We pay respect to the first peoples on whose land we are, ;xNLx;We acknowledge the loss of lands, spirituality, tradition and culture.;xNLx;Knowing the consequences for people, communities and nations, ;xNLx;We walk together hand in hand to a better future.
In 1606, the Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon landed near the site where Weipa is now located on the western shore of Cape York. This was the first recorded encounter between Europeans and first Australian peoples.
Lieutenant James Cook and crew aboard a ship called the Endeavour mapped the east coast of Australia in April 1770.
Early life for the British marines and convicts was very difficult. The land was very different to that in Britain and initial plantings of crops failed. Finding suitable shelter was also a huge problem and the British convicts and soldiers had very limited building materials. Life was so difficult for the early colonists that by the time the second fleet of convicts and marines arrived from Britain to what is now known as Sydney, the convicts and marines from the first voyage were dressed in patched and threadbare clothes.
At the time of early British colonisation, the land around Fish Creek in The Gap would have remained in its natural state.
For Australia's first peoples, British arrival in Australia was an invasion – it brought war, disease and deprivation. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were displaced from the traditional lands they had occupied for 60 thousand years, since the time of the Dreaming.
In 1799 Captain Matthew Flinders explored Moreton Bay and around the Queensland coast but did not discover the entrance to the Brisbane River.
The Brisbane River was a spiritually important place and a vital food source for first Australians since the Dreaming. British explorers however, did not find the entrance to the river until 1823.
British settlement of Brisbane was initially as a penal settlement. Redcliffe was the first city in Queensland colonised by the British and is located on the edge of Moreton Bay.
In 1825 the British colony was moved from Redcliffe to the banks of the Brisbane River. Early on, Brisbane was called a different name – Edenglassie.
By 1830 the population of Moreton Bay included 1,000 convicts and 100 soldiers.
