How many convicts were in the Sydney colony?
Early Convict Life. The settlement of Sydney began its life as a penal colony, with a total of 568 male and 191 female prisoner convicts with 13 children, 206 marines with 26 wives and 13 children, and 20 officials having made the voyage.
What was the original name of Sydney colony?
Phillip originally named the colony "New Albion", but for some uncertain reason the colony acquired the name "Sydney", after the (then) British Home Secretary, Thomas Townshend, Lord Sydney (Baron Sydney, Viscount Sydney from 1789).
When was the first settlement established in Australia?
A few days after arrival at Botany Bay the fleet moved to the more suitable Port Jackson where a settlement was established at Sydney Cove on 26 January 1788. This date later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. The colony was formally proclaimed by Governor Phillip on 7 February 1788 at Sydney.
Do you think the Australian prison system was originally a prison?
No. Originally it was the home - for maybe 70,000 years to the Indigenous Australians when humans first populated the land we now call Australia. At the time of first European contact, it is generally estimated that between 315,000 to 750,000 people lived in Australia Only for a tiny fraction of that time, maybe 90 years was it used as a prison.
Was Sydney Australia a penal colony?
Seeking to pre-empt the French colonial empire from expanding into the region, Britain chose Australia as the site of a penal colony, and in 1787, the First Fleet of eleven convict ships set sail for Botany Bay, arriving on 20 January 1788 to found Sydney, New South Wales, the first European settlement on the continent ...
Was the Sydney Cove colony a convict prison?
Following the charts of Captain Cook, a fleet of 11 British ships carrying convicts, settlers and soldiers started a penal colony at Sydney Cove in 1788. The ill-prepared outpost struggled for several years until farms succeeded at Parramatta and Norfolk Island and supply ships arrived more often.
What two Australian cities began as settlements for convicts?
In addition to the original settlement in Sydney, other well-known convict settlements were set up at Moreton Bay (now Brisbane), on Norfolk Island, and at Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania). The Swan River Colony in western Australia began as a free settlement but later accepted convicts.
When was Sydney a penal colony?
1788Those who survived faced a very different world, and often became entwined with the colony and its convicts. They and their descendants have a very different view of the significance of the arrival of convicts in Sydney in 1788.
Where was the first settlement in Australia?
SydneyThe first settlement, at Sydney, consisted of about 850 convicts and their Marine guards and officers, led by Governor Arthur Phillip. They arrived at Botany Bay in the "First Fleet" of 9 transport ships accompanied by 2 small warships, in January, 1788.
What were the 19 crimes that sent you to Australia?
The crimes that make up 19 Crimes include:Grand Larceny, theft above the value of one shilling.Petty Larceny, theft under one shilling.Buying or receiving stolen goods, jewels, and plate...Stealing lead, iron, or copper, or buying or receiving.Impersonating an Egyptian.Stealing from furnished lodgings.More items...•
Why was Sydney Cove chosen for settlement?
The site of the settlement was Sydney Cove. It was one of the smaller inlets, chosen because it had fresh water and good anchorage for ships close into the land.
Who arrived in Australia first?
James Cook was the first recorded explorer to land on the east coast in 1770. He had with him maps showing the north, west and south coasts based on the earlier Dutch exploration.
What was Sydney originally called?
Meanwhile, the first free settlers arrived in Australia in 1793. One of them was called John Palmer. He was granted some land and he built a house on it called Woolloomooloo. It gave its name to an area of Sydney.
What are the 7 penal colonies?
The Bureau shall carry out its functions through its divisions and its seven (7) Penal institutions namely—New Bilibid Prisons, Correctional Institution for Women, Iwahig, Davao, San Ramon and Sablayan Prisons and Penal Farms and the Leyte Regional Prisons.
What problems did the Sydney Cove colony have?
