Heirisson Island
This small island in the Swan River which forms the link between the two bridges of The Causeway, which joins the City of Perth to suburban Victoria Park, has an interesting history. The island, originally a series of mudflats, is named after a French midshipman named Francois-Antoine Boniface Heirisson who explored the Swan River in a longboat from 17th to 22nd June 1801. Heirisson made a direct observation on a chart after his journey, which included soundings along the entire length of his journey up the river, and comments on the singular topography of the mouth of the river (the bar), making reference to several features seen along its course.
That expedition, headed by Nicolas Baudin, charted much of the WA coast between 1801 and 1804. During their stay in the area in June 1801, a long-boat party which included Louis de Freycinet and Pierre Faure surveyed Rottnest Island. Another longboat under Sub-lieutenant Heirisson's command, explored the Swan River just as Willem de Vlamingh had done 103 years earlier. Just as Vlamingh's crew had reported finding gigantic human footprints on the banks of the Swan River, near where the city of Perth now stands, so Heirisson and his offsider Moreau, declared that they also had observed the same phenomena at the same place.
The expedition's naturalist, Francois Peron, had set down Vlamingh's stories to the exaggerative distortion of lovers of the marvellous, "of whom we counted some amongst us", but when his own expedition's sailors came scampering back to the ship with the tale that they had actually seen the giants and been pursued by them, the naturalist began to think that there was probably some ground for the belief. At all events, he determined to go and see for himself.
Peron requested Baudin send a few armed men ashore with him, but was rudely refused. Not to be thwarted in continuing his researches in so favourable a place, Peron determined to make use of a couple of days during which a furnace was to be erected for extracting salt from the sea by evaporation - the ship's supply having been depleted - to run the risk of an excursion on his own account; whereupon Petit, one of the artists, and Guichenot, one of the gardeners, resolved to accompany him.
Not long after coming ashore, the adventurous three were soon favoured with a visit from a troop of aboriginals, who, though by no means giants, were certainly formidable foes. There were forty of them, all armed with spears. Peron and his companions had only a musket and a pair of pistols so they played their opponents' bluff and continued on, which proved disconcerting to the natives who left them alone. Peron and his companions concluded this signal display of coolness and daring by quietly walking back and proceeding on their journey inland. They were not pursued nor further molested. Peron continued to Heirisson's island but found no large footprints there.
Willem de Vlamingh's ships, with black swans, at the entrance to the Swan River, Western Australia, coloured engraving (1796), derived from an earlier drawing (now lost) from the de Vlamingh expeditions of 1696-97.
The first European to visit the Heirisson Island area was the Flemish explorer Willem de Vlamingh in January 1697. He was exploring the Swan River in long-boats but only got as far as the Heirisson Island(s) because the mud flats impeded any further progress.
Today Heirisson Island is very popular with joggers and cyclists who take advantage of the 2km walking track around the island and the bicycle paths across it. The fauna on the island, including several grey kangaroos, is protected and the bird life is abundant and varied. A monument to the aboriginal tribal leader Yagan who was killed there is built on the west end of the southern island. The monument has a controversial history and at one point vandals actually removed the head of the statue. The head was retrieved and a special ceremony took place to re-attach it (see below).
The area around Heirisson Island is traditionally associated with the Beeloo Nyungah people who knew the small islands and mud flats as Matagarup, referring to the river as being "one leg deep". The island located on either side of the current causeway bridge was known as Kakaroomup. The Matagarup mud flats were the first major crossing point upriver from the river's mouth (at Fremantle) and were an important seasonal access way over which the Beeloo Nyungah gave other groups right of passage across the river.
Yagan statue
Of historical significance on Heirisson Island is a statue of an Aboriginal tribal leader named Yagan. Yagan was a Nyungar leader who played a key part in early indigenous resistance to white rule around the area now occupied by Perth. Initially he had good relations with the white administration and distributed goods and rations received as compensation for the use of land by settlers. As the whites increasingly encroached on traditional lands and threaten the Nyungar way of life he was forced to fight back.
Yagan's first recorded act of open rebellion was the June 1833 spearing of a servant and the destruction of a mud brick home in reprisal for the shooting of an un-named Nyungar man who had been "stealing" from a settler's garden. Following this a number of other attacks on settlers occurred throughout the Swan area leading to his arrest. Acting through a white interpreter named Robert Lyon, Yagan was spared the death penalty as he successfully claimed he was a prisoner of war. He also confronted the court with its complicity in sparking the guerrilla war by stating "You came to our country. You have driven us from our haunts and disturbed us in our occupations. As we walk in our own country we are fired upon by white men. Why should he mistreat us so?"
After being exiled to Carnac Island Yagan and another warrior made an escape to the mainland. Trigger happy settlers had begun the wholesale killings of Nyungars and shortly after Yagan's father Midegooroo was arrested and executed. In return Nyungar reprisal attacks had escalated including one against a guard at Carnac Island. Nyungar attacks were far more selective in their range of targets than those by whites as the nature of Yagan's death attests. Yagan and a companion were shot in the back whilst sharing a meal with the Keats brothers on Heirisson Island.
The brothers were bounty hunters who had lured in the pair with promises of friendship. Before the attack was over one of the brothers had been speared. The other abandoned him before returning with a posse. The posse found Yagan dead and finished off his dying friend Heegan with a bullet to the head. Yagan's head was then hacked off and later preserved over a smoky fire in a tree stump before being wrapped in a kangaroo skin. His skin was then carefully removed and hung to dry in order to obtain intact his tribal markings. The other remains were left behind, unburied and unburned.
From there Yagan's head was to undertake the long journey to Britain. In 1834 it was falsely and ghoulishly displayed throughout the country as belonging to the "Chief of the Swan River". The head later became the property of the Museum of Liverpool and was displayed for many years before being disposed of in 1968 as part of a general clean out. It was later buried in a paupers grave in Everton Cemetery along with the bodies of 21 still born children. Efforts by Aboriginal elders to obtain it culminated in 1997 when a four person delegation went to Britain and negotiated the exhumation of Yagan's head which was handed over in a special ceremony. Controversy continued to dog Yagan however. On its return to Perth, disputes also broke out amongst Elders over where Yagan should be buried with some groups claiming he should never have been brought back. Elder Robert Bropho suffered a mysterious heart attack shortly after Yagan's return and attributed this and a run of bad luck to Yagan's angry spirit.
