User:Moorstreet/Rolepana (or Benny Ben Lomond)

Rolepana (or Benny Ben Lomond) ...

Rolepana, also known as Benny Ben Lomond, was captured as the child survivor of a massacre of Tasmanian Aborigines, lead by John Batman, at night, in September 1829. Rolepana was later taken by Batman with the founding party at Melbourne in 1835, aged 8 years old. Upon Batman's death in Melbourne from syphillis in 1839, he was employed by colonist George Ware, before dying, aged 15 years, in Melbourne.

The captured woman, named Luggenemenener[7], was later sent to Campbell Town gaol and separated from her two-year old son, Rolepana, "...whom she had faced death to protect."[8] Batman reported afterwards to British Colonial Secretary, John Burnett, in a letter of 7 September 1829, that he kept the child because he wanted "...to rear it...".[9] Luggenemenener died on 21 March 1837 as an inmate at the Flinders Island settlement.[10] Later, Rolepana (aged 8 years), child-survivor of a massacre by a 'roving party' led by John Batman, travelled with him as part of the founding party of Melbourne in 1835. After Batman's death in 1839, Rolepana would have been 12 years old. Boyce notes that Rolepana was employed by colonist George Ware at 12 Pounds a year with Board on Batman's death, "...but what became of him after this is also unknown."[11] However, Haebich records Rolepana as having died in Melbourne in 1842 (he would have been about 15 years).[12] She also says that:

Batman openly defied Governor Arthur and [George Augustus] Robinson] by refusing to hand over two Aboriginal boys in his employ: Rolepana (or Benny Ben Lomond) and Lurnerminer (John or Jack Allen), captured by Batman in 1828. He claimed the boys were there with the consent of their parents,....He also demonstrated a strong proprietorial interest in the boys, when he told Robinson they were 'as much his property as his farm and that he had as much right to keep them as the government'. Indeed Batman was convinced that the best plan was to leave the children with the colonists, who clothed and fed them at no expense to the government and raised them to become 'useful members of society'. In a series of letters to Governor Arthur, he 'pleaded hard for the retention of youths educated by settlers and devoted to their service'.

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