AustLit

'Biography of Willshire which attempts to counteract the emphasis on Willshire's charge of murder rather than the honourable acquittal he received; presents Willshire's police service record (1879-1908) and emphasises his contribution to Australian anthropology via his four books; emphasises Willshire's pleas to government for assistance in improving Aboriginal welfare.' (Source: Google Books)

'The author's bush experiences as a patrol officer in the Western Desert in the 1950s and 1960s.' (Source: Westprint website)

'Falling stones and other objects showing scant regard for the laws of physics, rained down on an Aboriginal camp in the southwest of Western Australia between 1955 and 1957.'

'When Helen Hack settled on this property in the 1980s, tales of bizarre poltergeist activity were the last thing she expected to hear. Over the years as she helped her husband on the farm, raising three children and running a physiotherapy practice she became increasingly intrigued with what the Aboriginals called the Jannick.'

'In the late 1990s Helen decided to research the remarkable activity that had occurred forty years earlier. Her journey led her to interview many witnesses, some of whom reported strange lights in conjunction with the phenomena of the falling stones.'

The Mystery of the Mayanup Poltergeist includes recollections, diary extracts and media reports published at the time. Some questions are unanswerable and the Jannick remains a compelling mystery for believers and sceptics alike.(Source:Bookworm website)

'Stories and legends of the Arunta people living near Mount Sarah Station in central Australia in the 1920s.' (Source: Antiqbook website)

'Phil Aitchison’s life story has the potential to appeal to the broader community. Australians like to read about “battlers.” How he has overcome adversity and lived a fulfilling life is a fascinating story.'

'Phil has seen a lot and had many different experiences. From being kidnapped and taken to another country as a 2 year old to being a runaway ward of the State. To finally discovering his mother’s family some 85 years later. It is similar to the Aboriginal ‘stolen generation.’'

'This story will interest many - the people of the Pilbara, pastoralists, those interested in Australian history and the evolution of mining, and other readers state wide. It is also of great Aboriginal interest.' (Source: The Chart & Map Shop website)

'While their family was quite young, the Shedleys took into their home on the hill, in what is now an elite suburb of Perth, aboriginal teenagers from the country to attend high school. The story tells of the early lives of Meg and Don, of how they became involved, of the family relationships developed and the extraordinary outcome that now extends throughout Western Australia and filters across the whole nation.' (Source: Back cover)

'Martu woman Dadina Brown was born and reared in Western Australia's Little Sandy Desert during the 1970s. Like her famous kinsfolk, Warri and Yatunkga ('The Last of the Nomads'), her family met Stan Gratte's party of field historians, and came to live in Wiluna. Combines the memories of a last Aboriginal nomad with a history and geography of the Little Sandy Desert. Personal stories merge with images of desert landscapes in a colourful, descriptive and candid account of outback life. Dadina Georgina Brown was born in that desert, but outside the bounds of her Mandildjara aboriginal tribe. Ms Brown is one of the last people to have lived the traditional nomad life. Features stories about her early childhood as Dadina, living wild and free; and then adjusting to life as Georgina, resident in the outback community at Wiluna.' (Source: Google books website)

A short story on the life of Jandamarra, resistance leader of the West Kimberley area in the 1890s who rebelled against the injustices that were being committed against the Bunuba people and their land.

'"Major" was a fine type of Australian black-fellow, and might have lived and died as a useful member of society but for the deep-laid vengeance of "a woman scorned." Plotting with Machiavellian cunning, she first induced him to commit murder and then helped the police to hunt him down. Finally, when a bullet had put an end to his ill-starred career, she proceeded, like a dutiful wife, to mourn his loss!' (Source: Publishers website)

'Intriguing material from Western Australia’s first gold rush to Peterwangy. This idiosyncratic travelogue written for the author’s friends describes a journey from Albany, overland to Perth and eventually to Northampton. While the descriptions of travel, places and people – from convicts to governors, are of some interest it is his repeated references to gold, at Kendenup, Dandalup, and Peterwangy, as well as notes on the natives, including his near nemesis King Johny or Errinnoo of Northampton area, that create the greatest interest.' (Source:" Publishers website)

'This novel, set in the 1930s in the far north Kimberley region of Western Australia, not only is a story of enduring love and revenge, both European and Aboriginal, but a portrayal of life on a remote cattle station where access and transport were both limited to slow. Characters are varied, including the worthy station manager and his beautiful daughter as well as employees needed for the day to day running of the station: storekeeper, stockmen, Aboriginal ‘boys.’'

