On Wadi Wadi Country – From the Mountains to the Sea

By Helen Laidlaw

Australia is a large continent and before British colonisation there were over 250 First Nation areas with different languages and cultures. The Wadi Wadi nation lived on an eastern coastal region south of Sydney, which was covered with thick subtropical rainforest and bordered by the Pacific Ocean which provided fish and shellfish in abundance. With its rich volcanic soil, it was one of the first areas to be taken by colonising farmers. The land was cleared and the food, culture and Dharawal language were all almost wiped out. Many First Nations people died from massacres, hunger, and European diseases.

This story began in a deep valley ‘Willow Gully’ with remnant rare subtropical rainforest, inhabited by wallabies, echidnas, possums and hundreds of birds in a small coastal town called Kiama. The gully was settled in the 1840s by two British farming families, and in 2015 the remains of a small farm cottage was unearthed in the rainforest. By coincidence the Aboriginal family who lived there in the 20th century were discovered and they have shared their personal stories. This has provided links to the amazing history of the Wadi Wadi people all along the coast. Through this book find their stories, but also meet an Indigenous King and Queen, WW1 soldiers, a poet, fishermen, sports stars, and silent film makers. Many people have hidden their Aboriginal heritage as racism was rife. The 50,000 years of continuous indigenous heritage is at last being recognised. However, a referendum to recognise Aboriginal people in the constitution, held in October 2023, failed due to misinformation by opponents. But there is still hope!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Jun 21, 2024
• ISBN: 9781398495524

Helen Laidlaw

Helen Laidlaw was born in Australia to an English father and a fifth-generation Australian mother, whose ancestor farmed Wadi Wadi country in 1837. Helen has worked as a teacher, teacher-librarian and university librarian. Her qualifications were earned at Wagga Wagga Teachers’ College, a BA at the University of the South Pacific, Fiji and a Grad Dip Lib at the University of Tasmania. She has also worked in Tonga, writing the Museum Guide and computerising libraries. She is passionate about Pacific and Indigenous history. Her other interests include the custodianship of an area of rare subtropical rainforest, playing tennis and swimming. She works to gain better treatment for the refugees who come to Australia and for the ratification of a treaty with the First Nations as outlined in the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

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About the Author

Helen Laidlaw was born in Australia to an English father and a fifth-generation Australian mother, whose ancestor farmed Wadi Wadi country in 1837. Helen has worked as a teacher, teacher-librarian and university librarian. Her qualifications were earned at Wagga Wagga Teachers’ College, a BA at the University of the South Pacific, Fiji and a Grad Dip Lib at the University of Tasmania. She has also worked in Tonga, writing the Museum Guide and computerising libraries. She is passionate about Pacific and Indigenous history. Her other interests include the custodianship of an area of rare subtropical rainforest, playing tennis and swimming. She works to gain better treatment for the refugees who come to Australia and for the ratification of a treaty with the First Nations as outlined in the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

Dedication

For Scott,

who shares my passions for the environment and

indigenous friends.

Copyright Information ©

Helen Laidlaw 2024

The right of Helen Laidlaw to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398495500 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398495524 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published 2024

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd®1 Canada Square

Canary Wharf

London

E14 5AA

Acknowledement

The National Library of Australia’s Trove has been a basic resource, a treasure trove, providing digitised copies of local newspapers.

Jimmy Carlson has provided many stories and photos of his Edwards ancestors and family.

The Emery family of Gerringong have filled in some great gaps in the story of the Dixon family of Crooked River, Gerroa.

Geoff Pike (great-great-grandson of Joseph and Mary Pike) has done in-depth research into his ancestors and much of his work is available online and on Trove.

The present owner of Willow Creek Farm, Elaine Russell (nee Donaldson), has provided information on the Donaldsons and photographs.

Chris and Warwick Adams wrote the chapter on the Freedmans of horse-racing fame.

Dale and Nicole Vaux and Helen Jones have given invaluable information and photos of the Longbottom family.

Photos of the first house built in the new subdivision of Cedar Ridge Rd in Willow Gully were provided by Lexie and Darren Anderson.

Kiama Library’s photographic collection has been very helpful.

Great support was provided by Burnett Trees and members of the Minnamurra Lions Club in rediscovering the foundations of the original cottage, and clearing up the bottles! Also, they gave wonderful assistance in clearing fallen trees after the Kiama tornadoes of 2013 devastated the Conservation area.

