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the separate states combined to form one nation. The group of travellers who form the
subject of this story were, therefore, those people who came from the northem regions
of the Italian peninsula, an area under the control of Austrian mle.
The Poschiavini arrived later than the northem Italians and Ticinesi and for
reasons not so closely related to poverty, although many had been affected by the
devastation of their vineyards in the 1850s.^^ From the Swiss canton, Grisons, their
valley of Poschiavo (ref figure 2) was similar to Ticino in that its people shared a
largely Italian culture. Arriving in Australia from around 1859 to the early 1860s, the
Poschiavini came chiefly to avoid the threat of conscription brought on by a military
campaign in the nearby Italian Valtellina, an alpine valley extending along the Adda
River (ref figure 2). In 1859, Valtellina had been freed from half a century of Austrian
mle and the Poschiavini had felt themselves too close to the conflict. Although there
was never any real danger of Italian action against them, many decided to emigrate.^'*
Poschiavo was poor but it had never experienced the economic crisis which had
devastated Ticino, and as contact between the valleys of Ticino and Poschiavo was
severely restricted in the 1850s,^^ it is difficult to know the degree to which each was
aware of the other's problems. It may have been, as Jacqueline Templeton suggests,
that, following the peak years of emigration from Ticino up to 1855, the shipping
companies shifted their business into the Poschiavo Valley and from there vigorously
promoted the joumey to Australia. ^^ The 400 or so Poschiavini who came to Australia
were, however, also attracted to the Jim Crow mines and many, such as Martino
Pedretti and Maurizio Luminati, decided to make the area their permanent home.
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