Early Colonial Settlements and Immigration
- British Settlement
- After 1788, Australia began as a penal colony, but by the 1820s free settlers arrived seeking land and opportunity.
- New Zealand Settlement
- Initially driven by missionaries and traders, formal colonization followed after the Treaty of Waitangi (1840).
- Government-Assisted Migration
- British authorities subsidized emigration for poor workers and families under settlement schemes.
- Push Factors
- Industrialization, unemployment, and rural poverty in Britain encouraged migration.
- Pull Factors
- The promise of cheap land, gold rushes (1850s), and social mobility attracted thousands from Britain, Ireland, and later Europe and China.
Definition
Penal Colony
- Settlement used to exile prisoners from the mother country.Penal Colony
Definition
Gold Rush
- Mass migration following discovery of gold (e.g., Victoria 1851, Otago 1861).
Land Distribution and the Growth of Pastoral Society
- Large Land Grants
- Wealthy settlers (often ex-officers or officials) received vast estates for sheep and cattle ranching.
- Pastoralism
- Economy based on wool and livestock became central to both colonies; “Australia rode on the sheep’s back.”
- Squatters:
- Unofficial settlers who occupied large tracts of Crown land without legal titles; later gained legitimacy.
- Crown Lands and Selection Acts:
- Governments introduced Selection Acts (1860s) allowing smaller farmers to purchase land, though squatters often used loopholes to keep control.
