Aboriginal
Aborigines
Archaeological evidence suggests that Aborigines have inhabited the continent of Australia for over 50,000 years, although their occupation of the area we call Blacktown may have been only recent (between 28,000 and 40,000 years ago). Evidence of campsites has been found along South Creek, Eastern Creek, Rickabys Creek and Second Ponds Creek. Trees can still be found which are scarred from where bark has been removed to make shields or dishes. Since Aborigines have an oral tradition of history, we have to rely on the European records for information. After the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788, many of the soldiers and sailors explored the area west of Sydney Harbour and wrote about their journeys and what they saw. Most of the information about how the Aborigines lived comes from these diaries and journals.
In this area, the Aborigines camped along the major waterways. They made spears from local trees and a stone called red silcrete which they got from the ridges above South Creek and Eastern Creek.
They ate plant foods, including berries, yams and fern root, the flowers of different banksias, and honey. The women and children gathered yams, roots, fruits and small game, while the men hunted possums, birds, rats, bandicoots, wallabies. The creeks provided a lot of food : fish such as mullet and eels, platypus, yabbies, tortoise and freshwater mussels. Emus, ducks, swans, and other water birds and their eggs were hunted and collected. Snakes and lizards also formed part of the Aborigines diet.
Since the waterways gave the Aborigines so much of their food, it is not surprising that most of their campsites were within a few hundred metres of a creek or river. This also is why we find little evidence of Aborigines in the area — remains of their camps have been washed away by flooding over the years.
Their huts were made of bark - David Collins who wrote about his observations of the Aborigines, described their huts as being “made of the bark of a single tree bent in the middle and placed on its two ends on the ground”.
Once the Europeans arrived, there was competition for land. The Europeans wanted their farms to be close to water for the crops they grew. This not only brought them into conflict with the Aborigine, but also drove away animals from the Aborigines’ traditional hunting areas. There was some armed conflict between the Aborigines and Europeans, but guns were much more powerful than spears, and the Europeans won. The Europeans also brought diseases with them that had not been in the country before, so the Aborigines had no immunity to things like measles, mumps and smallpox. Within three years of European settlement, it is believed that between 50% and 90% of the Aboriginal population in the vicinity of Sydney had died of smallpox.
Some of the Aborigines that remained were taught to farm. The best known school for Aborigines was started by Governor Macquarie in Parramatta in 1814. As Parramatta grew, some people complained about the Aborigines living near them, so the school was moved further west, to the corner of Richmond Road and Rooty Hill Road North. The area around the school and the land granted to Aborigines became known as the Black’s Town, and it is from this that the City of Blacktown got its name.
Sources:
Brook, Jack & Kohen, J L (1991) The Parramatta Native Institution and the Black Town Sydney: UNSW Press
Collins, David (1971) An account of the English colony in New South Wales Facsimile edition, originally published 1798. Adelaide: South Australia Libraries Board.
Kohen, J L (1983) The Aborigines of the Blacktown District Blacktown: Blacktown & District Historical Society.
Kohen, J L (1993) The Darug and their neighbours Blacktown: Darug Link & Blacktown Historical Society