The incident at Risdon Cove on the Derwent River on 3 May 1804 remains an event of considerable historical significance, not only within Tasmania and Australia, but also in the history of the British Empire.

Did the soldiers at the fledging settlement wantonly fire on an innocent hunting party of Aborigines, killing scores of them, as some historians claim, bequeathing a dark and shameful history we have yet to fully acknowledge? Or was it a justified intervention by British troops to rescue a settler and his wife from Aboriginal assault that left just two or at most three casualties among their assailants? This book presents unexpected new findings that overturn all the received interpretations.