Victoria Land and Property

Online Resources

 * Victoria Land and Property at FamilySearch. Links to 28 online land and property records.
 * Crown Land Licences Victoria 1852-1853 at FibdMyPast, Index ($)
 * Land Tax Register & Valuation Victoria at FindMyPast, Index ($)
 * Historic plans collection (1834-1984) at PRO Victoria, index and images.
 * Summary Contract Books, 1856-1935 at PRO Victoria, index and images.
 * Melbourne Rate Books, 1861-1975 at PRO Victoria, index and images.

Historical Plans
Clicking on the above link will take you straight to the Historical Plans page of The Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment website. The Department holds a collection of historical plans relating to the first 60 years of European settlement in Victoria which are available at a cost from the Land Information Centre at:
 * Search for a Planning Report

Land Victoria Level 9, 570 Bourke St Melbourne 3000 Victoria, Australia Phone: (+61 3) 8636 2831 Opening hours: 8.30am to 4.00pm Monday to Friday

The collection includes 8000 plans dating from 1837 and covers all parts of Victoria.

New South Wales Archive Resources Kit, Including Records for Areas now in Victoria

 * Archive Resources Kit
 * Registers of depasturing licences, 1837-51
 * Indexes to land grants, 1788-1865, and selected registers

"The ARK is held by 40 community access points across NSW. The majority of access points are libraries. The ARK consists of microfilm copies of our most popular and heavily used colonial records. Included are records relating to convict arrivals, assisted immigrants, births, deaths and marriages, publicans' licences, electoral rolls, naturalisation, returns of the colony ('Blue Books'), land grants, and the wide range of functions of the Colonial Secretary (1788-1825). You may find that the ARK (or parts of it) are held at a library near you."
 * Community Access Points A list of libraries and archives which hold microcopies of the Archive Resource Kit records

Land Grants

 * Governor Phillip, in 25 April 1787, was empowered to grant land to emancipists. Each male was entitled to 30 acres, an additional 20 acres if married, and 10 acres for each child with him in the settlement at the time of the grant.
 * To encourage free settlers to the colony, Phillip received additional Instructions dated 20 August 1789 entitling non-commissioned Marine officers to 100 acres and privates to 50 acres, over and above the quantity allowed to convicts.
 * Other settlers coming to the colony were also to be given grants.
 * In 1825, the sale of land by private tender began.
 * In a despatch dated 9 January 1831, Viscount Goderich instructed that no more free grants (except those already promised) be given. All land was thenceforth to be sold at public auction.

Depasturing Licenses
Settlers were permitted to occupy Crown lands for grazing purposes if they obtained a license that could be renewed annually. The first of these licenses was the Ticket of Occupation, which was granted in about 1820. These licenses gave owners rights to grazing land within two miles of their residence. Later, depasturing licenses gave owners rights to the vacant Crown lands beyond the limits of the owners’ homes. (Today, depasturing licenses can be used as census substitutes.) The applications for depasturing licenses list:


 * Name
 * Trade or calling
 * Residence
 * Land applied for
 * Marital status
 * Number of children
 * Name and condition of the person under whom stock are to be placed
 * Real or personal estate possessed by applicant

Licensing impacted not only the grazing industry, but the mining industry as well. Mining licenses began with the gold rush in 1851. Mining is still licensed today.

Soldier Settlement

 * Soldier settlement, also known as the Soldier Settlement Scheme or Soldiers Settlement Scheme, administered by the Soldier Settlement Commission, was the settlement of land throughout parts of Australia by returning discharged soldiers under schemes administered by the state governments after World War I and World War II.
 * By 1924, 23.2 million acres (93,900 km²) had been allotted 23,367 farms across Australia.
 * Other than supporting soldiers and sailors that were returning from those wars, the various governments also saw the opportunity of attracting both Australians and specific groups of allied service personnel to some of the otherwise little inhabited, remote areas of Australia.
 * The states took responsibility for land settlement and thus enacted separate soldier settlement schemes.
 * In addition to soldiers, nurses and female relatives of deceased soldiers were also able to apply for the scheme.
 * The procedure of supporting such soldiers was repeated after World War II with all Australian state governments.