Why were seven white men hanged after the Myall Creek massacre?

The hanging of seven white men following the 1838 Myall Creek massacre occurred at the insistence of the governor of New South Wales, Sir George Gipps.1

This event was highly significant because, throughout the period of colonial expansion, massacres and violent acts against Aboriginal peoples typically went unpunished due to the difficulty of enforcing the law in outlying districts and a prevailing bias that favored settlers. By ensuring these men were held accountable, Governor Gipps asserted the principle that Aboriginal people were British subjects entitled to the protection of the law, standing against the systematic racism and violence that characterized the frontier. Despite this rare instance of justice, the broader reality remained that the legal system and the pressures of colonial expansion often left Indigenous populations vulnerable to unchecked violence and dispossession.1