Page:The Native Tribes of South Australia (1879).djvu/225



following particulars of the wreck of the Maria have been compiled by the writer from the South Australian Register, to which he was allowed access through the kind courtesy of the proprietors of that old-established newspaper—the first in South Australia.

In the end of July, 1840, a report was sent to the authorities by Police-Sergeant W. Macfarlane, enclosing a letter from H. Nixon, of Encounter Bay, which stated that the natives said that a number of white people who had escaped from a wreck had been killed by the blacks up the sea-coast in the direction of Rivoli Bay. Ten men, five women, and some children were said to have thus been murdered. A letter from Dr. Penny confirmed this account, which was substantiated by the result of the inquiries of Sergeant Macfarlane himself. At that time the country on the coast between Encounter Bay and Rivoli Bay was a terra incognita to the colonists. An active whale fishery was at that time being carried on at Encounter Bay. The Government, in consequence of this report, despatched Mr. Pullen, who was at that time at the Elbow (now Goolwa), to learn particulars by proceeding as far as he could up the Coorong in a whaleboat

Mr. Pullen hastily got together a party, consisting of himself, Dr. Penny, five boatmen, one police-trooper, and three natives of Encounter Bay. They started from Encounter Bay on the 28th of July, so no time was lost, and on the 29th proceeded down the river, on the south side of Hindmarsh Island, to the entrance