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Port Jackson Painter
(fl.17881792)
Five Half-length Portraits of Aborigines c.1790
gouache; 38.5 x 55 cm
T2129 NK144/C
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1788
January
18-20 The First Fleet (eleven ships) arrive
at Botany Bay under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, carrying male
convicts
22 Following a brief
exploration of Port Jackson, Phillip and Captain John Hunter find it to
be a more suitable site for settlement
23 The French frigates
La Boussole and L'Astrolabe, under the command of Jean-François de Galaup,
comte de La Perouse, arrive off Botany Bay
26 Phillip establishes
a settlement at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson The first white child is born
in Australia to Sergeant Thomas Whittle of the marines and his wife
February
6 The first female convicts arrive at Port Jackson. Rioting and debauchery
follow
7 The colony of New South Wales is formally proclaimed. Phillip is sworn
in as Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief
10 The first marriages are solemnised in Australia
11 The Court of Criminal Jurisdiction sits for the first time
17 A number of Aboriginal people are fired upon by a party under the command
of La Perouse
27 A seventeen year old convict, Thomas Barrett, receives the first death sentence in the colony.
A farm is established at Farm Cove under the direction of Henry Dodd
March
6 Lieutenant Philip Gidley King takes formal possession of Norfolk Island. He takes convicts and marines to set up the settlement
10 La Boussole and L'Astrolabe leave Botany Bay, and are never seen again.
The ships are wrecked at Vanikoro (Vanuatu) with no survivors
April
15 Governor Phillip explores northwards to Manly and sights the Blue Mountains
23 Phillip explores the site of Parramatta
May
29 Two convicts are killed by Aboriginal people at Rushcutters Bay
June
5 All cattle, transported with the First Fleet from Cape Town, stray from
the settlement. They are found seven years later
July
1 The Court of Civil Jurisdiction sits for the first time September Sydney's
first road is completed
October
2 Hunter sails for Cape Town in the Sirius for provisions
November
2 A settlement is established at Rose Hill. On 2 June 1791 the settlement
is renamed Parramatta
December
30 Governor Phillip has an Aboriginal man Arabanoo captured so that
he may act as an interpreter
Other
The indigenous population of Australia is estimated at 750,000
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