The role of Aboriginal trackers in policing and law enforcement in Broken Hill is defined by the career of ‘Tracker Tommy’. Little is known of Tommy’s personal life, since neither his surname nor date of birth is recorded.
Tommy worked with the Broken Hill and Silverton constabulary between 1890 – 1910 on numerous cases of missing personas and robbery, including the theft of livestock. At least two high profile cases made him a sought-after tracker: the theft of sheep from the famous Kidman family – who owned more property in the far west than any other single landowner – and, famously, the case of the legendary pantry robber.
With his knowledge of Country and ability to read the land, Tommy could find practically anything or anyone. The camp of the pantry robber was discovered after he followed bicycle tracks, visible to him even on the gravel, to a cave north of Broken Hill near Stephen’s Creek, the town’s water reservoir. The pantry robber swam the reservoir and escaped to the nearby Eaglehawk Range, leaving behind stolen property that was recovered by Tommy. Amongst the spoils was a box of surgical equipment belonging to a Broken Hill physician that had been missing for months.
In the case of the Kidman’s missing sheep, along with a stolen horse, in 1895 Tommy tracked the stolen livestock for 15km from a slaughterhouse in Broken Hill to Mt Gipps Station, site of the famous discovery of silver ore by boundary rider Charles Rasp twelve years earlier.
Then there was the case of a stolen safe from the Commercial Hotel in 1899, soon after which Tommy found evidence of a horse-drawn cart heading out towards the North Mine tailings heap at Round House Creek. The cart tracks led Tommy to the safe which, the Barrier Miner later reported, was found in the dust, ‘mutilated’.
Amongst other adventures, the Barrier Miner rans stories of Tommy ‘apprehending three lads who robbed an aviary of its canaries’ and assisting in the arrest of ‘a dishevelled woman of ample girth who was wandering the streets in the costume of Lady Godiva’ after a Sunday drinking session at one (or more) of Broken Hill’s many hotels.
A 1909 report has Tommy driving the police cab through the picket lines to the BHP and Block 10 mines, a role he was not happy to undertake.
Tommy was praised by the Barrier Miner for his ‘marvellous skill’, but the vital historical role of Aboriginal trackers in policing and in uniting the communities of the far west is often overlooked.
Audio transcript available.