No Place For A Colony: Sullivan Bay, Sorrento & The Collins Settlement
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.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Good
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
In the early nineteenth century, the colonial ambitions of the British Empire extended to the remote southern shores of a vast and largely uncharted continent, yet not every foothold in the New World was destined to survive. No Place for a Colony: Sullivan Bay, Sorrento & the Collins Settlement chronicles one of Australian history's most overlooked episodes — the doomed 1803 attempt by Lieutenant-Colonel David Collins to establish a British settlement at Sullivan Bay, near present-day Sorrento on the Mornington Peninsula, a venture that would be abandoned before it ever truly began. Richard Cotter presents a meticulous and richly detailed account of the expedition's failures, drawing on historical records, correspondence, and the dramatic landscape of Port Phillip Bay itself to reconstruct why this early colonial effort collapsed so spectacularly. Beyond the immediate narrative of failure, Cotter illuminates the broader political, logistical, and human forces that shaped — and ultimately doomed — early British colonisation attempts in what would become Victoria. The work argues that the Collins settlement was not merely an administrative blunder but a pivotal, if cautionary, moment in the shaping of Australia's colonial identity. Written with an authoritative command of primary sources and a sharp eye for the telling detail, this is essential reading for anyone curious about the roads not taken in Australian history — and what might have been had Sullivan Bay become the cradle of a nation.
Author: Richard Cotter
Format: Paperback
Genre: Australian history
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: No dust jacket
Pages: Good
Condition remarks: Condition as shown in image
In the early nineteenth century, the colonial ambitions of the British Empire extended to the remote southern shores of a vast and largely uncharted continent, yet not every foothold in the New World was destined to survive. No Place for a Colony: Sullivan Bay, Sorrento & the Collins Settlement chronicles one of Australian history's most overlooked episodes — the doomed 1803 attempt by Lieutenant-Colonel David Collins to establish a British settlement at Sullivan Bay, near present-day Sorrento on the Mornington Peninsula, a venture that would be abandoned before it ever truly began. Richard Cotter presents a meticulous and richly detailed account of the expedition's failures, drawing on historical records, correspondence, and the dramatic landscape of Port Phillip Bay itself to reconstruct why this early colonial effort collapsed so spectacularly. Beyond the immediate narrative of failure, Cotter illuminates the broader political, logistical, and human forces that shaped — and ultimately doomed — early British colonisation attempts in what would become Victoria. The work argues that the Collins settlement was not merely an administrative blunder but a pivotal, if cautionary, moment in the shaping of Australia's colonial identity. Written with an authoritative command of primary sources and a sharp eye for the telling detail, this is essential reading for anyone curious about the roads not taken in Australian history — and what might have been had Sullivan Bay become the cradle of a nation.