Strangers In A Foreign Land: The Journal Of Niel Black And Other Voices From The Western District

(Paperback)

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Drawing on the extensive collections of the State Library of Victoria, Strangers in a Foreign Land provides rare insight into the realities of early settlement in Victoria. When Niel Black, one of the most influential settlers of the Western District of Victoria, stepped onto the sand at Port Phillip Bay in 1839 and declared Melbourne to be 'almost altogether a Scotch settlement', he was paying the newly created outpost of the British Empire his highest compliment. His journal, reproduced here in its entirety, provides rare insight into the realities of early settlement in Victoria, detailing experiences of personal hardship and physical danger as well as the potential for accumulating great wealth and success. Drawing on the extensive collections of the State Library of Victoria, Strangers in a Foreign Land also includes glimpses into the lives of other settlers and the indigenous people of the area. It evokes the sense of place and dislocation that the early settlers encountered, and the hopes and anxieties they carried with them as they created new homes in Australia.

Author Bio

Maggie MacKellar lectures in Australian and cross-cultural comparative history at the University of Sydney. In 1996 she spent three months hiking, camping and kayaking in the Alaskan wilderness with the National Outdoor Leadership School, which provided the inspiration for this book. She lives in Sydney with her two children. Core of My Heart, My Country is her first book. MacKellar has since published her second book Strangers in a Foreign Land.