Synopsis

Based on Kate Grenville’s novel, the two-part drama tells the deeply personal story of Will and Sal Thornhill, early convict colonists who lay claim to a plot of land on the then remote Hawkesbury River.

Will arrives in penal New South Wales and is lucky enough to be assigned to his wife, free settler Sal. With their two sons and baby, the family struggles with the harsh surrounds: a rundown, makeshift town, drunkards, corporal punishment, snakes. “It’s no place for kids to be growing up.”

Will works hard as an oarsman transporting supplies on Sydney Harbour and befriending ex-waterman turned free settler Thomas Blackwood. After six years he earns his emancipation which is all the freedom he needs to pursue Blackwood’s idea of a relocation up the Hawkesbury River. There, a new beginning may await them, if they are prepared to leave civilisation behind.

On his first visit to the Hawkesbury, Will is captivated by the Australian setting, despite odd encounters with naked oyster farmer Smasher Sullivan and the haunting, distant fires of Aboriginal tribes. Blackwood assures, it is possible to co-exist. “Give a little, take a little, otherwise you’re dead as a flea,” he advises.

Will convinces Sal to a relocate the family to a parcel of land on the river under a 5-year plan, although she hopes to return the family to London.

As he claims the land “before some other bugger does,” Will encounters local Aboriginal people passing through. These are curious, if guarded exchanges by both although the children will be far more unfiltered in their expression. As he builds his farm through grit and determination, there's just one problem with that land: it's already owned. It's been part of the territory of the Darug people for perhaps 40,000 years.

The Aboriginal people haven't left fences or roads or houses, but they live on that land and use it, just as surely as Thornhill's planning to do. They aren't going to hand over their land without a fight.

Spears may be primitive weapons, but settlers know that they can kill a man as surely as a ball of lead from a musket. As he realises all this, Thornhill faces an impossible choice. Some of his neighbours - Smasher Sullivan, Sagitty Birtles - regard the Darug as hardly human, savages with as little right to land as a dog.

When the Darug object to being driven off, those settlers have no compunction in shooting or poisoning them. Other neighbours make a different choice, and find ways to co-exist with the Darug. Blackwood has made a family among them. Mrs Herring "gives them when they ask". Hostility between blacks and whites gradually escalates. Finally a group of settlers decides to go out and "settle" the Darug for once and for all. Will Thornhill join them? The decision he makes is with him for the rest of his life.

Whilst these characters are fictitious they serve as a microcosm of a larger Australian history, and one that is steeped in blood and shame. The second episode of Secret River is a powderkeg of emotion and brutality that makes it unmissable television.

Secret River is a complex, challenging tale for us as an audience. Part-action, part-social commentary, it has echoes of the colonial miniseries Australia used to produce in the 1970s and -hands down- it’s also the best thing Daina Reid has ever directed.

Trailer

Episode guide

Episode 1

In 1813 ex-convict Will Thornhill settles on the beautiful Hawkesbury River. But his plans are soon overshadowed by misunderstandings and conflict with the local Indigenous people.

Episode 2

Will's increasing desperation to hold onto 'his' land despite the resistance of the local Indigenous people, leads to his involvement in a brutal incident which will haunt him forever.