January 26 - It’s Complicated!?
There are, of course, many people for whom the celebration of Australia Day is a given, and not complicated at all, and perhaps it would be good if we all felt like that.
Matthew Flinders was the first person known to refer to people as Australians. He used the term referring to the original inhabitants of Kangaroo Island.
Lachlan Macquarie, the fifth Governor of New South Wales, used the term in his farewell address a few months before he returned to England, and his use of it was inclusive. He began his address, “My Fellow Australians”. He intended it to include all of us, from the Governor’s household, to Free Settlers, Emmancipists, Exclusives, Convicts, Soldiers, and Aboriginals.
There were a couple of things that happened on the 26th of January 1788. Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse, arrived outside Botany Bay on January 24, where he encountered the First Fleet departing for Sydney Cove. On January 26, the French sailed into Botany Bay and stayed for six weeks.
Meanwhile, now in Port Jackson, Captain Arthur Phillip raised the Union Jack, claiming New South Wales for the Crown, or the British Empire. Whilst Phillip did not know much about what he was claiming, for it did not include Western Australia, which many thought was not connected to Australia, but it did include Tasmania, which most people thought was connected to Australia.
The colony was formally inaugurated on the 7th of February. The raising of the Union Jack on the 26th of January was, quite possibly, to get it up before the French raised a tricolour.
The date was not initially regarded as significant, and it is 18 years later, in 1806, that we find it marked informally, largely by emancipated convicts who had decided to stay rather than return to the cold of Britain. A significant consumption of alcohol and much merriment accompanied the celebrations.
1808 marked the 20th anniversary, and the NSW Regiment was involved. On the evening of the 25th, Major George Johnson was carried from a landing craft on the back of a convict, James Ruse, followed by celebrations. Johnson fell from his gig on the way home later that night. On the afternoon of the 26th, he had recovered and was able to march a group of soldiers of the NSW Regiment with the band playing The British Grenadiers down to Government House and arrested/deposed Governor Bligh. This military coup is referred to as the Rum Rebellion.
In April 1816, Maquarie issued an edict to take hostages of Aboriginal people around Appin, seeking to hold them until those following troubles and the murder of some settlers. The patrol dispatched did not take hostages, but rather shot 16 and hung a further three. This is referred to as the Appin Massacre. The Massacre and the dodgy reporting of it to England are black marks on a record that was generally better than that.
By 1817, we find the date being marked more respectably with dinners at the tables of successful immigrants. They referred to the day as ‘First Landing Day’, or ‘Foundation Day’. That is interesting, because clearly it was neither. One must wonder in passing if there was not a celebration of the anniversary or Bligh’s deposition. For Macquarie, Bligh was the reason he had come to New South Wales, to clean up the mess, a task he performed admirably. Personally, Macquarie did not like or think much of Bligh, and he stayed in Sydney too long for Macquarie’s liking before eventually sailing back to England.
In 1818, the 30th anniversary of the Founding of the Colony, Governor Lachlan Macquarie chose to acknowledge the day with the first official celebration. The governor declared that the day would be a holiday for all government workers, granting each an extra allowance of "one pound of fresh meat", and ordered a 30-gun salute at Dawes Point – one for each year that the colony had existed. This began a tradition that was retained by the Governors who followed.
By 1837, the tradition of a regatta on Sydney Harbour had become established, and they decided to make the day an annual event. The following year, it marked the 50th Anniversary, and a Public Holiday was declared.
In 1838, the crowds gathered for a celebration that was for everyone. There was the regatta and fireworks. About 600 kilometres north, near the Gwyder River, Major James Winniett Nunn led a troop looking to retaliate following conflict with squatters over dispossession. A charge ensued, and no Kamilaroi were apprehended, only shooting till it stopped. Nunn’s own officers were unclear as to how many were killed, one suggesting 4 or 5, and another suggesting 40 or 50. The Reverend Lancelot Threkhold suggested that the number was between 200 and 300, which may have included several other incidents.
As the States developed separation from New South Wales, they tended to mark the dates that made sense in each state, and so for most of the rest of the next 100 years, the day was important in New South Wales, and the celebrations focused on Sydney.
Federation, by which the States came together as a single country with a central government, happened formally on the 1st of January 1900.
In 1915, a committee was formed to celebrate Australia Day, and the date chosen was the 30th of July, on which many fundraising efforts were held to support the war effort and wounded soldiers. It was also held in July in subsequent years of World War I: on 28 July 1916, 27 July 1917, and 26 July 1918.
In 1931, Victoria adopted the 26th of January as Australia Day. By 1936, the other States followed suit, though in New South Wales it was still called Anniversary Day.
1938 marked the 150th anniversary, and several Aboriginal Organisations called for a day of mourning in protest against the white man’s seizure of our country.
In 1946, the Commonwealth and the states agreed to unify the celebrations to the 26th of Australia, with the Public Holiday falling on the closest Monday.
In 1948, the Australian Citizenship Act took effect on the 26th of January. This meant Australians were not simply British Subjects but also Australian Citizens.
In 1975, the Australian Honours System was introduced, and this led to the Australia Day Honours list celebrating the accomplishments of our citizens in various aspects of life.
In 1988, we made a big effort to celebrate the bicentennial, with a re-enactment of the landing and Tall Ships, and 2.5 million people attended various events in Sydney. From 1988, the Public Holiday associated with Australia Day came to be celebrated on the day, rather than the nearest Monday.
Australia Day has grown in prominence since 2000, largely promoted at various levels of Government and the provision of various events, including fireworks. Citizenship Ceremonies have often taken place in the context of Australia Day.
Since around 2010, there has been an increased emphasis on multiculturalism in our celebrations, together with an increasing awareness of the role of First Peoples of our Nation in our community. Along with this has grown a sense that Australia Day is the occasion to debate whether we should celebrate it on this day, or another day, or if it should not be a sorry day, or if it should be marked as Invasion Day.
If the purpose of the day is to discuss whether we have the day or not, it seems fairly pointless. Surely we have all done good and bad. Whilst I would never want to ignore history, we do not simply look back and lament, nor should we whitewash the past. The important thing is to look forward with a sense of hope, and that hope should be inclusive, enabling us all to hope.
Some of that hope is expressed in our National Anthem.
Australians all let us rejoice
For we are one and free
…
With courage, let us all combine
To advance Australia fair
In joyful strains, then let us sing
Advance Australia fair
Clearly, we have some work to do. When it comes to the First Peoples of our nation, there are disparities in the sharing of the common wealth, be that in educational opportunities, employment opportunities, health outcomes, and incarceration rates.
At the same time, we have seen problems in the assimilation of some migrants, some of whom have wanted to bring foreign (sometimes ancient) feuds to life in our community.
These issues have been present in one form or another since the European Occupation. We have had problems with convicts, emancipists, exclusives, currency lads, the Irish, the Afghans, and the Chinese, all within the first 100 years.
In our short history since the European arrivals in Australia, we know that some have achieved great things, some have done bad things, and most of us have done both. Some of our greatest failures arise when we see only the group and not the individuals who make it up. The tendency to generalise, which we see in our history, be it the Irish, the Catholics, the Afghans, the Chinese, the Aboriginals, the Exclusives, are things we too often see reflected in contemporary debate. My hope this Australia Day is that we might do better, and generalise less.