In pre-colonial times, Phillip Island was occupied by the Bunurong people. 

Around the coast of the island numerous sites, now termed middens, where the aboriginal people gathered, can still be recognised today.

The wonderful book “Phillip Island in Picture and Story”  written by JW Gliddon in 1958 and published at the time as a fundraiser for Warley Hospital, paints a picture of the timeless life style and idyllic environment that the island’s indigenous inhabitants had enjoyed, before the advent of white settlement.

Abundant wildlife, birdlife, shellfish and eggs meant that nutritious food was always available. And the first people did not slaughter or take  needlessly, ensuring that the island’s bountiful larder was always preserved,.

Gliddon observes that one of their main camping areas, “where the charcoal of their ancient hearths and the refuse bones and shells bear silent yet eloquent evidence of the people of the past” was at Forrest Caves.

Gliddon suggests that Phillip Island may have been visited by more than one tribe; and that it might have even had a resident tribe. 
But of one thing he was certain. The Bunurong people came most often.
Until European settlement began.

The idyllic existence enjoyed over the milleniums was shattered, not immediately, but over time. 
The end result!

“It has been our evil destiny to destroy a race of fellow human beings who in some ways were superior to ourselves,” JW Gliddon sadly noted.

“This is the tragedy we face in thinking of the people who were here on Phillip Island before us.”