[SCOTTISH COMMUNITY IN AUSTRALIA] Letter copybooks of the Highland Society of New South Wales (1881-86).

[Sydney : Highland Society of New South Wales, Bell’s Chambers, Pitt Street, 1881-86]. Three letter copybooks produced by Sydney stationery firm John Sands. Uniform quarto (270 x 220 mm), half leather over cloth or marbled papered boards (mild rubbing and some wear to extremities), spines stamped in gilt ‘Letter Book’; alphabetical tab dividers; containing a large number of copies on onion-skin paper of outgoing local and overseas correspondence, most signed by Hon. Secretary John Macdonald; includes an appended letter on the Society letterhead signed by inaugural President, Sir John Hay; several leaves at front of one book excised (probably at the time), occasional foxing, but generally very well preserved.

A unique manuscript record of an institution dedicated to the fostering of Scottish culture in New South Wales in the 1880s.

The Highland Society of New South Wales was inaugurated in Sydney in June 1878, with politician Sir John Hay as its first president. The Society was a charitable and cultural institution intended to fill the gap left by its predecessor the St. Andrew’s Society, which had become defunct by the end of 1875. It was formed through the amalgamation of two interim entities, the Caledonian Society and the Gaelic Society.