'Who was responsible for the 1928 Coniston Massacre in Central Australia where a police party killed 100 Aboriginal people? Not those who pulled the trigger, according to the Enquiry. Instead it was 'a woman missionary living amongst naked blacks'. This was Annie Lock, the 'whistle-blower' who caused the Enquiry.
'She believed Aboriginal lives mattered, with controversial results. This biography dives into massacres, stolen generations and the thorny problem of Aboriginal missions.
'A faith missionary, Annie Lock fought with Daisy Bates, met the Duke of Gloucester and inspired R.M. Williams. She was shipwrecked in a pearling lugger, drove a buggy 200 miles across desert to escape drought, produced Christmas puddings in 40-degree heat, nursed sore-ridden children, hit headlines for supposedly being 'Happy to Marry a Black', and pronounced on Aboriginal culture and policy with erratic spelling but genuine conviction.
'More problematically, she 'saved' souls, 'rescued' children, eroded culture and condoned Aboriginal men beating their wives.
'A strident and divisive figure, Annie Lock was appealingly eccentric but horrifyingly complicit in Australia's worst policies. Indigenous people variously called her 'lovely' and the provider of 'too much cabbage and Jesus Christ'. (Publication summary)
'The peripatetic Methodist missionary Annie Lock worked with around a dozen Aboriginal communities across three Australian states and the Northern Territory from the 1900s to the 1930s. A historical biography by Catherine Bishop draws on the travelogue form to describe these places, landscapes and cultures, as well as the benefits and damage connected with cultural exchange. Bishop’s biography is the study of an ordinary individual who has previously had only a cameo role in academic histories.' (Introduction)
'I read Too Much Cabbage and Jesus Christ in the week that a jury in Darwin found a police constable not guilty of murdering a Warlpiri teenager named Kumanjayi Walker. The constable, an ex-soldier, shot Walker three times, claiming that the boy resisted arrest. In 1928, as this book recounts, less than 100 kilometres from where Walker was killed, more than 60 Warlpiri and Anmatyerr men, women and children were killed by gangs led by police constable William Murray. Murray, an ex-soldier, claimed the victims had resisted arrest. A public enquiry into the deaths exonerated Murray and his fellow murderers.' (Introduction)
'A successful biography gives the reader much more than an insight into the life of the protagonist. The subject of Too Much Jesus Christ and Cabbage: Australia’s ‘Mission Girl’ Annie Lock is an intriguing character, a missionary who works alone in the desert ministering to impoverished, displaced Aboriginal people. What we learn from Catherine Bishop’s biography about early twentieth-century central Australian society is at least as important as what we learn about the protagonist.'(Introduction)
'A successful biography gives the reader much more than an insight into the life of the protagonist. The subject of Too Much Jesus Christ and Cabbage: Australia’s ‘Mission Girl’ Annie Lock is an intriguing character, a missionary who works alone in the desert ministering to impoverished, displaced Aboriginal people. What we learn from Catherine Bishop’s biography about early twentieth-century central Australian society is at least as important as what we learn about the protagonist.'(Introduction)
'I read Too Much Cabbage and Jesus Christ in the week that a jury in Darwin found a police constable not guilty of murdering a Warlpiri teenager named Kumanjayi Walker. The constable, an ex-soldier, shot Walker three times, claiming that the boy resisted arrest. In 1928, as this book recounts, less than 100 kilometres from where Walker was killed, more than 60 Warlpiri and Anmatyerr men, women and children were killed by gangs led by police constable William Murray. Murray, an ex-soldier, claimed the victims had resisted arrest. A public enquiry into the deaths exonerated Murray and his fellow murderers.' (Introduction)
'The peripatetic Methodist missionary Annie Lock worked with around a dozen Aboriginal communities across three Australian states and the Northern Territory from the 1900s to the 1930s. A historical biography by Catherine Bishop draws on the travelogue form to describe these places, landscapes and cultures, as well as the benefits and damage connected with cultural exchange. Bishop’s biography is the study of an ordinary individual who has previously had only a cameo role in academic histories.' (Introduction)
