AustLit

19th-Century Australian Travel Writing

Richmond Henty (1837-1904) was born in Launceston in 1837 and was the nephew of Edward Henty, an early settler in Victoria, who established Muntham Station in 1836. Australiana or My Early Life is an autobiographical account of his life in the Australian colonies. Dedicating this work to the Royal Highness, the Duke of Edinburgh, with whom he spent a pleasant day "amongst the kangaroo", Henty labelled himself the first white native of the first settlement of Victoria. These memoirs are written retrospectively in a conversational manner and were originally written for the private perusal of Henty’s friends who then pressed him to publish them. Rather than beginning with Henty's life, the work was established through a description of Aboriginal peoples and their customs. Henty provided an illustration of his early life in Australia, his travels abroad to the Middle East, and his return to Australia, before describing bush life, family affairs, and travels through the colony of Victoria.