'Perhaps the most outstanding aspects of this novel are the descriptions of the scenery. The author knew and loved the Kimberley and showed his affection in his detailed observation of the fauna and flora: “….Lily Springs where there was a beautiful pool of clear spring water. In the centre of this grew a profusion of white, mauve and yellow water lilies, set like coloured stars in a sky of limpid blue. Serried ranks of white stemmed ti trees growing down to the water’s edge created splashes of light and shade upon the placid surface of the pool and afforded harbourage for hundreds of gaily coloured finches, parakeets and other birds intent on quenching their thirst or pursuing the abounding insect life.”'

'What is particularly notable is the author’s depiction of the Aboriginals, showing his understanding of their beliefs, his wish to maintain the integrity of the race and, through kindly treatment and education, improving the lot of Australia’s indigenous people.' (Source: Publishers website)

This is Pigeon's story and of those who suffered his reign of terror and the men who hunted him.

It is without academe historians' fashionable fabrications and elaborations, which in recent times have dissembled the past to rewrite history as they would like it, not as 'it was. They attack any historical writing that questions their spurious promotion of utopian aboriginal culture. They will not welcome this work.'

'The truth may destroy the legend of Pigeon, but importantly it will show the pioneers of this furthest frontier were mainly decent young men who survived against the odds and were of immense courage and fortitude. It is a true story of a legend that belongs to the pioneer police, but was stolen from them by the falsity of Pigeon's myth makers.'

'Pigeon's cowardice is shown by the callous murder of Constable Richardson in his sleep; in the shooting of the stockmen Burke and Gibbs in the back, and his involvement in the spearing and shooting of Tom Jasper in the head as he slept.'

'Pigeon, through the barrel of a gun, tyrannised his own people, defied tribal laws and the old men and seized what women he wanted and when on the run he and his gang resorted to cannibalisation of their own people. He fled his after ammunition was spent and escaped tribal punishment twice.' In the end white man's justice prevailed.' (Source: Publishers website)

'Oombulgurri emerged from the remnants of Forrest River Mission to become one of the first independent Indigenous communities in Australia. During its 97 years its people have participated in events that captured national headlines; the search for the Southern Cross, the rescue of the crew of a German seaplane, reports of a massacre that sparked a Royal Commission, their service as guides to an elite military force preparing for the anticipated Japanese invasion of Australia and, in recent years, the community’s decline into poverty, depression and suicide. Sixty percent of the school children of 1967 are now dead. The missionaries and most of those they served are gone and so too is the lifestyle of that not so distant past, but in these pages we discover how church and government policies and failures shaped the present and the small achievements of Aboriginal people are soon lost in yet another wave of policies and practices that are presumed to be good for ‘them’.' (Source: Publishers website)

'Dowker spent some years on the Gascoyne and later in the South West. Stories of bush and station work and the men and Aboriginals he worked with.' (Source: Publisher website)

'Vincent Wallace Liddelow, 1903-1982, joined the Police in 1925 as No. 1512. He was first attached to Central Police, then Fremantle and the Water Police. Afterwards he was stationed at Toodyay, Nullagine, Kalgoorlie, Albany, Perth, then back to Fremantle. As a plain clothes policeman he formed a great interest in Alcoholics Anonymous and helped many people although he was not an alcoholic himself. He retired after 38 years of service in the Police Force in 1963.'

