Caledon Bay crisis: Difference between revisions

Content deleted Content added

Inline

Latest revision as of 01:10, 18 August 2024

The Caledon Bay crisis refers to a series of killings at Caledon Bay in the Northern Territory of Australia during 1932–34, referred to in the press of the day as Caledon Bay murder(s). Five Japanese trepang fishers were killed by Aboriginal Australians of the Yolngu people. A police officer investigating the deaths, Albert McColl, was subsequently killed. Shortly afterwards, two white men went missing on Woodah Island (with one body found later). With some of the white community alarmed by these events, a punitive expedition was proposed by Northern Territory Police to "teach the blacks a lesson".

However, it was feared that a punitive expedition would lead to an event similar to the 1928 Coniston massacre (when a number of innocent Aboriginal people were killed by a white patrol group after a murder). A party from the Church Missionary Society travelled to Arnhem Land and persuaded Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda and three other men, sons of a Yolngu elder, Wonggu, to return to Darwin with them for trial.

In Darwin in April 1934, Dhakiyarr was sentenced to death by hanging for the murder of McColl. The three other men were sentenced to 20 years' hard labour. After a seven months’ investigation, the Federal Government freed the three men imprisoned for the killings. On appeal to the High Court of Australia, in a case known as Tuckiar v The King, Dhakiyarr's sentence was quashed in November 1934, and he was released from jail, but disappeared on his way home.

Sequence of events

Killings

There had previously been killings of Japanese fishermen in 1921 and 1926.^[1]^[2] On 17 September 1932,^[3] five Japanese trepangers were killed by Aboriginal men in the Caledon Bay area of northeast Arnhem Land. (Evidence was later given that the Japanese men had taken several Aboriginal women.)^[4]^[5]^[6]

In a separate incident, two white men, William Fagan and Frank Traynor, were reported missing some months earlier after they failed to return from a fishing expedition.^[7]^[8]^[9]

In June 1933 a police party arrived in the area from Darwin, to look for suspects.^[3] On 1 August 1933, a group of police, led by Mounted Constable Ted Morey and including Constable Albert McColl, were on Woodah Island trying to track down the people they believed were involved in the killings of the Japanese and possibly the missing men. They came across a group of Aboriginal women, and McColl and the women became separated from the others. The women included Djaparri, a wife of Dhakiyarr, a Yolngu elder. McColl had handcuffed the women, as part of a plan to trap Dhakiyarr. When Dhakiyarr attempted to contact his wife, McColl shot at him and misfired; Dhakiyarr threw a spear at McColl, killing him.^[10]^[11]^[12]^[13]^[14]

Reaction

After the news of McColl's death reached Darwin on 11 August 1933, many in the community became alarmed. A punitive expedition by police was proposed on 29 August by Administrator R. H. Weddell^[3] to "teach the blacks a lesson".^[15] There were protests against this idea, peaking in early September with a unanimous resolution by the Council of Churches,^[16] and Interior Minister John Perkins quashed the idea.^[3] In 1928, during a previous punitive expedition in the Northern Territory, police had killed up to 200 Aboriginal men, women and children; an event known as the Coniston massacre, and many feared another such slaughter.

On 14 November 1933, one Fred Gray, a trepanger, reported that "Mereela" and "Barion" had killed Fagan and Traynor, and Dhakiyarr had killed McColl.^[3] On 22 November 1933^[3] a peace mission was planned by the Church Missionary Society to speak with the alleged murderers and eyewitnesses. They travelled to Arnhem Land and persuaded Dhakiyarr and three other men, who were sons of a Yolngu elder, Wonggu, to return to Darwin with them for trial.^[17] On 15 March 1934, Dhakiyarr and 16 other Yolngu men travelled to Darwin, accompanied by missionaries.^[3]

Trials

Dhakiyarr was arrested and put in Fannie Bay Gaol, but there were many delays before the cases could be brought to trial, owing mostly to lack of prosecution witnesses. In April 1934, it was ruled that the confessions of Dhakiyarr and Meerera, who was said to have acted with Dhakiyarr in the killing of Traynor and Fagan, were inadmissible in a murder trial for these killings (the remains of one of the two, unidentified, had been found earlier). There was not enough evidence for these cases to be brought to trial.^[9]

In May 1934, a Northern Territory Ordinance was amended so that a death sentence would not be mandatory in Aboriginal murder convictions. Clergyman and anthropologist A. P. Elkin and others argued for the need for a separate system of native courts.^{[citation needed]} Evidence was offered that the Japanese men had assaulted the Yolngu women before they were killed.^{[citation needed]} Gray was prepared to return the Aborigines to their community in his boat, suggesting that a lecture would be sufficient.

