Henry Reynolds (historian) - Friendship With Eddie Mabo

Friendship With Eddie Mabo

Reynolds was on friendly terms with Eddie Mabo, and, in his book Why Weren't We Told?, describes the talks they had regarding Mabo's people's rights to their lands, on Murray Island, in the Torres Strait. Reynolds writes:

"Eddie would often talk about his village and about his own land, which he assured us would always be there when he returned because everyone knew it belonged to his family. His face shone when he talked of his village and his land.
So intense and so obvious was his attachment to his land that I began to worry about whether he had any idea at all about his legal circumstances. I said something like: 'You know how you've been telling us about your land and how everyone knows it's Mabo land? Don't you realise that nobody actually owns land on Murray Island? It's all crown land.'
He was stunned. How could the whitefellas question something so obvious as his ownership of his land?"

Reynolds looked into the issue of indigenous land ownership in international law, and encouraged Mabo to take the matter to court. "It was there over the sandwiches and tea that the first step was taken which led to the Mabo judgement in June 1992." Mabo then talked to lawyers, and Reynolds "had little to do with the case itself from that time", although he and Mabo remained friends until the latter's death in January 1992.