Marriage: Love and Law exhibition catalogue - Flipbook - Page 39
Properties ranged in size from 60 to 1,280 acres (29). Administration
of the marriage portions scheme was slow, and it took six years for the land
deeds to be finalised. During this time, Hannah Tompson’s husband, Charles,
became increasingly anxious about the legal status of his wife’s 60 acre
marriage portion at Hunters Hill. Squatters occupied the Tompson’s land,
and until the deeds were executed, Charles was unable to evict them (30).
Complicating the situation further, was that the Tompson marriage had not
produced children. It was therefore uncertain what would happen to the
property in the future.
By 1831, the State ceased to grant land freely and Governor Darling’s
marriage portions scheme, which he had introduced in 1828, came to an end.
The initiative—which had both supporters and detractors—had been shortlived. The idea that married women could own property separate to their
husband would not reappear for another 50 years.
Darling’s marriage portions scheme was part of an expansive practice
of granting land to advance the British Crown’s colonisation of NSW.
Post-colonial understandings of this uncover other perspectives, including
the impact on Australia’s Indigenous people. Artist Danie Mellor, who was
commissioned by NSW State Archives to create a new work for Marriage:
Love and Law, explores how Darling’s marriage portions scheme had profound
consequences for NSW’s Indigenous people.
29 Colonial Secretary
List of orders of grants of
land as marriage portions
enclosed in Surveyor
Generals Blank Cover report
of 7 August 1850
(No. 50/208)
Paper
1850
NSW State Archives,
NRS 906 [5/4779.2]
30 Charles Tompson
Letter to Alexander
Macleay, Colonial Secretary,
requesting the title deeds of
the marriage portion so as
to remove a squatter on the
land, Doon Moor Cottage,
Penrith, 13 December 1835
Paper
1835
NSW State Archives,
NRS 907 [2/7990]
30
29
38
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