Transcription Page 1

No. 16/47
Comm. Crown Lands Office
Alberton, 2nd February 1847

Sir,
I have the honor to acknow-
ledge the receipt of Your Honor’s
letter No 47/83, enclosing the
Port Phillip Herald of 21st January,
containing a Report of the pro-
ceedings of Mr De Villiers, who is
in command of the expedition
to Endeavour to recover a white
woman, said to be in the hands
of the wild Blacks-

On the subject of the proceedings
of the Native Police at the Snowy
River, under Mr W. P. Dana,
animadverted upon in that
Report, I beg to refer Your
Honor to my letters No 1/47 of
9th Jan’y, and to the depositions
of Messrs De Villiers and Warman
and

To
His Honor
The Superintendent
Port Phillip

[Annotations: top]

copd
19th/2/47
AH

No 47/318
16th Feby 1847
The Crn Comr of Gipps Land
In ansr to letter
conveyg authority to give certain
Govt aid condity to ye prty searchg
for ye white woman.

Transcription Page 2

and Report of Trooper Cowan
forwarded therewith. From
those documents it appears
that death resulted from the
adoption of an unauthorised
plan of Mr W. Dana, by
Surrounding and endeavouring
to capture a party of wild Blacks
while in camp.

With reference to Your
Honors authority to me to
Supply Mr De Villiers’ party with
rations, provided I could
Calculate with some degree of
certainty that the position of the
white woman is such, that
an immediate expedition would
be successful, and delay pre-
Judicial to the object in view
I have the honor to state, that
as there appears to be no pro-
spect of obtaining the white
woman without recourse to
coercive measures – and as
I believe those measures would
inevitably