Arawarra (c.1860

Abstract: Arawarra (c.1860 - c.1825) was a Shoalhaven Aboriginal Elder / Chief and Warrior of the Country around Cullungutti (Mount Coolangatta), located on the southeastern coast of New South Wales, Australia. He is known to have attacked and killed a group of cedar cutters at nearby Blackhead during the 1810s. At some stage during his life he moved away from the coast, likely to the nearby Southern Highlands, but returned briefly just prior to his death around 1825. During 1827 his body was unearthed and decapitated by Dr. Alexander Berry (1781 - 1873), a Scottish settler at Coolangatta and North Sydney. On 20 August 1827 Berry forwarded Arawarra's skull to John Fitzgerald, commandant of the Illawarra stockade at Wollongong, for dispatch to Great Britain - likely England or Scotland - for study and experimentation. Though Berry had a scientific background, his activity at the time was also mercenary, with profit overriding principle or respect for Australian Aboriginal burial traditions and culture. The following article looks in depth at what is known of Arawarra.

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Contents

Arawarra
Berry's Desecration
Aftermath
References

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1. Arawarra

Precious little has been located in regard to the life and times of Shoalhaven Aboriginal man Arawarra (c.1860 - c.1825), apart from what Dr. Alexander Berry (1781 - 1873) recorded in his 1827 correspondence relating to the transfer of Arawarra's skull from Australia to Great Britain, and later reminiscences from 1838. Arawarra spent the majority of his life engaging in a traditional lifestyle. He was born and raised in the decades prior to the arrival in Australia of the British in 1788, in the Shoalhaven from the early 1810s, and with Berry in particular as a settler during 1822. From the few mentions in reminiscences and letters presented in detail below, we can construct the following brief biography of Arawarra:

Arawarra (circa 1860 - c.1825) was a local Indigenous man of the Cullungutti area of the Shoalhaven region. No information is available on his precise familial relationships, apart from that of a son whose English name was Charlie [Charley]. Arawarra was apparently "known for many dark deeds of blood" and a warrior, going on to become a local Elder. On one occasion he led a group of local Natives who attacked and killed a party of cedar cutters near Blackhead, to the south of Cullingutti. He moved away from the coast perhaps later in life, and likely to the nearby Southern Highlands and the Bundanoon area. Around 1825, shortly before his death, his son Charlie brought him back to Cullingutti in order to see the coast for the last time. Arawarra was described as "very old" at the time of his death a couple of days later. He was buried in a nearby sandy grave, perhaps within the Jeribayley burial ground on a point of land located close to Cullingutti near the entrance to the Shoalhaven River. From this we can propose an approximate birth date of circa 1860, giving him a final age of around 60-70 years, which was typical for elderly Aboriginal men of the time. His body was likely unearthed by Dr. Alexander Berry around August of 1827, though it could have been earlier as he had been involved in the trade in Indigenous body parts for a number of decades prior. Berry decapitated Arawarra's body and during that month forwarded it to a museum, university or personal collection most likely in Scotland. It's precise location remains unknown to the present day.

A number of historical assumptions and guesstimates have been made in preparing this brief biography of Arawarra and will be subject to change and refinement should additional information come to light.

There were three Natives listed as Charley on the 1833 / 1834 / 1836 Shoalhaven Blanket Lists - Ambic / Arbig / Yambet (aged 38 / 50 / 23, with a wife and 3 children), Namamba / Unumbar (40 / 28, with a wife and a child) and Water Water (25). One of the first two may have been Arawarra's son, though Aboriginal men often bore children late in life and had more than a single wife, with up to three noted on the Blanket Lists during the 1830s.

