Macquarie Island is a subantarctic island in the south-western Pacific Ocean, about halfway between Tasmania and Antarctica. It has been governed as a part of Tasmania, Australia, since 1880. It became a Tasmanian State Reserve in 1978 and was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997. Macquarie Island is an exposed portion of the Macquarie Ridge and is located where the Australian plate meets the Pacific plate. The island is home to the entire royal penguin population during their annual nesting season. Ecologically, the island is part of the Antipodes Subantarctic Islands tundra ecoregion.
History
19th century Frederick Hasselborough, an Australian, discovered the uninhabited island on 11 July 1810, while looking for new sealing grounds. He claimed Macquarie Island for Britain and annexed it to the colony of New South Wales in 1810. The island was named for Colonel Lachlan Macquarie, Governor of New South Wales from 1810 to 1821. Hasselborough reported a wreck "of ancient design", which has given rise to speculation that the island may have been visited before by Polynesians or others. In the same year, Captain Smith described in more detail what is presumably the same wreck and incorrectly speculated that it belonged to French explorer Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse: "several pieces of wreck of a large vessel on this Island, apparently very old and high up in the grass, probably the remains of the ship of the unfortunate De la Perouse". Between 1810 and 1919, seals and then penguins were hunted for their oil almost to the point of extinction. Sealers' relics include iron try pots, casks, hut ruins, graves and inscriptions. During that time, 144 vessel visits are recorded, 12 of which ended in shipwreck. The conditions on the island and the surrounding seas were considered so harsh that a plan to use it as a penal settlement was rejected. Richard Siddins and his crew were shipwrecked in Hasselborough Bay on 11 June 1812. Joseph Underwood sent the ship Elizabeth and Mary to the island to rescue the remaining crew. The Russian explorer Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen explored the area for Alexander I of Russia in 1820, and produced the first map of Macquarie Island. Bellingshausen landed on the island on 28 November 1820, defined its geographical position and traded his rum and food for the island's fauna with the sealers. In 1877, the crew of the schooner Bencleugh was shipwrecked on the island for four months; folklore says they came to believe there was hidden treasure on the island. The ship's owner, John Sen Inches Thomson, wrote a book on his sea travels, including his time on the island. The book, written in 1912, was entitled Voyages and Wanderings In Far-off Seas and Lands.
Tasmania–New Zealand seal skin dispute Macquarie Island was made a constituent part of Tasmania on 17 June 1880 through Letters Patent for the Governor of Tasmania. In 1890, the Colony of New Zealand wrote to Lord Onslow (the Governor of New Zealand), Philip Fysh (the Premier of Tasmania), and the Lord Knutsford (the Secretary of State for the Colonies) regarding the island, initially requesting permission to annex the island, then requesting its transfer from the Colony of Tasmania, as this would close a loophole in New Zealand's closed sealing season when vessels were poaching on sub-Antarctic islands under the Colony's jurisdiction but claiming they got the seal skins from Macquarie Island. On the recommendation of Fysh, the Tasmanian Legislative Council passed a motion on 24 July 1890 requesting the "necessary steps be taken" for Macquarie Island to be transferred to New Zealand. Fysh was in no hurry to complete this process, and the request was only officially transmitted to the Tasmanian Legislative Assembly on 28 August 1890. When the Legislative Assembly considered the matter on 2 September 1890, the virtue of transferring a dependent island was questioned, and (after several points of order and jokes from members) the assembly deferred consideration until the following day (effectively denying the transfer). By October 1890, it was certain that Tasmania would not condone the transfer of the island to New Zealand. Sir Harry Atkinson (Premier of New Zealand) expressed his regrets that Tasmania had decided against the transfer, with Fysh noting that all of New Zealand's stated objectives could be achieved under existing Tasmanian legislation and through inter-colonial agreements. In mid October 1890, The Southland Times was reporting that an explanation was forthcoming from Wellington. On 23 October 1890, Fysh formally advised New Zealand of the colonial legislature's refusal to transfer the island, and on 20 November 1890 Knutsford formally advised Onslow that the British government had not consented to any transfer. On 20 April 1891, regulations issued by the Tasmanian Commissioner of Fisheries for the protection of seals on Macquarie Island came into effect. This was possible under existing Tasmanian legislation, namely the Fisheries Act 1889. By 26 October 1891, these regulations were amended to expire on 20 July 1894, and to no longer include the forfeiture of a vessel as penalty for the offence.
20th century Between 1902 and 1920, the Tasmanian Government leased the island to Joseph Hatch (1837–1928) for his oil industry based on harvesting penguins.
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