Red coat, blue jacket, black skin: Aboriginal men and clothing in early New South Wales

Abstract

In 1819 a group of Aboriginal men from the Nepean River and the Blue Mountains came to Sydney, where they met some of the Frenchmen from the corvette Uranie. The French visitors were on a voyage of scientific discovery, and had planned a journey across the Blue Mountains. Most likely the Aboriginal men had agreed to act as their guides. Artist Alphonse Pellion sketched them at their camp on the edge of Sydney, and his drawings show that they were all wearing jackets or coats. Tara and Peroa, from the Nepean River, were not wearing trousers. Neither, probably, were the others - the engravings made from Pellion's sketches show them only from the waist up, and the Frenchmen noted with some shock that this was the usual manner of dress for the Aboriginal men in Sydney.