How do I add birth place for profiles born in Melbourne pre 1851

Question

I have several family members to enter into Wikitree who were born in Melbourne Australia before 1851. I can not find this place in the birth place list. I assume it would be colony of New South Wales or Port Philip. Is there a way to do this?

Comments

I have grappled with this same question for a while and have decided to follow the following guidelines below for the state of Victoria, Australia was variously known before Federation in 1901 as

* Port Phillip District, of New South Wales, Australia (between 1836 and 1851)

* Colony of Victoria, Australia (between 1851-1901)

* Victoria, Australia (1901 onwards)

Not sure if it is absolutely correct but I  needed to make a decision as we were expanding the Jacka ONS category to cover Australia and wanted to add in subcategories for the different States & Territories of Australia, and I needed to explain what goes where so to speak.

So at an individual profile level, it is good to have them listed as above as it gives some indication as to where records may be located. However, for higher-level examination and study such as in the case of a one-name study, lumping them all together is more appropriate.

see how I dealt with the issue in the Jacka One-Name StTudy recently https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Australia_Victoria%2C_Jacka_Name_Study 

I will be interested to see what others think.

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* Port Phillip District, Colony of New South Wales, Australia (between 1836 and 1851)

* Colony of Victoria, Australia (between 1851-1901)
Australia did not exist until 1901, so drop Australia from the place name ie

* Port Phillip District, Colony of New South Wales

* Colony of Victoria

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Thank you Sandra and Leslie. I will use these three place names (without Australia) as appropriate and try to go back and amend some of the ones I have already entered between 1851 and 1901 for uniformity.

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Thanks Leslie, subtle but important difference that I hadn't really understood. I've updated the category as you've suggested.

Answer 1

Hello Dee, you can definitely ignore the birth place list that comes up when you enter places and enter it as you think it should be.  

I often use Wikipedia articles or other sources to get a bit of an idea, what places were named, when.

The article for Melbourne, indicates it was named Melbourne on 10 April 1837 but you are right would have still been in the Port Philip District which would have still been in the Colony of New South Wales.

If you have anyone earlier than that, it looks like it was briefly named Batmania, and before that Dootigala still under the Colony of New South Wales.

Comments

Thank you John, good advice. The birth registrations in this case are after 1844 and Melbourne is the place name so I think Melbourne, Port Philip District is what I will use.

Answer 2

For category I still use [[Melbourne, Victoria]].

In the location field I use one of the following as appropriate.

* Port Phillip District, of New South Wales, Australia (between 1836 and 1851)

* Colony of Victoria, Australia (between 1851-1901)

* Victoria, Australia (1901 onwards)