Books with First Nations family histories

We have sorted the books by Local Aboriginal Land Council regions. Click the name of the book to view the catalogue record.

Books in the Library’s collection can be read in the Library. If you would like assistance accessing these items, please contact the First Nations specialists. 

A library card may be needed to access some of the resources. 

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General family history books

• Lookin for your mob : a guide to tracing Aboriginal family trees
• Tracing your family history in Australia : a guide to sources
• Connecting kin : guide to records : a guide to help people separated from their families search for their records
• Tracing Koori ancestry
• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander volunteers for the AIF : the Indigenous response to World War One
• Pathfinders : a history of Aboriginal trackers in NSW

Riverina region

• Wiradjuri places
  Areas covered: Central and Central southern NSW
• The camp of mercy: an historical and biographical record of the Warangesda Aboriginal Mission/Station, Darlington Point, New South Wales
  Areas covered: Warangesda
• Riverina Aboriginals: 1874-1945
  Areas covered: Warangesda, Narranderra, Leeton and Griffith
• Memories of Bulgandramine Mission
  Areas covered: Bulgandramine and Peak Hill
• Down there with me on the Cowra Mission: an oral history of Erambie Aboriginal Reserve, Cowra, New South Wales
  Areas covered: Erambie and Cowra
• The Aboriginal people of Erambie: descendants of the Wiradjuri
  Areas covered: Erambie and Cowra
• Aboriginal women's heritage: Brungle & Tumut [ebook]
  Areas covered: Brungle and Tumut
  Also available in hard copy in the library
• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Wagga Wagga
  Areas covered: Wagga Wagga
• Making waves for a new Dreaming
  Areas covered: Wagga Wagga
• Aboriginal history of Central Western NSW : focus area : Macquarie River, Minore Falls to Buddah Lake Timbrebongie and Narromine of the Wiradjuri Country
  Areas covered: Macquarie River, Minore Falls, Buddah Lake Timbrebongie and Narromine
• A history of the Wiradjuri people of New South Wales, 1883-1969 [microform]
  Areas covered: Riverina region
• The Wiradjuri of the Murrumbidgee : a local history
  Areas covered: Murrumbidgee River Valley
• The Aboriginal people of Erambie [manuscript] : descendants of the Wiradjuri
  Areas covered: Cowra, Erambie Mission
• Double ID : life story of Hilton Hamilton Walsh ; born 11th June, 1923, died 5th December 1997
  Areas covered: Cummeragunja Mission, Maloga Mission, Murray River Region
• Wiradjuri identity
  Areas covered: Riverina region
  Sydney region Port Hacking River to Broken Bay
• The Darug and their neighbours: the traditional Aboriginal owners of the Sydney region
  Areas covered: Western Sydney (Lock, Everingham, Barber and Randall families)
• Daruganora: Darug Country - the place and the people
  Areas covered: Western Sydney
• Sacred waters: the story of the Blue Mountains Gully Aboriginal people
  Areas covered: Blue Mountains, Katoomba and Western Sydney
• Aborigines of the Burragorang Valley, 1830-1960
  Areas covered: Blue Mountains and Burragorang Valley
• The wander of it all
  Areas covered: Blue Mountains and Western Sydney
• Rivers and resilience : Aboriginal people on Sydney's Georges River
  Areas covered: George’s River
• Hidden in plain view : the Aboriginal people of coastal Sydney
  Areas covered: South Coast Sydney
• Shut out from the world : the Sackville Reach Aborigines Reserve and Mission 1889-1946
  Areas covered: Hawkesbury River region, Sackville Reach Reserve
• The story of Bob Waterer and his family 1803-2010
  Areas covered: Pittwater region
• Spirit of place : Aboriginal sites of the Hunter Region
  Areas covered: Hunter River region
• The Lock family in World War One : how service records contribute to Darug history
  Areas covered: Sydney region
• Back on the block : Bill Simon's story
  Areas covered: Redfern

Newcastle region – from Broken Bay to Forster

• The convict valley : the bloody struggle on Australia's early frontier
  Areas covered: Hunter River Valley
• The Port Stephens blacks : recollections of William Scott
  Areas covered: Port Stephens
• The earliest inhabitants : Aboriginal tribes of the district : the blacks of Dungog, Port Stephens and Gresford
  Areas covered: Dungog, Port Stephens and Gresford
• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Port Stephens [ebook]
  Areas covered: Port Stephens
  Also available in hard copy in the Library
• The Rainbow Beach man : the life and times of Les Ridgeway, Worimi elder
  Areas covered: Murrin Bridge Reservation
• The Kabook and Watoo People of the Gringai Barrington River Gloucester, NSW - Robert Syron and Luke Russell
  Areas covered: Hunter and Manning Rivers, Great Dividing Range, Newcastle to Singleton.
• Title: Wamberal Cemetery : monumental inscriptions and unmarked graves
  Areas covered: Central Coast