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2. Berry's Desecration

Hundreds, if not thousands, of Australian Aboriginal body parts - mostly skulls - were sent out of the country from the late 1700s through to the early 1900s, mostly to museums, universities and private collections in Great Britain and Europe, for research, write-up and display. The skull of Arawarra is one of the most significant, and controversial, due to the available detail on that of the grave robber, Doctor Alexander Berry (1781 - 1873) and the process of acquisition and dispatch. Berry was a Scottish-born ship's surgeon and merchant with diverse scientific interests, including the study of medicine, the evolving earth-bound science of geology, and the pseudosciences of phrenology and craniology (Wikipedia 2019). From as early as the 1810s he is known to have acquired body parts for scientific research and study, both for himself and a growing network of international associates (Berry Papers, State Library of New South Wales). This was facilitated through initial travels in association with employment by the East India Company and his later branching out as a merchant supplying the young penal colony of New South Wales and Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania). One outcome of this combination of entrepreneurship and scientific wonder was engagement in, and support for, grave robbing. This became evident upon his setting up a business in Australia in 1819. It was whilst resident at his Shoalhaven grant - acquired in June 1822 and named the Coolangatta Estate after the prominent and sacred Mount Cullunghutti upon which he built a homestead - that we find records of his disturbing the graves of the local Aboriginal people, including that of Arawarra, an elder of the Shoalhaven region of New South Wales.

During 1827, Alexander Berry married Elizabeth Wollstonecraft (1782-1845), sister of Edward Wollstonecraft his business partner. In the United Kingdom the British Anatomy Act was passed to allow access to ‘unclaimed’ bodies for dissection and study. This meant the bodies of the poor were now widely subject to dissection and study, often in opposition to the demands of family and friends. As British law applied in the colony of New South Wales, Berry may have felt that it was reasonable for him to disinter the body of Arawarra and remove his skull for scientific study. Presumably no reference to his relatives or the local Indigenous community would have been seen as necessary to undertake this desecration of the body. He would not have been alone in this view. In fact, on 18 January 1827, the skull of an Aboriginal woman of New South Wales was presented to the Phrenological Society of Edinburgh by Sir Thomas Brisbane, a graduate of the University of Edinburgh and governor of the colony of New South Wales between 1821-1825. Berry was also an alumnus of the university. Berry obviously had little respect for Australian Indigenous culture and for the people, then commonly referred to as Natives. For example, on 6 May 1827, in a letter to Edward Wollstonecraft, he wrote the following in regards to treatment of the Aborigines at Shoalhaven:

....Take care you are not humbugged by the natives. Endeavour to get them all away. Poor Lieut. Lowe is committed to take his trial for shooting one of them at Hunters River. Tom tells me that they are fully determined to kill Wylie. I shall therefore send down a couple of excellent riffles. {Berry Papers, ML MSS 315/46 p.403}

In a reply four days later, Wollstonecraft wrote, rather indignantly: Coolangatta 10th May 1827 Dear B.

....You desire me to turn away the Natives from the Farm - meaning, of course, to keep them away altogether. Pray how is that to be done!{Berry Papers, ML MSS 315/46, pp.87-89}.

Three months later, Berry had extracted the skull of Arawarra, a former Aboriginal chief of the Shoalhaven, from its burial place. Letters were then draft for those who would dispatch the skull to the UK and eventually receive it. These included: 1) John Fitzgerald, commandant at the Illawarra stockade, Wollongong; and 2) Michael Goodsir, Royal Navy surgeon, for possible forwarding on to a correspondent at the Edinburgh Museum. It is likely that Fitzgerald sent his on to Goodsir, or that two, near identical, versions of the letter exist, as outlined below {ML MSS 315/46 CY2025, pp.247-8; Turnbull 2001}:

[#1 - Goodsir version]

