Emigration in search of a husband, 1833 / J. Kendrick

SV/339

fonds

1833

Graphic Materials, Prints

9615852

1 print - etching, hand coloured - 24 x 20.1 cm (sheet)

In the early 1800s, the colonial population in Australia was predominately male, comprising convicts, soldiers and agricultural workers. Recognising the need for more single women in Australia, the Emigration Commission began advertising for women in search of employment, marriage or a new life.

Between 1833-1837, fourteen ships sponsored by the London Emigration Committee departed from England and Ireland as part of a scheme to send female emigrants to Sydney, Hobart and Launceston. About 4000 people, 2700 of them 'bounty women', were assisted to emigrate to Australia during this period.

References:
Library correspondence file
'Shipboard: the 19th century emigrant experience', State Library of New South Wales online story, http://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/stories/shipboard-19th-century-emigrant-experience (accessed 22 November 2018)

1 hand coloured etching of a cartoon satirising the scheme to send female emigrants to Australia to counteract the shortage of women, originally published 10 August 1833. The etching depicts a slender, ragged porter weighed down with a large trunk balanced upon his head with one hand, in conversation with a short, stout, red-faced woman wearing a large bonnet. A notice on the wall in the background reads, 'Emigration of females to Sidney under sanction of Government.' In the caption below, the porter asks the woman, 'What are you going to Sidney for, pray ma'am?' The woman replies, 'Vy they says as how theres lots of good husbands to be had cheap there whereas the brutes in England can't see no charms in a woman unless she's got plenty of money to keep 'em in idleness.'

Out of copyright: Artist died before 1955
Please acknowledge:: Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales

The bottom margin has been trimmed, removing the publishing details, and the title and caption reattached.