The Last Man

More about the book

Little more than 70 years after the British settled Van Diemen's Land (later Tasmania) in 1803, its indigenous population had been virtually wiped out. Yet this genocide - one of the earliest of the modern era - is virtually forgotten in Britain today. 'The Last Man' is the first book specifically to explore the role of the British government and wider society in the destruction of the Aboriginal Tasmanians. Although the introduction of European diseases undoubtedly contributed to the decline of the indigenous population, Tom Lawson shows that Britain supported what was effectively the ethnic cleansing of Tasmania - particularly in the period of martial law in 1828-1932