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This series focuses on Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific region from the arrival of European seafarers and missionaries to the early twentieth century. Contemporary accounts document the gradual development of the European settlements from penal colonies and whaling stations to thriving communities of farmers, miners and traders with fully-fledged administrative and legal systems. Particularly noteworthy are the descriptions of the indigenous peoples of the various islands, their customs and their differing interactions with the European settlers.

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107 results in Cambridge Library Collection - History of Oceania

Page 2 of 6

A Voyage Round the World, in the Years 1800, 1801, 1802, 1803, and 1804
  • In Which the Author Visited Madeira, the Brazils, Cape of Good Hope, the English Settlements of Botany Bay and Norfolk Island, and the Principal Islands in the Pacific Ocean
  • John Turnbull
  • Published online:
    05 September 2014
    Print publication:
    22 August 2013
    First published in:
    1805
  • This nineteenth-century travelogue documents John Turnbull's five-year journey around the world. Turnbull (fl. 1799–1813), a sailor in the merchant service, set out from Portsmouth in 1800 with the original purpose of pursuing trade in north-west Asia. In his ship, the Margaret, he sailed via Madeira and around the Cape of Good Hope. Setting aside his trading plans, he went on to explore Pacific territories, including Australia, Norfolk Island and the Society Islands. This book records his observations throughout, and also includes an appendix featuring Turnbull's account of his time in New Zealand. His notes from the voyage were first published in 1805, and an abridged version appeared a year later. This expanded edition was published in 1813. Popular at the time due to growing public interest in the Antipodes, A Voyage Round the World is a fascinating memoir of ship life and English exploration of the Pacific in the early nineteenth century.

A Narrative of the Expedition to Botany Bay
  • With an Account of New South Wales, its Productions, Inhabitants, etc.
  • Watkin Tench
  • Published online:
    05 March 2014
    Print publication:
    26 September 2013
    First published in:
    1789
  • In May 1787, eleven ships left England with more than seven hundred convicts on board, along with orders to establish a penal colony at Botany Bay, New South Wales. Watkin Tench (c.1758–1833) was a crew member on one of the ships of this First Fleet, the Charlotte, and he recalls the voyage and early days of the settlement in this vivid and engaging account, first published in 1789. The first half of the work retraces the route of the six-month journey, which took the fleet to Brazil and the Cape of Good Hope. The later chapters recount the landing at Botany Bay in January 1788, the establishment of a colony at nearby Port Jackson and observations about the natural world in this new settlement. Tench also discusses the initial interaction with the Aboriginal people, making this work an important source for scholars of British colonialism and Australian history.

State Experiments in Australia and New Zealand
  • Volume 1
  • William Pember Reeves
  • Published online:
    05 March 2014
    Print publication:
    04 May 2011
    First published in:
    1902
  • William Pember Reeves' scholarly work of 1902 provides a full and candid account of radical and experimental laws in Australia and New Zealand. From the Anti-Chinese Acts of 1881 to the adoption of the women's franchise by the Commonwealth Parliament in Australia in 1902, the two volumes survey all noteworthy laws and statutes, addressing colonial questions of the time. Well-known for his history of New Zealand, The Long White Cloud (1898), the statesman Reeves (1857–1932) draws attention to admitted defects or failures in the laws without imposing his personal political views on the reader. Volume 1 sets out the historical background of Australasia, and covers such areas as the Progressive Movement, the women's franchise and issues concerning land laws. Overall, the two volumes represent an important record of the many reforms and changes occurring in the political and social systems of the continent at this time.