On 1 August 1934, the three men convicted of murdering the Japanese trepangers were sentenced to twenty years' hard labour, and on 3 August 1934 Dhakiyarr was sentenced to death by hanging in the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory by Judge Wells and 12-person jury.^[3]^[17]^[18]

NT newspapers supported Judge Wells' sentence, but there were protests from many quarters, not only about the sentence, but about the fairness of the trial and the Judge's comments during the trial.^[3] Four days before Dhakiyarr's scheduled hanging, on 29 August 1934, Governor-General Isaac Isaacs ordered a stay of execution, pending an appeal, and the following day, the High Court granted the right to appeal.

Appeal: Tuckiar v The King

On 29–30 October 1934 the appeal was heard at the High Court of Australia in Melbourne, in a case known as Tuckiar v the King, Dhakiyarr's sentence was quashed^[19] after numerous irregularities in the first trial were pointed out,^[20]^[21] and he was released from jail and taken to Kahlin compound, but was never seen again. Oral tradition has it that he was murdered by friends of McColl.^[22]

Aftermath

The resulting crisis threatened to bring about even more bloodshed. To defuse the situation, a young anthropologist, Donald Thomson, offered to investigate the causes of the conflict. He travelled to Arnhem Land, on a mission that many said would be suicidal, and got to know and understand the people who lived there. After a seven months’ investigation, he persuaded the Federal Government to free the three men convicted of the killings and returned with them to their own country, living for over a year with their people, documenting their culture.^{[citation needed]} In the course of his negotiations, he wrote of Wonggu sending a message stick to his sons, at that time in prison, to indicate a calling of a truce. In etched angles, it showed people sitting down together, with Wonggu at the centre, keeping the peace.^[23]^[24] The message stick is now housed in the Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Centre at Yirrkala.^[25]

He formed a strong bond with the Yolngu people, and in 1941 he persuaded the Army to establish a special reconnaissance force of Yolngu men known as the Northern Territory Special Reconnaissance Unit, including Wonggu and his sons, to help repel Japanese raids on the northern coastline of Australia.

The historian Henry Reynolds has suggested that the Caledon Bay crisis was a decisive moment in the history of Aboriginal-European relations.^{[citation needed]}

