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The natives of this land saw the ships entering the bay and remembered 18 years earlier that they had seen ships like this before.
As Phillip and his crew took a long boat to shore they witnessed the aborigines brandishing their spears yelling "wirri, wirri!" or "bad, bad!"
A shot was fired into the air, the natives scattered and the crew made landfall without incident.
18 years earlier Captain Cook reported to the Admiralty in England that Botany Bay was a lush verdant land with running water and good soil for cultivation.
Arthur Phillip was second guessing if they had actually reached the same bay as Cook did 18 years earlier.
Looking around they found no lush vegetation, no running water and poor soil. Phillip was bemused. Where was it that Cook and his crew landed?
They continued to search the bay for the water and good soil but none was to be found.
We now know that the reason was the effects of El Niño and La Niña, it's effects on the climate between Australia and South America.

As a sailor, he was far from satisfied with Botany Bay as the main harbour. Ships had to anchor near the entrance to the bay as most parts were too shallow. As strong easterly winds blew in, there was no high coastal headland to offer shelter to the ships.

Contact was made with the natives or indians as the First Fleet referred them as and the natives were confused by Phillips crews gender.
No man wore a beard in the officer ranks and one man had to drop his pants and expose himself as proof he was actually male.
I suppose this broke the ice and good relations were stuck and trading of trinkets ensued.
Phillip was still troubled, he could not find the fresh water source and found no good soil. How could he set up a colony without these resources?
He check his chart as he'd done a hundred times confirming he was in the right location. He was.
He saw that Cook had marked on his map a few miles north a harbour that he name Port Jackson. Cook never entered the heads of Port Jackson as it was fogged in and Cook continued his mapping of the coastline heading north.
Phillip took a longboat and entered the heads of Port Jackson. Phillip had never seen such a magnificent harbour. He continued to survey the harbour of the next few days, he found a permanent running fresh water source, reasonable soil and the harbour offered good protection for the ships and made the decision to move the settlement to Port Jackson.
Relations soured with the natives when the aborigines realized that Phillip was here to stay.
Arthur Phillip was governor, he answered to no one in this land of New South Wales.
Phillip tried to entice the natives to learn English so a dialogue could be established but they now avoided the settlement.
Phillip had one native captured; a young man named Arabanoo and tried to force him to learn English and himself learn some native tongue.
Sadly Arabanoo died from the ravages of smallpox that the English brought with them along with many other disease that the natives had no immune to and soon the natives started dying.
The colony started expanding westwards. A new village known as Rose Hill was founded but was renamed Parramatta after the aboriginal name for the area; Baramatta or Burramatta.
As the expansion grew, so did the competition for resources, food and water. The aborigines were denied access to their hunting grounds around Parramatta. Attacks grew more frequent, the burning of huts, pillage of crops, spearing of cattle and no access to fishing grounds.
The aborigines started to attack the invaders and Phillip soon retaliated. He ordered the heads of ten indians to be placed in bags for the death of his Gamekeeper John MacEntyre in 1790.
The ten heads were never brought to him. The killer - Pemulwy.
The hunting grounds around the settlement were being disrupted by the expansion of the colony. Food-rich areas such as the Hyde Park swamps and the Tank Stream were all depriving the aborigines of hunting and game moving on or scared away.

The aborigines in the Port Jackson area practiced a ritual of tooth evulsion where the front tooth of a young man was knocked out with a rock when the young man was initiated in a ceremony to manhood. The women had their first two joints of their left little finger removed when they were infants in another ritual found along the coastal tribes.
Arthur Phillip by change had one of his front teeth missing and this help calm many tense situations with the aborigines who looked up to Phillip and even called him "Biana" or "father" as a sign of respect.
25th November, 1789; Another two natives were captured, two young men named Colbee and Bennelong. They were put in chains and made to conform to English rule and to learn English.
Colbee escaped seventeen days after capture but Bennelong was kept under tight security. Bennelong learned much English and began to get a taste for English clothing and English wine.
The chains were no longer needed and Bennelong became a regular sight in the young settlement of the growing colony.
Phillip had named the area "Sydney" after a Lord Sydney, the natives called it Warrane or Warranie.
Bennelong had almost become an outcast among his people, he had learned English well and acted as a facilitator between the Europeans and the natives.
Bennalong eventually escapes the colony on 3rd May, 1790 to be with his own people even though Phillip had built a small brick hut on the site where the Sydney Opera House now stands on Bennelong Point.
One rare occasion a whale had died and drifted into Port Jackson and was beached at a small cove called Manly Cove a few miles from the settlement.
Aborigines from all over the area came to feast on the whale and it was during this time that Governor Phillip thought it would be a good time to try to find Bennelong and Colbee as he heard they had been sighted at the whale.
On 7th September, 1790 he took a longboat with some marines and headed to Manly. Phillip had named the area after the 'manly' looking natives sighted there.
As Phillip landed there were many natives feasting that became wary at the approach of Phillip and his party.
A few of the natives had never seen Europeans before and one became defensive and raised his spear in a threatening gesture.
Phillip raised his hands saying "wirri, wirri" but the native threw his spear and struck Phillip in the shoulder with such a great force that it pierced through the back of the shoulder.
The aborigine fled into the bush and Phillip was taken back to the settlement with the spear still lodged in his shoulder.
He was later told that the aborigine was named Willamaring. Phillip understood that it was a bad time to try to find Bennelong and place no blame on Willamaring and ordered no retaliation.

