PROLOGUE

 
 
This is the third volume in my series on births, deaths and marriages in 
the early colony of New South Wales. It covers the years 1811 to 1820, the 
third decade of the young colony's existence.
 
The early colonial church registers of baptisms, marriages and burials are 
somewhat disappointing, to say the least, from a genealogical point of view. 
Often there is just a date and a name, no place nor other identifying 
information. This series of books attempts to redress this problem by combining 
the data in the church registers with data from the shipping indents, the 
early colonial musters of 1802, 1806, 1811, 1814, 1822, 1825 and the "1828 Census 
of New South Wales".
 
During the third decade of the colony's existence the number of convict 
arrivals 17,344 (males 15,414 and females 1,930) far exceeded the two previous 
decades combined for convict arrivals 11,674 (males 9,333 and females 2,341). 
 
The 73rd Regiment was replaced by the 46th Regiment in 1814, which in turn 
was replaced by the 48th in 1818. In the first 'decade' there were 1,800 births 
but 1,820 deaths. In the second decade the corresponding figures were 3,142 
births against 1,414 deaths. In this third decade there were 6,081 births 
against 2,820 deaths. Thus the population of the colony more than trebled.
 
The number of births almost doubled from the previous decade. For this third 
decade the rate of identification of the fathers fell slightly from 74% to 73%. 
Similarly the rate of identification of the mothers also fell from 77% to 71%.
 
The number of marriages increased by two and a half times from the previous 
decade. For this third decade the rate of identification of the grooms 
decreased slightly from 94% to 91% and for the brides from 93% to 91%.
 
A sign of the improving morality of the colony was the fact that during the 
third decade the number of de facto relationships compared to marriages fell 
by more than half from 66% to 31%.
 
The number of deaths almost exactly doubled from the previous decade. For 
this third decade the rate of identification of the increased from 75% to 86% 
reflecting the better documentation of the deaths.
 
Thus by the end of the third decade of the colony's existence it can be estimated, 
using these birth and death details explained in this study, that the population 
was 33,987 plus the 48th Regiment.
 

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