References

^ "Killing of 5 Japs Reported". The Daily Telegraph. Vol. 2, no. 195. New South Wales, Australia. 29 September 1932. p. 7. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "In The Northern Mounted". The West Australian. Vol. XLIX, no. 9, 746. Western Australia. 23 September 1933. p. 5. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g ^h ⁱ "Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda: Timeline". Uncommon lives. Archived from the original on 6 February 2006.
^ "Massacre of Pearl Divers". Northern Star. Vol. 57. New South Wales, Australia. 29 September 1932. p. 7. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Caledon Bay Massacre". The West Australian. Vol. XLIX, no. 9, 713. Western Australia. 16 August 1933. p. 13. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Caledon Bay Murder". The West Australian. Vol. XLIX, no. 9, 770. Western Australia. 21 October 1933. p. 5. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Murder by Blacks". The Mercury. Vol. CXXXIX, no. 20, 638. Tasmania, Australia. 29 September 1933. p. 9. Retrieved 9 July 2019 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Murder by Blacks". The Mercury. Vol. CXXXIX, no. 20, 638. Tasmania, Australia. 29 September 1933. p. 9. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ ^a ^b "No Evidence Against Caledon Killers". The Courier-mail. No. 193. Queensland, Australia. 11 April 1934. p. 14. Retrieved 9 July 2019 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Constable Speared". The Uralla Times. New South Wales, Australia. 17 August 1933. p. 1. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Tragic Story Told". Tweed Daily. Vol. XXI, no. 177. New South Wales, Australia. 26 July 1934. p. 5. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "Spearing of Policeman". The West Australian. Vol. 50, no. 15, 006. Western Australia. 26 July 1934. p. 18. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ Egan, Ted (1996). Justice All Their Own. Melbourne University Press.
^ This incident is dramatised in the documentary film Dhakiyarr vs the King Archived 14 August 2014 at the Wayback Machine (2004) by Tom Murray and Allan Collins.
^ Howard Morphy, 2005, "Mutual Conversion? The Methodist Church and the Yolŋu, with particular reference to Yirrkala", Humanities Research, vol. XII, no. 1, p. 43]
^ "Council of Churches Protests". The Advertiser (Adelaide). South Australia. 5 September 1933. p. 9. Retrieved 18 August 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
^ ^a ^b Murray, Tom (2002) Producer. Tuckiar vs the King and Territory. ABC Radio National Hindsight.
^ "Caledon Bay Murder Cases". Northern Standard. No. 28. Northern Territory, Australia. 13 April 1934. p. 5. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ Tuckiar v The King [1934] HCA 49, (1934) 52 CLR 335 (8 November 1934), High Court (Australia).
^ "Caledon Bay Murder". The West Australian. Vol. 50, no. 15, 089. Western Australia. 31 October 1934. p. 16. Retrieved 8 July 2019 – via National Library of Australia.
^ "High Court Hears Appeal by Tackiar". The Advertiser (Adelaide). South Australia. 30 October 1934. p. 15. Retrieved 30 May 2018 – via National Library of Australia.
^ Mickey Dewar, 'Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda (1900–1934)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/dhakiyarr-wirrpanda-12885/text23275, published first in hardcopy 2005, accessed online 30 May 2018.
^ Peterson, Nicholas, Donald Thomson in Arnhem Land, Melbourne University Press ISBN 0-522-85063-4, pp 80-81.
^ Kelly, Piers (4 July 2019). "Australian message sticks: Old questions, new directions". Journal of Material Culture. 25 (2). SAGE Publications: 133–152. doi:10.1177/1359183519858375. hdl:21.11116/0000-0003-FDF8-9. ISSN 1359-1835.
^ "Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka". Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka Centre. Retrieved 30 May 2020.

