An attractive copy of this beautifully illustrated account of New South Wales, published over the name of the gentleman pickpocket George Barrington. The hand-coloured plates offer a series of views of the voyage out and the early settlement.

An attractive copy of this beautifully illustrated account of New South Wales, published over the name of the gentleman pickpocket George Barrington. The hand-coloured plates offer a series of views of the voyage out and the early settlement.

The book was issued at the same time and by the same publisher as the History of New South Wales, and collectors have often bound the two works to style.

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Barrington, as is now well-attested, was most certainly not the author of this or any of the other books published in his name, but was co-opted by the London press as the apparent author of works which were actually plagiarised from the expensive First Fleet quartos. In fact, the original source for Barrington's Voyage was John Hunter's Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island (1793). In turn, Barrington's Voyage, first published in 1795, was expanded into this much improved edition after "incorporating a great deal of additional material plagiarised from the first volume of David Collins' Account of the English Colony in New South Wales (1798)" (Garvey). Amongst much of interest, this edition adds a letter said to have been written by Barrington in Parramatta in 1802.

Transported to New South Wales on the Third Fleet of 1791, Barrington was already a legendary hero in England. The English public's continuing interest in New South Wales and the fate of the transported convicts encouraged the publishers to make these cheaper accounts than the more imposing First Fleeters, and were thus more widely read. It is quite reasonable to suggest that the little most people in Great Britain knew about New South Wales derived chiefly from one or another of the Barrington books.

The book was issued at the same time and by the same publisher as the History of New South Wales, and collectors have often bound the two works to style.