For a long time Pemulwuy hardly rated a mention in Sydney's history books. Yet for twelve years, from 1790 to 1802, this Bidjigal man led the fight against the new settlement, from Botany Bay to the farms at Parramatta, Toongabbie, Prospect and the Hawkesbury. He was shot and taken prisoner, and he escaped in irons. In the end he was shot dead, and his head was cut off, put in spirits and shipped to England for Sir Joseph Banks. More than two hundred years later, nobody knows where it is.
This is his story, as best the records let us tell it. Most of what we know comes from the people who were trying to catch or kill him, so I've tried to say who said what. I've also tried to sort out the "Rainbow Warrior" name, which a lot of people think is a traditional title. It isn't. It's the title of a 1987 novel.
Bidjigal Country – Botany Bay and the Georges River
Pemulwuy was born around 1750 near what the British later called Botany Bay, on the northern side of the Georges River. That's according to J. L. Kohen in the Australian Dictionary of Biography. He spoke a dialect of the Darug (Dharug) language. The ADB says his name came from the Darug word pemul, meaning earth. Keith Vincent Smith, writing in the Dictionary of Sydney, gives it as Pemall (bimul), meaning earth or clay. The colonists spelled it every which way: Pemulwhy, Pemulwoy, Pimbloy, Bimblewove and Bumbleway are a few of them.
His people were the Bidjigal (also written Bediagal). Smith describes their country as stretching "from Botany Bay south of the Cooks River and west along the Georges River to Salt Pan Creek, south of Bankstown". Bidjigal, he says, literally means "River Flat Clan". He also notes there was a second Bidjigal clan around today's Castle Hill. According to Colebee and Ballooderry, speaking in 1791, that clan had been wiped out by smallpox.
The colonists usually lumped Pemulwuy in with the "woods tribes" or "wood natives", people who lived inland rather than on the harbour. David Collins, the Judge Advocate, wrote of an attack in 1793 by people of "the Hunter's or Woodman's tribe, people who seldom came among us, and who consequently were little known".
The Man With the Marked Eye
The British first heard of Pemulwuy in October 1790. Bennelong asked a marine sergeant and his men, who were out looking for a missing convict, to join a war party to kill him. Bennelong told Governor Phillip that Pemulwuy, then about 30, was "well known for having lost an eye" and led a clan at Botany Bay. Captain Watkin Tench put it a bit differently: "a young man, with a speck, or blemish on his left eye".
The other thing people noticed was his foot. Colebee, the Cadigal headman, told Phillip that Pemulwuy was easy to pick because a club had bruised the toes of his left foot. The ADB says his left foot "had been clubbed", which suggested he was a carradhy, a clever man. The National Museum of Australia explains that this wasn't a club foot in the modern medical sense of something you're born with. Colebee said it had been done to him on purpose with a club, and it marked his standing as a carradhy, a man with special powers. Smith says there's evidence Pemulwuy could heal wounds. He also points out that kadaicha men in Central Australia dislocate their small toes so they can travel quickly and quietly to take revenge on an enemy.
Pemulwuy was no simple enemy of Bennelong's either. Smith argues that Bennelong and Colebee, looking back, seem to have worked with him. In November 1790 Pemulwuy stayed for two weeks in Bennelong's brick hut on Bennelong Point. Phillip himself noted that a Botany Bay man had slept at Bennelong's hut for more than a fortnight, "though [Bennelong] said the man was bad, and spoke of him as his enemy".
The Spearing of John McEntire – December 1790
John McEntire (also spelt McIntyre) was a convict and Governor Phillip's gamekeeper, one of three armed convicts sent out to shoot game for the hungry colony. The Eora people feared and hated him. Collins wrote that McEntire "had been suspected of having wantonly killed or wounded several of the natives in the course of his excursions after game". Smith adds that he was trespassing on Bidjigal land and shooting animals that were totems and spirit ancestors, like possum, kangaroo, emu and dingo.
On 10 December 1790, McEntire was resting with a shooting party near the Cooks River when they heard something in the bush. Tench's account, quoted on Wikipedia, says they saw men with spears creeping towards them. McEntire said, "Don't be afraid, I know them", laid down his gun and walked forward talking to them in their own language. He followed them for about a hundred yards, chatting the whole way. Then one of them jumped onto a fallen tree and threw his spear, which lodged in McEntire's left side. Tench wrote that the man had "a speck or blemish on his left eye", and that he'd clearly been in the settlement lately because he was freshly shaved. "I am a dead man," McEntire cried.
