Scott family - Manuscript and pictorial material, 1777-1925

fonds

1777-1925

Textual Records, Graphic Materials, Photographs, Drawings, Prints, Badges

440134

Microfilm : Preservation copies are held for the originals at A 2260 - A 2284.
Microfilm : Preservation copies are held for most vols./boxes comprising MLMSS 38/1-79.
Microfilm : CY 4349 (MLMSS 7312).

Textual Records
Photographs
Drawings
Prints

Helenus Scott, the elder, 1760-1821, physician, was born in Dundee, Scotland and was married to Augusta Maria Frederick. Dr. Scott spent thirty years in medical service in India and later returned to private practice in England. In 1821 he sailed from England, bound for Australia, with his sons, Robert (1799-1844), and Helenus, the younger (1802-1879), but died during the voyage. He was buried at the Cape of Good Hope, and his sons continued their journey to Sydney.
Robert and Helenus, the younger, each received land grants on the Hunter River near Singleton, N.S.W., which they combined to form the estate 'Glendon'. Augusta Maria Scott and her remaining children, Alexander Walker, Augusta Maria, David Charles Frederick, and Patrick, also settled in New South Wales.
Patrick (d. 1887), later returned to England. Augusta Maria, the younger (1798-1871), married Dr. James Mitchell in 1833. Robert Scott died unmarried at 'Glendon' in 1844. Helenus Scott married Sarah Anne Rusden in 1835.
The Scott family bred bloodstock horses on 'Glendon' until the property was sold during the 1840s. Helenus was appointed to the magistracy in 1826, then Warden of the District Council of Patrick's Plains in 1843, and was Police Magistrate at Carcoar, Wollombi, Macdonald River and Newcastle. Helenus died at Newcastle in 1879.
Rose Scott (1847-1925), the fifth of eight children of Helenus and Sarah Anne, was prominent in the early feminist movement in N.S.W. and worked for various social reforms, particularly the improvement of the position of women and children through legislation. She was secretary of the Womanhood Suffrage League, 1891-1902, president of the Women's Political Educational League, 1902-1910, president of the Peace Society of N.S.W., 1908-1917, and international secretary of the National Council of Women of N.S.W. until 1921. Rose Scott adopted her nephew Helenus Hope Scott Wallace (b.1878), after the death of her sister Augusta Maria in 1880.
-- Reference: Australian Dictionary of Biography. Vol.2, 1788-1850 & Vol.11, 1891-1939. Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press, 1967 & 1988

This collection comprises 21 pictorial and manuscript record series. You may navigate to a more detailed description of each series from this collection record.

The main body of the Scott family papers were received by the Mitchell Library in 1925 from the estate of Rose Scott, through her nephew Helenus Hope Scott Wallace. Part of this collection was arranged and bound, with the rest remaining unbound.
In 1950 Helenus Hope Scott Wallace presented further Scott family papers to the Library. These papers were added to the unbound papers, with the exception of a volume labelled 'Autographs'.
The unbound papers from the 1925 and 1950 donations were allocated the manuscript number MLMSS 38 and were arranged and described in the "Guide to the Papers of the Scott Family in the Mitchell Library, Sydney. Part 1" Library Council of New South Wales, 1979. The Guide includes an index to correspondence in MLMSS 38, a list of pictorial material that was removed from the collection and located at Pic.Acc.4495, and genealogical tables of the Scott and Rusden families.
The bound volumes were given the manuscript call numbers A 2260 - A 2269 (bound in 1943), and A 2271 - A 2284 (bound in 1931). The volume labelled 'Autographs' was given the call number A 2270.