Can anyone on the Histarch list pass along some information?
 
In a message dated 97-09-11 13:05:13 EDT, you write:
 
>Subj:  Query: Aboriginal slave building in Fremantle, Western Australia
 
>To:    [log in to unmask]
>
>From:   IN%"[log in to unmask]" 11-SEP-1997 03:18:26.74
>Subj:   The RoundHouse 1833, Fremantle, Western Australia
>
>
>Hello, my name is Hannah McGlade, I am an Aboriginal lawyer from Australia
>seeking information about a possible Aboriginal slave building in
>Fremantle, Western Australia. This was the first building in West
>Australian. It is made of a wall of 11 sides with lean-to cells on the
>inside. We know that it was used to house Aboriginal men in particular and
>was located on a large limestone outcrop. The limestone was quarried for
>this and other British colonial buildings built nearby. Twenty years later,
>a much later complex consisting of a similar round building was built on
>Rottnest Island, an island 18 kilometres off the coast of Fremantle. A
>drawing of the roundhouse can be viewed at
>http://www.mkt.com.au/roundhou.nsf
>
>I have been informed that there is a similar building to the roundhouse on
>the east coast of Africa. The building is a former slave building and is
>currently a museum.
>
>I would appreciate any information or confirmation regarding the genre of
>this building type. We are in the process of mounting an argument on the
>basis that this building type has its origin as a slavery building not as a
>building for housing prisoners.
>
>There is no evidence of systematic slavery existing in British colonial
>Australia. However, the existence of these slave compounds, if it can be
>demonstrated that their origin is in slavery, would confirm a immensely
>important feature of early contact between the two cultures.
>
>
>Thank you very much
>H. McGlade