Cornish Australians
Cornish Australians are citizens of Australia who identify as being of Cornish heritage or descent, an ethnic group native to Cornwall in the United Kingdom.
Cornish Australians form part of the worldwide Cornish diaspora, which also includes large numbers of people in the US, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, Mexico and many Latin American countries. Cornish Australians are thought to make up around 4.3 per cent of the Australian population and are thus one of the largest ethnic groups in Australia and as such are greater than the native population in the UK of just 532,300.
Cornish people first arrived in Australia with Captain Cook, most notably Zachary Hickes, and there were some Cornish convicts on the First Fleet, James Ruse, Mary Bryant, along with several of the early governors. The creation of South Australia, with its emphasis on being free of convicts and religious discrimination, was championed by many Cornish religious dissenting groups and Cornish people comprised a sizeable proportion of settlers to that colony. Large scale Cornish emigration to Australia did not begin until the 1840s, coinciding with the Cornish potato famine and slumps in the Cornish mining industry. The gold rushes and copper booms were major draws on Cornish people, not just from Cornwall itself, but also from other countries where they had previously settled.
In recent years the story of the Lost Children of Cornwall, child migrants sent from Cornwall to Australia up until the early 1970s, has come under intense scrutiny. The practice of sending apparently unwanted or orphaned Cornish children abroad continued long after it had been discredited and had ceased from other areas. It has been the subject of apologies by both the Australian and British prime ministers.
Number of Cornish Australians
A 1996 study by Dr. Charles Price gives the total ethnic strength of Cornish Australians as 269,500 with a total population of 768,100, a number which was roughly 4.3 percent of the Australian population at the time. This is made up by 22,600 of un-mixed origin and 745,500 of mixed origin. This makes the Cornish the fourth largest Anglo-Celtic group in Australia after the English, Irish and Scottish, and the fifth largest ethnic group in Australia.Approximately 10 percent of the population of South Australia, and over 3 percent of Australia as a whole, has significant Cornish ancestry. In the 1986 Australian Census 15,000 people reported their ancestry as Cornish, however, no figure from the 2006 Australian census has been published as to how many reported their ancestry as such in that year.
In 2011 a campaign was launched to increase the number of people writing in their Cornish ancestry on the 2011 Australian Census.
Culture
Festivals
The Cornish who moved to Australia brought with them many festivities and holidays. The most important being at Christmas and Midsummer.- Christmas, amongst other things they would bring greenery inside their houses and sing their traditional carols.
- Midsummer, 24 June, was traditionally celebrated with fire. Cornish Australians used large amounts of fireworks, described as enough to bombard a town, as well as numerous bonfires. It was observed as a general holiday with large numbers of community events also took place, including many sporting events, concerts, parades and tea-treats.
- The Duke of Cornwall's birthday was observed as a general holiday.
- Whit Monday was believed to be a more important celebration than the Queen's birthday.
- St Piran's Day was celebrated during the early days in South Australia.
There have been four Cornish festivals held in the City of Bendigo since 2002. The most recent was held at Eaglehawk in March 2010 and was entitled 'Welcome Back Cousin Jack'.
Food and drink
like the Cornish pasty remains popular in Australia. Former premier of South Australia, Don Dunstan, once took part in a pasty-making contest. Swanky beer and saffron cake were very popular in the past and have been revitalised by Kernewek Lowender and the Cornish Associations.In the 1880s Henry Madren Leggo, whose parents came from St Just, Cornwall, began making vinegar, pickles, sauces, cordials and other grocery goods based on his mother's traditional recipes. His company, now known as Leggo's, is wrongly believed by many to be Italian.
Angove Family Winemakers, formerly Angove's, was founded by Dr W.T. Angove, a Cornish doctor who migrated to South Australia with his family in 1886. He planted vines in the outer Adelaide suburb of Tea Tree Gully, though 125 years on most of its wines are based on Riverland grapes. They have recently started producing wines from their new vineyard purchased in 2002 in McLaren Vale. The distribution company wholesales not only Angove wines and St Agnes Brandy but also Nicolas Feuillatte Champagne and a dozen other companies' wines and spirits.
Matt Wilkinson of Pope Joan in Brunswick East, Melbourne, won the Southern Final of the Great Australian Sandwichship in 2011 with his lunch roll The Cornish which won an award in its category.
