Marriage: Love and Law exhibition catalogue - Flipbook - Page 36
PROPERTY,
RESPECTABILITY
To encourage marriage among the free classes, Governor Darling,
who presided over the Colony from 1825 to 1831, established
a ‘marriage portions’ scheme for the ‘daughters of men
of respectability of the Colony’.
Once engaged—or ‘promised’—in marriage, daughters of clergymen,
mid-level officials and other groups who lacked inherited wealth but
had standing in the community, could register for a marriage portion
land grant. Upon marriage, the woman could claim her land.
It was thought that a bachelor of respectability would be more
inclined to marry a woman who had property. The birth of children
would likely follow, and this would boost the Colony’s respectable
class. Under the marriage portions scheme women would hold the
property title. Upon a woman’s death, the title would pass on to her
children and not her husband.
In 1830 and 1831, a total of 42 married women, including Hannah
Tompson, were granted land portions (28).
28 William Nicholas
Hannah Tompson, 1839
(detail)
Watercolour
1839
State Library of NSW, ML 626
28
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