Narrative of Some Passages in the History of Van Diemen's Land
  • During the Last Three Years of Sir John Franklin's Administration of its Government
  • John Franklin
  • Published online:
    05 June 2013
    Print publication:
    02 August 2012
    First published in:
    1845
  • The famous explorer of the Arctic region, Sir John Franklin (1786–1847) was appointed Governor of the penal colony of Tasmania (then known as Van Diemen's Land) in 1837. At first enthusiastically welcomed by the free colonists of the island, Franklin quickly became embroiled in political and administrative difficulties, and his compassion for convicts and aboriginals alike was incompatible with his duties. In 1843, colonial officials loyal to his predecessor succeeded in getting Franklin recalled by sending damaging accounts of his conduct to London. This pamphlet was Franklin's defence of his own character against these misrepresentations, but he was not to see his reputation recovered. He completed the book on 15 May 1845, just days before he departed on another Arctic expedition to search for the North-West Passage. Franklin and his entire crew died on the journey, and only many years later was the tragic fate of the expedition discovered.

The Felonry of New South Wales
  • Being a Faithful Picture of the Real Romance of Life in Botany Bay
  • James Mudie
  • Published online:
    05 June 2013
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1837
  • In 1822, an ambitious but bankrupt mariner named James Mudie arrived in Australia. With the support and patronage of the Colonial Office he was appointed justice of the peace and went on to acquire a reputation as one of the harshest and most brutal magistrates in New South Wales. Published in 1837, as a gesture of protest against Sir Richard Burke's relative leniency, Mudie's account of the 'social, moral and political condition' of the penal colony terrified British readers. Using dramatic imagery and anecdotes to support his argument, the author recommends a three-pronged attack on the 'depraved appetites and vicious courses' of convicts. Advocating strict discipline, the subjection of the will of the prisoner to that of the master, and 'religious impression', Mudie's treatise reveals not only the challenges facing nineteenth-century magistrates, but also the brutal treatment that awaited those whose punishment began with transportation to Australasia.

Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, during the Years 1837, 38, and 39
  • Volume 2
  • George Grey
  • Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    23 February 2012
    First published in:
    1841
  • Educated at Sandhurst, Sir George Grey (1812–98) became Governor of South Australia when he was not yet thirty. Later he served as Governor of New Zealand and High Commissioner for South Africa, and in the 1870s he enjoyed a period as premier of New Zealand. Although he liked to portray himself as 'good Governor Grey', some of his contemporaries found him ruthless and manipulative. Like many other Victorian administrators, he was convinced that the 'savage' natives needed to be 'improved' in order to become more like Europeans. In this 1841 publication, Grey writes about two expeditions to North-West Australia that took place under his leadership in 1837–9. Both expeditions encountered difficulties, and Grey himself was seriously wounded. In Volume 2, Grey focuses on the language and culture of the native Australians, and reveals his plans for 'raising' the Aborigines to what he regards a 'civilised' level.

Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, during the Years 1837, 38, and 39
  • Volume 1
  • George Grey
  • Published online:
    05 February 2013
    Print publication:
    23 February 2012
    First published in:
    1841
  • Educated at Sandhurst, Sir George Grey (1812–98) became Governor of South Australia when he was not yet thirty. Later he served as Governor of New Zealand and High Commissioner for South Africa, and in the 1870s he enjoyed a period as Premier of New Zealand. Although he liked to portray himself as 'good Governor Grey' some of his contemporaries found him ruthless and manipulative. Like many other Victorian administrators, he was convinced that the 'savage' natives needed to be 'raised' properly in order to become more like Europeans. In this 1841 publication, Grey writes about two expeditions to North–West Australia that took place under his leadership in 1837–9. In Volume 1, he tells of the difficulties that the expedition encountered while seeking a site for settlement, including an incident when the spear of a 'coloured man' wounded him and he shot the 'wretched savage'.

The King Country, or, Explorations in New Zealand
  • A Narrative of 600 miles of Travel through Maoriland
  • James Henry Kerry-Nicholls
  • Published online:
    05 December 2012
    Print publication:
    22 December 2011
    First published in:
    1884
  • Originally published in 1884, this work by the relatively unknown 'gentleman explorer' James Henry Kerry-Nicholls (d. 1888) focuses on nineteenth-century New Zealand. It recounts the journey into what he describes as terra incognita, the area known as the King Country, almost exclusively Maori and little explored by Europeans due to political difficulties and Maori hostility. Travelling with only three horses and what he could carry on them, and accompanied by an interpreter, he endeavoured to cover and accurately record details of an area totalling 10,000 square miles; owing to good contacts, he was even able to meet Maori King Tawhiao. Writing in what now seems an imperialist style, he recounts a history of Maori–European relations, notes potential sites for European settlement, includes geographical surveys and descriptions of the landscapes, and supplies a map which gives the 'most complete chart of the interior of the North Island as yet published'.

