alternatehistory.com
June 1850 - Moving toward a suspension of transportation
16 June 1850, Toorak House, Melbourne, Victoria
Adye Douglas and Horatio Wills were of the same mind as their New Zealand counterpart. Whilst convicts had continued to pour into New South Wales, South Australia had never been a convict state and Tasmania had suspended the transportation of convicts in 1847 for two years before a resumption.
The resolution of both men was simple enough. From 1.1.1851, they would both ask for suspension of convict transportation to both Victoria, Tasmania and New Zealand and that no further convicts would be accepted after that time, with any future emigrations to either of these states to be only free men.
They were not to know that in fact such a trade would never resume in any of the three states, or of course South Australia and that in fact the age of transportation was coming to an end at the same time the future of Australasia took shape in what would be a very turbulent six year period, driven by competing priorities, an upswell of democratic thought in the Southern colonies, transportation and it’s implacable opponents in the Anti Transportation League. All these were set against the background of the Gold Rush in Victoria and again in Tasmania, a rush that attracted people from all over the World, but, much to the dismay of many, attracted as many as 45,000 Chinese to goldfields town by the mid 1850’s, changing the demographic picture in Victoria in particular in a way not seen or anticipated before and skyrocketing the population of “marvelous Melbourne.”
Of course, this was also to affect Australasia’s most populous colony. A succession of autocratic Governors in New South Wales had severely limited the power of the Legislative Assembly. When gold was discovered, all in the southern colonies, the lure for fleeing convicts improved dramatically and the wool barons faced abandoned flocks as numbers of convicts started to abscond. It placed enormous pressure on the New South Wales Governor from his own political supporters, a pressure that only increased from the start of 1851. It was to reach it’s zenith when Britain’s attention was firmly fixed elsewhere by a combination of the Crimean War, a full on Sepoy Mutiny and a nationalist uprising in Burma.
Adye Douglas and Horatio Wills were of the same mind as their New Zealand counterpart. Whilst convicts had continued to pour into New South Wales, South Australia had never been a convict state and Tasmania had suspended the transportation of convicts in 1847 for two years before a resumption.
The resolution of both men was simple enough. From 1.1.1851, they would both ask for suspension of convict transportation to both Victoria, Tasmania and New Zealand and that no further convicts would be accepted after that time, with any future emigrations to either of these states to be only free men.
They were not to know that in fact such a trade would never resume in any of the three states, or of course South Australia and that in fact the age of transportation was coming to an end at the same time the future of Australasia took shape in what would be a very turbulent six year period, driven by competing priorities, an upswell of democratic thought in the Southern colonies, transportation and it’s implacable opponents in the Anti Transportation League. All these were set against the background of the Gold Rush in Victoria and again in Tasmania, a rush that attracted people from all over the World, but, much to the dismay of many, attracted as many as 45,000 Chinese to goldfields town by the mid 1850’s, changing the demographic picture in Victoria in particular in a way not seen or anticipated before and skyrocketing the population of “marvelous Melbourne.”
Of course, this was also to affect Australasia’s most populous colony. A succession of autocratic Governors in New South Wales had severely limited the power of the Legislative Assembly. When gold was discovered, all in the southern colonies, the lure for fleeing convicts improved dramatically and the wool barons faced abandoned flocks as numbers of convicts started to abscond. It placed enormous pressure on the New South Wales Governor from his own political supporters, a pressure that only increased from the start of 1851. It was to reach it’s zenith when Britain’s attention was firmly fixed elsewhere by a combination of the Crimean War, a full on Sepoy Mutiny and a nationalist uprising in Burma.
- johnboy
- Word Count: 380