Colonialism in the Secret River

There There offered a narrative on the immorality of settler colonialism and the generational effects on individual Native American people. In There There, colonists are the villain—and rightfully so—because personal accounts depict them as considering Native Americans as fundamentally and inherently inferior. Due to these, Native Americans were less "intelligent," mannered, civilized, and deserving of basic human respect. Colonizers used these as justifications for murdering, stealing from, and desecrating Native American tribes. There There gives insight into the devastating repercussions this treatment has on Native American tribes and individuals today. The Native Americans were clearly the victims of an unjust and immoral settlement. 

In contrast, Secret River paints the Thornhills as the victims of a poorly distributed socioeconomic English society. The Thornhills are the disadvantaged bottom of society who deserve a larger piece of the pie. Grenville makes the reader feel sorry for the Thornhills because of their desperate impoverished situation. Due to this desperation, Thornhills become colonizers of Aboriginal land in New South Wales. They go from victims of an unjust system to aggressors and perpetrators of a system that steals land from the Aboriginals and murders them when they try to defend themselves and their land while offering no reparations, respect, or deference to morality. This shows how situations influence one's character: Will goes from the one who was oppressed to the one who oppresses—nothing changes except for his situation.  Will became the social agent who degraded him and made him feel like an outsider his entire life.