Surgeon John White found the spearhead had gone into McEntire's lung and was barbed with "small pieces of red stone". The ADB says those red stone barbs confirmed that the thrower was a Bidjigal man. Other Aboriginal people in the settlement told the surgeons it was "Pemullaway, of the tribe of Bejigal". McEntire hung on for weeks and died on 20 January 1791.
Phillip's Punitive Expeditions
The National Museum says Phillip had been fairly tolerant up to then, even though he'd been speared himself at Manly Cove a few months earlier. This time he was furious, because he believed McEntire had been unarmed and the attack was unprovoked. Tench's own account, as summarised on Wikipedia, says Phillip first ordered ten Bidjigal men killed and their heads brought back, and two more captured. Tench talked him down to taking six prisoners. Smith, in the Dictionary of Sydney, describes the orders as killing six men and capturing two for execution. Wikipedia calls it the biggest military operation since the colony was founded. About 50 marines marched out under Tench on 14 December 1790, carrying hatchets and bags for heads.
They never found anybody. On the second day they met Colebee at Botany Bay, who told them Pemulwuy had gone south and was a long way off. As Smith puts it: "The expedition was a failure, and a second one was a farce."
Twelve Years of Resistance – Prospect, Toongabbie, Parramatta and the Hawkesbury
From 1792, Pemulwuy led raids on the settlers at Prospect, Toongabbie, the Georges River, Parramatta, Brickfield Hill and the Hawkesbury River. According to the National Museum of Australia, the first was at Prospect in May 1792. The Bidjigal burnt huts, took maize crops and attacked travellers, and the farms they hit were right on their own land. The National Museum calls it an attempt to stop the farming settlements from taking hold. By April 1794 the fighting between Aboriginal people and the farmers was "frequent and extensive". In what the National Museum calls the "Battle of Toongabbie", a European reprisal party cut off the head of a warrior they'd killed and carried it back to Sydney as proof.
Collins called Pemulwuy "a most active enemy to the settlers, plundering them of their property, and endangering their personal safety". But Collins was also honest enough to say that most of the attacks came from the settlers' "own misconduct", including the kidnapping of Aboriginal children. The ADB notes the raids were mostly for food, especially corn, or were payback.
Even in the middle of all this, Pemulwuy could walk into Sydney. In January 1795 Collins recorded that "Pe-mul-wy, a wood native, and many strangers, came in" to an initiation ceremony at Farm Cove, where Pemulwuy acted as sponsor for one of the youths. Nobody tried to arrest him. That May his followers wounded a convict near the Brickfields, around today's Chippendale. In December 1795 a story went around that John Caesar, the African convict known as "Black Caesar", had killed Pemulwuy. Smith says it turned out to be false. Runaway convicts were joining him by then, and the government issued a proclamation calling on them to surrender.
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The Battle of Parramatta – March 1797
In March 1797 Pemulwuy led a raid on the government farm at Toongabbie. There'd been a run of robberies at the Northern Farms near Parramatta. Smith places them near where the Burnside Homes later stood, and Wikipedia gives the modern suburbs as Oatlands and Carlingford. A party of armed settlers and soldiers went after the raiders. At sunrise they came on more than 100 Aboriginal people and chased them towards Parramatta, then gave up and went into town for a rest.
About an hour later, Pemulwuy and "a large body of natives" followed them right into Parramatta. The National Museum says he threatened to spear anyone who tried to stop them. Smith writes that Pemulwuy, in a rage, speared a soldier. Spears flew, the soldiers and settlers opened fire, and at least five Aboriginal warriors were killed in the first volley. Pemulwuy went down with seven pieces of buckshot in his head and body, and he was taken to the hospital badly hurt. Writing much later, in the 1870s, the journalist John Henniker Heaton claimed that 50 people were shot in the fighting.
