Three Voyages

In this paper I discuss three voyages and the impact they had on Tasmania – showing the movement of its society from a British penal colony to that of a settler society beginning to identify with place. The first voyage was that of Joseph Dalton Hooker on his botanical expedition to Tasmania and New Zealand in 1839–1842. This was a voyage of a British scientist venturing to the southern colonies to collect botanical specimens to bring back to the imperial centre at Kew Gardens for study, classification and naming. The second and third voyages were both by the same man; Tasmanian-born botanist and botanical illustrator, William Archer (1820–1874). Archer’s first voyage to England was as a young man of sixteen – sent to the imperial centre for an education (he studied architecture and engineering). After returning to Tasmania, Archer became an accomplished amateur botanist, corresponding with JD Hooker, sending botanical specimens – and more importantly, botanical information – to Hooker at Kew Gardens. William Archer’s second voyage to England was significant in conceptually moving Tasmania from the periphery of an imperial British centre to the centre of an emerging settler society. Archer returned to England in 1859, not as the provincial student ready to learn from the metropolitan expert, but as a confident scientist and artist. He journeyed to Kew Gardens to work with JD Hooker of Flora Tasmaniae. Both his research and illustrations were used in Flora Tasmaniae. Hooker dedicated Flora Tasmaniae to Ronald Campbell Gunn and to William Archer.