Early Settlement in Australia

The settlement of the Australian colonies in the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries could hardly be described as "harmonious experiments in colonization". The period of Australian history from 1788 until the 1820s was fraught with unanticipated difficulties, forcing the colonists and convicts to struggle for their very survival. Some of the problems that emerged within the colonies of New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land concerned very basic matters such as insufficient food supplies and the keeping of general law and order. Other areas in which the colonials struggled included the development of a workable internal economy, and the managing of relations between the social classes, and between the white settlers and the indigenous people of Australia, the Aborigines. These problems and the lengthy fight for solutions created environments in the colonies that were far from harmonious.

There were some motivations for colonising Australia which may be considered experimental. James Cook, after his famous voyage to Australia, had reported to the Admiralty that he had discovered an abundance of tall pine trees which would make excellent masts for the British fleet. These trees flourished on Norfolk Island, and of equal interest, so did the flax plant, upon which the British navy depended for their ships' sails and cordage. These plans eventually were undone, due to Cook's exaggeration of the amount and acce

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f secondary punishment was designed to discourage escape attempts. But the remoteness of the various outposts cut the early inhabitants off from supplies. The colonists of New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land battled in vain to establish law and order. Over a thousand convicted felons had arrived with the First Fleet. According to Russel Ward, "about three quarters of them (the First Fleet passengers) were convicts, men, women and children; many were aged or infirm, and nearly all unwilling to work. The remainder were mainly Marine Corps officers and men, sent out as a guard . . ." (Ward 1992, 52-3) The largely uneducated status of the newcomers, their criminal persuasion, and their disregard for law and order led to a good deal of petty crime, violent brawls and generally uncivilised behaviour in the New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land colonies. But the isolation of the island colony was by far the most alarming threat to law and order in the Tasmanian settlement. The grave imbalance between the sexes (one in every six or seven people were female, according to Russel Ward (1992, 53) created a male-dominated society, which was no place for children, and which moulded a certain crudeness into the characters of many of its inh
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Approximate Word count = 1732
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)

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