The Escape, and the Man Guns Couldn't Kill
Then Pemulwuy did the thing that made him a legend. Still carrying the shot, and with an iron on his leg, he escaped from the Parramatta hospital. Late in April 1797 the governor met several groups of Aboriginal people near Botany Bay, and Pemulwuy was among them. Collins wrote that he had "perfectly recovered from his wounds" and "escaped from the hospital with an iron about his leg". He spoke with one of the gentlemen in the party and asked whether the governor was angry, "and seemed pleased at being told that he was not".
After that, the ADB says, the Darug came to believe firearms couldn't kill him. In Collins's words: "Through this fancied security, he was said to be at the head of every party that attacked the maize grounds." In 1800 John Washington Price, the surgeon on the convict ship Minerva, wrote that "Pummil-woy" had "lodged in him, in shot, slugs and bullets about eight or ten ounces of lead, it is supposed he has killed over 30 of our people". Smith puts it simply: the legend grew that guns couldn't kill him, "but in the end he proved mortal".
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Outlawed – King's Orders of 1801
Philip Gidley King became governor in 1800, and he took a much harder line. On 1 May 1801 he issued a government and general order that Aboriginal people around Parramatta, the Georges River and Prospect could be driven off by gunfire. The ADB and the National Museum both read it as an order that they could be shot on sight. He also outlawed two runaway convicts, William Knight and Thomas Thrush, who had joined the resistance.
In November 1801 troops went out to Mill Creek on the Georges River, and King issued a proclamation that outlawed Pemulwuy and offered rewards for him "dead or alive". The National Museum quotes the sliding scale of rewards:
To a prisoner for life or 14 years, a conditional emancipation. To a person already conditionally emancipated, a free pardon and a recommendation for a free passage to England. To a settler, the labour of a prisoner for 12 months. To any other descriptions of persons, 20 gallons of spirits and two suits of slops.
Wikipedia, quoting the Historical Records of New South Wales, dates the order to 22 November 1801. It blamed Pemulwuy for killing two men, badly wounding several others and a string of robberies.
The Death of Pemulwuy – June 1802
The rewards worked. Pemulwuy was shot dead on or just before 2 June 1802. The ADB gives it as about 1 June, and Smith says 2 June. His head was cut off.
Who fired the shot is still argued about. King told Lord Hobart in London in October 1802 that "two settlers, not having the means of securing the person of Pemulwuye and another native, shot them". King also claimed that other Aboriginal people had asked for the head to be cut off and sent to him. His clerk, David Dickinson Mann, wrote in 1811 that King had offered a reward "to any person who should kill him and bring in his head. This was soon accomplished by artifice, the man received the reward, and the head was sent to England in spirits by the Speedy."
The name most often given is Henry Hacking, first mate of the Lady Nelson, which was lying in Sydney Cove at the time. Hacking was a First Fleet man, a quartermaster on the Sirius, and he'd led a lot of the colony's hunting trips. Wikipedia says he had shot Aboriginal people before, at Middle Harbour in 1789 and on the Hunter River in 1799. The evidence comes from Samuel Smith, a seaman on Flinders's Investigator, who wrote in his journal on 20 July 1802 that "Bumbleway … a Severe Enemy to White people" had been "shot by the Master of the Nelson Brig, that was shooting in the Woods, his head being brought Tranquility was again restor'd".
Not everyone accepts it. In 2013 the historian Doug Kohlhoff looked at the evidence again and suggested the killers were more likely settlers from around Parramatta, Toongabbie and Prospect Hill. The National Museum quotes his conclusion, and I think it's worth repeating: "Knowing who fired the fatal shot does not affect Pemulwuy's place in history. Pemulwuy was, as [Governor] King recognised, 'a brave and independent character'. He inspired others, fought hard and died for his land and his people."
There's a sad twist in the timing. About a week after Pemulwuy was killed, according to the National Museum, a dispatch arrived from Lord Hobart telling King that "any instance of injustice of wanton cruelty towards the natives will be punished with the utmost severity of the law". Wikipedia, quoting King's letter to Hobart, says King then ordered that Aboriginal people were not to be molested and could come back into the Parramatta and Prospect districts.
