The Evidence To The Bigge Reports: New South Wales Under Governor Macquarie (Two-Volume Set)
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Edition: 1st ed.,
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
At the dawn of Australia's colonial era, one royal commission would lay bare the contradictions of a society built on convict labour, imperial ambition, and the vision of a single, formidable governor — The Evidence to the Bigge Reports presents a meticulously curated selection of primary source testimony gathered during Commissioner John Thomas Bigge's landmark inquiry into New South Wales under Governor Lachlan Macquarie. Spanning two authoritative volumes — The Oral Evidence and The Written Evidence — this work chronicles the raw, unfiltered accounts of settlers, convicts, military officers, and officials whose words painted a portrait of a colony at a defining crossroads in the early 1820s. Selected and edited by historian John Ritchie, this collection stands as an indispensable resource for scholars and enthusiasts of Australian colonial history alike. Ritchie's careful editorial hand illuminates the tensions between Macquarie's progressive governance and the conservative imperial establishment that ultimately sought to curtail his power. The Bigge Reports themselves shaped the very trajectory of Australian society — making these volumes not merely a historical archive, but a living window into the fierce debates over convict reform, land policy, and free settlement that would define a nation. Who, in the end, truly held power in the colony at the edge of the world?
Author: John Ritchie
Format: Hardback
Published: 1971, Heinemann
Genre: Australian history
Edition: 1st ed.,
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
At the dawn of Australia's colonial era, one royal commission would lay bare the contradictions of a society built on convict labour, imperial ambition, and the vision of a single, formidable governor — The Evidence to the Bigge Reports presents a meticulously curated selection of primary source testimony gathered during Commissioner John Thomas Bigge's landmark inquiry into New South Wales under Governor Lachlan Macquarie. Spanning two authoritative volumes — The Oral Evidence and The Written Evidence — this work chronicles the raw, unfiltered accounts of settlers, convicts, military officers, and officials whose words painted a portrait of a colony at a defining crossroads in the early 1820s. Selected and edited by historian John Ritchie, this collection stands as an indispensable resource for scholars and enthusiasts of Australian colonial history alike. Ritchie's careful editorial hand illuminates the tensions between Macquarie's progressive governance and the conservative imperial establishment that ultimately sought to curtail his power. The Bigge Reports themselves shaped the very trajectory of Australian society — making these volumes not merely a historical archive, but a living window into the fierce debates over convict reform, land policy, and free settlement that would define a nation. Who, in the end, truly held power in the colony at the edge of the world?