William Robinson Mystery

William Robinson was black settler who was murdered on Salt Spring Island in 1868. He was one of three black residents killed in this small community in a space of less than two years. An Aboriginal man named Tshuanhusset, also called Tom, was charged with Robinson's murder, and convicted and hanged, but a closer look at the evidence challenges the guilty verdict.

This website contains many original documents that allow visitors to explore the mystery, as well as learn something of the history of the Blacks, Aboriginal people, Kanakas (Hawaiians), and Whites of many national backgrounds, from Azorian Portuguese to the British colonial elite, who settled Salt Spring Island. The documents tell "about settlement, the importance of land, the dispossession of Aboriginal people, about justice, racism, family life, religion -- the full gamut of life in the colony."

http://web.uvic.ca/history-robinson/