7 - From Sierra Leone to Swan River

Summary

The experiences of John William Bannister as Chief Justice of Sierra Leone are brought into conversation with those of his brother Thomas Bannister, a settler in Australia, as both tried urgently to mobilize the global resources of empire to rescue failing family fortunes. In Sierra Leone, John William Bannister tried to administer impartial justice in a deeply racialized context. Thomas was one of the ‘pioneers’ in the Swan River colony in western Australia and an investor in the project of Van Diemen’s Land settlers to colonize Kulin lands in what would become the colony of Victoria, in the aftermath of genocidal violence in Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania). He promoted consensual colonialism through treaties, echoing his brother Saxe, former Attorney General of New South Wales. The chapter examines the invasion of Australia, including violence against Indigenous peoples, ‘exploration’, ecological change including the importation of livestock, British elite patronage and the highly controversial effort of disingenuous settlers to create a treaty with the Kulin. The chapter closes with comparison between West Africa and Australian coastal colonies in the 1820s and 30s, disparate sites along the sea lanes of empire tenuously linked by imperial markets, military control and common justificatory ideologies.