Editing Collet Barker (section)

===Death===
On 29 April 1831, they reached the [[Murray Mouth]]. Barker swam across the narrow channel the next morning, went over a sandhill, and was never seen again. A few days later the party learned that Barker had been killed by the local [[Ngarrindjeri]] [[Indigenous Australians|Indigenous people]] who may have taken him for a whaler or sealer, many of whom had abducted Indigenous women. The men responsible had been identified,<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article25740466 |title=An Old Time Episode. The Murder of Captain Barker, Narrative of a Survivor. |newspaper=[[The Advertiser (Adelaide)]] |location=South Australia |date=30 October 1894 |accessdate=18 May 2017 |page=6 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref> but no retaliation or punitive action against those believed responsible was undertaken, which one commentator believed emboldened those people to commit further attacks on Europeans, notably the [[Maria (brigantine)|''Maria'']] survivors.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Book of the Murray|editor=G. V. Lawrence and Graeme Kinross Smith|author=H. A. Lindsay|chapter=Ch. 11: Aborigines in the Murray Valley|publisher=Rigby Ltd.|date=1975|isbn=0-85179-917-5}}</ref>

Had he lived, Barker was to have been sent by [[Ralph Darling|Governor Darling]] to New Zealand's [[North Island]] as first resident because of the feared [[Māori people|Māori]] unrest; his role was to conciliate.