Quaker Mission of Launceston

This quote is from Professor Michael Bennett's paper Quaker Missions in Launceston and Northern Tasmania.

...The Quakers, or more formally members of the Religious Society of Friends, belonged to a community that emerged from the religious anarchy of the English Civil War ...

Between October 1832 and December 1833 James Backhouse and George Washington Walker frequented the north on eight out of fifteen months and Launceston on six occasions. On one occasion after a visit to Flinders Island to inspect the Aboriginal Settlement, they stayed in Launceston at the house of Mr. Isaac Sherwin a merchant of Charles Street. Sherwin established a Launceston branch of the Commerical Bank of Tasmania. During Backhouse and Walker's visit they attended a service being held in the Court House by Charles Price. Price offered his podium to Backhouse at the evening service. Backhouse and Walker attended several meetings and services sponsored by Protestant congregations.

Monthly meetings were held by a small group of Friends in Launceston in 1844, Frederick Mackie and Robert Lindsey reported this on their visit in 1852. While there, they visited Mr. George Yates a miller who lived at Pattersons Plains, it was reported they had difficulty finding a place to stay in Launceston due to the town being full of 'gold diggers'.