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| The
Europeans |
| in
Australia |
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Chinese
and Asians have
arrived in Australia many times in early XV century, a
long time before any European landed in Terra Australis.
They came to dive collecting sea cucumbers, a precious
food at the time, the Australian cucumber was much
bigger than the Chinese ones. The Spanish people has
also been around the south of
New Guinea, but this is not confirmed if they had
landed at Cape York or not, but a good sign is that
Torres Strait was named honouring the Spanish navigator
Luis Vaez de Torres. At this time, the Australian
population was composed for about half million of
Aborigines, 10 million Kangaroos, 5 million Koalas, 2
million poisonous snakes, the same amount of lizards,
and billions of noisy lorikeets.
After
the Dutchman Abel Tasman
landed two times and called Australia Van Dieman's Land
(today Tasmania) and the Englishman Willian Dampier went
back to England saying all bad things about Australia
(it is all desert, ugly women, etc), England lost
interest in Australia, and it stayed for more than 70
years that way. So Aborigines, Kangaroos, and poisonous
snakes kept happily doing what they used to do (eating
themselves). Until one day when the Frenchman Marion
Dufresne started to show interest in the West of
Australia. At this time, Captain Cook had already
claimed the East side, having also mapped the coast and
part of the inland country, besides naming many areas
such as Botany Bay in New South Wales. But they stopped
for there, and Australia was abandoned until more or
less the year of 1786 when someone in England had the
idea to send prisoners and order them to work. The
colony, (or the beginning of it), had that to be
self-sufficient, and do not give any other expenditures
to England.
The
disaster was done
because nobody wanted to work. Aborigines left to the
north, and the prisoners just wanted to drink. The
Northfolk Island turned to be a maximum-security prison
to the laziness, until they changed the
"Mariners" for the ones called "New South
Wales Corps". One of the functions of these new
governing was to control the buzz and the commerce of
Rum. So now on if they work they will get the buzz
otherwise they will drink only water preferable salty
water. One more time the governor was substituted, and
William Bligh (well known Captain of the Bounty)
replaced the position, but soon after he left with the
"Rum Rebellion" in 1808. This revolt was
caused by the amount of rum the lower floor people could
receive was not enough. The new governor Lachlan
Macquarie, took the control with a whip, and progress
the settling per 21 years ahead. Prisoners kept coming,
but now they were from people with light convictions
such as chicken thieves and prostitutes. The fact is
these group of people was not very skilled or have any
ability (except the prostitutes) and therefore every
work delayed excessively to be builded, apart of the
brothels. The houses were completely out of alignment,
especially after a certain amount of Rum.
But
the Frenchmen
were still wondering about Australia, and therefore
England had to effectively take the continent and start
a new villages and cities as fast as possible. The order
was to go inland and settled down. Many people died in
this attempt not knowing that when leaving the coastal
area in Australia, everywhere else is just a desert.
Few people had survived, and John Forrest and
Ernest Giles are considered heroes of the settlings,
crossing Australia from one side to the other without
becoming well done BBQ (more than 4000 km desert
crossing). Once knowing how Australia was, many other
expeditions and mappings were done, allowing the
construction of ports in different parts of the country.
These ports became the colony capitals and than later
cities. Meanwhile, the price of Wool in the
international market increased so much that a lot of
English farmers decided to move to Australia to breed
sheep. With the starting of new technologies, such as
refrigerated cargos, many kilos of delicious lamb were
exported internationally..
The next big thing was the discovery of a large amount
of gold in Australia, calling worldwide attention. This
fact attracted many adventurers from everywhere, and not
only Europeans came, but again a large amount of people
from Asian. But at this stage, Australia had already
residents, a government and economy that means, it was
already settled.
Note:
A chronological continuation of this page can be found
at this same section with the Immigrants topic and many
other important facts are in the history
page.
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When
I arrived in Australia there was a strong
competition.
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