AustLit

This is a collection of oral histories about the displacement of Aboriginal adults and children from their traditional lands to the Kahlin Compound and the Retta Dixon Children's Home in the Northern Territiory. The children's home was run by the United Inland Mission and was established within the Government compound in 1947 and both areas are referred to today as the Bagot Reserve. The author Barbara Cummings highlights the forced living of Aboriginal people at the compound to the removal of their children to the Retta Dixon home. The history spans over six decades from the 1911 Aborigines Act to 1980 and examines the beginning of Aboriginal Affairs in Darwin, as well as the political and social impacts of institutionalisation that include the adverse affects of alcoholism, violence and homelessness.