Despite Governor Phillip's benevolent attitude towards the Aboriginal peoples of Sydney, the British presence in Sydney Cove proved disastrous in many ways, in particular with the outbreak of a smallpox epidemic in 1789.
Who was the youngest convict sent to Australia?
John Hudson, described as 'sometimes a chimney sweeper', was the youngest known convict to sail with the First Fleet. Voyaging on board the Friendship to NSW, the boy thief was 13 years old on arrival at Sydney Cove.
Where did the convicts live in Australia?
Convicts lived in their own homes in an area known as 'The Rocks', some with their families. But it wasn't just convicts living in the village; local Aboriginal people lived there too. They camped near the convict houses, fished on the harbour, traded goods and food with townsfolk and brought news from further away. .
What is an interesting fact about Sydney Cove?
Historically, Sydney Cove is one of Australia's most significant landmarks. On the 26th of January 1788, Captain Arthur Phillip—the leader of the First Fleet—raised a flag on the shore of Sydney Cove to proclaim the Colony of New South Wales, in the name of the King of England.
Early Convict Life
The settlement of Sydney began its life as a penal colony, with a total of 568 male and 191 female prisoner convicts with 13 children, 206 marines with 26 wives and 13 children, and 20 officials having made the voyage.
Australian Currency?
There was a shortage of coinage in NSW, so rum, an easily produced spirit from sugar cane, began to be used as currency. Needless to say, this was to slow the settlement’s development considerably, as it is all too easy to for soldiers and convicts to drink their pay compared to trading it for food, clothes and supplies.
The Colony Grows
With the arrival of Governor Lachlan Macquarie in 1810 (along with the 87th Regiment!) the NSW Rum Corps were sent packing back to England.
The Town Becomes a City
Transportation of convicts to New South Wales (NSW) was finally abolished in 1840 and shortly afterwards, in 1842, Sydney was declared a city. The population grew rapidly during this period, helped by the discovery of gold and the gold rush of 1850 - one year after the Californian gold rush of 1849.
What was the first colony to settle in Sydney?
The first area to be settled beyond Sydney and Parramatta was the Nepean/Hawkesbury. (The Nepean and Hawkesbury are in fact the same river, but a section was discovered and named the Nepean by Capt. Watkin Tench in 1789, unaware that it was the upper end of the Hawkesbury which had been explored and named some months before). As the alluvial soils of the district were found to be particularly fertile and the colony at the time had little fertile land suitable for agriculture, the Governor opened up the area for faming as quickly as possible. By 1794, settlers had moved into the Hawkesbury and the township of Green Hills (later named Windsor). The town, which was laid out and renamed Windsor by Gov. Macquarie, became a local centre for the transfer of produce and goods between Sydney and the region.
What were the signs of Sydney's progression from a convict camp to a colonial settlement?
At the time of Macquaries arrival, the signs of Sydney's progression from a convict camp to a colonial settlement were becoming evident. The first free settlers had arrived in 1793 on the Bellona, eight years after the arrival of the First Fleet. These newcomers, the first in a long stream of free settlers to join a growing number of emancipists who were making a new start for themselves, played an ever increasing role in the transformation. A brewery had been established some years earlier in Castlereagh Street which complimented a similar, even earlier business establishment at Kissing Point (Ryde). Three windmills dominated the skyline, one above Farm Cove, the others were to the west on Miller Point beyond Fort Phillip. Brickfields village had become a hive of activity with numerous businesses engaged in the manufacture of pottery, crockery, roofing tiles and bricks. A tannery there supplied the cattle and kangaroo hides used by a factory in Pitt Street in the manufacture of boots and shoes. The Government lumber yard in what is now George Street had been extended to include a forge where iron and steel being imported from England was used in the manufacture of tools and implements. The Rocks area was fast becoming a re-fitting port for the growing number of British and American sealing and whaling vessels visiting the colony.
What was the purpose of the Sydney gaol?
