Pemulwuy

Pemulwuy (1750 – 2 June 1802) was a Bidjigal warrior from the Dharug Nation, an Aboriginal Australian people of New South Wales. He is widely recognised as one of the most prominent Aboriginal resistance fighters during the colonial period, opposing British colonisation that started with the First Fleet’s arrival in January 1788.

Resistance

Born around 1750 near Botany Bay—called Kamay in the Dharug language—Pemulwuy was considered a carradhy, or cleverman, meaning a spiritual healer and keeper of Dharug culture. He began a twelve-year guerrilla war against the colonists in 1790, which lasted until he was killed and beheaded in 1802. As an adult, he was known as Bemul Wagan, meaning “the earth and the crow.” According to Dharug activist Uncle Richard Green, Pemulwuy “wasn’t very impressed with the mix of cultures. He preferred that we stayed within our own peoples.” He was also called Butu Wagan, which translates to “crow.”

Early life

Pemulwuy was born with a turned eyeball or a blemish in his left eye. Historian Eric Willmot noted that in Dharug tradition, a child with such a deformity was often expected to be “sent back” to be reborn, as people believed humans came from the land and that conception involved a woman being infected by a child’s spirit. Pemulwuy, however, became exceptional: he could run farther, throw a spear better than anyone, and was surrounded by an aura of difference, leading to his reputation as a clever man who dealt with spiritual matters and sorcery. His contemporary Colebee said Pemulwuy’s left foot was distinctive, damaged by a club—possibly to mark him as a carradhy, similar to the Kurdaitcha of Central Australia, who deliberately mutilate their feet.

The Bidjigal people, Pemulwuy’s clan, were the original inhabitants of Toongabbie and Parramatta in Sydney. Before his resistance, Pemulwuy hunted meat and traded it with the struggling colony for goods.

The conflict began on 9 December 1790, when a shooting party including Governor Phillip’s gamekeeper John McIntyre went to Botany Bay. According to Watkin Tench, the group was approached by two natives with spears.

Spearing of McIntyre

McIntyre, saying “don’t be afraid, I know them,” laid down his gun and spoke to them in their language. One of the natives—a young man with a speck or blemish on his left eye, recently shaved—suddenly speared McIntyre in the left side. The attack was likely revenge for McIntyre’s violence against Aboriginal people and his hunting of sacred totem animals, which violated Aboriginal law.

Governor Phillip's military expeditions

Governor Phillip ordered Lieutenant Tench to gather marines and retaliate against the Bidjigal, demanding two be captured and ten killed, with their heads brought back. Tench suggested a less bloody plan: capture six Bidjigal and bring them to Sydney Cove without killing any. This was accepted, and on 14 December, Tench, Lieutenants William Dawes and John Poulden, and 46 marines set out—the largest military operation since the colony’s founding. After three days of searching, they found no sign of the Bidjigal and returned to Sydney Cove for supplies.

Pemulwuy persuaded other Dharug to join his campaign. From 1792, he led raids on British colonists at Parramatta, Georges River, Prospect, Toongabbie, Brickfield, and Hawkesbury River, often burning crops and killing livestock.

In May 1795, he or one of his followers speared a convict near present-day Chippendale. In December 1795, Pemulwuy and his warriors attacked a work party at Botany Bay that included John “Black” Caesar, an early African-descended settler and bushranger. Caesar cracked Pemulwuy’s skull, and many thought he had died, but he survived.

In early 1797, large groups of Aboriginal warriors led by Pemulwuy raided the Northern Farms, northeast of Parramatta (now Oatlands and Carlingford). During one raid in March, a male and a female settler were killed. The remaining settlers then decided to organise.