The following links are to transcripts of significant diaries, journals or letters of emigration to Victoria and Ballarat or life on the Victorian goldfields. If you would like to contribute an article or have a page which you would like linked in this section please email the Webmaster (details at the bottom of the page).

• BRAIN, P. H. - 1855 letter from Alma - Transcript of an 1855 letter from P. H. BRAIN om the Alma Goldfield near Maryborough, Victoria to his friend George WORLOCK back in Gloucestershire, England. The letter contains candid observations of life on the diggings in 1855.
  
  
• COSTELLO, Patrick - 'In the Days when the World was Wide' - Patrick Costello related his extraordinary pioneering experiences of the 1840's and early 1850's. The following is the narrative as transcribed from seventeen instalments in serialised form which were published weekly in "The Ballarat Courier" from Saturday, July 4, 1896 to Saturday, October 24, 1896. Compiled by Dorothy Wickham
  
  
• DAVIES, James - 1855 letter - Transcript of an 1855 letter from James DAVIES about the trip from Wales to Ballarat in 1855. Also, a letter (undated) from his son, James about the trip from Geelong to Ballarat and a few events in his early life on the diggings.
  
  
• FERGUSON, James - 1854 letter - Transcript of an 1854 letter from James Douglas Ferguson about the gold fields of McIvor, Victoria to his parents in Northumberland, England and a letter (1878) from his daughter, Esther with a Heathcote address.
  
  
• GRAY, Hugh - 1852 letter - A staunch Glasgow liberal has just received a long letter from the Antipodes from a well-known Glaswegian of the same school, the leading features of which we have been requested to publish. He writes from Geelong, on arrival, and says I will now give you my experience since our arrival.
  
  
• GUINANE, Michael - 1867, 1881, 1882 letters - Transcripts of letters from Michael GUINANE in Ballarat and Williamstown regarding gold mining and later joining the Navy.
  
  
• LYLE, Thomas - 1852 Voyage to Australia - The story of Thomas LYLE, his wife Sarah COUMBE, daughter Anne (13), sons William (11) and Henry (9) and their voyage to Melbourne, Victoria, Australia in 1852. Compiled by Dione Coumbe, Kent, Eng.
  
  
• SNEDDEN, James & McGEE, Maria - 1854 Voyage to South Australia - The emigration of James SNEDDEN, his wife Maria McGEE and infant daughter Mary from Glasgow to South Australia in 1854, followed by gold mining in Vic and NSW. Article by Annie Stuart.
  
  
• TAYLOR, Rev. Theophilus : his diaries - Rev. Theophilus TAYLOR (1829-1859), a Wesleyan Minister in Ballarat over the Eureka period left a valuable record of his journey to Australia and life in Ballarat & Creswick, in which he makes observations on incidents in the Eureka Rebellion.
  
  
• TOWNSEND, Henry - 1825 Voyage - In June 1825 Henry took a position as Captain's Clerk on THE YORK and in this letter describes conditions on board, names some crew and passengers and vessels he encounters. Also described are a stand off with pirates, the brutality in some graphic detail of the crew on crossing the Line; the Australian Company; dissatisfaction of crew and Passengers; the slave trade and his first sight and taste of a banana. The YORK was a vessel bound from GRAVESEND to NEW SOUTH WALES via RIO DE JANEIRO. Compiled by Dione Coumbe, Kent, Eng.
  
  
• WALLACE / WALLIS - 1860's, letters from McIvor Goldfields - Transcripts of letters from WALLACE family members on the McIvor Goldfields, Heathcote, Victoria to family members in England. Contributed by Sue HOLLOWAY, Nth Qld, Australia
  
  
• WENBORN (nee GULLOCK), Susan Welsford. - Transcript of the diary of Susan Welsford WENBORN (nee GULLOCK), 1844-1925 covering the voyage from England to Sydney in 1843 and life in the Colonies, particularly at Bendigo, Victoria.
  
  

• 1852, Burra, South Australia to Mt Alexander, Victoria
  1852 diary of 5 week overland journey of nearly 600 miles with horse and dray from the Burra Mine in SA to Mt Alexander diggings in Victoria by Charles RULE.
  
  
• 
  
  
• 
  
  
• 
  
  

Please email Daryl (click on animated computers) with any information or link related to the genealogy of Ballarat & Western Victoria.