This book contends that two rogue First Fleet officers deliberately infected Aborigines with smallpox.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 83-93) and index.

In April 1789 a smallpox plague broke out at Sydney Cove. It then swept around the entire country, killing two and a half million Australians. Only one person from the First Fleet, a sailor Joseph Jeffries, died of smallpox. Curiously, he was a Native American 'Red' Indian.

Historians have ever since argued about the cause of the smallpox epidemic and whether or not it was deliberate genocide. Now the answer has finally been unearthed.

The Dust of the Mindye maps the story of how two rogue First Fleet officers gained jars of smallpox scabs bought at Cape Town. They then repeated the successful strategy from the North American Indian Wars, using the unsuspecting Jeffries to distribute infected clothing and blankets to the native population.