Survival Day...Invasion Day...Australia Day

Survival Day (26 January annually)

January 26 marks the landing of the First Fleet in Sydney Cove. In 1938, on the 150th anniversary of this landing, a 'Day of Mourning' was organised-principally by William Cooper (who had founded the Australian Aboriginal League in Melbourne and drafted a petition of Aboriginal grievance which the Government refused to pass on to King George V) and William Ferguson (leader of the NSW-based Aborigines Progress Association). For the protest Ferguson and J. P. Patten wrote a manifesto entitled Aborigines Claim Citizenship Rights in which they appealed for a new Aboriginal policy, full citizenship status, equality and land rights. The manifesto opened with: 'This festival of 150 years' so-called "progress" in Australia commemorates also 150 years of misery and degradation imposed on the original native inhabitants by white invaders of this country'. The day is often marked by Aboriginal communities with a Survival Day concert.