Exploration and Settlement in Colonial Australia

Settlement of Australia by Europeans began on 26 January 1788. On that day Captain Arthur Phillip of the Royal Navy stepped ashore at Sydney Cove, accompanied by his officers and a detachment of Marines. Beside the steadily flowing Tank Stream they erected a flagpole and raised Britain’s Union flag. A proclamation by the King was read, claiming just over half the continent as a possession of Great Britain for the penal colony of New South Wales.