Page:The Native Tribes of South Australia (1879).djvu/229

 EXECUTION OF NATIVESDISCOVERY OF WRECK. 155 The chiefs of the expedition now came to the conclusion that something must be done to satisfy the demands of justice on the murderers, and to strike terror into the minds of the natives and deter them from similar atrocities in the future; so a court of justice was extemporised on the spot, and such evidence as was obtainable adduced in support of the charge against the two prisoners. There appears to have been plenty of proof that these two men were leaders in the massacre; so a verdict of guilty was pronounced against them with the universal assent of the party. By virtue of the commission from His Excellency the Governor held by Major O’Halloran, he then passed sentence of death upon them. The next day (the 25th of August) the natives were driven to a spot near the place where the bodies of some of the murdered people were found, and in the presence of their countrymen hanged in sheaoak trees over the graves of their victims. They evinced great courage at the place of execution, and died immediately. The bodies were left hanging in the trees, and the other blacks warned not to touch them. This they carefully abstained from doing, and the carcases of the culprits were suspended there until the weather caused them to fall to pieces. The rest of the natives were allowed to depart, and they at once precipitately fled from the vicinity of the expedition. It appeared, upon inquiry, that a man named Roach and his mate, who had gone up the Coorong for some purpose, had also been killed by these people. The expedition now pressed on in order to find the wreck, and on the 4th of September obtained another watch from the natives, the dial stained with blood. In the huts of these people much European clothing was found, so the party set fire to the huts and consumed them. They now communicated with a party which had been sent up the coast in a whaleboat from Encounter Bay under the command of Mr. Thomson. They found that these had first discovered the longboat and then the remains of the wreck of the Maria in Lacepede Bay. The expedition now returned down the Coorong, and discovered other bodies of the murdered people, which they reverently interred. In the vicinity of these bodies several books