Sources

Conor, Liz (2013). "'Black Velvet' and 'Purple Indignation': Print responses to Japanese 'poaching' of Aboriginal women". Aboriginal History. 37: 51–76. doi:10.22459/AH.37.2013.03. JSTOR 24046958.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
+{{Short description|Series of killings in Australia}}
-In 1932-1934, a series of killings in '''Caledon Bay''' in Northern [[Australia]] threatened to create even deeper rifts between [[Indigenous Australians]] and non-Indigenous Australians, but, largely because of one man, it instead became a turning point towards reconciliation.
+{{Use Australian English|date=March 2018}}
+{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2018}}
+The '''Caledon Bay crisis''' refers to a series of killings at [[Caledon Bay]] in the [[Northern Territory]] of [[Australia]] during 1932–34, referred to in the press of the day as '''Caledon Bay murder(s)'''. Five [[Japanese people|Japanese]] [[trepanging|trepang fishers]] were killed by [[Aboriginal Australians]] of the [[Yolngu people]]. A police officer investigating the deaths, Albert McColl, was subsequently killed. Shortly afterwards, two white men went missing on [[Woodah Island]] (with one body found later). With some of the white community alarmed by these events, a [[punitive expedition]] was proposed by [[Northern Territory Police]] to "teach the blacks a lesson".
-In [[1932]], Japanese poachers captured and raped a group of [[Yolngu]] women in the [[Caledon Bay]] area of North-East [[Arnhem Land]], and then attacked the Yolngu men who came to rescue them. In the resulting fight, five Japanese poachers were killed. In a further related incident on [[Woodah Island]], two white men, Fagan and Traynor, were killed. An investigating policeman, Constable McColl, was subsequently also killed by the Yolngu people. According to eye-witnesses, Constable McColl had handcuffed and then raped a Yolngu woman, and had then fired his revolver at her husband, Takiara (or Dhaakiyarr), who had responded to her cries for help.
+However, it was feared that a punitive expedition would lead to an event similar to the 1928 [[Coniston massacre]] (when a number of innocent Aboriginal people were killed by a white patrol group after a murder). A party from the [[Church Missionary Society]] travelled to [[Arnhem Land]] and persuaded Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda and three other men, sons of a Yolngu elder, Wonggu, to return to [[Darwin, Northern Territory|Darwin]] with them for trial.
-The killings triggered panic in [[Darwin]] and [[Canberra]], generating fears that the "natives were restive" and might stage an uprising. A punitive expedition was proposed by the Federal Government to "teach the aborigines a lesson". It should be noted that in the previous "punitive expedition" in [[1928]], police had slaughtered 100 Aboriginal men, women and children at [[Coniston]] in Central Australia.
-Many feared another such slaughter, and a party from the [[Church Missionary Society]] travelled to Arnhem Land and persuaded Takiara and three other men, who were sons of a Yolngu elder, Wonggu, to return to [[Darwin]] with them for trial. In Darwin, to the horror of the missionaries, Takiara was sentenced to death by hanging, and the three other men were sentenced to twenty years hard labour. On appeal, Takiara’s sentence was quashed, and he was released from jail, but disappeared. It was widely believed he had been lynched by police.
+In Darwin in April 1934, Dhakiyarr was sentenced to death by hanging for the murder of McColl. The three other men were sentenced to 20 years' hard labour. After a seven months’ investigation, the [[Government of Australia|Federal Government]] freed the three men imprisoned for the killings. On appeal to the [[High Court of Australia]], in a case known as ''[[Tuckiar v The King]]'', Dhakiyarr's sentence was quashed in November 1934, and he was released from jail, but disappeared on his way home.
+==Sequence of events==
-The resulting crisis threatened to bring about even more bloodshed. To defuse the situation, a young anthropologist, [[Donald Thomson]], offered to investigate the causes of the conflict. He travelled to Arnhem Land, on a mission that many said would be suicidal, and got to know and understand the people who lived there. After seven months’ investigation he persuaded the Federal Government to free the three men convicted of the killings and returned with them to their own country, living for over a year with their people, documenting their culture.
+===Killings===
