Courtship & Marriage

Macquarie's 1793 journal is a chronicle of love-struck ardour, desire and frustration as Lachlan Macquarie sought to meet and speak with the young heiress, Jane Jarvis. Propriety and rank were strongly against Macquarie's success, and his journal documents quite clearly his distracted efforts to fulfil his army duties whilst pursuing every opportunity to see her. His energies were constantly directed towards gaining military promotion and thereby improve his chances of respectability and contact with Jane.

On 16 July James Morley ordered Macquarie to desist in his approaches to Jane; but then, on 2 August, through his friendship with Captain John Abercromby, Macquarie discovered that he had been appointed to be Major of Brigade to the King's Troops in Bombay. On 3 August he proposed marriage to Jane, and on 4 August she accepted. Their marriage took place on Sunday 8 September 1793 in the Morleys' home in the presence of twenty-eight guests and friends.

The entries in Macquarie's 1793 journal are amongst the most personal statements available to us to indicate the inner world of his thoughts and feelings. However, his journal should not be read as confessional or intimate document – there is always a sense that he expected his writings to be read by other eyes. Nevetheless, it, along with all the other journals, remains an important legacy of his life.