Indigenous Genealogy - Victorian Resources

Use this list of books, journals, websites and agencies to help you with your research into Aboriginal ancestry in Victoria. For information about resources with broader Australian coverage, see Indigenous Genealogy - Australian Resources.

Information databases

The State Library of Victoria provides access to a number of online databases that are useful for Indigenous Australian research. These include bibliographies, historical records, journal indexes, encyclopedias and cultural histories.

You can access these databases in two ways:

• At the Library
  The databases are available on computers in the Library's public reading rooms. Go to the Information Databases page, click 'Access from the Library' and then select Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders from the databases list.
• From home
  If you are a Victorian resident you can access selected databases from home. To do so you will need to register as a Library user. Go to the Access from Home page and then click the 'Informit Complete' link. After you've logged in, select the 'Indigenous Peoples' set of databases and click the 'Start Searching' button at the top and bottom of the page.

Websites

The websites listed below provide access to key Indigenous genealogical information.

Mission Voices
http://www.abc.net.au/missionvoices
An interactive website telling the stories of six Aboriginal mission stations and reserves in Victoria. Looks at the history, experiences and events of missions through the oral stories of Elders who came from missions, or whose family came from them. 

Public Record Office Victoria Research Pathway: Koorie People and Places
http://www.access.prov.vic.gov.au/public/pathways/pathway3/pathway3.jsp
Information about finding Koorie family history records, and about getting research assistance from the Public Record Office Victoria’s Koorie Records Unit.

Victorian Local History Index: Koorie & Aboriginal History
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~nuttall/links/koori.htm
Links to websites relating to Victorian Indigenous Australian history and research.

Research guides

To successfully research your family history, you need to know what steps to take and what information is available. Research guides answer these questions.

Australian Archives: Victorian Branch c1993, My heart is breaking: a joint guide to records about Aboriginal people in the Public Record Office Victoria and the Australian Archives, Victorian Regional Office Australian Archives and the Public Record Office Victoria, Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra.
View catalogue entry >

Griffiths, Tom (ed.) 1989, Koori history: sources for Aboriginal studies in the State Library of Victoria, Friends of the State Library, Melbourne. 
Special issue of the La Trobe Library Journal, v. 11, no. 43. Includes bibliographic references.
View catalogue entry >

Massola, Aldo 1970, Aboriginal mission stations in Victoria: Yelta, Ebenezer, Ramahyuck, Hawthorn Press, Melbourne.
View catalogue entry >

Public Record Office Victoria 2005, Finding your story: a resource manual to the records of the Stolen Generations in Victoria, Public Record Office Victoria, North Melbourne.
View catalogue entry >
Access online copy in PDF format >

Public Record Office Victoria 2004, Private lives, public records: family history resources at the Public Record Office Victoria, Public Record Office Victoria, North Melbourne.
View catalogue entry >

Further reading

Bibliographies

Evans, Heather 1993, The Aboriginal people of Victoria: select bibliography of pre-1960 printed sources in the collections of the State Library of Victoria, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne.
View catalogue entry >

Evans, Heather & Macdonald, Judy 1998, The Aboriginal people of Victoria. Volume 2. Select bibliography of post-1959 printed sources in the collections of the State Library of Victoria, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne.
View catalogue entry >

Kinship groups

Wesson, Sue C 2000, An historical atlas of the Aborigines of eastern Victoria and far south-eastern New South Wales, School of Geography and Environmental Science, Melbourne, Victoria.
View catalogue entry >

Clark, Ian D c1990, Aboriginal languages and clans: an historical atlas of western and central Victoria, 1800-1900, Department of Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria.
View catalogue entry >

Contacts and agencies

These agencies provide access to specialist resources including:

• advice and/or assistance with your research
• books, journals and historical materials documenting the lives of Indigenous people.

Koorie Heritage Trust: Family History Service
295 King Street (corner Little Lonsdale Street)
Melbourne VIC 3000
Phone 03 8622 2600
Email familyhistory@koorieheritagetrust.com
Web http://www.koorieheritagetrust.com/oral_history/koorie_family_history
The Koorie Heritage Trust’s Family History Service provides confidential advice and support, and can assist with finding records, getting copies of records, putting together family trees and bringing families back together. Researchers are also welcome use the Trust’s library.

Link Up Victoria
Phone 03 9480 4511 (Aborigines Advancement League Victoria)
Email  linkup@nex.net.au
Link Up helps reunite Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who, as children, were separated from their families and placed in care for adoption or fostering, or sent to live in institutions. They offer services associated with achieving family reunions, including research required for accessing family and personal records, obtaining copies of records, support and counselling.

Public Record Office Victoria: Koorie Records Unit
Web http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/events/kru.asp
Provides assistance and advice for those wanting to research Victorian Aboriginal history at the Public Record Office Victoria and the National Archives of Australia.