British colonisation of South Australia
British colonisation of South Australia describes the planning and establishment of the colony of South Australia by the British government, covering the period from 1829, when the idea was raised by the then-imprisoned Edward Gibbon Wakefield, to 1842, when the South Australia Act 1842 changed the form of government to a Crown colony.
Ideas espoused and promulgated by Wakefield since 1829 led to the formation of the South Australian Land Company in 1831, but this first attempt failed to achieve its goals, and the company folded.
The South Australian Association was formed in 1833 by Wakefield, Robert Gouger and other supporters, which put forward a proposal less radical than previous ones, which was finally supported and a Bill proposed in Parliament.
The British Province of South Australia was established by the South Australia Act 1834 in August 1834, and the South Australian Company formed on 9 October 1835 to fulfil the purposes of the Act by forming a new colony financed by land sales. The first settlers arrived on Kangaroo Island in July 1836, with all of the ships later sailing north soon afterwards to anchor in Holdfast Bay on the advice of Surveyor-General, Colonel William Light. The foundation of South Australia is usually considered to be the proclamation of the new Province by Governor Hindmarsh at Glenelg on 28 December 1836.
However, after the government under the Colonisation Commission set up by the 1834 Act failed to achieve financial self-sufficiency, the South Australia Act 1842 repealed the earlier Act, made South Australia a Crown colony, provided for the formation of an appointed Legislative Assembly and passed greater powers to the Governor of South Australia.
There were moves towards representative self-government in the mid-nineteenth century, and South Australia became a self-governing colony in October 1856.
Background
The French Nicolas Baudin and the British Matthew Flinders had both made exploratory voyages along the central southern coastline. On 8 April 1802, the vessels of the two explorers met off South Australia, at what is now called Encounter Bay. They each gave names to various places around Kangaroo Island and the two gulfs: Gulf St Vincent and Spencer Gulf. The British Government, not wanting to be pre-empted by the French, sent out expeditions to Port Phillip and northern Tasmania, and set up the first free settlement, the Swan River Colony, in 1829.Historian Geoffrey Dutton suggests three clear phases in the foundation of the colony: first, the practical men, with their discoveries, second, the theorists, in particular Wakefield and Gouger, who had not seen Australia, and, lastly, the settlers, who had to marry fact with ideals.
Previous European settlement
Prior to the establishment of a formal British colony, Kangaroo Island was inhabited by sealers more or less continuously from 1803, when American sealing captain Isaac Pendleton established an outpost at what was named American River. The island soon became a target for sealers based in the British colonies of New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land.In 1826, The Australian estimated that Kangaroo Island had a population of around 200 people, who in addition to sealing also traded in salt and wallaby and kangaroo skins. However, following the decline of the sealing industry, the island's population had dwindled significantly by 1836. Several farms were established at Three Well Rivers, with poultry and pigs being reared and barley, wheat and vegetables under cultivation. Many residents lived with Aboriginal women – either from mainland South Australia or Aboriginal Tasmanians from the sealing colonies on Bass Strait – who were often violently abducted from their homelands and made to work as slaves.
1829–1831
Wakefield
Influenced by prison reformer Elizabeth Fry serving a term in prison for abducting a minor, Wakefield turned his mind to social problems caused by over-population. In 1829, he wrote a series of anonymous "Letters from Sydney" to a London newspaper, The Morning Chronicle, in which he purported to write about his own experiences as a gentleman settler in New South Wales, outlining his various ideas as a new theory of colonisation. He proposed an "Emigration Fund" payable by landlords' taxes and land sales, which would fund labour for the colonies. Gouger, an enthusiastic supporter, edited the letters and published them as a book, helping to distribute Wakefield's document.Wakefield saw the colonies as "extensions of an old society"; all classes would be represented among the settlers. In addition, the colonies would be more or less self-governing. His ideas were not original, but Wakefield was the one who synthesised a number of theories into one plan of systematic colonisation, and who spread the ideas among the British public and urged the Colonial Office to push forward with such a plan. After his release from prison in 1830, he funded the National Colonization Society, with Gouger as secretary and a large number of enthusiastic members. Wakefield's ideas caused much debate in Parliament.
After Charles Sturt discovered the River Murray in 1830, more interest in Wakefield's scheme followed. One key component of the Wakefield Scheme was that the land price should be set high enough to prevent land speculation. In 1831 a "Proposal to His Majesty's Government for founding a colony on the Southern Coast of Australia" was prepared under the auspices of Gouger, Anthony Bacon, Jeremy Bentham and Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, but its ideas were considered too radical, and it was unable to attract the required investment.
