Trugernanner biography of rory

Truganini or Trugernanner (1812-1876), Tasmanian Aborigine, daughter of Mangerner, a Lyluequonny man of the south-east tribe, was born at Recherche Bay in 1812, nine years after British occupation of the Derwent river area.

Her childhood and adolescence were spent on the violent frontier of British settlement. By March 1829, when Truganini and her father met the secular missionary George Augustus Robinson on Bruny Island, her mother had been killed by sailors, her uncle shot by a soldier, her sister Moorinna abducted and shot by sealers, and Paraweena, a young man who was to have been her husband, murdered by timber getters.

In July 1829 at Bruny Island mission Truganini 'married' Woorraddy, a Nuenonne man from Bruny Island. From 1830-35 they were associated with Robinson's expeditions around Tasmania to 'bring in' other Aborigines before they were exterminated by British settlers.

Truganini and Woorraddy acted as guides and instructors in their languages and customs to