After 200 years, a 'brutal' hanging is being marked
Tasmanians have marked the executions of two Aboriginal men, nicknamed Dick and Jack, on the 200th anniversary of their deaths.
In 1820s Tasmania, two Aboriginal men, known as Dick and Jack by colonists, were hanged in Hobart Town Gaol after being convicted of spearing a stockkeeper to death. Historian Naomi Parry Duncan revealed that the arrests were part of a wave of violence between colonists and Aboriginals, with little understanding of the events due to poor record-keeping.
Both men were from the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre. Dr. Duncan emphasized the unfair trial, which the two Aboriginals were unable to defend due to language barriers and lack of interpreters. Dick, who could not walk, had to be tied to a chair. Eyewitnesses described the men's fear as they approached their executions, which they deemed unjust and brutal.
The commemoration of their deaths, held on Thursday at the Treasury building, aimed to acknowledge the nation's brutal past and the loss of many innocent Aboriginal lives during the British invasion.
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