Editing Queensland (section)

=== Frontier wars and massacres ===
{{Further|Australian frontier wars#Queensland||List of massacres of Indigenous Australians#Queensland}}
The frontier wars fought between European settlers and Aboriginal tribes in Queensland were the bloodiest and most brutal in colonial Australia.<ref>{{cite thesis |last1=Loos |first1=Noel |title=Frontier conflict in the Bowen district 1861–1874 |date=1970 |publisher=[[James Cook University]] of North Queensland |doi=10.25903/mmrc-5e46 |url=https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/1136/ |access-date=11 September 2019 |type=other |archive-date=26 January 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240126071541/https://researchonline.jcu.edu.au/1136/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Many of these conflicts are now seen as acts of genocide.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Baldry |first1=Hannah |last2=McKeon |first2=Alisa |last3=McDougal |first3=Scott |title=Queensland's Frontier Killing Times{{Snd}} Facing Up to Genocide |url=https://lr.law.qut.edu.au/article/view/583/564 |journal=[[QUT Law Review]] |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=92–113 |issn=2201-7275 |access-date=27 August 2023 |archive-date=28 December 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231228031650/https://lr.law.qut.edu.au/article/view/583/564 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Palmer |first=Alison |year=1998 |title=Colonial and modern genocide: explanations and categories |journal=[[Ethnic and Racial Studies]] |volume=21 |issue=1 |pages=89–115 |doi=10.1080/014198798330115}}</ref><ref name="queteen">{{cite journal |last=Tatz |first=Colin |date=2006 |title=Confronting Australian Genocide |url=https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p72971/pdf/ch0251.pdf |journal=The Indigenous Experience: Global Perspectives |publisher=Canadian Scholars Press |volume=25 |pages=16–36 |isbn=978-1551303000 |pmid=19514155 |editor-first1=Roger |editor-last1=Maaka |editor-first2=Chris |editor-last2=Andersen |access-date=9 February 2024 |archive-date=14 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231114055722/https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p72971/pdf/ch0251.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Rogers |first1=Thomas James |last2=Bain |first2=Stephen |date=3 February 2016 |title=Genocide and frontier violence in Australia |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14623528.2016.1120466 |journal=[[Journal of Genocide Research]] |volume=18 |issue=1 |pages=83–100 |doi=10.1080/14623528.2016.1120466 |s2cid=147512803 |access-date=8 March 2022 |archive-date=31 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220331143722/https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14623528.2016.1120466 |url-status=live }}</ref>

The wars featured the most frequent massacres of First Nations people, the three deadliest massacres on white settlers, the most disreputable frontier police force, and the highest number of white victims to frontier violence on record in any Australian colony.{{Sfnp|Ørsted-Jensen|2011}} Across at least 644 collisions at least 66,680 were killed — with Aboriginal fatalities alone comprising no less than 65,180.<ref name="ReferenceA">Evans, Raymond & Ørsted–Jensen, Robert: 'I Cannot Say the Numbers that Were Killed': Assessing Violent Mortality on the Queensland Frontier" (paper at AHA 9 July 2014 at University of Queensland) publisher Social Science Research Network</ref> Of these deaths, around 24,000 Aboriginal men, women and children were killed by the Native Police between 1859 and 1897.<ref>R Evans, quoted in T Bottoms (2013) ''Conspiracy of Silence: Queensland's Frontier Killing Times'', Allen & Unwin, p.181</ref>

The military force of the Queensland Government in this war was the [[Australian native police|Native Police]], who operated from 1849 to the 1920s. The Native Police was a body of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander troopers that operated under the command of white officers. The Native Police were often recruited forcefully from far-away communities.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.abc.net.au/frontier/stories/ep3.htm |title=Episode Three |work=Frontier |publisher=Australian Broadcasting Corporation |access-date=4 August 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060718191740/https://www.abc.net.au/frontier/stories/ep3.htm |archive-date=18 July 2006}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=29 May 2023 |title=Frontier wars |url=https://www.qld.gov.au/recreation/arts/heritage/archives/collection/war/frontier-wars |access-date=2023-08-27 |website=Queensland Government |language=en |archive-date=27 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230827144736/https://www.qld.gov.au/recreation/arts/heritage/archives/collection/war/frontier-wars |url-status=live }}</ref> 
[[File:Wills_Tragedy_1861.jpg|thumb|Aftermath of the 1861 [[Cullin-La-Ringo massacre]] in which 19 settlers were killed by Aboriginal people, the deadliest attack on settlers in the frontier wars]]
Conflict spread quickly with free settlement in 1838, with settlement rapidly expanding in a great rush to take up the surrounding land in the [[Darling Downs]], Logan and Brisbane Valley and South Burnett onwards from 1840, in many cases leading to widespread fighting and heavy loss of life. The conflict later spread north to the [[Wide Bay–Burnett|Wide Bay]] and [[Burnett River]] and [[Hervey Bay]] region, and at one stage the settlement of [[Maryborough, Queensland|Maryborough]] was virtually under siege.{{Sfnp|Broome|1988|p=102}}

