Shepherds, Servants, and Stockmen: Labour, Class, and Conflict on Victoria’s Colonial Frontier, 1835–1855

MLA Educational Series — Work, Land, and the Human Cost of Colonisation

From 1835 to 1855, Victoria’s frontier economy relied on an invisible workforce — the shepherds, stockmen, and servants who sustained the squatting system. While wealthy squatters amassed fortunes from wool and land speculation, these workers lived in isolation, poverty, and danger. For Indigenous peoples, including the Wadawurrung, Gunditjmara, and Dja Dja Wurrung nations, the arrival of shepherds marked the beginning of violent displacement, cultural loss, and exploitation of labour.

This article examines the daily life of frontier workers, their conflicts with Indigenous communities, and the broader social and legal systems that normalised violence and inequality in early Victoria.

The Frontier Workforce: Expansion and Survival

The Rise of the Squatter Economy

By the late 1830s, pastoralism — grazing sheep and cattle — dominated the Port Phillip District’s economy. Squatters leased huge areas of land under annual licences from the Crown, often enclosing tens of thousands of hectares of Indigenous Country (Reynolds, 1987).

Each station required dozens of shepherds to guard flocks scattered across the plains.
Most were ex-convicts, poor immigrants from Britain or Ireland, or itinerant labourers who accepted isolation and low wages in exchange for rations and shelter.

Life and Labour on the Runs

Shepherds typically worked alone or in pairs, living in small huts built from bark, mud, and slabs. They rose before dawn, herded flocks over long distances, and returned them to pens at night. Food consisted mainly of mutton, flour, and tea — occasionally supplemented by fish or kangaroo hunted with local Indigenous people.

Payment was irregular and often made “in kind”: food, tobacco, or clothing rather than coin.
In some districts, wages averaged £10–£15 per year, compared to squatters earning thousands from wool exports (Serle, 1971).

The social divide between wealthy squatters and working-class labourers became a defining feature of early Victorian society — a system described by historian Geoffrey Serle as “pastoral feudalism on stolen land.”

Indigenous Country and the Arrival of the Shepherds

Invasion by Grazing

To Indigenous peoples, the coming of sheep and shepherds was an invasion not only of land but of sacred ecological balance. Sheep trampled yam-daisy (murnong) gardens, fouled waterholes, and displaced kangaroo and emu — severing Indigenous food systems built over millennia (Broome, 2005).

On Wadawurrung Country, stations spread rapidly from Geelong through the Moorabool, Leigh, and Barwon valleys. By 1840, almost all fertile land between the You Yangs and Ballarat was occupied under licence. Shepherds’ huts appeared beside sacred sites, and flocks grazed along rivers where Wadawurrung families once camped and fished.

Labour and Unequal Exchange

Initially, some Indigenous men and women worked alongside shepherds, helping to locate lost stock or clear scrub. They were paid in flour or tea rather than wages. This early cooperation soon gave way to exploitation, as squatters used “rations” to control movement and loyalty (Cahir, 2012).

Aboriginal trackers, stockmen, and domestic workers became essential to the pastoral economy, yet they were denied legal recognition or pay equity. Their labour was systematically erased from colonial records — a form of economic dispossession that paralleled the loss of land.

Violence on the Frontier

The Moorabool and Barwon Conflicts (Wadawurrung Country)

Tensions on the pastoral frontier quickly escalated into violence. On Wadawurrung Country, shepherds’ encroachment on water and hunting grounds sparked reprisal attacks and raids on flocks. Settlers often responded with “dispersals” — euphemisms for armed attacks on Indigenous camps (Clark, 1995).

Mt Cottrell Massacre (1836): Following the killing of a shepherd near Werribee, settlers led by John Batman and his men shot at least ten Wadawurrung people.
Moorabool and Barrabool Hills (late 1830s): Oral histories describe similar retribution killings after conflicts over sheep and water (Clark, 1995; Broome, 2005).

Colonial officials rarely investigated these incidents. When they did, courts dismissed charges for “lack of evidence” — since Indigenous people could not testify against settlers until 1876 (Reynolds, 1987).

The Western District: The Eumeralla Wars

In Gunditjmara Country, shepherding led to a decade of open conflict known as the Eumeralla Wars (1839–1846). Shepherds and stockmen were frequent victims of raids and retaliations, but Indigenous losses were far greater. Pastoral companies formed private militias, using Aboriginal trackers or Native Police to suppress resistance.

Records suggest that hundreds of Gunditjmara people were killed during this period, many defending their eel traps and stone aquaculture systems at Lake Condah and the Eumeralla River (Critchett, 1990; Clark, 1995).

Dja Dja Wurrung Country and the “Hanging Rock District”

Further north, Dja Dja Wurrung clans resisted pastoral invasion near Mount Alexander and Clunes. A notable case in 1841 involved the killing of a shepherd at Barfold. Despite confessions coerced under duress, the accused Indigenous men were later released — one of several early legal cases where violence on both sides was acknowledged but justice was denied (Broome, 2005).

