How Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Survived the Destruction and Utnyu Policies of the Stolen Generation Period

The Original McKenzie Clan Fathered by my Great-Grandfather Fred McKenzie Snr

My Great-Grandfather was the Son of an Adnyamathanha and Scottish European union, and thus explains why we are now known by the European Scottish name of McKenzie

Despite this My Great-Grandfather became one of the Last Ceremonial Leaders of Our People

Nhangka, Today I was reading the book “Yura and Udnyu – A History of the Adnyamathanha of the North Flinders Ranges” by Peggy Brock.

First published in 1985 by Wakefield Press ISBN # 0 949268 08 9

Peggy Brock Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Ngankini Consultants were: Rufus Wilton, Bill Stubbs, John McKenzie, Pearl McKenzie, Violet Gilbert, Claude Demell, Ethel Demell, Artie Wilton, Annie Coulthard, Roma Wilton, Gertie Johnson, Don Coulthard, Clem Coulthard, Clifford Coulthard and Elsie Jackson

I thought it important to share with you how my Grandfather’s Peoples handled the Stolen Generation issue and policies for their fortitude and response during this stressful and racial discriminatory time of our Australian Aboriginal history.

We Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Ngankini living today and our Future Descendants should always be proud and honoured to be descended from such strong Peoples.

Peggy Brock learnt this from our Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Ngankini Consultants the following:

• The Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Peoples of the Northern Flinders Ranges have survived today as a Peoples because they full accepeted the children of mixed unions – Adnyamathanha and Europeans – as FULL members of their Ancient Society;
• The Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Peoples, like other Aboriginal communities, had complex and very strict kinship rules;
• Contravention of these kinship rules could result in the death of the wrongdoer;
• These rules did not apply to sexual relationships with Europeans;
• Children born from sexual encounters between Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura-artu (Women) and European men were FULLY acccepted and brought up by the whole of the Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Community;
• When the Mother subsequently married an Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Miru (man) he accepted FULLY the children from such Adnyamathanha-European union as his own;
• There is no early recorded marriage of a European White Mother and an Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Miru Father. The first recorded Marriage was between an English women Rebecca Castledine and Jack Forbes in the 1920s;
• Such Marriages are quite common today and the children are considered FULLY as part of the Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Community;
• Occasionally the white fathers tried to take control of their children through police action, for instance the Beltana police attempted to ‘arrest’ children as neglected and bring them under state control;
• However, in two documented cases the Mother and Adnyamathanha (step) Father refused to give up their children and it was subsequently found they were not neglected as their Adnyamathanha (step) Fathers had employment;
• There were attempts from the 1890s to send children of mixed descent to other far flung misson stations;
• Our Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Wardumathanha (Ancestors, people of long ago) managed to fight off these attempts by the Protector of Aborigines and police to disperse our Peoples, especially their children of mixed descent;
• In 1893 the Sub-Protector of Aborigines tried to send the young children to far flung mission stations, but the childrens friends and realtives would not allow them to go because Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Ngankini Mudha saw that the customs and language of others were different, and they would not allow their children to grow up in places where such customs and languages were different;
• In 1902 there were another concerted attempt to send children to Point McLeay Mission, down south on the Shores of Lake Alexandria and the Lands of the Ngarrindjeri;
• Families where one parent was widowed were approached and persuaded to let their children go to Point McLeay, but they would not do so and could not do so because the whole community of Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Ngankini Mudha would not allow such a thing to occur, because our Laws prevented sole parents to decided for themeselves to send their children away. Such an sole action and decision needed firstly the whole communal permission of all the children’s Ngankini, especially their Elders, and such permission was not forthcoming, ever;
• After an measle epidemic the attempt to remove children was finally stopped when the whole of the Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Peoples said such attempt needed to be stopped because they needed the children to build up their tribe again.

This is how our Adnyamathanha Ararru Mathari Yura Ngankini Wardumathanha and their Yarkati (children) survived the disgracful and racial Australian Governments Stolen Generation Period and Policy of Removing Our Children.

Therefore, let us always be fully proud of the strentgh and fortitude of our Wardumathanha for many of us may not be here today, our culture would not be as strong, and our Peoples may have became exinct and vanished from our Yarta (Lands).

Warntu?

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