Australia Twice Traversed
  • The Romance of Exploration
  • Volume 1
  • Ernest Giles
  • Published online:
    05 November 2012
    Print publication:
    03 November 2011
    First published in:
    1889
  • Ernest Powell Giles (1835–97) is best remembered as one of the first explorers of South Australia. Powell emigrated to Australia with his parents in 1850, settling in Adelaide. From 1861 he was leading small-scale expeditions along the Darling River, searching for land suitable for cultivation. Following the completion of the Overland Telegraph Line between Adelaide and Darwin in 1872, Powell embarked on five expeditions attempting to discover an overland route between Adelaide and Perth. These volumes, first published in 1889, provide a detailed and dramatic account of his discoveries. Based on Powell's personal journals, these volumes describe in vivid detail the hardships and dangers of exploration in Australia in the nineteenth century, while providing an evocative description of the South Australian landscape before colonisation. Volume 1 contains Powell's account of his first two unsuccessful expeditions of 1872 and 1873, including his discovery of the Gibson Desert and Lake Amadeus.

The Discovery and Settlement of Port Mackay, Queensland
  • Henry Ling Roth
  • Published online:
    05 November 2012
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1908
  • Port Mackay is a district of Queensland, Australia, best known for its production of cane sugar. It was first settled in the 1860s, when John Mackay (1839–1914) successfully completed a mission to claim farmland and introduce agriculture there. First published in 1908, this study by the businessman and keen amateur anthropologist Henry Ling Roth (1855–1925) explores the district's history, tracing its development from an uncharted territory barely noticed by early European explorers to a burgeoning community that profited from its ideal conditions for cultivation. Drawing on extensive notes from his visits to the region over thirty years, as well as some fascinating anecdotal accounts from settlers, Roth explores the achievements of Port Mackay's early colonists in agriculture, industry and sea trading. The book contains maps and photographs, and includes a short account of the local Aboriginal population, and substantial notes on natural history and sporting pursuits.

The Journals of John McDouall Stuart during the Years 1858, 1859, 1860, 1861, and 1862
  • When He Fixed the Centre of the Continent and Successfully Crossed It from Sea to Sea
  • John McDouall Stuart
  • Edited by William Hardman
  • Published online:
    05 November 2012
    Print publication:
    03 November 2011
    First published in:
    1864
  • John McDouall Stuart (1815–66) was a surveyor and a pioneering explorer of Australia. Born in Scotland, he emigrated in 1839 to Australia where he worked in surveying and made many expeditions into the outback. The treks he undertook from 1858 to 1862 are the focus of this account, published in 1864, and are compiled from Stuart's notes by William Hardman (1828–90). During these periods of exploration he managed - though suffering from scurvy - to cross the continent, and he also discovered various rivers and geographical features. Hardman's account uses Stuart's journals to give an account of six historic and often gruelling expeditions. The first was to the north-west; the following two were explorations around Lake Torrens; the fourth was an attempt to find the centre of the territory; a fifth involved a forced retreat after an aboriginal attack; and in the final one Stuart traversed the continent.

Journal of an Overland Expedition in Australia, from Moreton Bay to Port Essington
  • A Distance of Upwards of 3000 Miles, during the Years 1844–1845
  • Ludwig Leichhardt
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1847
  • Published in 1847, this is a fascinating account by the Prussian explorer Ludwig Leichhardt of his 3,000-mile expedition from north to south across Australia, from 1844 to 1846. One of the most authoritative early recorders of Australia's environment, Leichhardt was also the best trained naturalist to explore Australia during this time. The expedition departed on 1 October 1844 from Jimbour, the farthest outpost of settlement on the Queensland Darling Downs. Leichhhardt describes in detail the difficulties his party encountered from the very start, the extreme weather conditions they battled, the kindness of the people they met and his close observations of the habits of the aborigines. He also presents detailed analysis of his findings of natural phenomena. After travelling nearly 3,000 miles, Leichhardt arrived in Sydney on 25 March 1846 to a hero's welcome. Engaging and historically revealing, the volume will capture the imagination of the modern reader.