My son Scott and my garden and forest assistants, Paul Crump and Noel Lonesborough, have been invaluable in developing Willow Gully again as a true rainforest.

Richard Scarborough of Landcare provided both excellent guidance as well as trees to plant. RIP 22/11/21.

Bernie Dean has allowed me to photograph the remains of the Pike original outbuildings, now his property, near Terralong Street.

And finally, thanks to the Cedar Ridge Landcare Group, as we continue to get rid of invasive species like madeira vine, privet and lantana, plant new areas and provide a welcome space for visitors.

Cover photo: Queen Rosie, the last surviving Aborigine from the Illawarra tribe, smoking a pipe, New South Wales, 1 November 1927

Reference: National Library of Australia (nla.pic-vn6300414v)

Acknowledgement of Country

From before recorded time

The First Peoples (Nations) cared for this Land.

I acknowledge the Elders and community of the Wadi Wadi people of the Dharawal nation, past, present and future who have told the sacred stories and nurtured faithfulness to our Creator.

Above: Noel Lonesborough and Paul Crump on the cliffs of Willow Gully, Kiama

Author’s Note

The Dharawal language was not written so people wrote what they heard, now Wodi Wodi. However Queen Rosie’s grand-daughter, Joan Wakeman, claimed it should be pronounced more like Wahdi Wahdi so I have chosen to spell it Wadi Wadi.

Reference: History of Aboriginal Illawarra Volume 2: Colonisation. Mike Donaldson, Les Bursill (UOW), Mary Jacobs (TAFE NSW), 2017

Foreword

My name is James Carlson. I grew up on a properly in Kiama in Willow Gully near Cedar Ridge Road.

I fully endorse this book that Helen Laidlaw has written about this area and the surrounding district. Helen Laidlaw has researched the historical information thoroughly in an attempt to keep the stories from being lost.

My family information is correct as far as I know. My mother’s name was Rose Mary Carlson and she was named Rose, as Queen Rosie was the midwife who delivered her.

I am a member of the New South Wales Land Council as well as Illawarra Aboriginal Land Council and Illawarra Aboriginal Corporation.

I am designated an Elder of the Wadi Wadi nation.

Uncle Jimmy

26th October, 2022

Introduction

My father Jack (A.J.E.) Jordan was the headmaster of Bomaderry Public school in NSW from 1947-1959. The children from the Bomaderry Aboriginal Children’s Home attended the school as did other Aboriginal families. My father was appalled that the school was segregated with Aboriginal children sitting in the back desks. He immediately desegregated the school. He believed all people are equal in God’s eyes, and he had to resist strong pressure from some of the parents who objected to his changes. His attitude has helped me fight for First Nations rights.

Growing up with Aboriginal children helped me understand that we are all unique and talented in our own way, but also similar, and must be appreciated for who we are. My mother had close friendships with some of the local Aunties in Nowra. But not until I researched this story of the Kiama Aboriginal history did I realise the importance of the Wadi Wadi people in caring for this country, and what they lost when the British took it.

This book began as the story of the Edwards-Carlson family, an Aboriginal family who had lived in a small farm cottage on the southern end of Willow Creek Farm in Willow Gully, Kiama from the 1930s. Now I live in Willow Gully and have three acres of sub-tropical rainforest, some of which is under conservation, and includes part of Willow Creek.

Jimmy Carlson, an Aboriginal Elder in Wollongong, drove the bus for the Noogaleek Children’s Centre, an Aboriginal preschool at Berkeley. He enjoyed talking to one of the teachers, Julie Farquhar Nicol, about where she lived in Kiama where he was born, and about his childhood memories of Kiama. Eventually they realised that the place he’d lived was close to the our house in Willow Gully at the end of Cedar Ridge Road.

It was 2015, and the burnt out cottage’s foundations had just been uncovered and the hillside cleared of lantana, coral trees and madeira vine. Replanting had begun with rainforest trees which soon were augmented by local species. Jimmy came to visit us and brought his photos and newspaper articles, and shared his memories of his grandparents, Lance and Mabel Edwards, and his own parents Rose Mary and James Carlson. The Edwards family were Aboriginal and once I researched them, the history of Willow Gully and other areas of Aboriginal living around Kiama began to unfold. It is great that there are still descendants of the local Aboriginal families in the area, and some of their fascinating stories have been included in this book.

