Settlers, Servants and Slaves: Aboriginal and European Children in Nineteenth-century Western Australia

Settlers, Servants and Slaves documents the exploitation of both European and Aboriginal children by the settler elite of nineteenth century Western Australia. In a struggling colony desperately short of labor, early settlers relied on the labor of children. Convicted and neglected children from the poorest sections of this divided society were placed in institutions, where they were trained to become a useful part of the work force. Education services developed slowly, and there was no system of secondary education provided by the government in the nineteenth century. Settlers, Servants and Slaves also shows how concern over "the problem" of children of mixed descent in the last decade of the nineteenth century was to provide the rationale for infamous twentieth century "solutions": the removal of children from their parents, and the establishment of Aboriginal Reserves.