At a glance:

• The 'wild white man'
• From bricklayer to convict
• The escape
• Survival with the Wathaurong people
• The enigma

The story of William Buckley has all the qualifications of a ripping adventure fable of survival against all odds, underpinned with the rich symbolism of racial harmony - an Australian Dances with Wolves.

The 'wild white man'
On a voluble afternoon at Indented Heads in 1835, John Batman was in the early days of his expedition to Port Phillip Bay that eventuated in the founding of Melbourne. Wary of Aboriginal tribes, his crew were shocked when they were suddenly approached by a 'wild white man' with long flowing hair and beard, his spears at bay and his 6ft 6in tall frame wrapped in possum skins. The wild man pointed to the 'W.B.' that was tattooed on his arm in an attempt to communicate his identity. Buckley eventually picked up enough of the forgotten language he used to read, write and speak 30-years prior, and began to tell his story.

From bricklayer to convict
Buckley was born in 1780 in Cheshire, England. As an adult he became a bricklayer, and served as a soldier. He fought in Holland against the French Republican forces, not knowing that one day he would be in a small party protecting the tiny mouth of a bay on the other side of the world from the French.

The inciting incident in his life took place when he was charged with receiving stolen goods, although the facts are disputed. Whatever the crime, like most British petty criminals of his day, Buckley was sent to Hell via a 9-month trip in the hull of a ship.

In October 1803, Buckley found himself a convict amongst 2 boatloads of 300 sentenced others - with marines, free-settlers, civil officers, and a missionary and his wife. Lieutenant David Collins headed the fleet. Their goal was to build a penal settlement near what is now Sorrento in Port Phillip Bay. Buckley may have looked into the eyes of a fellow convict's son, an 11-year-old named John Pascoe Fawkner, who was affected by the area in a much different way to Buckley.

The escape
However, while Collins was busy fighting a loosing battle against the elements, Buckley and some mates decided to make a break for it, and headed off into the disparate wilderness of Victoria.

And there their story should end - for all, but Buckley, it did. Of the 19 convicts who escaped, 13 were recaptured and the rest went up in smoke. Collins gave up and took his charges to Tasmania. Dispirited, hungry and thirsty Buckley might have watched the tall-ships slip back through the heads from his position at Clifton Springs on the Bellarine Peninsula.

Survival with the Wathaurong people

When Buckley fell face-forward with exhaustion landing on an anthill while clutching a found spear for support, he should have died. But an amazing thing happened.

The anthill wasn't an anthill, but the burial mound of an Aboriginal person, Murrangurk. When the Wathaurong Aboriginal tribe found Buckley, it was assumed that he was Murrangurk reincarnated.

The Aborigines then welcomed Buckley into their tribe and he lived with them for 32 years, adopting their way of life, their language, taking a wife and having a child. After a dispute over a blind boy in his care, Buckley decided to go it alone, and lived a nomadic life wandering up and down the south-west coast.

The enigma
Why did Buckley give himself back to European civilisation? There are fragments of stories that suggest he was greatly affected by the hardships that he endured. There were probably aspects of his life that he missed. He tried to make contact unsuccessfully with a number of ships %u2014 then he - approached Batman's crew. He seldom talked to anyone about his experiences.

So after 32-years, the wild man returned to 'civilisation'. He was eventually pardoned by Governor Arthur in 1835 and acted as a guide and interpreter accompanying settlers like Captain Foster Fryans. It is said that the wild man eventually grew disenchanted with white settlement and moved away to Hobart.

With his heart in both worlds, Buckley grew old, enduring both ridicule for his empathy with Aboriginal tribes while witnessing their massacre. Before he died a poor man in Hobart in 1856 from injuries after being run over by an ox-cart, he dictated his story to a John Morgan, who wrote up his tale as a romanticised Australian Robinson Crusoe.