Cirrus@Austlit

19th-Century Australian Travel Writing

Born in Derbyshire, William Howitt (1792-1879), was a well-known writer, poet and Quaker; his younger brothers were writer and traveller Richard Howitt and physician and natural scientist Godfrey Howitt, and his wife was poet and writer Mary Howitt. After residences in Europe, William travelled with two of his sons, including future ethnographer Alfred William Howitt, to Victoria, where his brother Godfrey resided. William and his sons spent approximately two years in the Victorian goldfields, resulting in a number of publications including A Boy's Adventures in the Wilds of Australia (1855), Two Years in Victoria with Visits to Sydney and Van Diemen's Land (1860), Life in Victoria (1860) and Tallangetta, the Squatter's Home (1857). The current work, Land, Labour and Gold, presented an account of the Victorian goldfields, describing his travel to and experience of the gold diggings. It is a detailed portrayal of life on the Australian gold fields and the dramas and incidences of colonial bush life.