TIAGARRA
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We now fly the flag of our TSI brothers and sisters alongside ours
Many thanks to Devonport City Council for installing this sign on the Bluff.
A brief history of Tiagarra
by local Aboriginal Elder Merv Gower 
Scary times ! - now fortunately behind us and Dev. council
Aboriginal cultural significance of the Mersey Bluff, Devonport
One means of concretely showing Aboriginal occupation and cultural activities maintained over thousands of generations on the Bluff includes stone artefacts.
These were routinely removed by collectors before disturbing Aboriginal sites became illegal in 1976. Many removed artefacts reside today in museum collections, including in Tiagarra. Research is ongoing into the whereabouts of Aboriginal stone artefacts removed from the Bluff. 
5 July 2010 Sharon Dennis with a school tour at Tiagarra
5 November 2010
Daki Spencer painting the colours of Tiagarra 
Tiagarra trees. More bush planting is needed: weaving garden, bush foods, to bring in birds, habitat, etc
The Aboriginal community and Tiagarra : who we are
A brief history of the Aboriginal community of the Devonport/Latrobe region
This region, referred to as north west Tasmania, is the home today of thousands of Aboriginal people, from many Tasmanian Aboriginal and mainland Australian Aboriginal families. The local Aboriginal organisation is Six Rivers Aboriginal Corporation based at Tiagarra The mouth of the river in Devonport is recorded as and we as the local family group recognise it as the paranaple. The original people of this northern region included the Punnilerpanner people from around Panatana (Port Sorell), the Pallittorre from Lartitickitheker (Quamby Bluff), the Noeteeler at Ningherner or Parteenno (Hampshire Hills) and the Plairhekehillerplue at Emu Bluff. British invasion/colonisation began in the 1790s, and one result is that there are no known direct descendants of these specific Aboriginal groups to survive into the twentieth century. In this region the incursion of the Van Diemen's Land Company from the 1820s, and the colonists' stock keepers' range extending along critical river / valley pathway corridors, plus pastoralists large local land grants eg: North Down, fatally impacted on the local Aboriginal population. The broader Aboriginal community of Tasmania today maintain cultural, custodian responsibilities for the entire island. This region was the final home base for Dalrymple Johnson (AKA Dolly, nee Briggs, born.c.1808 on Little Kangaroo Island, Furneaux group (see obituary TROVE). Dalrymple died in1864 in Latrobe, Tasmania. Baptised 'Dalrymple' in Port Dalrymple in 1814 (by Rev. Knopwood) Dalrymple was a daughter of Trawlwoolway woman Woretemoeteyenner (Woretemoeteyenner sister's were Wapperty and Wottecowidger) and Dalrymple's father was George Briggs, a 'sealer, originally from Bedfordshire . Dalrymple was a grandddaughter of Mannalargenna, a sister of John Briggs (later of Coranderrk, Victoria) and to Eliza Briggs and Mary Briggs, who passed away aged in their early twenties. Dalrymple and her (convict) husband Thomas Johnson lived here from the mid 1840s when they moved from Dunorlan, to initially lease Frogmore, on the Mersey River, from the Moriarty family, near to what was to become the township of Latrobe. The Johnson's raised a large family, with 10 surviving children, they built the first church and school in the district. They also built two inns, a coal mine, and a timber mill that exported to South Australia. Dalrymple and her ancestors' maternal home country was Tebrikunna, the far north east of Tasmania, but surrender to, capture and killing by British colonists led, from the early 1800s to Trawlwoolway people's exile from Country. In Dalrymple's case, she lived since her childhood in Country that was not her own, initially as a servant around Launceston and Norfolk Plains, then in the early 1830s near Quamby Bluff, and then Perth in Tasmania. Since 1845 a majority of Dalrymple and Thomas' children, and their descendants, remain in this district, emanating from Latrobe/East Devonport, now numbering in their thousands. To read more about Dalrymple's mother's experiences in Van Diemen's Land, and subsequently at Wybalenna Aboriginal settlement on Flinders Island, and of her eventual freedom, to live the remainder of her life with Dalrymple, who petitioned the Government for her release to her family in 1841 see: http://www.isrn.qut.edu.au/pdf/ijcis/IJCIS%20Walter%20&%20Daniels.pdf |
2 April 1975
Aboriginal sites undertaking given
THE EXAMINER
Aboriginal sites undertaking given
THE EXAMINER
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Senator Neville Bonner visiting Devonport Bluff in 1975, while TIAGARRA was being built. Senator Bonner was inspecting some of the many dozens of potential petroglyphs - or natural forms re-incised by Aboriginal people. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neville_Bonner
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The formation known as the emu
The plaque on the memorial to Dalrymple and Thomas Johnson (1970) located on Railton rd, south of Latrobe, adjacent to the original site of their home SHERWOOD HALL (relocated in the mid 1990s to Bells Parade, Latrobe and open to the public).
Ancestors living site
Looking out from the Bluff, Devonport, Tasmania
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