"A Brave and Independent Character" – The Head Sent to Banks
On 5 June 1802, a few days after the killing, King sat down and wrote to Sir Joseph Banks in London. The letter is in the Banks Papers at the State Library of NSW, and volunteers have transcribed it. Here is the passage, spelling and all:
I send by this Conveyance the articles named in the enclosed list --- The printed paper will explain how I came by the Head, the bearer of it [Pemulwuy] you will find mentioned in [David] Collins's Books, altho a terrible pest to the Colony, he was a Brave and independent character, understanding that the possession of a New Hollander. Head is among the desiderata I have put it in spirits and forward it by the Speedy.
"Desiderata" means things wanted, a wish list. Banks liked to send his collectors lists of specimens. What makes it so hard to read today is the next line of the letter, where King goes straight on to a box of protea specimens from the Hunter River and a lump of salt from the mountains. To King, Pemulwuy's head was another item for the collection.
The whaler Speedy got to London in November 1802. On 24 November the owners, Samuel Enderby and Sons, wrote to Banks from Paul's Wharf that the master "has a Black Swan, a Native's Head in Spirits and a number of other things for Sir Joseph Banks". In April 1803 Banks wrote back to King. He said the head "is said to have caused some Comical consequences when opened at the Customs house" and that it now "makes a figure in the Museum of the Late Mr Hunter". That was the anatomist John Hunter, whose collection became the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons. He was no relation to Governor John Hunter.
Where Is His Head Now?
The short answer is that nobody knows. Smith says that in the 1800s the head was known to be in the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons, and that its location is now unknown. The ADB says plainly that it "has not been found in an English repository to date".
A 2012 news.com.au report says the museum's records note that the heads of two Aboriginal people in jars of alcohol were given to the Royal College of Surgeons in 1802. No names were recorded with them, though, and there's no record of what happened to them after 1818. The College was heavily bombed in 1941, during the Second World War, and more than half its specimens were destroyed. In 1948 about 3,000 skulls went from the College to the Natural History Museum in London.
Prince William and the Redfern Elders – 2010
When Prince William visited the Block in Redfern in January 2010, a group of elders and activists, including Mick Mundine of the Aboriginal Housing Company, gave him a petition asking for Pemulwuy's skull to be returned. A couple of months later Mundine got a letter with the royal insignia on it. The prince's private secretary, Jamie Lowther-Pinkerton, wrote: "On his return from Australia, Prince William told me that he intended to do all that he could to investigate the circumstances surrounding the missing head". The letter, as reported in the Sydney Morning Herald, called it a "supremely important search".
The same letter quoted Michael Dixon, director of the Natural History Museum. He said the museum might have taken in the head in 1948 with the College's skulls, but that it could have been destroyed before then: "The Royal College of Surgeons was extensively bombed in 1941 and over half the specimens in their collection were destroyed." A History of Aboriginal Sydney summarises the letter a little differently. It says the head might have been destroyed in 1941, "or possibly may even have been returned to Australia in 1998". Mundine told the ABC: "For Aboriginal people, it will heal part of the wound."
The Trail Goes Cold
Christopher Pyne, then a federal MP, took up the cause and wrote to the prince in 2012. The answers he got back weren't encouraging. The prince's office said British investigations hadn't found the remains. Jeremy Hunt, the Culture Secretary, and Dr Dixon both said there was no evidence they were in the museum. Dixon added that identifying any one person's remains was extremely hard, and that using DNA raised ethical questions, including concerns from Aboriginal communities.
In 2014 the British High Commissioner, Paul Madden, visited the Natural History Museum and wrote about it. He called Pemulwuy's case "particularly prominent" and said what happened to the skull "remains a mystery". After the Blitz, some of the College's surviving collection went to the Natural History Museum and some was sent back to Australia. He wrote that the museum had "no positive information that indicates that Pemulwuy's skull is there".
The National Museum of Australia unveiled a plaque to Pemulwuy in March 2015. At the time it said it was working with the federal Ministry for the Arts on research into where his remains might be. Speaking to Australian Geographic in 2017, the museum's director, Mathew Trinca, said: "The Museum has searched and others have searched for records of his remains in the United Kingdom in vain… The problem of course, we simply do not know what happened." The National Museum's Pemulwuy page, last updated in May 2025, still says "the current whereabouts of the head is unknown".
