It’s true that the ocean has given birth to many beguiling life forms, veiling
it’s creations from being perceived by the world, one such creation is Australia.
It all started with the prominent voyage of an Englishman William Dampier reaching
the new land in 1688 which was yet to be discovered by the rest of the empire.
It is believed that aboriginal people of Australia were removed from
the land either by force or will, It’s still debatable in 21s century.
However, genetically there is very low evidence of
the habitants before the settling of the Britishers.
Australia has been shaped many time over the hundreds of years
and seen many voyage, offering the land to its inhabitants,
Australia had been the interest for many
crusaders, The British, The Dutch and the French.
When we talk about the History of Australia we should
consider it all started with the colonization.
Colonization: How did it all start?
It appeared British Council were deliberately trying to settle their
convicts in New South Wales as the prisons in Britain were over flooded,
however it was simply not feasible for Britishers to transport their
Skill men convicts halfway around the world for this reason alone.
The sentences were knowingly reduced, some were given early
pardons and also were given some piece of land to farm.
In 1770, British seafarer Captain James Cook
found the new Island with fertility and complete
alienated and declared it to be empty of human
lives, which broadly attracted the British empire.
The Britishers agreed upon settling yet another
colony in the new land, named the New South Wales.
James Cook was awarded with the title Lieutenant,
Sir Joseph Banks along with Lieutenant
James Cook on their voyage on 1770 found Botany Babe as their most preferable site.
Penal Culture
The new South Wales was based on a penal society.
The rise of poverty in British era lead people to indulge in some criminal activities,
many people were either killed or sent away as criminals to America before 1776,
convicts were sent to Georgia or Maryland as America was
under British rule, after America getting freedom from the
Britishers on 4th of July 1776 the Britishers were in the
search of a new land to transport their convicts and criminals.
Convicts were supposed to serve the penal punishment, under the
punishment convicts were supposed to serve until their death.
Assistance
The British didn’t do it all alone there was some offer of
assistance from a man called James Matra an American Loyalist.
In July 1783 James Matra proposed the whole blueprint in settling the colony in
the New South Wales which was quite appreciated by the whole British Regime.
The London Chronicles entitled James Matra as an officer of the
Treasury, It was never the plan to settle the convicts in the new land,
it was supposed to be the Loyalists, the Chinese and South Sea Islanders,
later Matra proposed to settle the convicts as settlers in New South Wales.
As the blueprint for the new colony and strategies were on point
it was time for transporting the new inhabitants to the new land.
Voyage to new land: French took an interest
The Britishers had their first sail on 13th of May 1787,
it was believed to be 11 ships with 1530 people on board.
The number of convicts were high as compared to Marins and marines wife.
The whole transportation and moving these whole lot of people from England
to New South Wales was under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip.
They arrived at Botany Bay.
On 24th of January 1788, Jean-François de la Pérouse led two ships to the new
Land, it was evident that the French had taken quite an interest in the new land.
On being called upon by the British commander Phillip, French some offer as they
were much more provisioned in terms of supplies and had lasted 3 years of voyage.
But neither of the offers were accepted by the British and The
French had to leave Botany Bay after running out of supplies.
La Pérouse is still remembered in the Sydney suburb from that name.
What happened to Aboriginals?
Aboriginals are believed to be the real inhabitants of the new Land,
it was believed that people from Africa had migrated to Australia
and been there since the arrival of British colony, they had their
rites and rituals before Catholics was imposed on the colony.
Phillip was granted Governor title, hence he had full authority over the new colony
and the locals it was presupposed that he would maintain harmonious relation
with the local aboriginal people and would balance the disciple, but
the journals and accounts of Watkin Tench says a different story.
The first year of settlement was not much entertained by the locales and
resulted in hardships, Britishers under the commands of Governor Phillip.
Soon the local aboriginal people started disappearing, it
wasn’t much of a harmonious act on the Governor’s side.
Aborigines had different reaction to the arrival of Britishers but
it was often confrontational, as the colonizers brought diseases
and now resources had to be shared their reaction to the sudden change was quite
obvious, there was no treaty signed between the Regime in power and the Aborigines.
Historian Geoffrey Blainey has said that there were
occasional shooting in thousand different places;
which is not is evident that aborigines weren’t welcomed
to be the part of the colony and peace was not an option.
Diseases like smallpox, influenza and measles were spread among the
locales and it was spreading from one Aboriginal camp to another.
Diseases led the Aboriginals to defeat and their demoralization.
Some general saw the Aboriginals people as threat to them and they couldn’t reason
with them, which determined them to either kill them or dispose them off the land.
Britishers claimed that Aboriginals often kill the men, sheep and
castles which made them even determined to had the Aboriginals gone.
