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Germans immigrants in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland

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Date: 1788 to 1900
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Contents

Introduction

German speaking immigrants played a significant role in the Colonies of New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland.

Colony of New South Wales (1788-1901)

1830s
By the early 1830s, many landowners were experimenting with wine-production, and the specialised skills for wine-making (e.g. vine-dressers, barrel-makers etc.) were not available in the Colony. The Macarthur family asked for special permission to bring in immigrants from the European continent. In 1838, Edward Macarthur brought six wine-growers and their families from Hattenheim near Eltville in the Duchy of Nassau to improve the family vineyards.

The six men - Caspar Flick (1802-1885), Frederick (Sickold) Seckold, Georg Gerhard, Johann Justus, Johann Stein and Johann Wenz arrived with their families on the Kinnear in 1838.[1][2] They brought with them the first Riesling grape cuttings to Australia. Later the Macarthurs distributed vine cuttings from vineyards established with these cuttings throughout New South Wales and South Australia.[3]

List of ships

1840s-1850s
 By the 1840s, the colony of New South Wales suffered from a significant labour and skills shortage. In particular, skilled British labour was not available for the cultivation of vines, olives and silk. Large scale German immigration to New South Wales started in the late 1840s due primarily to the activities of William Kirchner who was the Hamburg Consul in Sydney in 1847 and William Westgarth, a leading Melbourne merchant who arrived from Scotland in 1840. Kirchner proposed a bounty scheme that would provide for subsidised German migration to solve the labour shortage, particularly in relation to vine cultivation. This followed an earlier government decision to approve the entry of European workers for these specialised fields. The Bounty scheme for German migrants ended in 1857.

William Westgarth's Scheme (1848-1851)
About 1847, Melbourne based Westgarth reached an agreement with a Bremen shipping agent, Eduard Delius. The first ship with German immigrants to arrive under this agreement was the Godeffroy which left Hamburg on 1 October 1848. Three more followed. About 900 immigrants arrived in Port Phillip now in the state of Victoria under this scheme by the end of 1849. Most were from the north and north eastern states of modern Germany.
List of Ships
  • Godeffroy departed Hamburg on 1 Oct 1848, via Plymouth, Arrived Melbourne 11 Feb 1849 & Port Adelaide 1 Mar 1849
William Kirchner's Scheme (1849-1857)
Most of the vine dressers that came to New South Wales under Kirchner's scheme were from what are now the south western German states of Hessen and Baden-Württemberg. These immigrants were contracted to work for two years for the colonist who paid their bounty. Bounty immigrants were very attractive to struggling settlers who lacked the know-how to raise the vines and make the wine themselves. The vine dressers not only provided the technical expertise that the settlers lacked but were also cheaper as indentured workers were paid significantly less than local non-indentured labourers. Further, the female bounty immigrants that accompanied the vine dressers made good domestic servants. Again, they were paid less than non-indentured workers.
The first ship to set sail under this scheme was the Beulah which left London on 10 December 1849. Four other ships also sailed from London in 1849 including the Parland and Harmony. Subsequent voyages under this scheme left from Hamburg. Migrants who arrived under this scheme went to Camden, Prospect and Penrith in the outskirts of Sydney, the Kiama/Shoalhaven region south of Wollongong, Albury and the Riverina district, and the Hunter Valley. By 1852, about 2000 German immigrants had arrived in New South Wales under Kirchner's scheme.
List of Ships
Other ships carrying German immigrants to the Colony of New South Wales (1840-1859)
  • Luise (Louisa), Arrived Port of Melbourne 23 Feb 1855; arrived Port Jackson 21 Mar 1855

Colony Of Queensland (1859-1901)

Prior to 6 June 1859
Queensland was originally part of the British-administered colony of New South Wales. It separated from New South Wales on 6 June 1859. Prior to separation a number of ships brought German Bounty immigrants to Moreton Bay which was then part of New South Wales under the bounty scheme devised by William Kirchner including the Aurora and Marbs in 1855.

1860s
From 1861, unlike New South Wales, most Germanic immigrants to Queensland came from Prussia's central and eastern provinces although some migration continued from south western Germany.

List of Ships from 6 June 1859


References

1. Tampke, Jürgen (2006) The Germans in Australia, Cambridge University Press, New York

2. Tao, K. (2019) Vinedressers and vintners German bounty immigrants, Australian National Maritime Museum. Available at: https://www.sea.museum/2019/04/04/vinedressers-and-vintners--german-bounty-immigrants (Accessed: 28 November 2020).

3. Watt, Julie (2012) German vinedressers in Camden, Dictionary of Sydney. Available at: http://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/german_vinedressers_in_camden Archived 2021 (Accessed: 05 May 2023)

Sources

  1. ↑ Kinnear 1838 1838 'Ship News.', The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1803 - 1842), 24 April, p. 2. , viewed 11 May 2023, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article2548052
  2. ↑ Kinnear 1838 1838 'Shipping Intelligence.', The Sydney Monitor (NSW : 1828 - 1838), 25 April, p. 2. (MORNING), viewed 11 May 2023, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article32159859
  3. ↑ https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/german_vinedressers_in_camden#footnote-7 Accessed 12 May 2023.




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