Saturday, June 6, 2015

Scots in Victoria, Australia

Scots, Australia, Immigration, Victoria
As I child, I was fascinated by Australia and as a graduate student it was always on the periphery of my studies because so many Scots emigrated there. Recently, one or two Australia projects have crossed my desk at work which inspired me to see if I could find online sources for researching Scots who went there. What I found were many wonderful online sources for Victoria. There may be  equivalent sources in other states, but I was totally fascinated by the webpages about immigration and identity available from the Immigration Museum and other sources in Victoria.

Scots Wha Hae was a recent exhibit at the Immigration Museum (part of Museums Victoria) that examined the Scottish community in Victoria. On the exhibit page is a video with recent Scottish immigrants. I was much amused by the fact that one immigrant felt their new home Down Under reminded them of Glasgow and another was reminded of Edinburgh.

The Immigration Discovery Centre has a page dedicated to Family History Research. A reference sheet for Scottish Migration to Australia can be found here. The Centre also has data on Immigrant Communities and an online exhibit on Identity. These pages would be useful those studying immigration, ethnicity, or identity as data for a comparative study for a college paper or inspiration for a larger project.

Origins hosted by Museum Victoria is based on census data collected in Victoria since 1854. The page dedicated to Scottish immigrants is here.

There are many Scottish associations in Victoria including the Scots of Victoria, Australia. More groups can be found here.

A comparison of Scots in the 2006 and 2011 censuses can be found here (PDF).

Birth, Marriage, and Death records for Victoria can be found here. Bear in mind that there is a cost to see the search results. Then on the results page is information on ordering the record needed.

The State Library of Western Australia hosts a page for research in Victoria here.

Resources available at Ancestry.com are listed here.

The FamilySearch Wiki page for Victoria could use a little help; but the main page for Australia looks useful.

The Australian Government has a web page dedicated to Family History with links to further information on many topics including Indigenous Family History, Anzacs, and how to get Birthday and Special Occasion Greetings from the Prime Minister or the Queen.

See what Family History resources are available at the National Archives of Australia.

And finally, see the Family History resources at the National Library of Australia. Resources specific to immigration can be found here.

Happy Searching!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

From Chris Schuetz.
Good sources. Many Scots reached Victoria through other ports than the capital, mainly Geelong, and there are specialised resources there via Susie Zades' website http://zades.com.au/gandd/index.php/ and Geelong has its own archives, although this is more somewhere to visit - https://www.geelongaustralia.com.au/heritage/
Gaelic speakers from the Hebrides and Highlands came to the Western Districts of Victoria (often via Geelong) and into the South East of South Australia and herded sheep. Geelong had an area called "Little Scotland" for some time, and there is still an Aberdeen Street there.
The first MP for the area was a Scot. (He was also the first doctor.) And the first newspaper (still exists) was started by a Scot. On its 50th anniversary someone noted that Scots settled in Geelong who travelled, expressed their love for the town in the same way as they did for Scotland. So don't ignore this additional resource.

Amanda E. Epperson said...

Thanks for sharing the additional sources Chris!