Port Lincoln as Site for Capital

In this new series of articles, Mr. J. D. Somerville traces the outstanding events in the colonisation of South Australia, more particularly where they concern Port Lincoln, which was freely mentioned at a suitable site for the capital.

So early at 1803 or 1804, New South Wales made an attempt to establish a settlement in what is now known as South Australia, principally to frustrate any French effort to settle on the southern coast. Grimes, of the Survey Department, who inspected Kangaroo Island [actually King Island - ed.], reported unfavorably ; if his report had been satisfactory, it is most likely convicts would have been landed on the island. 

Collins, with his ships and the convicts under his charge, was sent to Port Phillip instead. 

For over a quarter of a century, no further attempt was made, then the southern coast of Australia came into prominence. Edward Gibbon Wakefield had proposed a new scheme for the colonisation of a new district. His ideas were that a high price for land should be demanded, and that the monetary returns for the land sold should be devoted to the introduction of laborers into the new area. By these means, the land would be held by the more or less wealthy who should have sufficient money and labor to improve and work their properties. At the same time the high price would prevent purchasers getting too large a holding which they would be unable to work. (In Western Australia a grant of 500,000 acres is said to have been made to one individual). The high price of land would also de-bar the laborers from becoming land holders, without means to permit them to satisfactorily work their possessions. 

About that time, that was the position in Western Australia, where land was so cheap that laborers were able to acquire land, but could not work it, and the wealthier land holders were unable to get labor to work their larger estates. 

I am indebted to Dr. A. Grenfell Price's book, " Foundation and settlement of South Australia." This book is full of data, relating to the early days of South Australia, gleaned from many sources, and that, together with the masterly way he has treated the subject, makes the book well worth reading. Most of the following particulars of the inauguration of the scheme of colonisation up to the time of the despatch of the first boat are from Dr. Price's book ; the particulars are not a full narration of the settlement of South Australia, but only sufficient to make the history of Eyre Peninsula intelligible. 

HOSTILITY TO SCHEME 

Dr. Price says: " For five years, 1830-1834, the theorists struggled to overcome the apathy or antagonism of the British people and Government. They formed societies and planned companies. They published pamphlets and books. They organised meetings and lecture tours." 

Wakefield had been imprisoned from 1827 to 1830 for an abduction, and runaway marriage. During his imprisonment he gave much thought to this plan of colonisation, which was first made public in 1829. Wakefield subsequently stated that the plan had been adopted by three different associations, the Colonisation Society of 1830, the South Australian Land Company of 1831-2, and lastly the South Australian Association of 1833-4. Further he said he was instrumental in forming those societies, and for the most part responsible for the pamphlets, books and advertisements in connection with them during the years 1829-1834. 

It's said that Wakefield had written a pamphlet, "Sketch of a proposal for colonisation in Australia," and in July 1829, Robert Gouger sent it to the Colonial Office. The project was unfavorably received. Although times were hard, the English Government did not wish to encourage emigration. 

In 1830, the National Colonisation Society was formed, with Gouger as secretary, to carry out the ideas formulated by Wakefield. According to Dr. Price, the first plan for the settlement is dated December, 1830, and he says, " if it is authentic, it is earlier than any of the proposals in the British Colonial office, and is the earliest document known referring to South Australia as the site of the Wakefield experiment." 

A later English administration felt the justice of the arguments enumerated by Wakefield, and in consequence the land laws of Western Australia and Van Diemen's Land were altered in January, 1831, by abolishing land grants. Through this alteration, the Hentys, as we have seen, were debarred from getting a large area of land in the latter colony. 

CAPITAL ON YORKE PENINSULA 

Bacon in February, 1831, submitted a scheme, not on Wakefield's lines, but for raising funds by public subscription for transporting laborers, putting the capital somewhere on Yorke Peninsula, but with Port Lincoln as the chief seaport. He apparently did not amplify his proposal by saying how his scheme for the capital on one peninsula and the seaport on another; would work. This separation of capital and seaport was a bone of contention in the selection of the site of Adelaide, and caused bitter strife among the early settlers, even though only six miles separated two proposed sites. 

Probably trying to force the hands of the Government, an advertisement appeared in the 'Spectator' of October 31, 1831, asserting that the Government had given sanction to the project. An immediate notification to the contrary was sent by Lord Howick to Major Bacon, and at the same time gave some advice about the procedure to be adopted before a draft of a charter company was submitted. 

In that year a strong and influential committee was formed in England for establishing a chartered company to carry out the scheme in South Australia. This company was probably known as the ' Chartered Joint Stock Land Company.' Wakefield and Gouger were not included on that committee. A Mr. Whitmore M.P. was the chairman. Under the auspices of this committee, evidence was collected of the suitability of South Australia as a place where the experiment could be made, and we have seen in a previous article some of the evidence collected as it affected Eyre Peninsula. The committee had gathered a large body of people who agreed to settle in the intended colony. However, the negotiations with the Government failed; the charter was not granted and the people were scattered far and wide. The project was abandoned for the time being. 

In connection with this scheme, the South Australian land company issued a publication with the cumbersome title of " Plan of a company to be established for the purpose of founding a colony in South Australia, purchasing land therein and preparing the land so purchased for the reception of emigrants"; published by Ridgway & Son in 1831. This company had as early as 1831 proposed the formation of a settlement at or near Port Lincoln. 

FLINDERS NOT KEEN

In that year very little information was available about South Australia. Flinders was not enthusiastic about Port Lincoln as a site for a settlement ; he rather favored Kangaroo Island. The opinion of the French, expedition, voiced by Peron and Freycinet, was quite the reverse. Gould and Dillon had spoken highly of Port Lincoln. Sutherland was enamored with Kangaroo Island, but he had not seen Port Lincoln. Some of Sturt's views of the Murray and Encounter Bay had arrived in England before the publication of the first pamphlet. Barker had discovered the harbor, now known as Port Adelaide, in 1831, but the results of his explorations were unknown in England, and probably were not known until two or three years later. Another three years had to pass by ere Jones rediscovered the same harbor. 

Some of Sturt's views were used by Wakefield in a memorandum, marked ' the first papers etc.' dated December, 1830. In this paper it is stated that the site of the colony was to be St. Vincent's Gulf, the new site chosen being due to the news just to hand that " a magnificent river had just been discovered by Capt. Sturt, which falls into the sea at Gulf St. Vincent." In another plan of May, 1831, Gouger quotes Lardner's cyclopedia in connection with Sturt's trip down the Murray. In this plan the site of the colony was fixed on the coast of Southern Australia, as nearly as might be found expedient opposite Kangaroo Island 

(To Be Continued.)