The largest reasonably well-documented massacres in southeast Queensland were the [[Kilcoy, Queensland|Kilcoy]] and [[Whiteside, Queensland|Whiteside]] poisonings, each of which was said to have taken up to 70 Aboriginal lives by use of a gift of flour laced with [[strychnine]]. At the [[Battle of One Tree Hill]] in September 1843, [[Multuggerah]] and his group of warriors ambushed one group of settlers, routing them and subsequently others in the skirmishes which followed, starting in retaliation for the Kilcoy poisoning.<ref name="kerkhove">{{cite web |last=Kerkhove |first=Ray |date=19 August 2017 |title=Battle of One Tree Hill and Its Aftermath |url=https://frontierbattle.wordpress.com/battle-of-one-tree-hill-and-its-aftermath/ |access-date=5 August 2020 |archive-date=29 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201029130225/https://frontierbattle.wordpress.com/battle-of-one-tree-hill-and-its-aftermath/ |url-status=live }} Ray Kerkhove, owner of this site, is a reputable historian. See [https://uniqld.academia.edu/raykerkhove here] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200824020134/https://uniqld.academia.edu/raykerkhove |date=24 August 2020 }} and [https://www.boolarongpress.com.au/our-authors/authors-k/ray-kerkhove/ here] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201020113350/https://www.boolarongpress.com.au/our-authors/authors-k/ray-kerkhove/ |date=20 October 2020 }}.</ref><ref name="marr">{{cite news |last=Marr |first=David |date=14 September 2019 |title=Battle of One Tree Hill: remembering an Indigenous victory and a warrior who routed the whites |work=[[The Guardian]] |url=http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/sep/15/battle-of-one-tree-hill-cutting-through-silence-to-remember-a-warrior-who-routed-the-whites |access-date=5 August 2020 |archive-date=5 August 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200805060402/https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/sep/15/battle-of-one-tree-hill-cutting-through-silence-to-remember-a-warrior-who-routed-the-whites |url-status=live }}</ref>

Central Queensland was particularly hard hit during the 1860s and 1870s, several contemporary writers mention the Skull Hole, Bladensburg, or Mistake Creek massacre{{efn|Not to be confused with the 1915 [[Mistake Creek massacre]] in [[Western Australia]].}} on [[Bladensburg Station]] near [[Winton, Queensland|Winton]], which in 1901 was said to have taken up to 200 Aboriginal lives.<ref>Queenslander 20 April 1901, page 757d-758c and [[Carl Lumholtz]] Among Cannibals (London 1889) page 58–59; See also {{harvnb|Bottoms|2013|pp=172–174}}.</ref> First Nations warriors killed 19 settlers during the [[Cullin-La-Ringo massacre]] on 17 October 1861.{{Sfnp|Connor|2008|p=220}} In the weeks afterwards, police, native police and civilians killed up to 370 members of the [[Gayiri]] Aboriginal people in response.<ref name="Jackson">{{cite web |last=Jackson |first=Russell |date=18 September 2021 |title=Research discovery suggests AFL pioneer Tom Wills participated in massacres of Indigenous people |url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-18/suggests-afl-pioneer-tom-wills-participated-indigenous-massacres/100463708 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210917193518/https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-18/suggests-afl-pioneer-tom-wills-participated-indigenous-massacres/100463708 |archive-date=17 September 2021 |access-date=17 September 2021 |website=ABC News |publisher=Australian Broadcasting Corporation}}</ref>

Frontier violence peaked on the northern mining frontier during the 1870s, most notably in Cook district and on the [[Palmer River (Queensland)|Palmer]] and Hodgkinson River goldfields, with heavy loss of Aboriginal lives and several well-known massacres.<ref>''Queenslander'', 8 March 1879, page 313d</ref> Raids conducted by the [[Kalkatungu|Kalkadoon]] held settlers out of Western Queensland for ten years until September 1884 when they attacked a force of settlers and native police at Battle Mountain near modern [[Cloncurry, Queensland|Cloncurry]]. The subsequent battle of Battle Mountain ended in disaster for the Kalkadoon, who suffered heavy losses.{{Sfnp|Coulthard-Clark|2001|pp=51–52}} Fighting continued in [[North Queensland]], however, with First Nations raiders attacking sheep and cattle while Native Police mounted heavy retaliatory massacres.{{Sfnp|Connor|2008|p=221}}<ref>Queensland State Archives A/49714 no 6449 of 1884 (report); QPG re 13 July 1884, Vol 21:213; 21 July 1884 – COL/A395/84/5070; Q 16 August 1884, p253; 20 August 1884 Inquest JUS/N108/84/415; POL/?/84/6449; 15 Queensland Figaro November 1884 and Queensland State Archives A/49714, letter 9436 of 1889.</ref>