Emotional return of artefacts to Bunurong country

IT WASN’T meant to be political. It wasn’t a protest, and it was all fairly low-key. But the repatriation of First People’s artefacts by the South Gippsland Conservation Society to Cultural Heritage Officer for the Bunurong Land Council, Sonia Weston-Hume, last Wednesday was nonetheless an important occasion.

And it was Ms Weston-Hume, speaking on behalf of elders who weren’t able to walk out on the Screw Creek coastal trail for the occasion, who explained

why it was so important that the collected tools and artefacts needed to be returned to the land.

“This is a very important day for us and for this country to help with the healing,” Ms Weston-Hume said.

“And you can’t heal the country unless you heal us,” she said, noting that the recovered artefacts would be returned to appropriate sites around the district.

“I get emotional about this because we really do feel it.

“I’m one generation on from the Stolen Generation but it still impacts us,” she said noting that her mother was always worried it might happen with her own kids.

Ms Weston-Hume said that in her work for the Bunurong Land Council she had become aware of how extensive First Nation’s People settlement was through the area with the bones of a mother and baby being discovered in recent times at Venus Bay and artefacts right through the district.

“I always say, in the first few feet of excavation, you’ll find colonial remains, then it’s all artefacts and signs of settlement right through this area.

“Sharp tools used to skin animals to cook and eat. And they farmed this country too for yams. They knew where they all were. And they built fish traps out of rock, to catch the fish as the tide went out. Eel traps too at Harmers Haven and all around.

“On these days you can see our creator. We’ll remember this day for a long time.”

Ms Weston-Hume was responding to an emotional handing back of the Aboriginal artefacts collected by Susan Williams, by her sister Debbie Williams, on behalf of the conservation society which had kept the collection from a different time.

Time had come to hand them back, though, and they’ll be returned to Bunurong country so the healing process can continue.