[ to AUE only]
On Thu, 19 Jan 2023 10:58:03 +1100, Peter Moylan
<peter@pmoylan.org.invalid> wrote:

>On 19/01/23 02:47, rbowman wrote:
>> On Wed, 18 Jan 2023 19:09:28 +1100, Rod Speed wrote:
>
>>>> although the treatment was similar to the US Native Americans.
>>>
>>> No, quite different
>>
>> I don't know the full history. Poisoning the cattle rustlers sounded
>> like a very American move although we usually just shot Indians that
>> got in the way.
>
>Some people poisoned wells during early white settlement of Australia.
>But shooting was a more common way of getting rid of the natives. When
>it came to open warfare, as it sometimes did, the whites always won
>because they had better weapons.
>
>But we shouldn't ignore the influence of disease. Among the Awabakal
>tribe, who lived where I now live, the population fell from 3000 to 30
>over a remarkably short time. (I've forgotten how long.) We're told that
>that was because of disease ... measles, or something like that. But I
>won't take that as certain.

Googling the book,
Plagues and Peoples is a book on epidemiological history by
historian William H. McNeill published by Anchor Books in 1976. It
was a critical and popular success, offering a radical new
interpretation of the extraordinary impact of infectious disease on
cultures as a means of enemy attack. Wikipedia

I don't remember McNeill mentioning the Austrialian case,
but the American natives (both North and South) were wiped
out by smallpox, measles, scarlet fever and (maybe) chickenpox.

Population reduction by 90% for each continent is one estimate,
not entirely unreasonable.
Populations of natives of the American Midwest and West were
not affected much (I think) until the westward migrations of the
19th century -- the same time frame as the settling of Australia.

> One thing we are now learning is that a lot
>of the history of that period was suppressed. The official story was a
>lot simpler when I was at school.

--
Rich Ulrich