New Zealand
  • Being a Narrative of Travels and Adventures during a Residence in that Country between the Years 1831 and 1837
  • Volume 1
  • J. S. Polack
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    24 November 2011
    First published in:
    1838
  • J. S. Polack (1807–82) lived in New Zealand during 1831–7 and 1842–50. An enterprising businessman and land speculator, he traded in timber and flax, and in 1835 set up the first brewery in the country. He also learned the Maori language, and warned against the destructive effects on Maori society of unorganized European settlement, while arguing for the benefits of systematic colonization. This two-volume work, published in 1838, was the first of two successful books by Polack about his experiences in New Zealand and is still regarded as an important and impartial source about the period immediately preceding the Treaty of Waitangi. Volume 1 outlines the discovery of the islands, their climate, geology, topography and fauna. It contains vivid descriptions of the Maori and their customs (including an account of an energetic haka) and details about family life, social status, food, tapu prohibitions, dress, and tattooing.

A Narrative of a Nine Months' Residence in New Zealand in 1827
  • Together with a Journal of a Residence in Tristan D'Acunha, an Island Situated between South America and the Cape of Good Hope
  • Augustus Earle
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    24 November 2011
    First published in:
    1832
  • Augustus Earle (1793–1838) was a professional watercolour artist specialising in colonial themes. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from the age of thirteen and in 1815 travelled to the Mediterranean. He spent the next fifteen years touring the world and in 1832, when this book was published, was briefly employed by Darwin on H.M.S. Beagle, though he left that expedition in Montevideo owing to ill health. The first part of the book describes Earle's experiences in New Zealand, where he observed in detail the lifestyle of the pre-colonial Maori and the early European settlers. The second part tells how in 1824 Earle, travelling from Rio to Cape Town, found himself left behind on the Atlantic island of Tristan da Cunha and spent eight months sharing the simple life of the tiny British community there and tutoring their children until finally a rare passing ship took him on board.

Savage Life and Scenes in Australia and New Zealand
  • Being an Artist's Impressions of Countries and People at the Antipodes
  • Volume 1
  • George French Angas
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1847
  • George French Angas (1822–86) gave up a career in business to become an artist, and his interest in natural history and ethnology is apparent throughout his work. In the early 1840s he travelled to Australia and New Zealand. His paintings from this period were later exhibited and formed the basis of two important large-format books of lithographs that appeared in 1849, having been announced in this two-volume 1847 account of his travels. Volume 1 documents Angas' expeditions in South Australia, a colony his father helped to found. Angas accompanied William Giles into the Murray basin and George Grey along the south-east coast, and his observations include detailed descriptions of the way of life of the Aboriginal tribes there. The book continues with Angas' voyage to Wellington, with views of Taranaki and the Kaikouras, his first impressions of the Maori (including a haka), and his onward journey to Auckland.

A Lady's Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia in 1852–53
  • Ellen Clacy
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1853
  • Mrs Charles (Ellen) Clacy (1830–1901) was a clergyman's daughter who, in 1852, travelled to the Australian goldfields. Published in 1853, on her return to England, this work, the first edition of which sold out almost immediately, is essentially a guide for prospective emigrants. It includes, within the lively narrative, practical advice on the cost of living, the labour market, gold-digging regulations, and marriage prospects. Mrs Clacy published several subsequent books, but her life remains obscure. Research suggests an illegitimate pregnancy or an absconding husband, unmentioned in the upbeat and respectable narrative, but possibly echoed by the highly coloured 'tale' of an anonymous emigrant woman, whose lover (twice) leaves her pregnant at the altar to go to the goldfields, with tragic consequences. However this relates to Mrs Clacy's actual circumstances, her writing vividly depicts the mixture of opportunity and hazard in nineteenth-century Australia, illuminating the country's early social history.

Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia, and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound, in the Years 1840–1
  • Volume 2
  • Edward John Eyre
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1845
  • In 1832, aged just seventeen, the future colonial governor Edward John Eyre (1815–1901) set sail from London for Australia. The farming life that awaited him laid the foundations of an enduring interest in the topography, anthropology and zoology of his adopted homeland. Following an initial expedition in 1839, in 1840 Eyre set out on his pioneering trek from Adelaide to Western Australia. The year-long adventure financially ruined the explorer, but won him the coveted gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society for discovering Lake Torrens. Published in 1845, this two-volume account of the expedition made Eyre a household name in Britain and fuelled popular interest in the former penal colony. Volume 2 leads readers through various dramatic episodes including the plundering of the camp, a 'night of horrors', forced marches, and hunting kangaroos. It concludes with a fascinating account of the celebratory aborigine reception that awaited the survivors.

Australia Twice Traversed
  • The Romance of Exploration
  • Volume 2
  • Ernest Giles
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    03 November 2011
    First published in:
    1889
  • Ernest Powell Giles (1835–97) is best remembered as one of the first explorers of South Australia. Powell emigrated to Australia with his parents in 1850, settling in Adelaide. From 1861 he was leading small-scale expeditions along the Darling River, searching for land suitable for cultivation. Following the completion of the Overland Telegraph Line between Adelaide and Darwin in 1872, Powell embarked on five expeditions attempting to discover an overland route between Adelaide and Perth. These volumes, first published in 1889, provide a detailed and dramatic account of his discoveries. Based on Powell's personal journals, these volumes describe in vivid detail the hardships and dangers of exploration in Australia in the nineteenth century, while providing an evocative description of the South Australian landscape before colonisation. Volume 2 deals with Powell's expeditions in 1874 and 1875, including his discovery of the Great Victoria Desert and his return journey.

Recollections of Travel in New Zealand and Australia
  • James Coutts Crawford
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    24 November 2011
    First published in:
    1880
  • Having decided to try his fortune in the new colonies of South Australia and New Zealand, budding geologist James Coutts Crawford (1817–89) landed at Sydney in 1838 and lost no time in buying and driving a herd of cattle from Braidwood, New South Wales, to Adelaide, a distance of more than three hundred miles of unfamiliar territory. This remarkable journey proved typical of the rest of his travels, during which he served variously as explorer, translator, and sheriff of Wellington. This book, which includes illustrations and maps, is his own record of his experiences, first published in 1880. Even at that time, New Zealand and Australia had changed radically since Crawford's first arrival in the earliest, minimal colonies; today, his account offers not only a fascinating insight into the difficulties and dangers of life there, but a useful source for students and researchers in history and geology.

Explorations in Australia
  • I–Explorations in Search of Dr Leichardt and Party. II–From Perth to Adelaide, around the Great Australian Bight. III–From Champion Bay, across the Desert to the Telegraph and to Adelaide
  • John Forrest
  • Published online:
    05 October 2012
    Print publication:
    08 November 2011
    First published in:
    1875
  • John Forrest (1847–1918), was an Australian surveyor and explorer. At twenty-two, he led an expedition to determine the fate of Ludwig Leichardt, who had earlier disappeared in the western desert. The following year he surveyed the coastal route from Perth to Adelaide, establishing the possibility of a telegraph line. In 1874, he crossed the central western desert, a two-thousand mile journey which confirmed his heroic reputation. He received the founder's medal of the Royal Geographical Society in London and was appointed Deputy Surveyor-General. His account of these expeditions, published in 1875, is based on his diaries, with extracts from official letters and the newspapers that covered the events. Forrest became Premier of Western Australia, held several positions under the subsequent federal government, and was the first native-born Australian to be recommended for a barony. This book thus illuminates the political history of Australia and that of its geographical exploration.

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