A History of the Port Phillip District: Victoria Before Separation by A G L Shaw

Book Description

Secondhand. Very good condition. Minor wear to book corners and edges. Light foxing to foredges. Dust jacket has light creasing at edges and some fading to spine. Now enclosed in protective cover. Interior and binding are also very good.

This book recounts the establishment of European settlement in what is now the State of Victoria. The period from the first temporary convict camp of 1803 to the formal separation of Victoria from New South Wales in 1851 encompassed years of struggle, adversity and uncertainty.

These are the years which Professor Shaw examines in his detailed narrative, years which saw the future of the territory shaped by diverse figures: Aborigines, whalers, adventurers, squatters, speculators and immigrants.

This is the first general history of pre-goldrush Victoria in more than ninety years. It incorporates advances in documentation and scholarship since then. In particular, it draws upon the correspondence between officials in Melbourne, Sydney and London, and on the Batman, Swanston, Port Phillip Association and La Trobe papers.

The story begins with the British government's decision to make a settlement on the shores of Bass Strait, and with a study of the Aboriginal inhabitants of Port Phillip as they were at the dawn of the nineteenth century. An account of Melbourne's beginnings, marked by the arrival of John Batman and John Pascoe Fawkner, leads to topics of squatting, speculation, immigration, economic depression and recovery, and ends with an examination of the issues that led to the district's separation from New South Wales.

The book is illustrated in colour with contemporary paintings, many of which will be unfamiliar to most readers. (book flap)