That is hardly surprising, given that the settlement was after all a gaol for Englands outcasts, and the purpose of a gaol is to be confining . The British Government which orchestrated the project must have been well aware of this as they made sure there wasnt a single horse in the menagerie of animals sent with the First Fleet (Phillip bought four mares and two stallions at the Cape of Good Hope on the journey out; a further ten arrived with the Second Fleet). In fact, it wasnt until the arrival of some free settlers who began importing horses from India that animals were used as a means of transport in Sydney.
How did the emancipists destroy the Aboriginal culture?
The Aborigines were forced to move into other areas or lose their identity altogether by attaching themselves to the fringes of the encroaching culture as it destroyed the environment that had sustained them for centuries.
What was the area of Sydney in 1795?
Apart from the official cross country expeditions, early access to the outlaying areas of Sydney in the vicinity of what are now the Bankstown, Liverpool and Macarthur districts was exclusively by boat up the George River, which rises near Appin. The area was opened up to farming in consequence to explorers Matthew Flinders and George Bass navigating the river in 1795. After sailing to beyond where Liverpool now stands, the pair returned with glowing reports of the area as potential farming land and of the navigational possibilities of the river. This led to land being granted between 1798 and 1805 on the alluvial flats on a bend in the river that is now Moorebank and Chipping Norton. By the turn of the Century, transportation of local produce by river had led to the development of a settlement at the furtherest navigable point of the river for coastal trading vessels. When Gov. Macquarie first journeyed to the newly settled district upon his arrival in NSW, he was so impressed by the settlements potential as a regional centre, he laid out a town there and named it Liverpool.
Where was the first boat built in Sydney?
By October 1788, the first boat built in the colony was launched at Campbells Cove. Named The Rose Hill Packet but affectionately known as The Lump, it was a flat-bottomed barge designed to ply the Parramatta River between the two settlements. On its maiden voyage, it returned from Rose Hill with the areas first harvest, amounting to some 200 bushels of wheat, 35 bushels of barley, and a quantity of maize. Many a boat would be built on the shores of Campbells Cove until well into the 19th century when Balmain, Woolwich and Cockatoo Island became the centres for boatbuilding activity on Sydney Harbour.
When was Sydney Town Hall built?
When the site was resumed for the construction of Sydney Town Hall in 1869, many remains and gravestones were removed to Rookwood Cemetery. In 1974, during excavations for the Town Hall shopping arcade, a number of brick vaults, one of which contained a coffin, were uncovered. DEFENCE OF SYDNEY.
When was Sydney established?
The modern history of the city began with the arrival of a First Fleet of British ships in 1788 and the foundation of a penal colony by Great Britain. From 1788 to 1900 Sydney was the capital of the British colony of New South Wales. An elected city council was established in 1840.
How many convicts were landed in Sydney?
Early efforts at agriculture were fraught and supplies from overseas were scarce. Between 1788 and 1792 about 3,546 male and 766 female convicts were landed at Sydney—many "professional criminals" with few of the skills required for the establishment of a colony.
What is the name of the Aboriginal people in Sydney?
The area surrounding Port Jackson (Sydney Harbour) was home to several Aboriginal tribes. The " Eora people" are the coastal Aborigines of the Sydney district. The name Eora simply means "here" or "from this place", and was used by Local Aboriginal people to describe to the British where they came from.
How long did the Aboriginal people live in Sydney?
Radiocarbon dating suggests that they lived in and around Sydney for at least 30,000 years. In an archaeological dig in Parramatta, Western Sydney, it was found that the Aboriginals used charcoal, stone tools and possible ancient campfires. Near Penrith, a far western suburb of Sydney, numerous Aboriginal stone tools were found in Cranebrook ...
What was Sydney Cove named after?
Phillip originally named the colony "New Albion", but for some uncertain reason the colony acquired the name "Sydney", after the (then) British Home Secretary, Thomas Townshend, Lord Sydney (Baron Sydney, Viscount Sydney from 1789).
