Description
Map of Australia and New South Wales in 1840 showing the settled portions.
The settled portions of New South Wales were within the original nineteen counties of New South Wales which were defined by Governor Ralph Darling’s Government in 1826 and were the limits of location in the colony of New South Wales. Settlers were only permitted to take up land which the Governments defined as the, Nineteen Counties, and were the limits to settlement due to the dangers in the wilderness. They were defined in accordance with a government order from Lord Bathurst, the Secretary of State. The counties had been used since the first year of settlement, with Cumberland County being proclaimed on 6th June 1788. Several others were later proclaimed around the Sydney area. Darling proclaimed the division of the settlement into Nineteen Counties in the Sydney Gazette of 17 October 1829. From 1831 the granting of free land ceased and the only land that was to be made available for sale was within the Nineteen Counties. The area covered by the limit, extended to Taree in the north, Batemans Bay in the south and Wellington to the West.
They were; Argyle, Bathurst, Bligh, Brisbane, Camden, Cook, Cumberland, Durham, Georgiana, Gloucester, Hunter, King, Murray, Northumberland, Phillip, Roxburgh, St Vincent, Westmoreland, Wellington.
