The last time I visited my mother’s place in 2018, my True Love, who is a nosy bugger, picked up what appeared to be a small family history journal. He was only a few pages in when he exclaimed that I had to read this. So I read a few pages. It dissolved me. I put the journal aside to digest the information, hopefully to return to it another day.

I’ve heard often the advice not to dwell in the past but instead to look forward. I wonder if that advice is given by those who have trouble leaving it behind. I wish I could take that advice. But I seem to be stuck there, in that moment of betrayal and tragedy when a family’s life was torn apart by colonial invaders. Surely anyone who knows this history would take it upon themselves to reached out to descendants of the other family to apologise?

The journal was a biography of the Little family. The Littles left Ireland in 1839 to build a new life in Australia. The family journal is lost now. Borrowed by another and not returned. So I only learnt recently that I’m a descendant of the 1839 Littles. So now I know. I must say sorry. I do not expect absolution for the sins of the past. There’s no absolution for lives taken, land stolen and freedom denied. There is only truth. The alternative to apologising is to live without compassion, without humanity, live the lie. Still, I appreciate how difficult it is to make the first move. I have been reflecting longer than I should. My time has come.

The family patriarch, John Little, settled on Baffle Creek, near Bundaberg. His wife, Catherine, suggested the property be named “Rosedale”.

Source: Fox’s History of Queensland – Its People and Industries, p. 291

It is not difficult to imagine the importance of this lagoon to the evicted owners, the Gooreng Gooreng people.

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In the absence of the journal, I dived into Ancestry. What a shock it was to see the family trees and photos of people who have committed atrocities and yet there is no acknowledgement of that. Maybe a better term for Ancestry would be Pandora’s box.

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In November 2024, the newly elected Queensland Government led by David Crisafulli, abolished the state’s Truth-telling and Healing Inquiry and repealed the Path to Treaty Act.

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Thanks for reading. Take care, everyone, and don’t let your ancestry shame you into avoiding the truth or hamper your compassion.

Kind Regards.
Tracy.

17 thoughts on “Into The Deep End – A Family History”

  2. It must have been so difficult to read this and yet, your family history couldn’t have been read today by a more compassionate soul and person than you Tracy and you are able to apologise on behalf of your whole ancestral line 💜 Sending love and hugs your way 💞 💜 💞 xxx

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  4. Tracy…I am at a loss for words, but I agree with Anne. You do lead a life of love and compassion. Maybe you have been atoning for the past and not even realizing it. ❤️

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    1. I’m not a nice person, Lois. I try to be but I am very flawed. Still, these social justice issues really speak to me for some reason. I have my theories but they are very wacky. It certainly also helped that I watched Gary Foley’s movie “Backroads” when I was a teen. I was totally gutted by that movie.

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  5. What they did with their necessities and values is not your problem. It’s like a book I taught from said, “That we had slavery in this country is not important. What is important is we stopped it.” The author went on to make the (true) point that humans have enslaved each other since the beginning. That we are no longer doing that? He’s right. That’s what matters. Even my African American students agreed with this, though some of them were surprised to learn that Africans were not the ONLY enslaved people in history. History is a shit-show. I figure my job is not to be an asshole.

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    2. Unfortunately, slaves or people trafficking is very much alive in our world. Even here in NZ. If everyone’s job was not to be an asshole we would be in a better place, wouldn’t we.

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