+There had previously been killings of Japanese fishermen in 1921 and 1926.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article246306871 |title=Killing of 5 Japs Reported |newspaper=[[The Daily Telegraph (Sydney)|The Daily Telegraph]] |volume=2 |issue=195 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=29 September 1932 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=7 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref name=mounted>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article33305182 |title=In The Northern Mounted. |newspaper=[[The West Australian]] |volume=XLIX |issue=9,746 |location=Western Australia |date=23 September 1933 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref> On 17 September 1932,<ref name=timeline>{{cite web|url=http://uncommonlives.naa.gov.au/timeline.asp?lID=2| title=Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda: Timeline|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060206075734/http://uncommonlives.naa.gov.au/timeline.asp?lID=2 |archive-date=6 February 2006 |website=Uncommon lives}}</ref> five Japanese [[Trepanging|trepangers]] were killed by Aboriginal men in the Caledon Bay area of northeast [[Arnhem Land]]. (Evidence was later given that the Japanese men had taken several Aboriginal women.)<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article94303000 |title=Massacre of Pearl Divers |newspaper=[[The Northern Star|Northern Star]] |volume=57 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=29 September 1932 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=7 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article33307013 |title=Caledon Bay Massacre |newspaper=[[The West Australian]] |volume=XLIX |issue=9,713 |location=Western Australia |date=16 August 1933 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=13 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article33319362 |title=Caledon Bay Murder |newspaper=[[The West Australian]] |volume=XLIX |issue=9,770 |location=Western Australia |date=21 October 1933 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
+In a separate incident, two white men, William Fagan and Frank Traynor, were reported missing some months earlier after they failed to return from a fishing expedition.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article24867599 |title=Murder by Blacks |newspaper=[[The Mercury (Hobart)|The Mercury]] |volume=CXXXIX |issue=20,638 |location=Tasmania, Australia |date=29 September 1933 |access-date=9 July 2019 |page=9 |via=National Library of Australia}} </ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article24867599 |title=Murder by Blacks |newspaper=[[The Mercury (Hobart)|The Mercury]] |volume=CXXXIX |issue=20,638 |location=Tasmania, Australia |date=29 September 1933 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=9 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref name=killers/>
-He formed a strong bond with the Yolngu people, and in [[1941]] he persuaded the Army to establish a Special Reconnaissance Force of Yolngu men, including Wonggu and his sons, to help repel Japanese raids on the northern coastline of Australia.
+In June 1933 a police party arrived in the area from Darwin, to look for suspects.<ref name=timeline/> On 1 August 1933, a group of police, led by Mounted Constable Ted Morey and including Constable Albert McColl, were on Woodah Island trying to track down the people they believed were involved in the killings of the Japanese and possibly the missing men. They came across a group of Aboriginal women, and McColl and the women became separated from the others. The women included Djaparri, a wife of Dhakiyarr, a Yolngu elder. McColl had handcuffed the women, as part of a plan to trap Dhakiyarr. When Dhakiyarr attempted to contact his wife, McColl shot at him and misfired; Dhakiyarr threw a spear at McColl, killing him.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article176007246 |title=Constable Speared |newspaper=[[The Uralla Times]] |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=17 August 1933 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=1 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article192616957 |title=Tragic Story Told |newspaper=[[Tweed Daily]] |volume=XXI |issue=177 |location=New South Wales, Australia |date=26 July 1934 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article32931482 |title=Spearing of Policeman. |newspaper=[[The West Australian]] |volume=50 |issue=15,006 |location=Western Australia |date=26 July 1934 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=18 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author-link=Ted Egan |author=Egan, Ted |year=1996 |url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/21652679 |title=Justice All Their Own |publisher=Melbourne University Press}}</ref><ref>This incident is dramatised in the documentary film [http://www.abc.net.au/aplacetothink/html/dhakiyarr.htm Dhakiyarr vs the King] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140814045534/http://www.abc.net.au/aplacetothink/html/dhakiyarr.htm |date=14 August 2014 }} (2004) by Tom Murray and Allan Collins.</ref>
-As historian [[Henry Reynolds]] wrote: The Caledon Bay Crisis "was a decisive moment in the history of Aboriginal-European relations. The High Court condemned frontier justice, the punitive expedition did not ride into Yolngu country and there had been an unprecedented outburst of public sentiment demanding a new deal for [[Indigenous Australians]]."
+===Reaction===
