The ''Aboriginal Witnesses Act'' was a series ordinances and amendments enacted by lieutenant Governor

George Grey Sir George Grey, KCB (14 April 1812 – 19 September 1898) was a British soldier, explorer, colonial administrator and writer. He served in a succession of governing positions: Governor of South Australia, twice Governor of New Zealand, Go ...

Governor of South Australia The governor of South Australia is the representative in South Australia of the Monarch of Australia, currently King Charles III. The governor performs the same constitutional and ceremonial functions at the state level as does the governor-gene ...

during the early colonial period of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

. The act was established "To facilitate the admission of the unsworn testimony of Aboriginal inhabitants of South Australia and parts adjacent". Despite the act's stated aims being to facilitate Aboriginal testimony, it had the opposite effect, creating a situation where the massacre of Aboriginal peoples by European colonisers could not be tried solely on the evidence of Aboriginal witnesses.

History

The lieutenant governor

was responsible for the act, and later lieutenant governor

Frederick Robe Major-General Frederick Holt Robe CB (1801 – 4 April 1871) was the fourth Governor of South Australia, from 25 October 1845 to 2 August 1848. Robe entered the Royal Staff Corps as an ensign in 1817, following his father, Sir William Robe wh ...

was responsible for the act's amendments. The acts: * * * * While its stated aim was to make provisions for unsworn

testimony In law and in religion, testimony is a solemn attestation as to the truth of a matter. Etymology The words "testimony" and "testify" both derive from the Latin word ''testis'', referring to the notion of a disinterested third-party witness. La ...

by "uncivilised people" to be admissible in court, the act made it possible for a judge to dismiss the testimony of an "uncivilised person or persons" as insufficient unless corroborated by other evidence - that the court could not base the conviction of a white man on the testimony of an aboriginal witness alone. Although it was a progressive law for the time, the act decreed that the credibility of the evidence be left to the discretion of "the justice of the court, or jury under direction of the judge". The act also made Aboriginal testimony inadmissible in trials that carried the penalty of death. Effectively, the act created a situation where settler solidarity and the law of evidence ensured that the murder and

massacre A massacre is the killing of a large number of people or animals, especially those who are not involved in any fighting or have no way of defending themselves. A massacre is generally considered to be morally unacceptable, especially when per ...

aboriginal Australians Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Islands ...

by European colonisers could not be tried solely on the evidence of aboriginal witnesses. Possibly in response to the

Avenue Range Station massacre The Avenue Range Station massacre was a murder of a group of Aboriginal Australians by white settlers during the Australian frontier wars. It occurred in about September 1848 at Avenue Range, a sheep station in the southeast of the Colony of ...

, where three Tanganekald women, two teenage girls, three infants, and an "old man blind and infirm" were murdered by Australian mass murderer and pastoralist

James Brown James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honor ...

, the Aboriginal Witnesses Act of 1848 was amended in July 1849 to allow a person to be convicted on the sole testimony of an aboriginal person, though this rarely occurred. The act remained in force until 1929.

References

{{Aboriginal South Australians 1844 in Australia 1844 in British law 19th century in South Australia Indigenous Australians in South Australia Australian frontier wars Legislation concerning indigenous peoples Public policy in Australia

History

See also

References