Colonial Secretary Guide - Flipbook - Page 339
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44.
Copies of letters to the Judicial Establishment, the Sheriff and the Coroners, 6 October 1826 15 October 1908 40 vols
Letters to Judges of the Supreme Court and officers of the Court, the Courts of Quarter Sessions,
Courts of Requests, Law Officers and Coroners; to July 1828 the Sheriff and to 1829 the Governor
of Sydney Gaol.
Letters to the Sheriff after July 1828 are in a separate series (68).
Saxe Bannister took up his appointment as Attorney General in April 1824 on much the same
basis as his counterpart in England and in the same year John Stephen assumed the Solicitor
Generalship as an unpaid adjunct to his office of Commissioner of the Court of Requests. He was
to be purely a deputy or assistant for the Attorney General "not to be officially consulted or
employed in any case in which the Attorney General may be able properly to conduct the Public
Business without such assistance". The Solicitor General's was created a separate paid office in
1827 in order to render the Attorney General more efficient assistance and to provide a deputy for
him in case of death or absence. For a time while Kinchela was Attorney General most of his
work fell upon Plunkett, the Solicitor General, and in 1836 the Solicitor Generalship was
abolished upon Kinchela's enforced retirement and Plunkett's elevation to his office. It was
reinstituted, however, in 1843 after repeated representation by the Governor, and in 1856 both
Attorney General and Solicitor General became ministers of the crown, the latter being
superseded in that capacity by a Minister of Justice in 1873.
In 1856 much of the business that was previously handled by the Colonial Secretary, was
transferred to the jurisdiction of the new ministers; and the contents of this series of letters books
decline in importance until finally the letters are almost entirely devoted to the appointment of
Justices of the Peace and the transmission of oaths taken by them.
45.
Indexes:
In front of volumes
Location:
4/3736-75; microfilm copy AO Reels 624-653
Shelf List:
See Appendix p. 356
Copies of letters to King George's Sound, 4 November 1826 - 11 January 1831 1 vol
Copies of letters to the Commandant and other officers in the settlement. The book begins with
instructions to Major Lockyer of the 57th Regiment to establish a settlement which continued
until handed over to Western Australia in 1831.
In the back of the volume is a list of convicts sent to King George's Sound which shows the name,
ship, convictions and sentence, trade, age, native place and personal description of each. Loose in
the volume is a "List of prisoners proceeding in the brig 'Governor Phillip' to King George's
Sound".
The settlement arose from fear of French designs upon the Australian mainland - which were
fostered by the presence of the Dumont d'Urville expedition - and the consequent desire to
establish a British title to the whole continent. The settlement differed from the others of the time
in that it became permanent.
Indexes:
In front of volume
Location:
4/3776; microfilm copy AO Reel 712
