Aborigines who fought against British settlement should be formally recognised as Australia’s first war heroes, according to the Victorian co-chair of NAIDOC.
The Australian War Memorial recognises that Aborigines and Islanders have fought for Australia since the Boer War in 1899.
But Lidia Thorpe, co-chair of the Victorian National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee, said Aborigines also fought against British settlement in what needed to be recognised as Australia’s first war in 1788. She said the armed conflicts carried out in the name of settlement were often referred to as the Frontier Wars.
“A lot of our people, our ancestors, have died protecting our culture,” Ms Thorpe said.
She said there was widespread support for a war memorial dedicated to indigenous Australians, and she called on Prime Minister Tony Abbott to commission one. But Australian War Memorial director Dr Brendan Nelson said last week he did not support the idea.
Ms Thorpe’s views were supported by the former senior historian and curator of the Australian War Memorial, Peter Stanley, now research professor at the Australian Centre for the Study of Armed Conflict and Society at the University of NSW.
He said Australians had to accept that not everything in their military history was “praiseworthy, heroic or worthy”.
“Some things happened, whether we like them or not,” Professor Stanley said at ANZAC Day commemorations in April. “They’re part of our national history, just as we as individuals have to accept that we sometimes do things we’re not proud of. [It] doesn’t diminish Anzac, but it would prove that, a century on from Gallipoli, we have perhaps grown up as a nation.”
NAIDOC Week’s theme is ‘Serving Country: Centenary and Beyond’, marking 100 years since the first World War.
Ms Thorpe said it was important to raise awareness of Australia’s true history, rather than taking it at face value. “It’s about recognising we have survived the last 226 years and acknowledging the true history that makes up our country,” she said.
