Friday essay: ‘I said no’ – Nie’s refusal and the troubling question of Pacific slavery in Australia

In 1881 Nie (also known as Nai), a Pacific Islander woman, walked off “Virginia” plantation, south of Maryborough, in the colony of Queensland.

Crossing through cane fields, she fled in the thick tropical heat to nearby “Gootchie” plantation to take up work as a domestic servant.

Walking off the plantation was a courageous act. Yet within two weeks, Nie was violently retrieved by her former employer, British planter Theodore Wood.

Wood believed Nie had broken a verbal contract with him. He arrived at Gootchie with another man, Harry, where they found Nie working in the kitchen of the main house alongside Irish servant Annie O’Leary.

When Nie refused to go with the men, they took hold of her by force. As Annie looked on in dismay, the men dragged Nie across the floor, tied her hands up, put her into a cart and returned with her to Virginia plantation...