Cooloomgatta Shoal Haven

20th Augt. 1827

Dr Sir,

I have now the pleasure of sending you a Craniological Specimen, being the skull of a former chief of the neighbourhood, valuable on account of part of the History of the Personage to whom it originally belonged being known. He was of the rank of a German Prince, or the chief of a Highland clan, and renowned for many dark deeds of Blood. Many years before Shoal Haven was settled by Berry & Wollstonecraft it was resorted to by Parties of Cedar cutters. In course of time these were either all destroyed or driven away by the natives. Arawarra - the owner of the present specimen - attacked and destroyed a Party of these sawyers who were employed at Black Head seven miles to the north of Shoal Haven River and utterly destroyed them, and if report speaks true, afterwards feasted on their flesh. He has left a numerous Progeny behind him, and notwithstanding the bloody deeds of his youth lived to an extreme old age and died in peace. On our arrival here he was tottering on the verge of human life. About 2 or 3 years ago I met Charlie his youngest son, a peaceable well disposed native like another Pious Orcus carrying this once formidable warrior upon his shoulders. The venerable old Gentleman merely came to take a last look of Cooloomgatta now occupied by strangers, died two days after & was buried in the neighbourhood. He was buried in the sand to the depth of ten feet, laying on his face & with his head pointing to south. Thus although this man of blood escaped punishment and died in peace, yet mark eternal Justice his bones have not been allowed to rest in their grave, & it is to be hoped that his skull will throw such light on science as may sufficiently expiate the crimes which he committed.

[#2 - Fitzgerald version]

Dr Sir,

I have the pleasure of finding you a Craniological Specimen, being the skull of a former chief of this neighbourhood, valuable on account of part of the History of the Personage to whom it originally belonged being known. He was of the rank of a German Prince, or the Chief of a Highland clan, and renowned for many dark deeds of Blood. Many years before Shoal Haven was settled by Berry & Wollstonecraft it was visited by Parties of Cedar cutters. In course of time these were either all destroyed or driven away by the natives - Arawarra the owner of the present specimen attacked and destroyed a Part of these sawyers who were employed at Black Head seven miles to the north of Shoal Haven River and utterly destroyed them, and if report speaks true, afterwards feasted on their flesh. He has left numerous Progeny behind him, and notwithstanding the bloody deeds of his youth lived to an extreme old age and died in peace. On our arrival here he was tottering on the verge of human life. About 2 or 3 years ago I met Charlie his youngest son, a peaceable well disposed native like another Pious Orcus carrying this once formidable warrior upon his Shoulders. The venerable old Gentleman merely came to take a last look of Cooloomgatta now occupied by strangers, died two days after & was buried in the neighbourhood. He was buried in the sand to the depth of ten feet, lying on his face & with his head pointing to south. Thus although this man of blood escaped punishment and died in peace, yet mark eternal Justice his bones have not been allowed to rest in their grave. It is to be hoped that his skull will throw such light on science as may sufficiently expiate the crimes which he committed.

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3. Aftermath

The subsequent fate of Arawarra's skull is unknown, as of writing (December 2025). It may have been subject to one of the following fates: 1) it remains in a UK museum or private collection; 2) it may be lost or destroyed; or 3) it may have been returned to Australia, but not identified as belonging to Arawarra within that process.

Apart from the aforementioned contemporary correspondence, we have Berry's reminiscences from 1838 mentioning the acquisition of the skull and aspects of his encounters with the local people, as in the following extract:

.....I have already mentioned that, shortly before I settled at Coolangatta, the Natives drove away some woodcutters. On that occasion they were commanded by a noted warrior - named, I think, Arawarra. Some years later the son of Arawarra, who was then very old, and unable to walk, brought his poor father to Coolangatta, carrying him on his shoulders for several miles. His motive was not that of the pious Eneas - but that the old man should behold the sea once more before he died, as he did a few days after (Organ 1989, 329).

In 1989 the present writer was made aware of the Arawarra story and published one of the accounts in his 630 page volume of printed and archival material entitled Illawarra and South Coast Aborigines 1770-1850, issued by the Aboriginal Education Unit, University of Wollongong. Some further material was included in the second volume published in 1993, entitled Illawarra and South Coast Aborigines 1770-1900, being a limited edition report to the Australian Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, Canberra. There was only limited interest at the time in Berry's grave robbing activities and pursuit of phrenology. Two decades later, during 2019 University of Wollongong research student Jennifer Saunders published a paper on small, regional museums in Australia, noted the following in regards to grave robbing activities during the 1820s of Shoalhaven landholder and former naval surgeon Alexander Berry:

