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A native reserve at Maamba at the foot of the Darling Scarp was established by Premier John Forrest in 1899 in an effort to care for derelict Aborigines.
It was developed as a small scale agricultural settlement for local Aboriginals. It was in the present-day Forrestfield/Wattle Grove area including what is now Hartfield Park. At the end of 1903, the chief Protector of Aborigines, Henry Prinsep
decided to make this Welshpool Reserve a ration depot. Prinsep insisted all Aboriginal people in the metropolitan area should be moved to the reserve, along with a European caretaker. Despite protests Aboriginals from Guildford,
Perth, Helena Valley, Gingin, Northam, York, Beverley, Busselton and Pinjarra were moved there.
Daisy Bates visited the area in 1905, pitching her tent and talked with the Aborigines over a period of time whilst living there. Prior to the formation of the reserve, the area had been a place where many Aboriginal tracks crossed in the
sandy foothills where travel was easier than in the hills. A “scarred tree” which has now been fenced off in Hartfield Park, is thought to have been used to produce bark which would have been used to create shield and
coolamons (dish-shaped utensils used to carry food or even a baby).
Charles Harrington, a ‘travelling missionary’ arrived in WA in December 1907. At the request of the Chief Protector, Charles Gale, from 1908 to 1909 the Aborigines’ Inland Mission took over the running of Welshpool
(Maamba) Reserve which had been established by the government in 1902.