Backbencher

This book looks at the removal or kidnapping of half -cast children in Australia. These are child that are half white and half Maradujara. This book starts when the white people start coming to the northwest part of Australia and the things that they did to the local population. They started out with the whaling ships that would come to the cost and the kill the men and take the women rape the women and then kill them as well. Then it move on to the first settlement of white people this was a military out post. This out post was to help the white people settle into this world. The military post also had another purpose to protect the native population from the white people and helped them become part of the new changes that where taking place. What this did was make the native population depended to the whites.

Later in the book it talks about how many of the native population moved to the sheep and cattle station. What the white people found out about the natives is that they make some of the best hands to take care of the livestock. They know the land well and how to live on it. They also make great house help that can double duty. This is where the half-cast starts many of the stock men and the station bosses did not have wives and women were hard to find. This would mean that these men would take wives form the native population. This would of course lead to children. These children were not accepted by either society. This was noticed by the government. The solution that was devised was to take these half bread children and take them to boarding schools or to adopted them out to white families so they could survive in the white world.

This is where the story really starts. There are Three girls that are half breeds, their names is Gracie, Molly and Daisy. The local government agent begins to notice that these girls are there and that they are not fitting in. So he sends a telegram about the girls to the Moore River Native Settlement. When they get there they are treated like they are in prison. The treatment was bad and they would not be allowed to talk to their families or have anything that is part of their old life. After the bad treatment and the life of being locked up the girls decided to run away. This is a long journey that can be very dangerous. The girls first big challenge is making fire and cooking food. There is also finding water. Somehow they found there way home by following the rabbit proof fence. This is a fence that runs north and south designed to keep rabbits out of good grazing land.

The book is written by the oldest daughter of Molly so there is a lot of family history it is very well written. I find it very odd that this practice of removing these children from their families until the 1970's. This almost a hundred years longer then the United States did this type of things with the Native Americans. I hope that the families that had did this done to them got some type of apology form the Australian government. It also seems that the Australian government is not trying to hide their mistake which is a good thing. That is a good step to healing wounds.