Berry Museum plays its part, presenting Alexander Berry as a soft-hearted adventurer yet hard-headed businessman, who was distressed by any form of human suffering. His interest in phrenology and trade in the skulls of Aboriginal people is not mentioned in Berry Museum. In 1822, Berry and his business partner Edward Wollstonecraft were granted 10,000 acres on the Shoalhaven River by Governor Sir Thomas Brisbane. This possession of a vast section of Yuin land, renamed Coolangatta, gave Berry access to Aboriginal graves. Collection of human skeletal remains, particularly skulls, was not uncommon in colonial societies. Berry and Governor Brisbane shared an interest in phrenology (the study of skull shape), and Brisbane donated a “skull of a native female of New South Wales” to the Phrenological Society of Edinburgh. During the 1820s Berry also actively sought out skulls from associates in Tasmania. In 1827, in a letter accompanying a “craniological specimen”, Berry describes Arawarra, “the owner of the present specimen”, as a “once formidable warrior”, being carried by his son to “take a last look of Cooloomgatta (sic) now occupied by strangers”. Berry describes how the “venerable old gentleman” died two days after this meeting and was buried on the Coolangatta estate. He goes on to describe the manner of Arawarra’s burial, stating that he “lived to an extreme old age and died in peace”. (Saunders 2019)

Late in 2025 a performance piece on the subject of Arawarra was announced in the 2026 program of the Merrigong Theatre Company, Wollongong. This followed on the work beginning in 2020 by the present author in collaboration with Associate Professor and Shoalhaven Aboriginal community member Marlene Longbottom. The aim was to find the remains of Arawarra and return them to Australia. This would hopefully be achieved in collaboration with researchers and support from academics at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. That work continues.

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4. References

Allam, Lorina, Alexander Berry: holes in the story of a NSW pioneer conceal a dark past of Indigenous exploitation, The Guardian, 9 July 2022.

Bennett, Michael, For a Labourer Worthy of His Hire: Aboriginal Economic Responses to Colonisation in the Illawarra and Shoalhaven, 1770-1900, PhD thesis, University of Canberra, 2003.

-----, A long time working: Aboriginal labour on the Coolangatta Estate, 1822-1901, in Greg Patmore, John Shields and Nikola Balnave (eds.), The Past is Before Us – The Ninth National Labour History Conference, University of Sydney, 30 June – 2 July, 2005, 19-27.

Berry, Alexander, Recollections of the Aborigines by Alexander Berry [May] 1838, Supreme Court
Papers, Cod 294, Part B, 557-608, Archives Office of New South Wales. Reproduced in Organ (1989, 228-240).

-----, Reminiscences of Alexander Berry, Angas & Robertson, Sydney, 1912, 194p

Longbottom, Marlene and Michael Organ, Alexander Berry, grave robbing and the Frankenstein connection, blogger.com, 1 February 2022.

Organ, Michael, Illawarra and South Coast Aborigines 1770-1850, Aboriginal Education Unit, University of Wollongong, 1989, 630p.

-----, Illawarra and South Coast Aborigines 1770-1900, Report to the Australian Institute for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, Canberra, 1993, 348p.

Saunders, Jennifer, Small histories: a road trip reveals local museums stuck in a rut, The Conversation, 18 October 2019. Available URL: https://www.uow.edu.au/media/2019/small-histories-a-road-trip-reveals-local-museums-stuck-in-a-rut.php.

Turnbull, Paul, Alexander Berry: ‘Laird of the Shoalhaven and phrenologist’, in ‘Rare work among the professors’: the capture of indigenous skulls within phrenological knowledge in early colonial Australia, in Barbara Creed and Jeannette Hoorn (editors), Body Trade: Captivity, Cannibalism and Colonialism in the Pacific, Pluto Press, 2001, 7-14.

-----, Colonial Phrenology in the 1820s: The Cranial Collections of Alexander Berry, in Science, Museums and Collecting the Indigenous Dead in Colonial Australia, Palgrave Studies in Pacific History, Palgrave Macmillan, 2017, 163-169.

Wikipedia, Alexander Berry, Wikipedia, accessed 20 August 2019.

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Michael Organ, Australia

Last updated: 12 December 2025

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