North Coast region – North of Forster to Nambucca Heads

• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Ballina and Cabbage Tree Island
  Areas covered: Ballina and Cabbage Tree Island
• Oral histories and portraits of members of the Aboriginal community recorded in the Manning Valley and Great Lakes
  Areas covered: Forster and Taree
• Sunrise Station
  Areas covered: Purfleet and Taree
• Mapping attachment: a spatial approach to Aboriginal post-contact heritage
  Areas covered: Taree
• Kinchela Aboriginal home and school: alphabetical index of students
  Areas covered: Kinchela Boys Home and Kempsey
• The land of Ulitarra: early records of the Aborigines of the mid-north coast of New South Wales together with various vocabularies, etc.
  Areas covered: Kempsey
• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Nambucca [ebook]
  Areas covered: Nambucca Heads
  Also available in hard copy in the Library
• Sunrise Station revisited 2nd Ed
  Areas covered: Purfleet Aboriginal Reserve
• Through my eyes
  Areas covered: Taree
• A place by the river : 150 years of Tabulam history
  Areas covered: Tabulam
• Notes on the Richmond River blacks
  Areas covered: Richmond River region
• Dunggir National Park : plan of management
  Areas covered: Nambucca Valley
• Nganyundiya miimingundiya jagunda = Into my mother's country
  Areas covered: North Coast
• The history of the coastal strip known as "Look-at-me-now", Moonee Creek Settlement (100 years) : the Skinner family and descendants
  Areas covered: Moonee Beach

Western region – West of Dubbo

• Menindee Mission Station: 1933-1949
  Areas covered: Menindee
• Mutawintji: Aboriginal Cultural Association with Mutawintji National Park
  Areas covered: Wilcannia, Tibooburra, Broken Hill, Bourke and Silverton (Bates, Dutton, Quayle, Williams, Tyler, Barlow and Gibson familes)
• The Bonney photographs
  Areas covered: Dubbo, Wonga Station
• The people of the Paroo River : Frederic Bonney's photographs
  Areas covered: Momba Station
• Aboriginal women's heritage : Bourke
  Areas covered: Bourke
• Cemetery & burial records : Dubbo Macquarie Family History Society
  Areas covered: Dubbo
• Yamakarra! : Liza Kennedy and the Keewong Mob
  Areas covered: Cobar region

North Western region

• Winanga-li = to remember
  Areas covered: Moree and Terry Hie Hie
• Burrul Wallaay
  Area covered: Moree
• Sun dancin’: people and place in Coonabarabran
  Areas covered: Burra Bee Dee and Coonabarabran
• Life on Burra Bee Dee
  Areas covered: Burra Bee Dee and Coonabarabran
• Aboriginal men’s heritage: Walgett and Collarenebri
  Areas covered: Walgett and Collarenebri
• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Walgett and Collarenebri
  Areas covered: Walgett and Collarenebri
• Isolated graves in the Coonabarabran Area
  Areas covered: Coonabarabran
• Oral histories of the Aboriginal women and men of Gulargambone
  Areas covered: Gulargambone

South Coast region – Port Hacking River to Nowra

• Illawarra and South Coast aborigines, 1770-1900
  Areas covered: Wollongong
• For a labourer worthy of his hire: Aboriginal economic responses to colonisation in the Shoalhaven and Illawarra, 1770-1900
  Areas covered: Berry, Nowra and Wollongong
  Also available online from the University of Canberra.
• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Nowra [ebook]
  Area covered: Nowra
  Also available in hard copy in the Library
• Aboriginal women’s heritage: Wollongong [ebook]
  Area covered: Wollongong
  Also available in hard copy in the Library
• Early ancestors of Illawarra's Wadi-Wadi people. Part 1
  Area covered: Wollongong

Monaro region – Yass, Blakney Creek, Canberra and Queanbeyan

• The Pajong and Wallabalooa: a history from the records of Aboriginal farming families at Blakney and Pudman Creeks, 1820-1945 and historical overview 1945-2002
  Areas covered: Yass and Blakney Creek
• The Kamberri: a history from the records of aboriginal families in the Canberra-Queanbeyan district and surrounds 1820-1927 and historical overview 1928-2001
  Areas covered: Canberra and Queanbeyan
• Stories of the Ngunnawal
  Area covered: Canberra

South South Coast region – Nowra to Bega

• Miryyal: Budawang Aborigines featured in church records
  Areas covered: Bega, Wallaga Lake and Narooma
• Biamanga and Gulaga: Aboriginal cultural association with the Biamanga and Gulaga National Parks [eresource]
  Area covered: Wallaga Lake
  Archived on Pandora. Also available in hard copy in the Library
• The mountains call me back: a history of the Aborigines and the forests of the far south coast of New South Wales
  Area covered: Wallaga Lake
• Monumental inscriptions and other burials in the Bega Valley Shire
  Areas covered: Bega Valley Shire

New England region

• The history and culture of the Aboriginal people of the Ashford district
  Areas covered: Ashford and Inverell
• Nimula, Tingha, Bullawangen: Aboriginal people and their land
  Area covered: Tingha
• Nucoorilma
  Areas covered: Tingha and Inverell (Munro family)
• Ingelba and the five black matriarchs
  Areas covered: Ingelba and Walcha
• A life together, a life apart : a history of relations between Europeans and Aborigines
  Areas covered: Servington and Bassendean