VPRS 13070 Register of Licensees, Hamilton, Section 42 Amending Land Act 1865 and Section 19 Land Act 1869.

Section 42 of the Amending Land Act 1865 was designed to allow the use of lands on or adjacent to the goldfields to the advantage of the general population without interfering with the operations of miners. Occupation , at a modest rental, was to be temporary and for the purposes of residence and cultivation. Each renewable licence was to cover a maximum of twenty acres for no more than one year although persons could apply for multiple licences. Rental, to be paid to Receivers of Revenue or Paymasters, was fixed at the rate of two pounds ten shillings per annum for less than 10 acres and at four pounds per annum for an area of between 10 and 20 acres. License holders were required to make identifiable improvements - to enclose their allotments and cultivate a prescribed proportion of the area to demonstrate their bona fides.Under the Land Act 1869, holders of licenses under Section 42 Amending Land Act 1865 were able to continue holding their licenses. They were also able to consolidate licenses held, where more than one was held by a particular person when making application under Section 19 Land Act 1869. Section 19 allowed the granting of a license by the Governor to occupy Crown land. The area was to be no more than 320 acres and the license was to be granted for no more than three years at a cost of two shillings per acre per annum. Under Section 20, the land had to be occupied by the licensee, improvements made within two years and the fee was to be paid half-yearly. If these conditions were complied with, a lease for a longer period (up to seven years) could be obtained and the lessor could subsequently purchase the land. Many holders of licenses under Section 42 Amending Land Act 1865 converted to a Section 19 Land Act 1869 license.As this land had already been surveyed for mining purposes and to determine the extent of the auriferous (or gold-bearing) lands, applications could be ruled upon efficiently and expeditiously. An application under this section of the Act was able to be submitted to either the Department of Crown Lands and Survey in Melbourne or at the office of the local representative or agent of the department. Some 36 land offices were established throughout the Colony to deal with applications received under this Act. The application would be registered in an Applications Register and allocated a number in order of receipt. Those applications for All Districts received at Melbourne were then indexed by name of applicant and the allocated number. The application was then investigated and reported upon by a local commission. Applications submitted under Section 19 Land Act 1869 would go before a Local Lands Board (see Section 100 Land Act 1869).The functions of this commission and the later Local Lands Boards were to investigate and report upon every application, to protect the public and local interests and promote the advantageous occupation of land. Commissions and Local Lands Boards included in their membership the Surveyor-General, the Assistant Commissioner of Lands and Survey, the Secretary for Mines, chairmen and members of Mining Boards and Shire Councils and were assisted by District Surveyors, other officers of the Department and Mining Surveyors who had made the surveys of the sites applied for. These commissions or enquiries were made in district centres and other principal centres of population on and in the vicinity of the goldfields. The decision with respect to the application arrived at by the Commission or the Local Lands Board was then entered in the Applications Register. For district registers, it became the practice to register and arrange applications with them directly relating to specific sittings of the commission at a specific place on a specific date.With the granting of the application, application then had to be made to the Governor-in-Council, as prescribed in the Act, to grant a licence of occupation to the successful applicant. In the same way, cancellations and / or revocations of licences and transfers of licences had to be approved by the Governor-in-Council. Some of these records may be seen in VPRS 863 Orders in Council Regarding the Issue and Cancellation of Licences , Land Acts 1865 and 1869.Once this leave had been granted by the Governor-in-Council, the licence was issued and an entry was then made in the Licence Register. These registers were arranged firstly by district or group of contiguous districts and then in alphabetical sections according to family name of the licensee. The Licence Register provided a record of the number of the licence issued (different to the application number), the location and size of the land, the payment of rents and, in the remarks column, the subsequent history of that holding of land and of the licence to occupy it. A number of these registers, in this series and others, were used to record details relating to some of the last licenses granted under Section 42 Amending Land Act 1865 and those granted under Section 19 Land Act 1869 prior to the administrative reorganisation of the Department of Crown Lands and Survey with the establishment of the Occupation Branch and the District Land Offices.At some point after the granting of the application for a licence under Section 42., a file was created upon which were placed the original application and other subsequent correspondence with respect to it. These files have also been allocated sequential numbers (see VPRS 624 Land Selection Files, Land Act 1865). The numbers on these files do not coincide with any other number allocated during the application or the licensing processes at either the district or central levels. It is hypothesized that there has been created at some point a register to these files and their numbers which is not (as at July 2002) in custody.Files were also created for applications and licenses granted under Sections 19 and 20 Land Act 1869 and these may be able to be found in VPRS 625/P Selection Files, Sections 19 and 20, Land Act 1869. It is possible that some file numbers are recorded in the Registers of Licensees with either the numerator or denominator as the section (19) and the other figure the file number.In August 1868, additional regulations were made under Section 42 of the Amending Land Act of 1865. These regulations extended the distance from a goldfield within which selections might be made to thirty miles and authorised the issue of eight licences per person thus allowing each selector to obtain 160 acres. Applications were able to be made once again both locally and at the Central Office. Land had been surveyed in preparation and commissions were held immediately upon the Regulations coming into operation to decide upon these applications. Records in custody show that these applications were kept separately in the Applications Registers, although, once licences were granted, they were entered into the existing Licence Registers.From the Licence Registers, it is apparent that much of the land selected and occupied under Section 42 of the Amending Land Act 1865 was either purchased under Section 31 of the Land Act 1869 or converted to leases under section 19 of the Land Act 1869. Other selections were able to be purchased at public auction, whilst others remained under the occupation of licensees for a lengthy period of time with licences able to be transferred or bequeathed.VPRS 13070/P1 was previously registered as Units 7 and 12 of VPRS 1290/P Registers of Licensees Section 19, 1869.