'These memoirs of the people and places he served will interest the many of those areas and those who knew him. Of particular interest is the inclusion of his occurrence book reports for his pre-war years at Nullagine. His photos of that time are also of great interest to all with memories of the North and record many of the identities and characters of the time.' (Source: Publishers website)

'Harold Godbehear was one of the great characters of the Kimberley and known by all of those in the Kimberley between the 1920s and 1950s. Starting life as a seaman, having escaped office life, he arrived in Fremantle in 1913.'

'With experience on Minilya Station and droving he was just in time to join the 10th Light Horse, serving in Egypt and Palestine. In 1929 he was appointed manager of Myroodah Station, on the Fitzroy out of Derby. Thus began his Kimberley life, of which he writes in a very readable style. Men, women, horses, cattle, sheep and dogs, and the Kimberley are the subjects of his humorous but caressing monologue of life in the tropics.' (Source: Publishers website)

Dry River is a 'Humorous, gritty, real…David Mills’ biography, Dry River, is a richly detailed account of working life in the Australian Outback in the last days of the old stockroutes and packsaddle cattle camps. An extraordinary story of an ordinary bloke.' (Source: Publishers website)

'Bob Johnson spent most of his working life in the North, Wodgina Ta mine, on shearing teams, Big Bell, Moola Bulla Station, Bedford Downs, etc. Much info and anecdotes on the people and places.' (Source: Publishers website)

'Claude Heppingstone was a cameleer on the 1908-1910 well construction party of the Canning Stock Route. This is his daily diary. Bush diaries are rare and the detail of this shows the long daily grind of hard bush work and what was done in this great enterprise.' (Source: Publishers website)

'John and Torrance McMicking were well known east Kimberley stockmen. Torrence started El Questro. The story of early life on Cashmere Downs and life in the Kimberley with his partner, Katy Vickers. An end of an era.' (Source: TROVE)

'J. S. Durlacher was a Pilbara pastoralist with a great interest in native customs. In 1900 he wrote his reminiscences of these, together with a unique series of sketches.'

'Lost for a century his fascinating descriptions are now available courtesy of the Roebourne Shire and Rio Tinto Iron Ore.' (Publisher's blurb)

'Sarah O’Neill was a widow on the Kimberley Goldfield, in the 1880s, the same time as Russian Jack, the famous wheelbarrow man who became legendary throughout the goldfields of WA.'

'Sarah led an even more fascinating existence in Halls Creek. Her fortitude, inner strength and tenacity were a byword wherever she went.'

'Yvonne’s book brings to life this almost forgotten pioneer and the time and place she lived.Beautifully illustrated in full colour it details Sarah’s life and the localities, with maps, photographs and artwork.'

'Accurate details of the historic sites around Halls Creek, the Old Halls Creek cemetery, the numerous lonely graves of the area, details of the original route to the goldfields, and information on the colonial liquor laws that Sarah ran afoul of are also included to make this book a pleasure to read, handle and view.' (Source: Publishers website)

'An intriguing story of one of the great and almost forgotten characters of the Australian bush. Ben Bridge was one of Australia’s greatest horsemen at a time when nearly all Australians were familiar with the finer points of horses and their riders.'

'Early acquaintance with men such as Ben Hall and Yellow Billy, and a love for a great horse led young Ben a little astray. From NSW to Queensland, the Territory to the Kimberley, Ben was tracked by the police, charged many times, released as many, except that several of these releases were unofficial – he broke out of gaol several times, including in Queensland where the gaol burnt down around him.'

'The police were searching for a will-o-the-wisp who many times was hiding mere yards from them. Eventually after some 8 years on the ‘run’ he was captured in the Kimberley and extradited to stand trial in NSW, again.' (Source: Hersperian Press website)

Billy Linklater was the author of Gather No Moss, a Northern Territory classic. He wrote of the Territory when he was young. The Magic Snake is his collected legends of the Warramunga tribe among whom he lived and worked for many years. A forgotten classic of the North. (Source: Hesperian Press website)