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Administration; in this same year, he was awarded long service and good conduct medals for 24 years’ service in
the police force.
After a Police and Citizens Boys Club was opened in Darwin in July 1955 he took a great interest in boxing
training of some of the young men. He was also founding Editor of the police magazine Citation, first published
in December 1964.
On 18 September 1968, holding the rank of Chief Inspector, Jim Mannion died at the young age of 56.
What better epitaph for any policeman than for it to be said, ‘Mannion is a very good cop... he is scrupulously
fair.’ He was a shy, friendly man with a quicksilver mind given to repartee. Of middle height, though broad and
strong, it was said of him that ‘when that broad, reddish face becomes set and the eyes chill, he will dominate most
gatherings.’
Advertiser, 2 April 1955; Melbourne Sun, 31 July 1956; Northern Territory News, 31 March 1955, 15 July 1958, 18 December 1959; Northern
Territory Police Association Journal, January/March 1960; People, 4 September 1957; South Australian Stock and Station Journal, 1960;
Sunday Mail, 3 April 1955; Sydney Morning Herald, 16 July 1958; Tennant Creek Times, 14 February 1957; Commonwealth Government
Gazette, no 41, 24 July 1958; Northern Territory Archives Service, NTRS 327 (Mannion papers), NTRS TS89 (oral history interview,
N Mannion); N Mannion, family information.
NANCY LITCHFIELD and HELEN J WILSON, Vol 2.
MANTON, JAMES THOMAS (1812–1899), surveyor, engineer and architect, was born in England. He arrived
in South Australia on 2 December 1849, in the ship Bolton, bearing a letter from Lord Grey to Governor Young of
South Australia outlining his experience on railways works and in the superintendence of surveying on the South
Devon, Wiltshire, Somerset and Waymouth Line. Manton’s initial task in South Australia was the building of the
Cape Willoughby lighthouse in 1850, under appointment by the Colonial Engineer, Freeling. By October 1853,
Manton had been appointed to the Central Roads Board and up to 1860 had worked in the south district and the
Tapley’s Hill Road.
In 1863, he applied to the Chief Secretary for the position of Superintendent or Government Resident of the
Northern Territory. Instead, B T Finniss was appointed to lead the expedition and Manton secured the second in
command position as Engineer and Surveyor of the Northern Territory Expedition. After arrival at Escape Cliffs
on 21 June 1864, the work commenced under Finniss, expeditions being made by W P Auld toward Darwin and by
Fred Litchfield to the Daly River. In May 1865, Litchfield discovered and named the Manton River after James
Manton. This river was, in 1940, to become the source of Darwin’s wartime water supply when a dam was built
there. When Finniss was recalled to Adelaide late in 1865, Manton remained in charge at Escape Cliffs.
Explorer John McKinlay arrived during Manton’s term and clashed with him about securing the vessel Julia
for exploration work aimed at finding alternative sites for a capital. Both Manton and McKinlay eventually agreed
that Darwin should be the site, against Finniss’s recommendation of Escape Cliffs.
Manton returned to Adelaide when the South Australian party was recalled. He then applied for a government
appointment with the Commissioner of Public Works but was not successful. Later work with the South Australian
Society of Architects, Engineers and Surveyors is recorded. He went into private practice and was, in later years,
an architect in Lower Mitcham, Adelaide. He retired there. He had some property in the area and was a supporter
of St Michael’s Church for forty-four years until his death after a long illness on 17 June 1899. The Manton River
Dam, and Manton’s Hill near the Adelaide River perpetuate his name in the Darwin district.
E Hodder, History of South Australia, vol 1, 1891; W A Norman, History of the City of Mitcham, 1955; E & R Jensen, Colonial Architecture in
South Australia, 1980; P F Donovan, A Land Full of Possibilities, 1981; C C Manhood, ‘The Life of Boyle Travers Finniss’, MA Thesis, 1966;
Adelaide Observer, 17 June 1899; Adelaide Register, 14 June 1899.
V T O’BRIEN, Vol 1.
MARIAC (WELLINGTON) (?–?), an Aboriginal elder of the Raffles Bay region, was nicknamed ‘Wellington’
by the members of the British garrison at Fort Wellington (1827–29). Impatience and intolerance on the part of the
commandant, Captain Henry Smyth, led to a tense and violent situation in which an injury to a soldier was revenged
with a massacre of some of Mariac’s people. The new commandant, Captain Collet Barker (1828–1829), adopted
a humane and conciliatory approach. At the earliest sign of Barker’s goodwill, Mariac immediately reciprocated,
even entering the fort, despite visible fear. Mariac returned Barker’s hospitality when Barker spent the night
unarmed with him at the Aboriginal camp. Between them, these two men forged a real peace that permanently
influenced race relations in the region. When, to Barker’s dismay, the closure of the military settlement was
ordered, Barker recorded in his diary on 28 August 1829, ‘abandoned the settlement to Wellington’. Mariac and
Barker were both, in their way, great statesmen and a regretfully rare example of what might have been.
T B Wilson, Narrative of a Voyage Round the World, 1835; Barker’s Diary, MS Mitchell Library.
JOHN HARRIS, Vol 1.
MARIKA, WANDJUK DJUAKAN (c1929–1987), a Riratjingu ceremonial leader from Yirrkala, was one of the
most significant Indigenous spokesmen of this century. He was active in the struggle by the clans at Gove prior
and during the first land rights case Milirrpum and Others v Nabalco and the Commonwealth Government 1971
which sought to stop mining activity on Riratjingu land. He became widely known as a public speaker and yidaki
performer, and as champion of Aboriginal artists’ rights through demands for recognition of traditional copyright.