Best Intentions: The Strange history of Governor Gawler's 67 Aboriginal Reserves.

This lecture will detail the little known series of 67 Aboriginal reserves which were rather idealistically created by Governor Gawler during 1839 as a commitment to ensuring that Aboriginal people retained control over at least a portion of the ‘settled districts’.

These reserves were set aside on the Adelaide plains, and at Encounter Bay, the Clare district, Port Lincoln, and even Kangaroo Island. The reserves were on well-watered land and after it became clear that Aboriginal people were not going to settle on these 80 acre sections and become small farmers, the Grey government decided to make these reserves available for general lease. I have located the original documents at State Records and am writing a history which maps the reserves and summarises the chain of leases which followed during the nineteenth century, until the reserves were eventually erased from the record.