Aborigines of Van Diemen's Land, 1830-1840 - Page 144
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[Page 144]
It is therefore I shall at once present the reader with some valuable documents extracted from the public records dated 18 31st December 1830. It would appear that the report only mentions twenty-two Inquests held by Mr Ansty in a few years, but that gentleman was only commissioned as Coroner in the beginning of 1826. Mr Humphry, Mr Js Gordon, Mr. P.A. Mulgrave were at the time the only Coroners in the Colony. The fact however is that Mr Ansty had held nearly sixty inquisitions and on casualties of various sorts acts but all before April 1826 were merely in his capacity of Police Magistrate. For those extra services Mr Ansty declined all remuneration.
My motives for merely confining myself to the Oatlands District are sufficiently apparent. Mr Ansty had been requested to superintend the Roving parties, and therefore most communications concerning the Aborigines passed through his hands. One Specimen will also do, for was I to publish the accounts of Coroners' Inquests held at Cam at Campbell Town, Norfolk Plains, Launceston, Oyster Bay, Richmond and New Norfolk, with the other outrages committed to the Blacks, they alone would fill a large volume.
Most of the Oatlands reports are well written, and attentively considered.