A Colony Divided: Religion and Politics in 1830s New South Wales

The year 1835 found New South Wales at a crossroads. What had begun as a penal outpost was transforming into a complex society with competing visions for its future. At the heart of this transformation stood two contrasting figures: Reverend Samuel Marsden, the aging Anglican clergyman known as “the flogging parson,” and Governor Richard Bourke, the progressive Irish-born administrator determined to reform the colony’s institutions.

Marsden, now in his seventies, sat in his Parramatta study reflecting on decades of missionary work and controversy. Recent accusations of intolerance toward Presbyterians in Lang’s historical account of New South Wales weighed heavily on him. The fiery evangelical who had once dominated colonial religious life now found himself withdrawing from public conflicts, mourning the recent death of his wife Elizabeth and sharing his daughter Martha’s yearning for eternal peace.

Meanwhile, Governor Bourke surveyed a different landscape. Having overcome personal grief, he envisioned introducing British political institutions to the colony – trial by jury, representative government, and an end to the transportation system that continued flooding New South Wales with convicts. But he faced formidable opposition from what he called “high Tory counsellors” in the Legislative Council, men like Colonial Secretary Alexander McLeay and Attorney-General John Kinchela who fiercely protected the interests of the colony’s wealthy landowners.

The Battle for Colonial Governance

The political struggle came to a head in 1835 as Bourke attempted to implement reforms. His proposal to charge police and gaol expenses to colonial revenue rather than British funds met fierce resistance from conservative councillors. They appointed a select committee chaired by McLeay that painted a dire picture of convict corruption, recommending strict Sabbath observance and restrictions on ticket-of-leave men as solutions.

Bourke responded with practical reforms, appointing G.M. Slade as commissioner for convict assignments and drafting new regulations based on utilitarian principles. But conservative landowners, particularly in the Hunter River region, saw this as an attack on their privileges. The Sydney Herald became their mouthpiece, portraying New South Wales as “a gaol yard” and Bourke as leading a “court and convict faction.”

Meanwhile, outside official circles, demands grew louder for self-government. The Australian Patriotic Association, formed in June 1835 under William Wentworth’s leadership, began pushing for representative institutions. This movement revealed deep divisions even among reformers, with Wentworth’s vision of property-based representation clashing with more democratic ideals advocated by men like Richard Hipkiss.

Moral Panics and Social Control

The debate over New South Wales’ future became entangled with moral anxieties. When Supreme Court Justice William Burton delivered a charge to jurors lamenting the colony’s “degraded state” and blaming lax morals and insufficient religion, conservatives seized on it as proof of Bourke’s failed policies. The Monitor published Burton’s remarks in full, while the Herald used them to attack Bourke’s administration.

This moral panic reached its peak in early 1836 when conservative leaders including James Macarthur and James Mudie drafted petitions to London warning of “lamentable depravity” and “fearful prevalence of crime.” They portrayed themselves as defenders of order against the threat of convict contamination and radical leveling.

The liberal response was swift. At a raucous public meeting in April 1836, Wentworth delivered a fiery speech defending Bourke’s administration and mocking the conservatives’ elitism. “We’ve now got a Whig governor,” he proclaimed, “and being myself a Whig, I am well pleased.” The meeting endorsed a counter-petition advocating representative government and rejecting the conservatives’ alarmist claims.

Education and Sectarian Conflict

As these political battles raged, another front opened in the culture wars: education. Bourke proposed establishing National schools based on the Irish model, offering non-denominational Christian instruction. This sparked furious opposition from Anglican leaders, particularly newly consecrated Bishop William Broughton, who saw it as an attack on Protestantism.

The education debate exposed deep sectarian divisions. Broughton warned that the National schools would “dash the Bible out of the hands of the people,” while Catholic leaders supported Bourke’s plan. The controversy reached absurd heights when one Anglican clergyman allegedly told convicts leaving church that “the Catholics were about to take over the land.”

For Bourke, the education fight became personal. He grew increasingly frustrated with Broughton’s intransigence and McLeay’s obstructionism. By September 1836, he demanded McLeay’s resignation, replacing him in January 1837 with his son-in-law Edward Deas Thomson. This “family compact” appointment further inflamed conservative opposition.

The End of an Era

As 1837 dawned, the colony’s future remained uncertain. Bourke, weary of constant battles, prepared to depart. His supporters gathered to honor him, with Wentworth delivering a passionate tribute to his reforms. Meanwhile, conservatives celebrated McLeay’s retirement and awaited news from London, where James Macarthur and others were lobbying against Bourke’s policies.

The aging Marsden, meanwhile, made one last missionary journey to New Zealand to investigate misconduct allegations against a fellow clergyman. Returning to Sydney in July 1837, he found himself embroiled in controversy yet again, even as his health declined.

When Queen Victoria’s accession was proclaimed in October 1837, the ceremony briefly united the divided colony. But the underlying tensions remained. As Bourke departed in December, cheered by crowds of ordinary colonists, the Sydney Herald sneered at this “felon mob’s” adulation of the “convicts’ friend.”

Legacy of a Transformative Decade

The years 1835-1837 marked a pivotal period in New South Wales’ transition from penal colony to free society. Bourke’s reforms – including moves toward representative government, educational expansion, and convict system reform – set the colony on a path toward self-government, though full realization would take decades.

The bitter conflicts revealed deep social fractures: between emancipists and exclusives, Protestants and Catholics, landowners and urban professionals. These divisions would continue shaping Australian politics long after the principal actors had left the stage.

Marsden died in 1838, his harsh evangelicalism increasingly out of step with a changing colony. Bourke returned to Ireland, his reputation secure as a progressive reformer. Wentworth would live to see responsible government achieved, though his own politics grew more conservative with age.

What emerged from these turbulent years was a clearer vision of what New South Wales might become – not merely a distant outpost of empire, but a society with its own distinct character and aspirations. The struggles over governance, justice, and education in the mid-1830s laid foundations for the democratic traditions that would define Australia in the century to come.