It still shocks me that Jimmy Carlson’s grandfather and great-uncles fought in WWI in France from 1917, were seriously wounded, but were not allocated any Soldier Settlement farms and they were not counted in the Census until 1967.

In early years, racism in Kiama was accepted and children were warned not to go along Terralong Street past the quarry, as "that’s where the blacks live". However, my newspaper research also showed how much the local Aborigines were valued for their athletic ability and fishing expertise in the early 19th century. But it also showed the extent that the Aboriginal people earlier were excluded from their land in this area—from Minnamurra, Black Beach, Kendalls Beach, Crooked River and Bombo. There was even a massacre at Minnamurra in 1802, and no punishment for the perpetrators.

The Aboriginal people often had no regular jobs, other than seasonal work picking beans and peas or digging potatoes, but were punished when they took local farmers’ animals or vegetables to feed themselves. Eventually they were employed at the quarries in Kiama. They were not able to be educated past 6th Class in the local schools.

I have struggled with printing some of the newspaper articles used in this book which use racist language like abos, gin, lubra, the blacks but have decided that I must be honest in terms of the attitudes and language used in former times. I have also realised that the Wadi Wadi people moved up and down the coast for many years after white settlement, and struggled to find places where they were welcome to settle. They were often hungry as their traditional foods were destroyed. Donations of blankets were necessary once the animals had been wiped out, as there was no way to obtain the skins previously used to make coverings and cloaks for the colder or wet weather.

I have enjoyed linking the history of the earliest settlers in Willow Gully as they were important in developing Kiama. Willow Gully is unique in Kiama as the southern section remains a rare area of the original sub-tropical rainforest. I have spent more than twenty years clearing out invasive weeds and trees, and planting out relevant indigenous species. Wallabies, echidnas and ringtail possums still live here, a huge range of noisy birds, as well as numerous bee swarms. It is a beautiful area and other local residents who live along the Gully are working to retain the original plants and animals, and reclaim the beauty of Willow Creek.

I believe that we non-indigenous Australians, must remember that this land was cared for and owned for many thousands of years by First Nations people before we arrived as either convicts or free immigrants. Or as the People say, the land owned them and retention of their knowledge is essential, as well as pride in who they are and their ancestral history.

To quote the Uluru Statement:

ALWAYS WAS, ALWAYS WILL BE.

Chapter 1

Aboriginal History for the Illawarra Region

The Dharawal, or Tharawal, people are Indigenous Australians, those Australian Aboriginal people who are united by the Dharawal (or Tharawal) language, and strong ties of kinship. They lived as skilled hunter-fisher-gatherers in family groups or clans scattered along the coastal area from Sydney to Jervis Bay on the south coast of New South Wales.

Dtharowal is the Aboriginal name for the cabbage tree palm (Livistona australis), common along the east coast of Australia and especially in the Illawarra district. Dharawal descendants recognise that they were in essence cabbage tree palm. The cabbage tree palm’s crown of new growth could be boiled or eaten raw and the heart of the trunk could be cooked and eaten to relieve a sore throat. Its leaves provided shelter and fibre for rope, string and fishing lines.

Cabbage tree palms on Jerarra Road, Jamberoo.¹

Prior to the arrival of Europeans, the Wadi Wadi people who spoke the Dharawal language had travelled through the Kiama area for tens of thousands of years. Their middens of shells were huge along the coast and they fished the seas and the rivers, and they moved with the seasons around their tribal lands and hunted kangaroos, wallabies, bandicoots, possums, goannas and emus. Their hunting methods are described and depicted in Bill Gammage’s wonderful book, The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines Made Australia. The natural plant foods and medicinal herbs were harvested in season. However, as British settlers came to the area and cleared the forests and the cedar cutters took out the red cedar, which was a very valuable commodity, the Aboriginal people lost their land, food sources and lifestyle, and even their lives.

One description of Aboriginal hunting methods was written in 1904, with the usual negativity of the white man.

The blackfellow does not care to exert himself too much, and is naturally very cunning in some of his methods to obtain supplies for his larder. A Kangaroo hunt is generally conducted by the whole tribe, men and women encircling portions of country frequented by the marsupials. Then a drive takes place to one particular point, and as the hunters, yelling as they proceed, close in on their