Butchulla Warriors Memorial unveiled in Maryborough
A memorial to the lives of Butchulla men lost during colonisation has been unveiled in Maryborough, believed to be the first of its kind in Australia.
Fraser Coast
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Less than a 100m from where the new Butchulla Warriors Memorial has been installed in Queens Park, Maryborough, the city’s Cenotaph and Gallipoli to Armistice monuments also stand.
As the Butchulla memorial was unveiled on Saturday, April 22, 2023, Australia’s commitment to remembering its war dead was reflected on, along with its reluctance to remember the nation’s first war dead, the indigenous men who fought with their spears against the firearms brought by the settlers.
The Butchulla memorial is thought to be the first of its kind in Australia, remembering the indigenous men who were killed while being dispossessed of their land during colonisation.
It is comprised of three shields, each showing a musket hole.
Butchulla men would throw their spears, which were collected from the ground and thrown back and forth between opposing groups until a resolution was reached.
The sculpture shows the end result of the unequal match between spear and musket, defender and intruder, and asks the observer to imagine what must have happened when Butchulla men threw all of their spears and stood there waiting for them to be thrown back – but instead were cut down by musket balls.
The three shields also commemorate the three Butchulla laws: What is good for the land comes first; do not touch or take anything that does not belong to you; and if you have plenty you must share.
It was Butchulla elder Glen Miller’s moving speech at the opening of the Gallipoli to Armistice memorial that first got the ball rolling, years after he had first started talking about a memorial to the lives lost at settlement.
The Chronicle stood shoulder to shoulder with Mr Miller as he continued to campaign for funds to turn the memorial into a reality.
Tens of thousands of dollars were raised by the community and then matched by the Fraser Coast Regional Council to make the memorial a reality, with Olds Engineering, the creative energy of Mr Miller and Robert Olds and two young apprentices bringing the project to fruition.
The whole community got behind the project.
In August 2021, David Moon from the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia took aim at three wooden Butchulla shields to put authentic musket holes into them.
At the time, Mr Miller said it might be the first time in two centuries indigenous shields had been fired upon.
Those shields would be used to craft the metal replicas now installed in Queens Park.
On Saturday, tears fell down Mr Miller’s face at times during the ceremony, which was attended by dignitaries including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships Minister Craig Crawford, Maryborough MP Bruce Saunders, Fraser Coast Mayor George Seymour and Hervey Bay MP Adrian Tantari, along with hundreds of local residents.
“As a nation, Australia has never acknowledged that during colonisation a state of war existed between the colonists and the traditional owners, which resulted in deaths on both sides, and that Aboriginal men from right across this country laid down their lives trying to prevent the loss of their lands to a determined and technologically superior force,” Mr Miller said.
“I am of course talking about the unequal match between spears and firearms, which this small monument depicts.”
Mr Miller said the monument was not about apportioning blame or trying to make anyone feel guilty about what happened in the past.
“It is simply about recognising that conflict happened here on Butchulla country, the same as it did right across Australia, and that despite being at a disadvantage, Aboriginal men laid down their lives in resistance for their respective traditional lands.
“It is this concept of sacrifice against greater odds that the Australian nation holds dear to its heart.
“It is that feeling that is missing when we talk about anything to do with the colonisation of this country.
“Why is it that Aboriginal war dead have a lesser value to Australia when they were the first and only Australian men to die on Australian soil, defending Australian soil, until the Japanese bombed Darwin in February 1942?
“I would like you to think about that when you stand before the monument.”
The story of reconciliation was also an important part of the monument, Mr Miller said, as the community came together to make the project a reality.
“This process of reconciliation has happened because a broad community of people recognised that it was time that the truth needed to be told and it was the morally correct thing to do.”
Mr Miller said the small monument would never win any prizes for its sculptural beauty, but its message was powerful.
“Do not forgot those Butchulla men who died defending their lands is the message,” he said.
It was a product of four ordinary men from Maryborough, he said, none of whom had “any artistic ability to speak of”.
“But we managed to create something which we believe is the first of its kind in Australia.”
Mr Seymour said the monument honoured the memory of men who saw their entire existence and their families threatened on their own country, men who had never seen guns before and died fighting for their loved ones, culture and way of life.
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