How long did it take to build the Sydney Harbour Bridge?
The landmark which links Sydney's northern and southern shores began construction in 1924 and took 1,400 men eight years to build at a cost of £4.2 million and of steel.
What were the people of Sydney?
Prior to the arrival of the British there were 4,000 to 8,000 native people in the Sydney area from as many as 29 different clans. Sydney Cove from Port Jackson to Petersham was inhabited by the Cadigal clan. The principal language groups were Darug, Guringai, and Dharawal. The earliest Europeans to visit the area noted that the indigenous people were conducting activities such as camping and fishing, using trees for bark and food, collecting shells, and cooking fish.
How long have Aboriginal people lived in Sydney?
Aboriginal people have lived in the Sydney area for at least 50,000 years. Known collectively as the Eora people which means ‘here’ or ‘from this place’, there are 29 clan groups in the Sydney metropolitan area. In 1770 the HMS Endeavour moored at what is now Botany Bay, and eighteen years later British settlement began, ...
Where to walk in Sydney Harbour?
In the Macquarie Street historic precinct, you can walk past Hyde Park Barracks , Parliament House, the Mint, Sydney Hospital and St James’ Church. information-circle. From Circular Quay you can catch the ferry to World Heritage-listed Cockatoo Island, a former convict prison on an island in Sydney Harbour.
When did convicts arrive in Australia?
Convict transportation tailed off to almost nothing in the 1850s and 1860s with the last 250 or so landed in Western Australia in 1868, by request of the free settlers there. South Australia never had any convicts. By that time the population was around 1.5 million and convicts and former convicts were a smallish minority.
Which colony was penalized?
Then New South Wales and later Tasmania started as penal colonies. However by the time the States of Australia joined in the Commonwealth of Australia, that practice was looooong gone.
What did the colonists learn from the convicts?
One way and another the colonists - free and convicts - learned to produce food in an environment different from the one they had left, built all of the buildings associated with a modern (for the times) society, and established farms and businesses to carry out the usual tasks of production, distribution and exchange. Over a generation or two the settlement went from being primarily a convict settlement to a society with a large but decreasing part of its population comprising current and former convicts.
How many people were in Australia in 1850?
About 1850 there were something over 400,000 mostly British people in Australia but there were others as well. Some of them went to the California gold rush of 1849, stayed a year or so and came back, with good ideas of where to look for gold. In 1851 gold was discovered in several places.
How many people lived in Australia at the time of the first European contact?
At the time of first European contact, it is generally estimated that between 315,000 to 750,000 people lived in Australia
When did the first fleet arrive in Australia?
When the First Fleet arrived on 26 January 1788 , there was no major infrastructure in Australia apart from what the fleet brought with it. The first task was for the convicts to build shelter for themselves and the guards and administrators - essentially to build their own prison.
When did the first British settlement occur?
When the first British settlement occurred in 1788, about two thirds of the people were transportees who had been exiled from England after being convicted of various crimes ( some, by today’s standards, quite trivial). The rest were either military or administrators.
