This union was performed on the 26th only by coincidence and has nothing to do with 'Australia Day' as we recognise it. However Maria Lock is a historical figure in Australia and it's Aboriginal history.
Maria was the daughter of Yarramundi, known as the 'Chief of the Richmond Tribes', and the sister of Colebee who was captured, along with Bennelong, in 1789 and held at Government House (Colebee later escaped).
In 1814, Maria was the first Aboriginal child to be admitted to the Native Institution in Parramatta, where it is firmly believed that in 1819, at the age of 14, she topped the school examination ahead of twenty other children from the Native Institution and around 100 European students.
In 1822 she married Dicky, a son of Bennelong, but he fell ill and died merely weeks after their wedding. Two years later she remarried, this time to Robert Lock, an illiterate, convict carpenter from England who was assigned to her and placed under her supervision. This was the first legal Aboriginal-British marriage in the colony and they were wed at St John's Church in Parramatta.
In 1831, Maria petitioned Governor Darling for her brother's land grant in Blacktown and received 40 acres (which were put in Robert's name). She received a further 40 acres in Liverpool in 1833, and eventually received Colebee's 30 acres in 1843.
When she passed away in 1878 her lands were left to her nine surviving children and they were occupied by her descendants until around 1920, when the freehold land was considered to be an Aboriginal reserve. It was later revoked by the Aborigines Protection Board.
حمّل تطبيق أس بي أس الجديد للإستماع لبرامجكم المفضلة باللغة العربية.