The Legal System and the Failure of Justice

Courts and Colonial Law

The legal system in early Victoria overwhelmingly favoured settlers. While Indigenous people could be charged, they could not give evidence in their own defence or against colonists. Even admitted massacres were often justified as “necessary defence.”

Governor George Gipps acknowledged privately in 1841 that “the blood of the blacks stains nearly every acre of land” in the Port Phillip District, yet official prosecutions were rare (Reynolds, 1987).

The Protectorate System

The Aboriginal Protectorate (1839–1849), led by George Augustus Robinson with assistants such as William Thomas and Charles Sievwright, aimed to reduce violence and mediate disputes. Yet it lacked authority and resources, and settlers often ignored its interventions. Sievwright’s reports on killings at Lake Colac and Camperdown were dismissed, and his career destroyed — illustrating how even humanitarian officials were silenced when challenging frontier interests (Clark, 1998).

Class and Inequality Among Settlers

The “Squattocracy” vs. the Working Poor

The term “squattocracy” referred to the powerful pastoral elite who dominated early Victorian politics and economics. These landholders lived in relative luxury compared to shepherds, assigned servants, and hired labourers who worked under brutal conditions.

Wealth concentrated in towns like Melbourne and Geelong, where squatters invested in shipping, banking, and property. Meanwhile, shepherds and their families endured isolation, hunger, and disease. Few could buy land or escape debt, ensuring a rigid class divide that mirrored Britain’s own social hierarchies (Shaw, 1966).

Women on the Frontier

Women — both settler and Indigenous — played essential yet overlooked roles.
Settler women managed homesteads, tended gardens, and provided unpaid labour.
Indigenous women worked as domestic servants, child carers, and cooks; others were coerced into relationships or labour arrangements. The disruption of kinship systems and gender balance compounded the trauma of dispossession (Barwick, 1998).

Survival, Adaptation, and Cultural Resilience

Despite widespread violence and exploitation, Indigenous peoples of Victoria — including the Wadawurrung, Wurundjeri, Gunditjmara, and Dja Dja Wurrung — maintained continuity of culture through adaptation and survival.

Wadawurrung men continued fishing and hunting despite restrictions, sustaining cultural knowledge along the Barwon and Moorabool Rivers.
Gunditjmara people preserved aquaculture systems at Budj Bim, later recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage site — testimony to thousands of years of sustainable engineering.
Wurundjeri and Taungurung leaders, such as William Barak and Simon Wonga, became key advocates for land rights and justice later in the 19th century.

Their endurance laid the groundwork for modern truth-telling, treaty, and cultural renewal.

Legacy and Historical Significance

The story of shepherds and stockmen in early Victoria is not simply one of economic expansion — it is also a history of labour exploitation, class struggle, and colonial violence. Shepherds were both victims and agents of the frontier system: exploited by squatters, yet complicit in the dispossession of Indigenous peoples.

For Indigenous communities, the period from 1835–1855 marked the collapse of traditional economies and the beginning of forced labour regimes that continued into the mission and reserve era. The economic wealth that built Melbourne and Geelong was thus inseparable from the destruction of Indigenous autonomy.

Conclusion

The frontier of early Victoria was shaped by more than ambition and discovery — it was built by workers and survivors: the shepherds who endured isolation, the Indigenous families who resisted, and the women who laboured unseen.
The violence that accompanied this expansion was not random; it was a structural feature of colonisation itself, sustained by law, economy, and silence.

Today, recognising the intertwined fates of shepherds and Indigenous peoples allows a deeper understanding of Victoria’s foundations — not merely as an economic success, but as a human story of inequality, resilience, and truth-telling.

References

Barwick, D. (1998). Rebellion at Coranderrk. Canberra: Aboriginal History Inc.
Broome, R. (2005). Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800. Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Cahir, F. (2012). Black Gold: Aboriginal People on the Goldfields of Victoria, 1850–1870. Canberra: ANU E Press.
Clark, I. D. (1995). Scars in the Landscape: A Register of Massacre Sites in Western Victoria 1803–1859. Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press.
Clark, I. D. (1998). The Journals of George Augustus Robinson, Chief Protector, Port Phillip Aboriginal Protectorate. Melbourne: Heritage Matters.
Critchett, J. (1990). A Distant Field of Murder: Western District Frontiers, 1834–1848. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.
Reynolds, H. (1987). The Law of the Land. Ringwood: Penguin.
Serle, G. (1971). The Golden Age: A History of the Colony of Victoria 1851–1861. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.
Shaw, A. (1966). A History of the Port Phillip District: Victoria Before Separation. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press.

Written, Researched and Directed by James Vegter (22 October 2025)

MLA

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Magic Lands Alliance acknowledges the Traditional Owners, Custodians, and First Nations communities across Australia and internationally. We honour their enduring connection to the sky, land, waters, language, and culture. We pay respect to Elders past, present, and emerging, and to all First Peoples’ communities and language groups. This article draws only on publicly available information; many cultural practices remain the intellectual property of their respective communities.

Shepherds, Servants and Stockmen