THE WELSH PATAGONIAN CONNECTION - A NEGLECTED CHAPTER IN AUSTRALIAN IMMIGRATION HISTORY

This article is an account of the history of Welsh migrants to Patagon ia from 1865 to 1914, their motivations for emigrating, their experien ces in Argentina, and the subsequent relocation of several hundred to the British dominions in the early twentieth century. The focus in the first part of the article is on the nature of those who went from Pat agonia to Australia between 1910 and 1915 and the migration of a group of Australians to Paraguay in the 1890s. The second half of the artic le examines the experiences of the Welsh Patagonians in Australia, the ir relationships with federal and state governments in the light of th e intense rivalry to procure them as settlers, and their involvement i n two New South Wales Royal Commissions concerning the operations of t he Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area. The article concludes with a discussi on on the degree to which a Welsh cultural heritage and identity has b een preserved by these settlers in an assimilationist post-Federation Australia. Not only is this a unique double migration experience, but it calls into question immigration encouragement policies and official advertising material during this period, a history which parallels ot her land settlement schemes of both the pre- and post-war eras in Aust ralia.