Mark Saddler | Opinion, July 22, 2015

HEY Mob, last week I have wrote and spoke about Australia Day and what the actual date means to us all as Australians.

I asked if the actual date could be moved.

People ask me: “If not the 26th of January, then what is a good day to celebrate Australia?”

Maybe December 28 could be good day, but why that day?

Maybe this report from The Sydney Gazette in 1824 may throw some light onto what I think is a day in our history where both Aboriginals and white mobs came together to talk?

The Sydney Gazette reported:

“With the loss of so many warriors and the severe damage caused to their society, Windradyne gathered the Wiradjuri again and determined to meet with the Governor to seek a formal end to hostilities. It was customary at the time for the Governor to hold an annual feast or conference for the Aboriginal people in late December in the marketplace at Parramatta. The Wiradjuri decided that would be an ideal and safe venue for the proposed meeting, with a large number of Aborigines from throughout the colony present, and the Governor on the spot, therefore making any reprisals against Windradyne unlikely.”

The Wiradjuri, led by Windradyne, travelled nearly 200 kilometres across the mountains to attend the feast on Tuesday, December 28, 1824, with Windradyne becoming the focus of attention and receiving a formal pardon from Governor Brisbane.

Who was Windradyne?

Windradyne (1800 to March 21, 1829) was an Aboriginal warrior and resistance leader of the Wiradjuri nation, in what is now central-western NSW. He was also known to the British settlers as Saturday.

Windradyne led his people in the Bathurst War, a frontier war between his clan and British settlers.

December 28 is a day in history where two different mobs came together to talk and make peace.

What say you to December 28 as Australia Day?

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