TANGIBLE MEMORIES with Patricia Tryon Macdonald

Patricia Tryon Macdonald has been a migrant three times in her life, so feels great empathy for our early settlers.

In the 19th century migrants to Australia faced a long, potentially dangerous, voyage in cramped conditions and limited baggage, so what did they take to remind them of the home and country they would probably never see again? 

Perhaps the most poignant objects are those recovered from shipwrecks such as The Dunbar, which sank at Sydney Heads in 1857 on its second return voyage to the colony. A cache of items belonging to early Melbourne settlers unearthed at the ‘Little Lon’ site, when a building site was excavated by archaeologists in 1987-88, also provide fascinating insights into Melbourne 140 years ago, in what was once a notorious red light district.

These, and other precious things passed down the generations shed light on the precarious and challenging world of our early settlers.

PATRICIA TRYON MACDONALD is an independent curator. Her recent exhibitions include Exiles and Emigrants: Epic Journeys to Australia in the Victorian Era, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (2005-2006) and For Auld Lang Syne: Images of Scottish Australia from First Fleet to Federation, Art Gallery of Ballarat (2014).