining.

Less than a year has passed since this alleged incident. last massacre First Australians at Coniston, not far north of Mparntwe, during the period 14 August to 18 October 1928. He served there for the next three years, chasing locals accused of stock theft. And one such man was killed by one of the Trackers (his name was Tracker Paddy) on a similar charge of stealing sheep, a similar charge leveled against him by Albert McColl’s brother Arch in Victoria.

I doubt a police arrest there could result in murder. But for those in Central Australia, deaths in custody or near-custody were a distinct possibility at those times of death. There appears to have been no follow-up investigation into the murder beyond the report.

After three years of camel patrols across various frontiers, including South Australia, Western Australia and Northern Australia, some lasting several months, he was granted three months’ leave, which he took back with his family in Gippsland. During this period, the two regions of Central and Northern Australia were merged into what we now know as the Northern Territory.

On 11 November 1933 he was assigned to Darwin, continuing to work (though spending most of his time on the Roper River flowing east into the Gulf, slightly south-east of Groote Island and south of Woodah Island, so within his general jurisdiction). He now had less than nine months left.

During this period, three letters describing this new life were discovered by the researcher’s family; one to his mother, two to his favorite brother, Walter. There are no photos, but then it looks like his camera and photos fell into the hands of someone else who didn’t pass them on to the family.

And so the stage was set for his murder on Woodah Island off the east coast of Arnhem Land.

Albert was part of a group of police and trackers sent to investigate the killing of a group of Japanese trepangers (sea cucumbers) who did not follow proper or appropriate protocols when retrieving things that clearly belonged to the local population.

Interactions in the 21st century, from the time of the Wukidi Ceremony/Broken Spear in Darwin in 2003, are inspiring, as is the granting of Guṯkuṯ, a special ceremonial gift with significant meaning in traditional law, to Alan McColl, representing his family/clan and binding their families together forever. Particularly impressive are the mutual visits between Victoria and Dhuruputjpi.

Australia needs these stories to be widely known. I highly recommend this book, not only for what it teaches us about making connections so that we can “continue our stories together” – First Australians and new arrivals (from 1788) – but also as a template, an example, for others who want to trace their own stories, to create their own stories. pasta Reconciliations with the first Australians.

(And, by the way, Ted Egan was always insistent that the pronunciation of this word more or less rhymes with Douglas MacArthur—as “makarta.”)

Albert, Alan and GuṯkuṯAvailable at: Collins Booksellers.

This book was reviewed by an IA Book Club member. If you want to buy free get high quality books and your review It was published On IA, subscribe to receive your email free IA Book Club membership.

Jim Kable’s paternal ancestors arrived from East Anglia as part of the completion of the First Fleet to New South Wales in January 1788. They have kinship ties with the Ngambri/Ngunnawal peoples of the Canberra/Yass region; Newcastle to Worimi to Port Stephens and Gloucester/Forster region of NSW; to Gurindji (the infamous Lord Vestey’s Wave Hill era, followed by Vincent Lingiari’s Wattie Creek – his most famous son of the 20th century); and the Woolwonga/Wulwulam people in the region around Burundie, a few hundred kilometers south of Darwin, almost all of whom were killed in the so-called Copper Mine massacres of 1884.

Jim Kable was a secondary school teacher of English (including EAL), History and Japanese before spending the last two decades teaching English in Japan in the 1990s and 2000s. For a short period of two years, from 2020 to 2022, he was a member of the now-defunct New Liberals. He has a sharp and knowledgeable perspective on politics.

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