+After the news of McColl's death reached Darwin on 11 August 1933, many in the community became alarmed. A [[punitive expedition]] by police was proposed on 29 August by Administrator [[R. H. Weddell]]<ref name=timeline/> to "teach the blacks a lesson".<ref>[http://epress.anu.edu.au/hrj/2005_01/pdf/hrj-ch06.pdf Howard Morphy, 2005, "Mutual Conversion? The Methodist Church and the Yolŋu, with particular reference to Yirrkala"], ''Humanities Research'', vol. XII, no. 1, p. 43]</ref> There were protests against this idea, peaking in early September with a unanimous resolution by the [[Council of Churches in South Australia|Council of Churches]],<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article46999032 |title=Council of Churches Protests |newspaper=[[The Advertiser (Adelaide)]] |location=South Australia |date=5 September 1933 |access-date=18 August 2024 |page=9 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref> and Interior Minister [[John Perkins (Australian politician)|John Perkins]] quashed the idea.<ref name=timeline/> In 1928, during a previous punitive expedition in the Northern Territory, police had killed up to 200 Aboriginal men, women and children; an event known as the [[Coniston massacre]], and many feared another such slaughter.
+On 14 November 1933, one Fred Gray, a trepanger, reported that "Mereela" and "Barion" had killed Fagan and Traynor, and Dhakiyarr had killed McColl.<ref name=timeline/> On 22 November 1933<ref name=timeline/>  a peace mission was planned by the [[Church Missionary Society]] to speak with the alleged murderers and eyewitnesses. They travelled to Arnhem Land and persuaded Dhakiyarr and three other men, who were sons of a Yolngu elder, Wonggu, to return to Darwin with them for trial.<ref name=Murray/> On 15 March 1934, Dhakiyarr and 16 other Yolngu men travelled to Darwin, accompanied by missionaries.<ref name=timeline/>
+===Trials===
+Dhakiyarr was arrested and put in [[Fannie Bay Gaol]], but there were many delays before the cases could be brought to trial, owing mostly to lack of prosecution witnesses. In April 1934, it was ruled that the confessions of Dhakiyarr and Meerera, who was said to have acted with Dhakiyarr in the killing of Traynor and Fagan, were inadmissible in a murder trial for these killings (the remains of one of the two, unidentified, had been found earlier). There was not enough evidence for these cases to be brought to trial.<ref name=killers>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article1188235 |title=No Evidence Against Caledon Killers |newspaper=[[The Courier-mail]] |issue=193 |location=Queensland, Australia |date=11 April 1934 |access-date=9 July 2019 |page=14 |via=National Library of Australia}} </ref>
+In May 1934, a Northern Territory Ordinance  was amended so that a death sentence would not be mandatory in Aboriginal murder convictions. Clergyman and anthropologist [[A. P. Elkin]] and others argued for the need for a separate system of native courts.{{citation needed|date=October 2020}} Evidence was offered that the Japanese men had assaulted the Yolngu women before they were killed.{{Citation needed|date=October 2020}} Gray was prepared to return the Aborigines to their community in his boat, suggesting that a lecture would be sufficient.
+On 1 August 1934, the three men convicted of murdering the Japanese trepangers were sentenced to twenty years' hard labour, and on 3 August 1934 Dhakiyarr was sentenced to death by hanging in the [[Supreme Court of the Northern Territory]] by [[Thomas Wells (Australian judge)|Judge Wells]] and 12-person jury.<ref name=timeline/><ref name=Murray>Murray, Tom (2002) Producer. [http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/hindsight/hindsight-sunday-july-7th2c013/4760586 Tuckiar vs the King and Territory]. ABC Radio National Hindsight.</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article49493298 |title=Caledon Bay Murder Cases |newspaper=[[Northern Standard]] |issue=28 |location=Northern Territory, Australia |date=13 April 1934 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=5 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
+NT newspapers supported Judge Wells' sentence, but there were protests from many quarters, not only about the sentence, but about the fairness of the trial and the Judge's comments during the trial.<ref name=timeline/> Four days before Dhakiyarr's scheduled hanging, on 29 August 1934, Governor-General [[Isaac Isaacs]] ordered a stay of execution, pending an appeal, and the following day, the High Court granted the right to appeal.
+===Appeal: ''Tuckiar v The King''===
+{{main|Tuckiar v The King}}
+On 29–30 October 1934 the appeal was heard at the [[High Court of Australia]] in [[Melbourne]], in a case known as ''Tuckiar v the King'', Dhakiyarr's sentence was quashed<ref name="Tuckiar">{{cite AustLII|HCA|49|1934|litigants=[[Tuckiar v The King]] |parallelcite=[http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/cases/cth/HCA/1934/49.pdf (1934) 52 CLR 335] |date=8 November 1934 |courtname=auto}}.</ref> after numerous irregularities in the first trial were pointed out,<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article32806859 |title=Caledon Bay Murder |newspaper=[[The West Australian]] |volume=50 |issue=15,089 |location=Western Australia |date=31 October 1934 |access-date=8 July 2019 |page=16 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article35015130 |title=High Court Hears Appeal by Tackiar |newspaper=[[The Advertiser (Adelaide)]] |location=South Australia |date=30 October 1934 |access-date=30 May 2018 |page=15 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
