A brief History…
…gurilahbu (long ago)
It is said that in our Dreaming, long ago, three brothers came to live at what is now known as Brunswick Heads, after some time they went their own ways, one went south, one went west, and the other north. The brother who came north was Yarberri/Yabarrain, who was also known as Jabreen; it was Yarberri who made us into Mibunn, who taught us our language, our lore, our initiation, and most importantly, how to care for ngalingah jagun (our country). Thousands of years later, the sons and daughters of Jabreen, still call this country his, to us it’s not Queensland, it’s Jabreensland!
…invasion
The Dagay (whitefella) first established a ‘penal colony’ at Brisbane, just north of the Yugambeh Nation in 1824. Settlement near the Moreton Bay Penal Colony was restricted for a period of time with the implementation of a 50-mile exclusion zone which encompassed a vast majority of Yugambeh country. This lasted 18 years before the area was proclaimed open for settlement on the 10th of February, 1842 - our anno incursi- year of invasion. Cedar-getters working along the borders of our country came quite early around the Tweed and Nerang areas in the 1840s, Edmund Harper and William Duncan being two early arrivals who came shortly after the proclamation. Around the same time, many pastoral stations were also established particularly on the Logan and Albert rivers in the west, with Bromelton being one of the earliest established c.1842 as well. The introduction of disease, which had come in a numbers of waves, affected multiple groups of Yugambeh people at various times of history, while intense colonisation of our area throughout the 1850-60’s lead to violence and the drastic decline of our population; it is estimated that by the turn of the century, our clans were reduced by 90% - with modern Yugambeh people tracing their descent to about 30 Ancestors (who were born c.1820-1860) whose families survived colonisation.
The taking up of our lands for pastoral homesteads and agriculture disrupted our camps and sacred sites, resulting in the near destruction of native plants and animals that our clans use for food, medicine, tool-making, and camp building. Unwanted Aboriginal people were typically ‘dispersed’ by the Native Police Force’s troopers, such brutal ‘dispersals’ lead to numerous inquiries, but no convictions were ever made.
‘and then he ordered his troopers to surround that camp of blacks and to disperse them, by which he meant firing at them.’
(The Courier - Native Police Report, 20 August 1861)
As colonisation intensified traditional foods became less and less available throughout the many traditional camps and our people found work among the newcomers as stock-men, ring-barkers, cedar-getters, oystermen, and fishermen in order to feed their families, while also working to maintain their traditional cultural practices and upholding their obligations. Yugambeh people learnt the language of the newcomers, as well as adjusting to the new customs, but they never abandoned their own way of life, continuing to pass language, lore, and culture onto their children and grandchildren.
…federation
The Aboriginal Protection Act (1897) forced many of our people onto Missions such as those established at Deebing Creek and Woodenbong, Reserves/Aboriginal settlements, like Ugerabagh island and the Fingal Peninsula, while others went to the mountainous regions / hard-to-reach areas of our country around the MacPherson Range near the Tamrookum, Hillview and Running Creek areas. By the 1920’s, Yugambeh people had established small villages at Beaudesert, Southport, Hillview, South Tweed, and Fingal. In these places, many survived via traditional bush foods and intermittent work with Europeans, many living in gunyah’s (some with modern changes, like tin sides), while others built small European style homes, in many cases a property would be a mixture, containing one or two houses and a number of gunyahs behind. Here, Yugambeh countrymen were able to live in relative peace, raising their large families under the ever-present eye of the Aboriginal Protector. This oppressive system overseeing the lives of Aboriginal people was dismantled throughout the 1950s-70s, partly in thanks to a strong movement of Aboriginal people throughout the area advocating for their rights, and through the 80s, Yugambeh people began to mingle more widely with the European community.
…today
Despite the hardships we’ve endured, we are still here. Living on the jagun of our Ngajanggali (Ancestors), we have continued to uphold our sacred lore to respect and care for our country and its stories, and we have to this day maintained our close bonds of kinship and community. A majority of our families continue to live within our traditional lands, or in nearby major urban centres. People from across our area continue to exercise their traditional rights, whether that be collecting natural resources, walking country with their family, hunting/fishing, making pilgrimage to our sacred sites, or conducting spiritual and community activities on country; we are forever and always teaching mobo jarjum (tomorrow’s children) the ways of our people on the jagun of our ngajanggali.
