Danish Australians are

Australians Australians, colloquially known as Aussies, are the citizenship, citizens, nationality, nationals and individuals associated with the country of Australia. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or ethno-cultural. For most Aust ...

with full or partial Danish ancestry.

History of immigration

There was some Danish immigration at the time of the

Australian gold rushes During the Australian gold rushes, starting in 1851, significant numbers of workers moved from elsewhere in History of Australia, Australia and overseas to where gold had been discovered. Gold had been found several times before, but the Colo ...

. It was estimated that there were 1,000 Danes on the Victorian goldfields. Danish immigrants had a significant effect on the Australian dairy industry from the 1880s, in particular establishing and managing butter factories.

Danes in Tasmania

During the 1870s, a number of East Prussian and Danish Lutherans arrived in Tasmania. Most of them settled in the farming district of Bismarck, attracted by the cheap land and an abundance of clean water. The area was declared a town in 1881. Lutheranism was very slow to establish in Tasmania. Due to the absence of a Lutheran church, some of the Germans in Bismarck joined the

Seventh-day Adventist Church The Seventh-day Adventist Church (SDA) is an Adventist Protestant Christian denomination which is distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the seventh day of the week in the Christian (Gregorian) and the Hebrew calendar, as the Sa ...

, which arrived in the region in 1889. A Lutheran church was finally opened in Hobart on 11 August 1871 and remains active today but none was ever built in Bismarck.

Post-war migration

There was little emigration from Denmark to Australia in the first half of the twentieth century: in 1901, Australia had a population of 6,281 people who had been born in Denmark; in 1947, that number had slackened to 2,759. At both counts, the population was approximately 75% male. Danish men married women of other ethnicities in Australia, which made it harder for the community to maintain its identity. Danish citizens were within the scope of Australia's Post-war immigration scheme. From a population of 2,954 Danish Australians in 1954, there were 7,911 Danes living in Australia in 1981. Masculinity ratios were healthier, with 58% of these being males. At the 2006 Census, 8,963 Australian residents declared they were born in

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

. In addition, 50,413 Australian residents claimed Danish ancestry, either singularly or with another ancestry.

Culture

There is a Danish Australian Cultural Society. The Australian Danish community has been written about in books. The Danish Royal Life Guards have a chapter of their veterans association in Australia.Australiens Garderforening
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Notable Danish Australians

References

External links

Danish Australian Cultural Society
{{Portal bar, Australia, Denmark

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

European diaspora in Australia