+and he was released from jail and taken to Kahlin compound, but was never seen again. Oral tradition has it that he was murdered by friends of McColl.<ref>Mickey Dewar, 'Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda (1900–1934)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/dhakiyarr-wirrpanda-12885/text23275, published first in hardcopy 2005, accessed online 30 May 2018.</ref>
+==Aftermath==
+The resulting crisis threatened to bring about even more bloodshed. To defuse the situation, a young anthropologist, [[Donald Thomson]], offered to investigate the causes of the conflict. He travelled to Arnhem Land, on a mission that many said would be suicidal, and got to know and understand the people who lived there. After a seven months’ investigation, he persuaded the Federal Government to free the three men convicted of the killings and returned with them to their own country, living for over a year with their people, documenting their culture.{{cn|date=July 2019}} In the course of his negotiations, he wrote of Wonggu sending a [[message stick]] to his sons, at that time in prison, to indicate a calling of a truce. In etched angles, it showed people sitting down together, with Wonggu at the centre, keeping the peace.<ref>Peterson, Nicholas, ''[[Donald Thomson]] in Arnhem Land'', [[Melbourne University Press]] {{ISBN|0-522-85063-4}}, pp 80-81.</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last=Kelly | first=Piers | title=Australian message sticks: Old questions, new directions | journal=Journal of Material Culture | publisher=SAGE Publications | volume=25 | issue=2 | date=4 July 2019 | issn=1359-1835 | doi=10.1177/1359183519858375 | pages=133–152| doi-access=free | hdl=21.11116/0000-0003-FDF8-9 | hdl-access=free }}</ref> The message stick is now housed in the [[Buku-Larrnggay Mulka Centre]] at [[Yirrkala]].<ref name=hist>{{cite web | title=Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka | website=Buku-Larrŋgay Mulka Centre | url=https://yirrkala.com/buku-larrnggay-mulka/ | access-date=30 May 2020}}</ref>
+He formed a strong bond with the Yolngu people, and in 1941 he persuaded the Army to establish a special reconnaissance force of Yolngu men known as the [[Northern Territory Special Reconnaissance Unit]], including Wonggu and his sons, to help repel Japanese raids on the northern coastline of Australia.
+The historian [[Henry Reynolds (historian)|Henry Reynolds]] has suggested that the Caledon Bay crisis was a decisive moment in the history of Aboriginal-European relations.{{cn|date=July 2019}}
 ==References==
+{{Reflist|20em}}
-*Thomson, D., & Peterson, N., 1983,“Donald Thomson in Arnhem Land”, Miegunyah Press, Melbourne. Revised ed. publ. 2003, ISBN 0 522 85063 4
+==Sources==
+{{refbegin|30em}}
+*{{Cite journal | title ='Black Velvet' and 'Purple Indignation': Print responses to Japanese 'poaching' of Aboriginal women
+ | last = Conor| first =Liz
+ | journal = [[Aboriginal History]]
+ | year =2013
+ | volume = 37
+ | pages = 51–76
+ | doi = 10.22459/AH.37.2013.03| jstor =24046958
+| doi-access = free}}
+{{refend}}
+==Further reading==
+*[https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/result?q=caledon+bay+murder Trove: numerous newspaper articles]
+* {{cite web|url=http://uncommonlives.naa.gov.au/contents-long.asp?sID=13| title=Dhakiyarr Wirrpanda: The first Aboriginal Australian whose case was heard in the High Court|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060206165547/http://uncommonlives.naa.gov.au/contents-long.asp?sID=13 |archive-date=6 February 2006 |website=Uncommon lives}} at the [[National Archives of Australia]]
+* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050719054936/http://www.atsic.gov.au//News_Room/atsic_news/September_1999/Reconciliation_article.asp ATSIC: The First Reconciliation Act]
+*[https://explore.moadoph.gov.au/people/albert-mccoll Albert McColl] at Explore Democracy
+* Thomson, D., & Peterson, N., 1983, “Donald Thomson in Arnhem Land”, [[Miegunyah Press]], Melbourne. Revised ed. publ. 2003, {{ISBN|0-522-85063-4}}
+{{Campaignbox Australian frontier wars}}
-==External links==
+{{Indigenous Australians}}
-* [http://www.atsic.gov.au/News_Room/ATSIC_News/September_1999/Reconciliation_article.asp ATSIC The First Reconciliation Act]
-[[Category:Indigenous peoples of Australia ]]
+[[Category:1930s in the Northern Territory]]
+[[Category:Crime in the Northern Territory]]
+[[Category:History of Australia (1901–1945)]]
+[[Category:1932 in Australia]]
+[[Category:1933 in Australia]]
+[[Category:1934 in Australia]]
+[[Category:Yolngu]]
+[[Category:Australian frontier wars]]
+[[Category:1932 murders in Australia]]
+[[Category:1933 murders in Australia]]
+[[Category:1934 murders in Australia]]