Tedbury – Pemulwuy's Son
Pemulwuy's son Tedbury, also known as Tjedboro, kept up the fight after his father's death. The ADB tells his story. Strangely enough, he became attached to John Macarthur, who let him come and go at Elizabeth Farm. When Governor Bligh was put under arrest in 1808, Tedbury turned up at Macarthur's cottage in Sydney with a bundle of spears and reportedly said he'd come to spear the governor. The next year he and a man called Bundle tried to rob a traveller on the Parramatta Road, and he was in an attack on a settler's farm at the Georges River. In 1810 Edward Luttrell shot Tedbury at Parramatta, and he died of his wounds. He had a wife and possibly a son, Tommy Dadbury, who was living with the Wianamattagal clan at Penrith in 1837.
The "Rainbow Warrior" – A Novel's Title, Not a Traditional Name
A lot of people call Pemulwuy the "Rainbow Warrior". It's worth being clear about where it comes from. In 1987 the Aboriginal scholar, engineer and author Eric Willmot published a novel called Pemulwuy: The Rainbow Warrior (Weldon, McMahons Point). The ADB and the Dictionary of Sydney both list it. Smith calls it "a brilliant work of fiction" and says that in it Willmot "constructed a black hero for Australia's Aboriginal community". In Willmot's story, Pemulwuy can turn himself into a bird to escape.
So "Rainbow Warrior" is the title of a novel, not a name Pemulwuy was given in his own lifetime or by his own people. None of the early records I've read use it. The Sydney Morning Herald, in its 2010 story on Prince William, said he was "known as the 'rainbow warrior', for the colours he wore". It gives no source for that, and I couldn't find one in the colonial records or the reference works.
There are Darug names linked with him, though. Cumberland Council, which looks after the suburb named for him, says Butu Wargun means "Black Crow: Clan Leader", Pemulwuy's totem. Butu Wargun Drive in the suburb carries that name.
How He Is Remembered Today
For a long time Pemulwuy was left out of the history books. Mathew Trinca of the National Museum said in 2017 that there had been "a growing awareness of Pemulwuy as a historical figure" since the 1980s. Today his name turns up all over Sydney.
- The suburb of Pemulwuy. It was created in 2004 on historic Prospect Hill, near Greystanes. The name was put forward by the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Consultative Committee of the old Holroyd City Council. Many of its streets and parks have Darug names, and Watkin Tench Parade is a reminder of the first Europeans to climb the hill.
- The ferry Pemulwuy. It's one of the first six Emerald-class harbour ferries, which came into service in 2017. Another of them is named after Bungaree.
- The Pemulwuy Project. The Aboriginal Housing Company's redevelopment of the Block in Redfern has housing for 62 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families, which was finished in December 2020.
- Pemulwuy Park in Redfern, according to Wikipedia.
- The National Museum plaque. It was unveiled in Canberra on 20 March 2015 as part of the museum's Defining Moments project. Bidjigal elder Uncle Vic Simms said: "What the Museum is doing is so important for getting the history right about Pemulwuy as a Bidjigal man."
- Songs and screen. Redgum's "Water and Stone" and Marlene Cummins's song "Pemulwuy" are both about him. According to Wikipedia, Cummins's song was presented to Prince William along with the petition. A feature film, First Warrior, was announced in 2024.
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Timeline
- c.1750 – Pemulwuy born near Botany Bay, on the northern side of the Georges River.
- January 1788 – The First Fleet arrives.
- 1789 – Smallpox hits the Aboriginal people of Sydney.
- October 1790 – Bennelong asks marines to join a war party against Pemulwuy, the first time the British hear his name.
- November 1790 – Pemulwuy stays about two weeks in Bennelong's hut at Bennelong Point.
- 10 December 1790 – Pemulwuy spears the gamekeeper John McEntire near the Cooks River.
- 14 December 1790 – Tench's punitive expedition sets out, and finds no one.
- 20 January 1791 – McEntire dies.
- May 1792 – First raid, at Prospect.
- 1792–1797 – Raids at Prospect, Toongabbie, Georges River, Parramatta, Brickfield Hill and the Hawkesbury.
- January 1795 – Pemulwuy attends the initiation ceremony at Farm Cove.
- December 1795 – A false report that John Caesar has killed him.
- March 1797 – Toongabbie raid and the Battle of Parramatta. Pemulwuy is shot seven times and captured.
