A UK family has returned sacred items to Broome – decades they were gifted to their late father.
Siblings Kate Chamberlayne and Andy Verreck explained that their father had brought the items back to the UK after receiving them from his friend Kim Ackerman in the 1970s. After his death recently, they felt it was important to return the items to their rightful place rather than letting them remain boxed up in their home.
This led to a months-long journey to find the appropriate community and return the items to their rightful place. During the process, Ms Chamberlayne noted that they encountered numerous challenges, including hitting many dead ends and navigating complex permit requirements.
She mentioned that a conversation with someone from the WA Department of Agriculture revealed that one of the items contained biological material, which meant they had make a new permit due to biosecurity risks.
The siblings sought help from many individuals and were even told by one person to “not contact them again, as this is highly dangerous”, which left them quite concerned.
Eventually, they reached out to Whadjuk Noongar elder, Professor Len Collard, who provided the assistance they needed.
“In my role as a university Professor, I had people around the globe for many decades contacting me because I’m a person of high academic status… people come to me as the boss, to speak, and ask for advice and direction,” Professor Collard told National Indigenous Times.
“It’s not uncommon for people to reach out to get advice and direction on how to deal with sacred objects or artefacts that they have.”
Professor Collard had insights into where the person who gave the items to the siblings might have been from. He suggested they reach out to local Aboriginal corporations to continue their efforts from there.
Ms Chamberlayne and Mr Verreck explained that their father’s friend, Mr Ackerman, was well known in Broome. They understood that during a difficult period, community members had entrusted him with the items freely and willingly as a custodian.
“I can’t discuss the people, I can’t discuss the items, because of cultural sensitivity,” said Ms Chamberlyne.
“Kim gave some to my dad, and my dad ended up, in 1974, moving back to the UK, where he met and married my mum. And then he had us, and [he] always talked about Australia.
“He taught us immense respect for other cultures. But he had a huge respect for the Aboriginal people. It really touched him, his time here.
“We felt that they had to be back here [Broome], so about September, October last year, I started the process of trying to repatriate the items.”
hamberlyn said.
“We’ve been able to pass that information on to the museum, so that they should be referred to the correct people.”
Professor Collard said the possession of sacred items by non-Indigenous people is a relatively common occurrence.
“It’s just part of the history of it. In a lot of the cases, people get them because they bought them. In this case, the people that had them felt it was time to get it back to where it comes from,” he said.
Ms Chamberlayne shared her discomfort with witnessing auctions in the UK selling cultural and sacred items. She said that this practice has always troubled her.
“We’ve got a terrible history. Our colonial history is so shameful and a lot of people in England feel that or I feel that reparations need to be made across the world. I mean we’ve just done terrible things to so many countries,” she said.
“I’ve seen them come up for auction in the UK and I always thought it’s wrong to be selling these things. These things should not be traded.
“When these items come up they do go for money, for quite good money I think that sometimes people are inheriting them and just selling them and they’re going straight back into private collections.”
With the successful return of the sacred items made by Ms Chamberlayne and Mr Verreck, Professor Collard hopes that their efforts will inspire others to also do the right thing and return cultural artefacts to their rightful places.
“I want to encourage other people that are overseas or within Australia to discuss stuff that they want to repatriate. It’s giving contact with your local Aboriginal corporations or traditional groups and seeking out guidance somehow to repatriate the items back,” said Professor Collard.
Ms Chamberlayne and Mr Verreck said they met many remarkable people and learned more about Aboriginal culture while in Broome. They expressed that they do not seek praise or thanks for returning the items; they simply felt that these items should never have left their rightful place in the first place.