Women in the Australian colonies:

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Women in Australia colonies Port Philip grew at an amazing rate in the 1830s when free settlers and female convicts were sent to Victoria to respond to the labor shortage. Women were outnumbered by men with a ration 1 to seven respectively. Women were the small population and were the most vulnerable proportion of the whole population. Initially, the majority of women were unmarried free settlers. There was a great demand for single women to serve as house servants, and the government covered the travel expenses to Victoria with families or married couples. . However, the free female settlers were still vulnerable as they were not lucky enough to get employment and they had to meet their financial needs. If they lost their job or get pregnant, they were forced to depend on charitable organizations or move to the streets. . For the convicts that were sent to Port Philip, the place was worse, with prostitution being their unspoken sentence. Life was difficult on arrival as convict women were taken to settlers households to serve as domestic servants. Some were lucky to marry and start new lives, but the majority of them were victims of prostitution and crime. For the most women, de facto relationships or marriage ensured they were protected and provided for from the rough elements of the society, and security was given at a price. Alcohol was too common in the settlements, and women had to deal with physical and verbal abuse from the drunken partners. Regardless of these hardships, there are women who were successful in Port Philip, with few of them achieving financial independence. For many convicts in the colony, life was all about struggle and hardships. Female colonists were made of three groups, the largest and the first group was the convicts who were given a chance to improve and develop skills to better their lives. The next group was made of military wives who were given the role of policing the convicts. The third group was made of free settlers that were lured by opportunity and freedom in a new country Australia could offer them. Women became a hardworking and influential part in the colony of Australia. In addition, there were indigenous Australians female convicts such as Torres Strait Islander and other Aboriginals whose lives were changed by colonist’s arrival.
As the government encouraged the migration of young single women and married couples, other immigrant women followed the lives of their husbands and fathers led. The pioneer selections as wives drovers and squatters created and shaped Australia’s rural towns just like men, managing homes, working alongside, educating families and raising kids. Life in the colonial meant that even the high-class women had to embrace hard work and physical labor that they were not prepared. Women of the social standing class found themselves in brutal and harsh surrounds of outback Australia where they had to struggle to build their lives and those of their families.
A man’s country According to Alford, Katrina, from the start, the women had three roles: indentured worker, whore, wife/mistress, or both. Construction of these entire roles started from the First Fleet voyages as Women were taken as whores. In the beginning, the conditions of the new colony were conducive to turning women convicts to sex objects for men: marines, officers, and convicts. Besides receiving or giving sexual favors, they had to work as servants and laborers for the officers under harsh and backbreaking conditions. Very of them that managed to start families with their fellow convicts. Some people think that the founding mothers of Australia were prostitutes. Unquestionably, some were whores, and others became whores to survive by trading sexual services. What is evident is that there is no woman who was transported to do prostitution because it was not a transportable offense. More than 80% of women convicts were convicted of minor theft, and violence crime were low among them. However, there was no comment on the colonial society, and the committees of government sent letters home describing the incorrigibility, worthlessness, and degeneracy of women convicts in the colony. Military officers, doctors, parsons, governors, and judges believed this even in their respectable wives. Convict men were able to redeem themselves through penance and work, but women were not able. It appeared as if the women convicts had become fiction and they invited contempt instead of pity from the superiors. However, there are women who helped shape the modern Australia, for instance, Caroline Chisholm, a British soldier wife moved to Sydney in 1838. After seeing the misery the unemployed women went through, she came up with an idea of how she can help them find work. She moved others to her home and taught them cooking and housekeeping basics to get employment in the upper and middle classes. Caroline persuaded Governor Gipps to give her an old shack to use it as a welfare agency. She moved a hundred women and toiled hard to educate them and land paid work. She expanded the agency and created 16 emigrant women hostels, where some of them were used as hiring and reception depot in the colony for unprotected female convicts. The depot registered thousands of English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish female immigrants. Despite these hardships, women in the Australia colonies played a big part in building Australia. The following article will discuss the rise and role of women in Australian colonies.

Alford, Katrina. Production or reproduction?: an economic history of women in Australia, 1788-1850. Melbourne; New York: Oxford University Press, 1984. 34, 56, 65 Jupp, James. The Australian people: an encyclopedia of the nation, its people and their origins. Cambridge University Press, 2001. 23, 45, 90, 144 Oxley, Deborah. Convict maids: the forced migration of women to Australia. Vol. 23. Cambridge University Press, 1996. 23, 36, 56, 67