Tasmania's Marion Bay should be renamed to honour an Indigenous man who died during the first encounter with Europeans 250 years ago, a Tasmanian Aboriginal leader says.
Key points:
- French explorer Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne's fleet made the first known interaction with Tasmanian Aboriginal people 250 years ago, on March 7, 1772
- It quickly became violent, with multiple sailors and Aboriginal people wounded, and one Indigenous man killed
- A researcher says the interaction would have been interpreted by Aboriginal Tasmanians as akin to an "alien invasion"
The popular bay in the state's south-east is named after French explorer Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne, who, on March 7, 1772, became the first European to encounter Tasmanian Aboriginal people when he landed at North Bay.
What was at first interpreted by the French as a friendly interaction quickly turned hostile, with one Aboriginal man killed and multiple members of both sides injured in the ensuing battle.
Tasmanian Regional Aboriginal Communities Alliance co-chair Rodney Dillon said Marion Bay should be renamed to honour the fallen soldier, rather than du Fresne.
"It was the death of our people who were defending their land and yet there's nothing around, if you look around Hobart it's naked of Aboriginal history and Aboriginals standing to protect our land," Mr Dillon said.
"It was the first time they ever had to defend it and they were standing up doing it and they got murdered doing it … and they get no recognition at all, but we'll recognise the people who murdered them."
Mr Dillon said the date was one of profound sadness.
"Rather than being a celebration, I think it's like a hang our heads in shame … and the person who was shot was never even recognised and we don't even know his name," he said.
Any renaming of a location would need to be submitted to the Place Names Advisory Panel and approved by the Natural Resources and Environment Department.
Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre campaign manager Nala Mansell said she supported looking at renaming places, including Marion Bay, through a truth-telling process in the state.
"I think there's certainly many names of places and bridges across the state that have wrongfully been named after people who committed such atrocities against Aboriginal people, for those people to still be glorified by having places named after them is completely wrong," Ms Mansell said.
"I think it's definitely a great idea to look at changing the names of murderers, but the truth-telling process could be a great way of dealing with more than just this one area all in one go so that we're not having to spend another 250 years dealing with each individual issue."
'Like an alien invasion'
Author and University of Tasmania adjunct researcher Nicholas Clements said the five primary sources of the landing at North Bay, all from members of the French fleet, told reasonably similar accounts of the conflict.
Two members of the fleet stripped off their clothes and swam to shore to meet the Aboriginal people gathered on Two Mile beach, giving them a mirror and receiving a firebrand in exchange.
But Dr Clements said the sailor's lighting of a fire with the firebrand caused tension and anger between the parties.
"The men got back in the boat, and they sort of just went along the beach a little while and the Aboriginals followed them," he said.
"The first two boats landed, which included [du Fresne], and the Aboriginal people got quite agitated by this and then when the third boat landed, they started throwing spears and stones."
Du Fresne and another sailor were wounded, with the French using their guns to fight back, wounding several men and killing one, prompting the Indigenous people to flee into the woods.
According to the diary of du Fresne's second-in-command, Marie-Julien Crozet, the French fleet stayed in Frederic Henry Bay for six days, unsuccessfully searching for fresh water and encountering flora and fauna, before setting sail for New Zealand.
There are no known accounts of the conflict from Aboriginal Tasmanians.
Dr Clements said the conflict between the groups was globally significant because before the 1772 conflict there had never been an interaction between "two more dissimilar groups of people".
"I've heard people liken this to an alien landing and yet it's even stranger than that, because whilst the French explorers had met indigenous people all over the world, the Aboriginal people didn't even know other humans existed," he said.
"Whether aliens exist or not, we've got that preconception. This is like an alien landing if we had never heard of aliens before, if we had never even come up with the idea — that's how strange it was."
Historian Henry Reynolds said the conflict was unusual and attributed it to a "complete misunderstanding" given European fleets had regularly encountered Indigenous Australians both before and after the incident without violence breaking out.
"The Europeans coming by ship had no particular reason for coming into conflict with Aboriginals in this part of Tasmania, they often had quite good relations with Aboriginal people," he said.
Dr Clements said news of the conflict would have spread widely around Tasmania, and suggested it played a part in more than 10 subsequent interactions with European fleets occurring without incident prior to colonisation.
"It's probably no coincidence it was the only violent one because after that they knew the power of what they would later refer to as thunder sticks and these strange white men," he said.
"Their normal approach of just unleashing spears didn't work that first time and it's probably why they didn't try it again."
'We haven't been equal since the first person was shot'
Mr Dillon said the conflict 250 years ago illustrated the need for a truth-telling body to educate the public about past abuses against Aboriginal people.
Professors Kate Warner and Tim McCormack recommended the creation of such a body in a report commissioned by Premier Peter Gutwein.
"All my life when we went to school and to this day, it's taken until now to speak the truth of history," Mr Dillon said.
"That's what we've put up with all our lives, one side of history … It's not until we have that truth and treaty that I think we can come along and say, 'This is why our people were so dispossessed and so far behind in those social areas.'
"We haven't been equal since the first person was shot.
"From then on, it was never equal, they had the power and the guns and even today when we negotiate a treaty we don't go to the table as equals, we're only going to get what they're going to give us."
Ms Mansell said the anniversary served as "a reminder of how far we've come, but also how far we've still got to go".
"The first death of an Aboriginal person would have taken place about this time so long ago, that also resulted in the invasion and dispossession of our people," she said.
"So 250 years of fighting for our legitimate rights as the legitimate people of this land. We haven't got too far over such a long period of time, and hopefully we don't have to keep fighting for another 250 years."
Mr Gutwein said in his State of the State address last week that an Aboriginal advisory body would be established to help guide the Truth Telling and Treaty process, with members of all registered Aboriginal community organisations invited to provide advice on its establishment.