- April 1797 – Escaped in irons, he's seen near Botany Bay.
- 1800 – Surgeon Price writes that he carries "eight or ten ounces of lead".
- 1 May 1801 – King's order that Aboriginal people near Parramatta, Georges River and Prospect be driven off by gunfire.
- November 1801 – Proclamation outlawing Pemulwuy and offering rewards (dated 22 November in the Historical Records).
- c.1–2 June 1802 – Pemulwuy is shot dead and beheaded.
- 5 June 1802 – King writes to Banks and sends the head in spirits on the Speedy.
- 24 November 1802 – The Enderbys tell Banks the head has arrived in London.
- April 1803 – Banks says the head is in "the Museum of the Late Mr Hunter".
- 1808 – Tedbury threatens to spear Governor Bligh.
- 1810 – Tedbury is shot by Edward Luttrell at Parramatta and dies.
- 1941 – The Royal College of Surgeons is bombed and over half its specimens are destroyed.
- 1948 – About 3,000 skulls go from the College to the Natural History Museum.
- 1987 – Eric Willmot publishes Pemulwuy: The Rainbow Warrior.
- 2004 – The suburb of Pemulwuy is created.
- January 2010 – Redfern elders give Prince William a petition, and his office promises to search.
- 2012 – British officials and the Natural History Museum say there's no evidence the head is there.
- 2013 – Doug Kohlhoff questions whether Hacking fired the fatal shot.
- 20 March 2015 – The National Museum of Australia unveils its Pemulwuy plaque.
- 2017 – The ferry Pemulwuy enters service.
- 2025 – The National Museum still lists the head's whereabouts as unknown.
Where the Sources Disagree
- The date of the spearing, and when McEntire died. Smith (Dictionary of Sydney) and the National Museum give 10 December 1790, and Smith says McEntire died on 20 January 1791. Cumberland Council gives 9 December and says McEntire "died 3 days later". Tench's account, on Wikipedia, has the shooting party setting out on 9 December and the men creeping up "about one o'clock", after the sergeant had been asleep. I've gone with 10 December and 20 January.
- Phillip's orders. Wikipedia, following Tench and the historian John Moore, says Phillip first wanted ten men killed and beheaded and two captured, and Tench talked him down to six prisoners. Smith describes the orders as six killed and two captured for execution.
- Black Caesar in 1795. Smith says the report that John Caesar had killed Pemulwuy was false. Wikipedia says Caesar cracked Pemulwuy's skull in a fight at Botany Bay and that he survived.
- How many died at Parramatta in 1797. Smith and the National Museum say at least five warriors were killed. Henniker Heaton, writing in the 1870s, claimed 50.
- The date of his death. The ADB says "about 1 June 1802". Smith says 2 June. The National Museum says "on or just before 2 June".
- Who killed him. King wrote of "two settlers". Mann wrote of one man who got the reward. The ADB names Henry Hacking outright, and Smith says "suspicion falls on" Hacking, based on Samuel Smith's journal. Doug Kohlhoff (2013), as summarised by the National Museum, thinks settlers from Parramatta, Toongabbie or Prospect Hill were more likely.
- What happened to the head. Smith says it was in the Hunterian Museum through the 1800s. The 2012 news report says the College has no record of the two 1802 heads after 1818. Dixon (2010) said it might have reached the Natural History Museum in 1948 or been destroyed in 1941. A History of Aboriginal Sydney's summary of the same letter adds that it might have been returned to Australia in 1998. Madden (2014) said the museum had no positive evidence it was there.
- His name. The ADB says pemul means earth. Smith says Pemall (bimul) means earth or clay. Wikipedia gives Bemul Wagan, "the earth and the crow". Cumberland Council gives Butu Wargun, "Black Crow: Clan Leader", as his totem.
- The "Rainbow Warrior". The ADB and the Dictionary of Sydney tie the name to Eric Willmot's 1987 novel. The Sydney Morning Herald (2010) said he was called that "for the colours he wore", but gave no source.
- The only picture. The National Museum says the 1803 engraving of "Pimbloy" in a canoe, after a lost drawing by James Grant, is "believed to be the only known depiction" of Pemulwuy. It also says the face is hard to make out and the feet are hidden. Australian Geographic says it's "thought to feature" him. Nobody can be certain it's him.
