Published on Nov 8, 2013
Presented by historian Michael Cathcart, Australia on Trial is a thought‐provoking three‐part series recreating the historic trials that throw light on the Australia of colonial times. These high‐profile and controversial court cases raised major issues of national identity at a time when Australia was evolving from the dominion of the British Empire into a more autonomous federated nation in the late 19th century.
Each of the cases caused a sensation at the time and attracted enormous public interest. Each triggered social and political debate about subjects at the very heart of Australian society: democracy and justice, the identity and behaviour of Australia's men, and attitudes towards women and Indigenous people - themes and concerns that are still relevant to modern-day Australia. In June 1838, a group of roughneck stockmen led by a squatter, rode in to the newly established Myall Creek station to 'teach the blacks a lesson'. They hacked around 30 Aborigines to death. The killers had not calculated on tow factors. The first was that a stockman named Anderson, who witnessed the crime, was determined to see his countrymen punished. The second was that the governor of New South Wales, George Gipps, shared Anderson's horror of such brutality. Anderson was ready to testify. The government was determined to press the case. But the prosecutor did not obtain the conviction easily. The trial was fought out as bitterly in the press as it was in the courtroom. But in the end, a white jury send seven men to the gallows for the murder of tribal Aborigines.
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Labels: Australia on Trial season1
