Fast Fact Tag: Wallabies

The immediate source of the Wallabies’ 1908 war cry was Newtown Rugby Club, not a documented Aboriginal ceremony.

Wallabies captain Herbert “Paddy” Moran wrote during the voyage to Britain that the team had “decided to appropriate the New town war-cry”. Newtown had already been using the routine in Sydney in 1908.

That establishes the first step in the chain: Newtown Rugby Club to the Wallabies. It does not establish the earlier provenance of the words, rhythm or movements. Later rugby history says Newtown’s president obtained the “basis” of a cry at La Perouse and had it put into rhythmic form, but the original source behind that specific claim has not yet been located.

The safest historical description is that the Wallabies performed a recently adopted rugby routine copied from Newtown. Given the variability associated with the war cry between different tribes, whether Newtown’s routine preserved genuine Aboriginal material from a specific tribe is a separate question that still requires proof.

The evidence strongly supports the sporting and commercial context. By 1908 the success of New Zealand’s Haka had created an expectation that touring teams would provide a distinctive pre-match spectacle.

Australian rugby had a problem: the historical record shows different Aboriginal groups using different war cries and war songs, not one national “Aboriginal war cry” that could simply become Australia’s equivalent of the Haka.

The Wallabies instead adopted Newtown Rugby Club’s recently used routine. Moran later said the Rugby Union’s final argument for continuing it was its “box-office value”. That is direct evidence that audience appeal formed part of the justification for the performance.

Was it fabricated? That remains unclear. What is clear is that the need for a spectacle does explain why a local or supposedly local Aboriginal-derived performance could have been adapted and promoted as a national Australian sporting spectacle.