The First Fleet founds a penal colony at Sydney Cove, 1788
Eleven ships, roughly 1,500 people, and the start of British Australia
Quick facts
- Fleet size
- 11 ships
- People aboard
- approximately 1,500, including about 775 convicts
- Commander
- Captain Arthur Phillip, first Governor of New South Wales
- Original inhabitants
- Eora nation
What happened
Eleven ships under Captain Arthur Phillip, the First Fleet, reached Botany Bay on 18 January 1788 after an eight-month voyage of roughly 24,000 kilometres from Britain, carrying about 1,500 people: naval and marine officers, crew, some 775 convicts, and about 50 children. Judging Botany Bay's anchorage poor and its soil sandy, Phillip explored further north and found Port Jackson, which he called the finest harbour in the world. The fleet moved to Sydney Cove, and on 26 January 1788 the British flag was raised and the colony of New South Wales formally proclaimed. The Eora nation, the Aboriginal people of the Sydney area, had occupied the land the colony now claimed; violence between settlers and the Eora began almost immediately.
Why it matters
The landing began continuous British settlement of the continent and the dispossession of the Eora and neighbouring nations from land they had occupied for tens of thousands of years, setting the pattern that would repeat as the colony expanded. Sydney Cove's deep, sheltered harbour, the reason Phillip chose it over Botany Bay, shaped the city that grew there and remains Australia's largest.
How we know
Multiple First Fleet officers, including Phillip, kept journals and dispatches describing the voyage and landing in detail, held today by institutions including the Australian Dictionary of Biography's Phillip essay drawing on these primary accounts.
Sources
- Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University. Arthur Phillip: 1788. The Foundation Year · Primary source (author-declared)adb.anu.edu.au · Cited as a "primary" source (no stronger domain match). · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- Australian Dictionary of Biography, Australian National University. Arthur Phillip: 1788. The Foundation Year · Primary source (author-declared)adb.anu.edu.au · Cited as a "primary" source (no stronger domain match). · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
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Related timelines
- The British Empire → · The First Fleet's penal colony was Britain's answer to losing its American colonies as a dumping ground for convicts, folding Australia into the empire's expansion.