Marriage: Love and Law exhibition catalogue - Flipbook - Page 18
SUITABLE MATCHES,
CONTROLLED MARRIAGES
The period 20 October to 28 December 1831 provides a useful snap shot (11).
Twenty-two couples were refused permission to marry. The most common
reason was ‘the female being already married’. Married women, it was thought,
were better treated in the Colony, so some women falsely declared themselves
married when disembarking in Sydney. When they did eventually seek
permission to wed, they were refused.
During Lachlan Macquarie’s governorship of NSW (1810 –1821),
marriage was encouraged. For the convict classes this was carefully
controlled by the State. The belief was that children born
of convicts might be ‘infected’ by the ‘convict stain’. Given that
the convict classes made up three-quarters of the registered adult
population, authorities feared that the next generation would
be morally tarred: a situation which threatened to destabilise the
Colony. Convicts, therefore, were required to have the explicit
permission of the Governor to marry the person of their choice.
These controls were tightened under Governor Ralph Darling
(1825–1831). Now, a convict’s master or mistress plus
a clergyman, had to approve a marriage prior to an application
being made to the Governor. In many instances, permission
was refused.
11
11 Principal Superintendent
of Convicts
Register of convicts’
applications to marry –
permission refused
Rebound volume
1831–1837
NSW State Archives,
NRS 12212 [4/4512]
18
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