There are books to prove that Aboriginals did hold
arm against the colonizers and some books that
says otherwise, the resistance of Aboriginals are
quite controversial and it is still debatable.
Problems faced
The first year of settlement of in the new land was
a total disastrous remarked by many historians.
It was problems for the convicts and the colonizers
as they were not the natural habitants and weren’t
familiar with the seasonal pattern of the new land
it did become a challenge to for them to farm.
Upon arrival the convicts were assigned tasks, for some tasks
were accounting and for some the task was build roads.
It would tool long time to travel from England to New South Wales upon
arriving the convicts were already unfit, tired or sick to do anything.
Poverty time was high and New South Wales was not doing so good in agriculture.
Governor Phillip had to call for supplies from
the England as for the survival of the people.
Exploration of Australia
George Bass and Matthew Flinders along with William Martin
sailed and explored the Georges River in October 1795
evidently their thorough exploration led to be
more informatics upon returning the details
of their exploration led in settlement of new towns across the banks of the river
the boat used by them to sail along the Georges river was Tom Thumb.
Their continuous sail and exploring the new land
of Australia led to new discoveries from time to
time, Lake Illawarra which later change to Tom
Thumb Lagoon after the name of their small boat,
Port Hacking and Tasmania were later discovered.
Aboriginal people guidance and continuous help did also come in handy, here aboriginals
played important role in providing vital information about the land and the fertility.
On discovery of Mount Blaxland, it had enough grass
to sustain the stock of colonizers for thirty years.
In mid-1830s a treaty was signed between Indigenous people and the
colonizers, the Indigenous had acres of land available to them.
Land were given to the Britishers in exchange for
money, the approximated land was 60,000 acres.
Economy
Australia was divided into three parts during 1846, The New
South Wales, South Australia and The Western Australia.
Colonies were highly depended on England for their food
supplies, which was later imported from England to Australia,
although the British pound was the actual currency for trading
services and products but unofficially rum was also accepted.
Where this period was difficult for the common people
in the Australia, the businessmen made fortune,
profits were made by granting land, connect labour,
and exporting native cedar back to England.
The Gold rush and the agricultural industries
brought an economic boost to the countries.
It was believed that Two English businessmen Berry and Wollstonecraft made
fortune off this strategies which mainly involved lands, slaves and gold.
Traditional Dividing, Religion and Culture
In 1846, Australia was divided into 3 major parts The
New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia.
Indigenous people had performed rites and rituals
before the colonizers imposed Catholics as major
practice, it was believed to be Dreamtime the
animist religion which was followed by the locals.
Before the colonizers the practice of Catholic religion was performed by la
Pérouse, who conducted the first burial ceremony in the new soil in 1788,
it was la Pérouse’s father (Louis Receveur) who had
died in Botany Bay, at the times of his exploration.
Some Irish convicts and settlers immigrated from their land for crime,
family disputes and hence some minorities of Australia are also Irish.
Convicts were impelled to attend the church services,
their children were often raised as protestants.
Reverends were moved from England to Australia to preach Catholicism
which often led to disability of services in the Churches of England
and Irish tradition and culture were slowly taken
upon on England, the new practice of Catholicism
and legal privileges soon started dropping in the New South Wales and the .
An act was established by an attorney general John Plunkett, this act established
equal rights between the religions that were majorly or in a small group
practiced in Australia namely Anglicans, Catholics and Presbyterians.
Education and Literature
At the beginning of all this education was limited and the primary
education begun at home, with the permission of King William IV,
the prime minister and the Duke of Wellington decided to set
up some institute mainly for the grammar in the colonies.
The King School, Parramatta is the oldest surviving school.
There were many catholic school established by the time of 1833.
Watkin Tench provided the first art of literature in the new land,
he produced many journals and articles over the settlement.
He came to Australia during the first fleet in 1788.
Australian theatre were established which was an
European culture came with the Britishers during
the first fleet, since then many production was
made and performed as the source of entertainment.
Freedom
Governor Phillip who had the authority over the discipline and
managing the morality of the people had returned to England in 1792,
the colonies were turned out to become prosperous day by day.
They were true feeling of founding and people began rallying in it
was the making of Australia and celebrating the day of foundation,
Historians remarked the day as it was celebrated with drinking and high spirits.
Finally, in 1818, January 26 Australia had become independent of British and the day
was marked as holiday, making it the 30th anniversary of the British settlement.
The day is celebrated as the Australia Day.
It’s the day which celebrates the settlement of white colonies
across the wide continent and also remorse for the Aboriginals
who were slowly disposed off the land and white people took over the entire nation.
History of Australia is debatable as the culture and the people take us
long back into the past, we merely adopted the remarks that were written,
but the people lived through the era were molded
by the acquaintance the colonization had to offer.