During the whale beaching it was estimated that there were more than two hundred aborigines that had come to feast on the whale.
Aborigines often crossed tribal boundaries for food gathering or to take part in ritual activities.
Many tribes gathered for the feast, tribes from the west and north attended and some from the south who spoke a different dialect from that of the tribes around Port Jackson.
Members from tribes have been known to travel more than 150 kilometers (93 miles) for ceremonies and food gathering.
Settling disputes between tribes often ended up with a fight with spears and clubs. The Gweagals use to frequent a fighting place that was the area between Central Station and Goulburn Street, then part of the Cadigal territory.

It had been reported that in February, 1797 a large band of Garigals from the Broken Bay area traveled to Cadigal territory to settle a dispute. They were escorting a member of their clan who had to face the spears of a murdered man's relatives.
Bennelong himself received spear wounds from a dispute in 1790 from the Gweagals.
Tribes traveled to other territories for food gathering when food was scarce. In the warmer months tribes from the inland territories frequented the coastal areas as fish was plentiful but in the colder months the coastal tribes would frequent the inland tribes. It was in these warmer months when ceremonies took place for the coastal tribes as marine resources were plentiful and could support large numbers gathered.

Suspicion existed between coastal and inland tribes and Bennelong claimed that the Gameraigals and Bediagals were his enemy despite often been seen in their company.
Bennelong had asked Governor Phillip to kill the Gameraigals and Bediagals. On one expedition inland, Colbee & Boladeree told Phillip that the Buruberongals were bad and they wanted to destroy their gunyas (huts).
Although the inland dialect was different to the coastal dialect, they had no difficulty communicating. The songs & dances from corrobories differed from tribe to tribe.....
The effects of disease was worsening, the spread of venereal disease spread through the native population from the European men's desire to be with the native women.
The aborigines would call this dreadful disease "goobahrong" after its terrible effects on the body.
By now tensions were worsening, relations broke and no natives we frequenting the colony.
The spread of agriculture & annexing of land continued, the aborigines were competing for resources on the same land and conflicts were inevitable.
The aborigines were forced into taking crops and spearing cattle. Reprisals by the settlers led to guerilla warfare over a large area of the Cumberland Plain.
Between 1793 and 1799 at least twenty eight European and more than two hundred aboriginal's were killed. The attacks on farms along the Hawkesbury, Georges River, Parramatta, Seven Hills, Toongabbie and Prospect was lead by Pemulwy.
In 1790 he fatally speared Phillip's Gamekeeper - John McIntyre near the Cooks River. In 1797 he was wounded in the streets of Parramatta during a battle that killed two settlers.
At least six aborigines during the battle and Pemulwy now in hospital escaped and continued his campaign until he was shot dead in 1802.
Attacks continued over the following years, Pemulwy's son - Tedburree continued in his fathers footsteps.
Reconciliation was needed so blankets were to be given to the natives. But in revenge they gave the natives blankets laced with smallpox.
Within a short time the dead bodies of the natives were littering the shoreline, the native population was decimated by 95%.
Skeletons were being found around the shores of Port Jackson, Botany Bay & Pittwater. As no cases of smallpox was reported among the colonists, one can only guess the evil instructions given to Phillip should the native population resist the settlements expansion.
The Eora peoples - Cadigal, Kuringal, Cammeraigal (Gameraigals), Garigal, Turramurragal, Ngarragal, Wallamattagal, Wangal, Murubora, Kamey, Toongagal (Tugagal), Burramattagal, Cabrogal, Norongerragal, Bediagal, Bidjigal, Gweagal, Cabrogal, Norongerragal, Walumedegal, Buruberongal and many others are sadly no more.
Their language is almost but lost except for a small percentage thanks to the efforts of some of the First Fleet's peoples and Bennelong.
Governor Phillip estimated the Eora peoples numbered about 1,200 and the inhabitants around the settlement and around 60 at Sydney Cove. This number had been reduced to just 3 by 1791.
95% of this population was gone, the disease spread further into bordering clans and the aboriginal's had to band together to create new clans, new boundaries, new lives.
Disease spread to these clans, alienation soon followed as did dispossession of their land and destruction of their traditions and culture.
Governor Phillip returned to England in 1792 with Bennelong & another young native - Yemmerrawannie.
They were well received there but on 18th May Yemmerrawannie dies there after two years away from home.
Bennelong now depressed and ill wants to return home.


To be continued and updated frequently

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