The Australian Broadcasting Corp reports on these amazing discoveries by retired Supreme Court librarian Dorothy Shea who is devoting her spare time to ensuring a cache of historic documents is preserved for future generations.
The report reveals
Mrs Shea stumbled across the documents two decades ago after noticing some brown paper parcels stacked in the court’s storeroom.
“I came searching for a piece of transcript,” she said.
“I didn’t find what I wanted but I did notice these brown paper parcels tied up with pink legal tape and wondered what they were.”
Inside the parcels were original copies of legislation dating back to 1833 when Tasmania was known as Van Diemen’s Land.
Many of the Acts are written on vellum, which is made from animal skin, and bear the signatures of lieutenant-governors including George Arthur and John Franklin.