South Australian Land Company
After his first proposal failed, Wakefield published his "Plan of a company to be established for the purpose of founding a colony in Southern Australia, purchasing land therein and preparing the land so purchased for the Reception of Immigrants", and the South Australian Land Company was formed in 1831 to establish a new colony in the area of South Australia. The SALC sought a Royal Charter for the purchase of land for colonisation, which would raise funding for the transport of immigrants, and for the governance of the new colony to be administered by the SALC. The company anticipated that the centre of government would be on Kangaroo Island or at Port Lincoln on the western side of Spencer Gulf, based on reports from Matthew Flinders.However, the scheme, which included free trade, self-government and the power to select the Governor, was not approved as these ideas were considered too radical and republican.
1833–1835
South Australian Association (1833)
In 1833, the South Australian Association was established and began to lobby the government for the establishment of a colony in South Australia, with Crown-appointed governance.Robert Gouger started setting up the South Australian Association from November 1833. Between that time and August 1834, he corresponded with George Grote, Sir Edward Smith-Stanley, Earl of Derby, William Wolryche-Whitmore, Joseph Hume, Liberal MP Sir William Clay, and Charles Shaw-Lefevre. The aim of the association was to bring to fruition the idea of "systematic colonisation", as proposed by Edward Gibbon Wakefield, in the creation of a new colony in South Australia by the British government. The proposal was for a colony that belonged to the Crown but with its administration run by trustees.
The aim of the Association and details of the planned administration of the proposed colony were published on 11 January 1834 in The Spectator:
The members of the South Australian Association were men of varied backgrounds, from philanthropists to merchants, including Wakefield, Robert Gouger, Robert Torrens Sr and George Fife Angas.
The association organised a huge public meeting at Exeter Hall in London on the 30 June 1834, to spread awareness about the proposal for the new province and emigration scheme, chaired by Wolryche-Whitmore. The meeting was attended by more than 2,500 people, including well-known philosophers and social reformers, and the speeches and discussions continued for seven hours. Afterwards the association received hundreds of enquiries from people interested in emigration.
''South Australia Act 1834''
The Association lobbied the British government for years, taking part in numerous negotiations and submitting plans that underwent many modifications. Finally, after intervention by the Duke of Wellington, the bill drafted by the Association and presented by Wolryche-Whitmore was presented to Parliament, which passed the South Australia Act on 15 August 1834. The Act provided for the settlement as the Province of South Australia, for the sale of lands, for funding of the venture, and for governance.South Australian Colonization Commission
The South Australia Act 1834 set out the governance of the new colony by a new body known as the South Australian Colonization Commission, also known as the Colonization Commissioners for South Australia, which would be based in London. However, the Act gave control of the new colony to the Colonial Office as well as the Commissioners, which led to tension between the two and caused problems later.The Act provided that three or more persons could be appointed as Commissioners to be known as Colonization Commissioners for South Australia, to carry out certain parts of the Act. The Commissioners formed a Board, which had responsibilities for:
- the disposal of land;
- an Emigration Fund which for conveying poor emigrants from Great Britain and Ireland to South Australia; and
- appointing a treasurer, assistant surveyors and other officers necessary to carry the Act into execution.
The British government appointed Commissioners to oversee implementation of the Act, to control sales of land and the administration of revenue: thirteen Commissioners were based in London, with a Resident Commissioner appointed by the board and stationed in the colony. Those first appointed, on 5 May 1835, were Colonel Robert Torrens, Rowland Hill, G. Barnes, George Fife Angas, Edward Barnard, William Hutt, J. G. Shaw-Lefevre, William Alexander Mackinnon M.P., Samuel Mills, Jacob Barrow Montefiore, Lt Col George Palmer, and John Wright, representing the Colonial Office.
Administrative power was divided between a Governor, John Hindmarsh, who represented the Crown, and the Resident Commissioner, who reported to the Colonisation Commissioners and who was responsible for the survey and sale of land as well as for organising migration and funding. The first Resident Commissioner was James Hurtle Fisher.
The Commissioner of Public Lands was appointed to act under the orders of the Commissioners. All monies were to be submitted to the Lord of His Majesty's Treasury, and be audited in the same manner as other public accounts. A report was required to be submitted to the Secretary of State at least once a year.
Robert Gouger was Colonial Secretary to the Commission, John Hindmarsh was appointed Governor and William Light Surveyor-General. The Commission was responsible for land sales and for land surveying, including choosing the site for the capital city. However, the Act did not clarify the powers of the Commission vis-à-vis the Governor, which led to discord for some years.