Australian museums are storing almost 600 ancestral remains from Pacific Island nations

Queensland United Australian South Sea Islander Council president Clacy Fatnowna is calling for a national audit of ancestral remains in Australian institutions. (ABC News: Amy Sheehan)

There are calls for a national audit of Australian museums after it was revealed another two national institutions are holding hundreds of ancestral remains from Pacific Island nations.

WARNING: This story contains details that First Nations readers may find distressing.

After inquiries from descendants, the National Museum of Australia (NMA) in Canberra has revealed it is storing the remains of 190 Australian South Sea Islanders at a facility in the city’s industrial precinct.

The Australian Museum in Sydney has also admitted to holding 404 ancestral remains from the Pacific.

It comes after the Queensland Museum last year admitted to holding the remains of 65 South Sea Islanders.

Clacy Fatnowna, the President of the Queensland United Australian South Sea Islander Council Inc, said he was “shocked” to learn of more remains at two of the country’s most prominent institutions

“Museums, if you are holding remains, then you come and talk to us,” Mr Fatnowna said.

“There’s organs and brains and other things there that are just, in my view, shocking,” he said.

Human brains, appendixes, skeleton wrapped in coconut leaves

The ABC has seen an inventory of 157 ancestral remains stored at the NMA – most of which are incomplete bodies.

The collection includes 20 human brains stored in jars of formaldehyde, dozens of skulls and craniums — some of them decorated or stuffed, several organs, a mummified body, and at least five “long bones” belonging to a child.

Shona Coyne, the NMA’s head of First Nations outreach, said it is likely they were collected from Melanesia when the trade of human remains was a thriving economy among scientists and academics.

“They were grave-robbing at the time. They were looting cultural material,” she said.

“It was about the study of mankind. It was the size of people’s brains and how intelligent they [collectors] felt that they were or not.

“They were swapping ancestors for other ancestors.”

The inventory shows most of the remains at the NMA came from Papua New Guinea, though many are specifically linked to other regions including Morobe, Madang, New England, Kokop, East Sepik, Haragu, Morigio, Arawe, Aitape, and Barida.

Football stadium named after body collector

The museum said it acquired the remains when the Australian Institute of Anatomy closed in the mid-1980s.

According to the inventory , the majority were sourced by Sir Hubert Murray while he was Lieutenant-Governor of the Australian Territory of Papua between 1907 and 1933.

A football stadium in Papua New Guinea was named after Sir Hubert Murray in 1969 and was used in 1975 to host a ceremony to signify the end of Australia’s colonial rule in the country.

Other collectors included public health administrator Sir Raphael Cilento, Thomas Clive Backhouse and anatomist Sir Colin McKenzie.

Are there more ancestral remains?

The discovery has sparked a renewed push by descendants to return the ancestors to their homelands.

“CEOs that run museums, if you are holding Australian South Sea Islander … remains, it’s probably best that we sit and talk about repatriation,” Mr Fatnowna said.

“We shouldn’t have to be funding ourselves to track [the museums] down to have these conversations.”

Ms Coyne said repatriating ancestors to descendant communities was a complicated process that could take years.

“Historically, the collectors at the time didn’t keep great records about where these particular people were from,” she said.

“There are a lot of resources that go into repatriation, the main one is actually building relationships with the communities that these ancestors originate from.”

But Mr Fatnowna said the museums have not been proactive in initiating conversations.

“I think I would have really liked the Queensland Museum [and other museums] to reach out to us, instead of the other way around,” he said.

He is calling for a national audit of Australian museums and universities to uncover other ancestral remains.

“In our culture, we worship the ancestors, our ancestral spirits … and then when we need help with drought or marriage or land disputes, the ancestral spirits help us,” he said.

“And what’s occurred … with our deceased people being put into the museum is culturally inappropriate and just disrespectful.

“Therefore, we have an obligation to ensure that they’re returned and interred appropriately.”

Repatriation ‘complex’: museum

The resting place of thousands Pacific Islanders is still a mystery, after they were taken to Australia and died working on plantations in Queensland during Australia’s blackbirding era.

Mr Fatnowna said the discovery of more ancestors is a way of making amends for Australia’s history.

“To find this out in 2024, it’s dragged us back to the 1880s with regards to how our people were treated,” he said.

“We need the financial, pastoral care and mental health support to be able to work through this.”

The Australian Museum in Sydney recently repatriated Tongan ancestors to traditional owners.

In a statement, the Australian Museum said it “acknowledges the harm these past practices have caused to First Nations and Pasifika communities and is actively engaged with various stakeholders to negotiate the return of Ancestral remains”.

The NMA said it was also in the process of working on international repatriation cases.

“We have made returns to international communities and we will continue to do so at their request and at the pace that they wish for that to happen,” NMA director Katherine McMahon said.

Who is responsible?

Mr Fatnowna acknowledged a relationship with the National Museum of Australia was in its early stages but said there were not enough resources dedicated to repatriating South Sea Islanders.

“I know that from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community, that this [repatriation process] is very proactive. It’s funded. It’s ceded in legislation. So, the government’s well aware of it,” he said.

“But when it’s people like myself, Australian South Sea Islander Kananka heritage … we’re not funded.”

The Commonwealth government formally recognised the Australian South Sea Islander community as a unique minority in 1994 but Mr Fatnowna said there had been little progress since.

“So, this is going to be a pretty long conversation … lobbying the government to return the remains to where they belong, back to us or back to the island of origin.

A spokesperson for the Commonwealth’s Office for the Arts said it had funded Australia’s eight major museums to repatriate ancestors and sacred objects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander traditional custodians.

But it said it did not fund the repatriation of foreign ancestors.

“Australian institutions holding foreign ancestors are responsible for their care, and decisions about their repatriation are managed constituent with the relevant institution’s policies and legislative frameworks,” the spokesperson said.

The Australian Museums and Galleries Association code of ethics explicitly supports repatriation of indigenous material.

“If rightful custodians ask for the return of ancestral remains, museums should agree,” its policy states.

Ms Coyne said sometimes descendant communities requested the museum maintain possession of remains.

In those cases, the National Museum has proposed uniting human remains housed in Australian institutions in a national resting place in Canberra.