The First Fleet was the group of eleven ships that carried the first British convicts and their guards, officials and families to Australia, under Captain Arthur Phillip, the first governor of New South Wales. It left Portsmouth carrying about 1,400 people, over seven hundred of them convicts, who had been sentenced to transportation, partly because Britain could no longer send them to the American colonies after the American War of Independence. After a voyage of about eight months, it reached Botany Bay, which Phillip found unsuitable, and moved to Port Jackson, where the settlement of Sydney was founded. The arrival began British colonisation of Australia and had grave effects on the Aboriginal peoples.
Before and after
- 7 March 1785Birth of Alessandro Manzoni
- 1786Founding of Reykjavík
- 1786Publication of Ode to Joy
- 17 January 1786Discovery of Comet Encke
- 1787First Fleet
- 1787Publication of Don Giovanni
- c. 1787Birth of Shaka Zulu
- 1787Discovery of strontium
- 1787Discovery of yttrium
More in Exploration & discovery
- from 7 August 1803 to 6 August 1806First Russian circumnavigation
- from 3 July 1815 to 3 August 1818Russian Rurik Expedition
- from 25 October 1859 to 1 January 1862Prussian expedition to East Asia (1859-1862)
- 4 June 1867Birth of Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim
- from 14 November 1907 to 30 November 19071907 Sub-Antarctic Islands Scientific Expedition
- 14 December 1911Amundsen reaches the South Pole
The era
This moment belongs to the Industrial era (1760 CE to 1914 CE), steam, factories and revolutions. You can also browse everything in the 18th century.