Jandamarra | |
---|---|
Nickname(s) | Crow |
Born | c. 1873 |
Died | April 1, 1897 Tunnel Creek, Western Australia |
Place of burial | Napier Range |
Allegiance | Bunuba |
Years of service | 1894-1897 |
Battles / wars | Australian frontier wars |
Jandamarra or Tjandamurra (c. 1873—1 April 1897), known to British settlers as Pigeon,[1][2] was an Aboriginal Australian man of the Bunuba people who led one of many organised armed insurrections against the British colonisation of Australia. Initially employed as a tracker for the police, he became a fugitive when he was forced to capture his own people. He led a three-year campaign against police and British settlers, achieving legendary status for his hit and run tactics and his abilities to hide and disappear. Jandamarra was eventually killed by another tracker at Tunnel Creek on 1 April 1897. His body was buried by his family at the Napier Range, where it was placed inside a boab tree. Jandamarra's life has been the subject of two novels, Ion Idriess's Outlaws of the Leopold (1952) and Mudrooroo's Long Live Sandawarra (1972), a non-fiction account based on oral tradition, Jandamurra and the Bunuba Resistance, and a stage play.
This article was first published in hardcopy in Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 12, (MUP), 1990.