My Earlier Posts
- Colbee (Colebee) – The Cadigal Man Kidnapped with Bennelong at Manly – c.1755 to c.1806
- Barangaroo – Cammeraygal Fisherwoman, Wife of Bennelong – c.1750 to 1791
- Woolaware Bennelong
- Bennelong Point – Circular Quay East
- Cora Gooseberry – Queen Gooseberry – Widow of Bungaree
- Philip Gidley King – Third Governor of New South Wales
- The Castle Hill Rebellion – Battle of Vinegar Hill – 5 March 1804
- Randwick – From Bidjigal Country to the Steam Trams
- Willow Grove – 34 Phillip Street – Parramatta
- Names of Railway Stations in New South Wales – Including Aboriginal Names and Meanings
- The Rum Corps – The New South Wales Corps, Rum, Land and Power in Early Sydney – 1789 to 1818
- Black Caesar – John Caesar, First Fleet Convict and Australia's First Bushranger – c.1763 to 1796
- Sydney's Aboriginal Rock Engravings – Whales, Wallabies and Ancestral Beings Cut in Sandstone, from Bondi to Ku-ring-gai Chase
- Parramatta – From Burramatta and Rose Hill to the River City – Old Government House, St John's, Elizabeth Farm and Australia's Second Settlement – 1788 to Today
- On my Historic Sydney Mansions blog: Greystanes House – Greystanes / Pemulwuy and Elizabeth Farm – Parramatta, where Tedbury came and went.
Sources
- J. L. Kohen, "Pemulwuy (c.1750–1802)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, supplementary volume, 2005. adb.anu.edu.au/biography/pemulwuy-13147
- Keith Vincent Smith, "Pemulwuy", Dictionary of Sydney, 2010. dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/pemulwuy
- Dictionary of Sydney, "Pemulwuy" (suburb). dictionaryofsydney.org/place/pemulwuy
- National Museum of Australia, "Pemulwuy", Defining Moments, updated 13 May 2025. nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/pemulwuy
- National Museum of Australia, "National Museum honours Aboriginal warrior Pemulwuy", media release, 20 March 2015. nma.gov.au
- State Library of NSW, "Letter received by Banks from Philip Gidley King, 5 June 1802 (Series 39.068)", page 4, Banks Papers transcription. transcripts.sl.nsw.gov.au
- Josephine Tovey, "Off with his head: prince pledges to return warrior's skull", Sydney Morning Herald, 1 April 2010. smh.com.au
- "Prince William vows to search for warrior's skull", ABC News, 1 April 2010. abc.net.au
- A History of Aboriginal Sydney, "Prince William investigates whereabouts of Pemulway's remains" (2010). historyofaboriginalsydney.edu.au
- Brad Crouch, "Prince William searches for missing skull of Aboriginal resistance leader Pemulwuy", news.com.au, 28 November 2012. news.com.au
- Paul Madden, "Behind the scenes at the museum", UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office blogs, 20 March 2014. blogs.fcdo.gov.uk
- "On this day: Pemulwuy is killed", Australian Geographic, 1 June 2017. australiangeographic.com.au
- Cumberland City Council, "Aboriginal heritage in Cumberland". cumberland.nsw.gov.au
- Aboriginal Housing Company, "About Us – The Pemulwuy Project". pemulwuyproject.org.au
- Wikipedia, "Pemulwuy" (for Tench's account of the McEntire spearing, the November 1801 order, King's letter to Hobart, and the songs and films). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pemulwuy
- Wikipedia, "Emerald-class ferry". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emerald-class_ferry
- Wikipedia, "Henry Hacking". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Hacking
- Eric Willmot, Pemulwuy: The Rainbow Warrior, Weldon, McMahons Point, 1987 (as cited by the Dictionary of Sydney and the ADB).
- Primary sources quoted through the works above: David Collins, An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales (1798–1802); Watkin Tench, A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson (1793); J. W. Price, Journal on the Minerva (SLNSW); Samuel Smith, Journal on the Investigator (SLNSW); Samuel Enderby to Banks, 24 November 1802 (SLNSW Banks Papers); King to Hobart, 30 October 1802 (Historical Records of NSW).
- Pictures: Wikimedia Commons, with credits under each image.
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