New Italy MemorialPrint Page

The memorial commemorates the pride, strength and courage of the Italian settlers and their contribution to the North Coast community.

Australia was an uncommon destination for Italians in the latter part of the nineteenth century, but, among those who came, two parties of immigrants founded rural farming communities. The survivors of the Marquis de Rays’ ill-fated colonising scheme in New Guinea landed in Sydney in 1881 and eventually established themselves in northern New South Wales, where they called their settlement New Italy. The Marquis de Ray`s free colony of Port Breton, also called New France, which was promoted widely in Europe, raised more than 7 million francs and lured hundreds of Europeans (mainly Italians, French, Germans, Belgians and Spaniards) to take part in a grand venture to colonise New Ireland, New Britain, the Solomon Islands and New Guinea.

The scheme aroused the opposition of the French and Italian governments, yet four expeditions of colonists departed from Europe before the Marquis was tried and imprisoned for fraud. The third expedition to the colony consisted almost entirely of Italians from the Veneto region and included women and children. The Italian contingent departed from Barcelona in July 1880 on the India, with more than 300 people on board, and arrived in New Ireland three months later to find that the first two expeditions had failed. Fever and starvation soon caused many deaths, and the surviving Italians requested the captain of the India to take them to Sydney before they all died.

The India went instead to the French colony of New Caledonia, where the Italians refused to leave the ship and requested the assistance of the British consul in getting them to Sydney. Sir Henry Parkes agreed to offer them refuge in New South Wales and they arrived on the James Patterson on 7 April 1881, nine months after leaving Barcelona. More than 80 had died before the 217 survivors reached Sydney. After a period in temporary occupations in Sydney, their dream to be established was fulfilled. Early in 1882, the flow to this area began. After a few months, a total area of 3000 acres had been selected and named `New Italy`.

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