Markets
- In the 19th century, markets formed an important part of Sydney's commercial sector, and tolls raised from running the wholesale and retail markets was a large part of revenue. They were also unhygienic and unruly places where unscrupulous trading practices were common. Hence man…
Roads
- The City's attempts at road making, drainage and repair were often less than successful and by the 1870s numerous roads remained unformed, pot-holed or prone to washaways. From the 1880s, major streets were overlaid with woodblocks. This surface was durable but slippery, and bitumen was soon used. In the 1930s the City's laboratory at Wattle Street, Pyrmont pioneered …
Lights
- In 1841 the streets of Sydney were first lit by gas, provided by the Australian Gaslight Company. The City left it to the private company to provide Sydney's lighting for the next half-century. In 1904 when the Lady Mayoress switched on the first electric street lights at Pyrmont Power Station, the City took on the provision of electricity to both private customers and suburban cou…
Water and Sewerage
- Until it became polluted from over-use in the 1820s, the freshwater Tank Stream was the town's water supply. By 1839 convicts working under John Busby had carved out water tunnels from a swamp in the City's east. This was called Busby's Bore. Pipes conveyed water to standpipes at various parts of the town and water carters sold water at one shilling a cask. The City had conne…
Rubbish and Rats
- Garbage disposal is one function the City is still responsible for but it was not always a priority. In the 19th century garbage was dumped indiscriminately until the bubonic plague in 1900 pushed the City into action. Garbage was incinerated or tipped at Moore Park, then at Pyrmont or punted out to sea. There was public outcry in 1929 when spring tides washed up assorted debris includi…
Health
- The City's by-laws have always covered public health, but the general level of understanding of what was required to keep a city healthy was limited. The City Health Officer was a part-time employee with an independent medical practice who did little more than offer advice to aldermen. The Nuisance Inspector oversaw a range of regulations from markets inspections to kite flying a…
City Planning
- In 1879, the City gained control over insanitary and unsafe buildings but it had to share this power with a government-appointed City Improvement Board. When bubonic plague threatened Sydney in 1900, the City was held responsible for failing to eradicate the rats blamed for the public health scare. As a result the state government took over the City's health powers and resumed the wha…
Overview
The History of Sydney is the story of the peoples of the land that has become modern Sydney.
Aboriginal Australians have inhabited the Sydney region for at least 30,000 years, and Aboriginal engravings and cultural sites are common in the Sydney area. The traditional owners of the land on which modern Sydney stands are the Darug, D…
Prehistory
The first people to inhabit the area now known as Sydney were Aboriginal Australians who had migrated from northern Australia and before that from southeast Asia. Flaked pebbles found in Western Sydney's gravel sediments might indicate human occupation from 45,000 to 50,000 years BP, while radiocarbon dating has shown evidence of human activity in the Sydney region …
Settlement
The first meeting between Aboriginals and British explorers occurred on 29 April 1770 when Lieutenant James Cook landed at Botany Bay (Kamay ) and encountered the Gweagal clan. Two Gweagal men opposed the landing party and in the confrontation one of them was shot and wounded. Cook and his crew stayed at Botany Bay for a week, collecting water, timber, fodder and botanica…
Sydney Town
After the departure of Phillip in December 1792, the colony's military officers began acquiring land and importing consumer goods obtained from visiting ships. Former convicts also engaged in trade and opened small businesses. Soldiers and former convicts built houses on Crown land, with or without official permission, in what was now commonly called Sydney town.
Colonial city (1841-1900)
The New South Wales Legislative Council was transformed into a semi-elected body in 1842. The town of Sydney was declared a city the same year, and a governing council established, elected on a restrictive property franchise.
The discovery of gold in New South Wales and Victoria in 1851 initially caused some economic disruption as male workers moved to the goldfields. Melbour…
Political development
The first government established in Sydney after 1788 was an autocratic system run by an appointed governor – although English law was transplanted into the Australian colonies by virtue of the doctrine of reception, thus notions of the rights and processes established by the Magna Carta of 1215 and the Bill of Rights of 1689 were brought from Britain by the colonists. Agitation for repres…
Cultural development
Over the course of the 19th-century Sydney established many of its major cultural institutions. Governor Lachlan Macquarie's vision for Sydney included the construction of grand public buildings and institutions fit for a colonial capital. Macquarie Street began to take shape as a ceremonial thoroughfare of grand buildings. He founded the Royal Botanic Gardens and dedicated Hyde Park to …
Transport
Ferries have played a key role in the transport and economic development of the city. Leading up to the 1932 opening of the Sydney Harbour bridge, Sydney had the world's largest ferry fleet.
From the time of the first European settlement in Sydney Cove, slow and sporadic boats ran along the Parramatta River serving Parramatta and the agric…