Language
The Cornish language is spoken by some enthusiasts in Australia.Members of the Gorsedh Kernow make frequent visits to Australia, and there are a number of Cornish Australian bards.
South Australian Aborigines, particularly the Nunga, are said to speak English with a Cornish accent due to the fact that they were taught English by Cornish miners. Most large towns in South Australia had newspapers at least partially in Cornish dialect. At least 23 Cornish words have made their way into Australian English, these include the mining terms fossick and nugget.
Literature
Not Only in Stone by Phyllis Somerville is the story of emigrant Cornishwoman, Polly Thomas, who faces many trials and tribulations in the pioneering era of South Australia. The book won the South Australian Centenary novel award in 1936.Kangaroo is D. H. Lawrence's semi-autobiographical novel based on his wartime experiences in Cornwall and subsequent visit to Australia.
D. M. Thomas is an internationally renowned Cornish author who spent part of his childhood in Australia, drawing upon his experiences in his work.
Rosanne Hawke is an author of children's books from Kapunda in South Australia.
Bruce Pascoe, who challenged the colonial historical narrative in Dark Emu, has both Cornish and Australian Aboriginal roots.
The Gommock. Exploits of a Cornish Fool in Colonial Australia. is a historical novel by Marie S. Jackman based around the lives of a Cornish emigrant miner Yestin Tregarthy and his wife Charlotte, set at the Burra Burra copper mine in South Australia.
Nobel Prize–winning author Patrick White wrote many novels with Cornish characters and themes. His fifth novel, Voss, includes a character named Laura Trevelyan. A Fringe of Leaves portrays Cornishwoman Ellen Roxburgh née Gluyas shipwrecked on an island and living amongst the aboriginal population.
The celebrated Australian poet John Blight's ancestors arrived in South Australia on the Lisander, in 1851. In the 1987 recording John Blight he describes his Cornish background and its influence on his style.
A true life character was George Hawke. He spent his early life working as a wool stapler for the Allanson family. He was born in St Eval Parish on 2 October 1802 at his father's farm near Bedruthan. Following losses in an economic recession, George decided to emigrate to Australia. His words were recorded in a letter at age 70 years to a nephew back in Cornwall. The letter was later reproduced in full in Yvonne McBurney's book, The Road to Byng.
Art
was a miner and cartoonist, born in Moonta and remembered for his humorous depictions of the lives of Cornish miners. Collections of his work include:- Pryor, Oswald. Australia's little Cornwall, Adelaide, S. Aust.: Rigby, 1962
- Pryor, Oswald. Cousin Jacks and Jennys, Adelaide : Rigby, 1966
- Pryor, Oswald. Cornish pasty : a selection of cartoons, Adelaide : Rigby, 1976
Music
Christmas carols are still traditionally sung in parts of Australia, just like in Grass Valley, California. Cornish Australians have a place in the transnational Cornish carol writing tradition. The Christmas Welcome: A Choice Collection of Cornish Carols, published at Moonta in 1893, was one of several such collections published between 1890 and 1925 from Polperro to Johannesburg. The Cornish also used to decorate their houses with greenery for Christmas, a tradition that was transported with them to Australia.Cornish male voice choirs and brass bands were once a popular part of Cornish Australian culture, but this has waned somewhat.
Religion
Many Cornish settlers in Australia were Methodist and many chapels were built in the places that they settled. Others were Anglican, while few were Roman Catholic. Their Methodism was a badge of distinctive Cornishness and also gave them their trade unionist convictions. Most of the 22000 Wesleyan Methodists, 6000 Primitive Methodists and more than 6000 Bible Christians in South Australia in 1866 were Cornish.Sport
There has been much involvement of Cornish Australians in sport over the years. Many playing rugby and cricket at an international level. This has led to the Cornish chant of "Oggie, Oggie, Oggie, Oi, Oi, Oi," taken on by all Australians as "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie."The Cornish took some of their own sports with them to Australia. Cornish wrestling matches were a regular occurrence, held at festivities throughout the year, particularly Midsummer, Easter and Christmas. Thousands attended these contests, which were sometimes spread over several days and with wrestlers representing different mining regions. There were many Australian champion wrestlers and some of these competed internationally.