1 Jan 1810 - Macquarie became Governor of NSW

On this day in 1810 Lachlan Macquarie was sworn in as the fifth Governor of New South Wales.

He and his wife Elizabeth had arrived in Port Jackson on 28 December 1809 after a seven month voyage from England. Macquarie's emancipist vision for the Colony led to social, architectural and economic reform and development.

Macquarie resigned on 1 December 1821 and died in London on 1 July 1824.

Source: Parliament of New South Wales, 1810 to 1821 – Governor Lachlan Macquarie

View digitised papers relating to Lachlan Macquarie

Colonial Secretary's Papers 1788-1825

Arranged by name and subject this is the most comprehensive index of early NSW settlement

View of Government domain & part of Sydney, taken from Bunkers Hill, N.S.Wales

Life at Government House in the Macquarie era

Historian Jane Kelso describes a busy schedule of social gatherings and official events at Sydney's Government House during the governorship of Lachlan Macquarie

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Lachlan Macquaire

Convict pardons: conditional and absolute

Convicts with a life sentence could receive a pardon but not a Certificate of Freedom. The two main types of pardons were conditional pardon and absolute pardon

Large 2 storey building with deep verandahs, steps leading to lower verandah and bushes and driveway in the foreground.
Museum stories

A rum deal

When Lachlan Macquarie began his term as governor of NSW in 1810, Sydney was in desperate need of a new hospital

Series of brass cogs and wheels.

Conserving Australia’s oldest public clock

On its 200th anniversary, Australia’s oldest surviving public clock received some much-needed conservation and care

Macquarie-composite-tall.jpg
Convict Sydney

For the civic good

With the Napoleonic Wars over in 1815 and Britain crowded with returned soldiers, poverty and crime, part two finds the colony swamped with incoming convicts