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Table of Contents

FIRST INTRODUCTION INTO THE ENGLISH SYSTEM—EXTENSION AND ALTERATION OF THE PRINCIPLE—A THREEFOLD BENEFIT—STOPPED BY THE AMERICAN WAR—£20 PER HEAD FOR CONVICTS—HOW THE SYSTEM OF WHITE SLAVERY WORKED—HORRIBLE SUFFERINGS—FATTENING FOR MARKET—LOOKING OUT FOR OTHER MORAL RUBBISH HEAPS—THE HULKS, HOUSES OF CORRECTION, AND PENITENTIARIES—REVIVAL OF THE SYSTEM—TRANSPORTATION TO AFRICA—A SMALL BILL OF COSTS—LOOKING TOWARDS THE SOUTH—OBJECTS OF TRANSPORTATION TO BOTANY BAY—OPPOSITION TO THE SCHEME PROPOSED—ADVERTISING ITS COMMENCEMENT—THE "FIRST FLEETERS"—CHARACTERS OF THE FIRST MEN AND WOMEN EXILES—THEIR NATIONALITY—THEIR SENTENCES—READY TO SAIL.

Transportation is commonly understood to have been first introduced into the English system of punishments in the year 1718, by the Act of the 4th George I cap. 11; and afterwards enlarged by the Act 6th of George I. c. 23; which allowed the court a discretionary power to order felons who were by law 'entitled to their clergy' to be transported to the American plantations for seven or fourteen years, according to circumstances. It is said in one old work that exile was first introduced as a punishment by the Legislature in the 39th year of Queen Elizabeth, when a statute enacted that such rogues as were dangerous to the inferior people should be banished the realm; and that the first statute in which the word 'Transportation' is used is the 18th of Charles II. c. 3, which gives power to judges at their discretion to execute or transport to America for life the Moss-Troopers of Cumberland and Northumberland; a law which was made perpetual by the Act 31 George II. c. 42.

The system of transportation to the American plantations existed for fifty-six years, during which period, and until the commencement of the American War, in 1775, great numbers of felons were sent from England, chiefly to the Province of Maryland. It was a benefit to England to get rid of her accumulating criminals; it proved, on the whole, beneficial to the criminals to get out of England; and, strange though it may seem, great benefit resulted to the land to which the criminals were transported, the new and apparently undesirable element thus introduced creating a vigour and life that was marvellously expansive and far-reaching.

Says one of the writers of the old school, in a 'Treatise on the Police of the Metropolis,' published in the year 1800:—

"The rigid discipline which the colonial laws authorised the masters to exercise over servants, joined to the prospects which agricultural pursuits, after some experience was acquired, afforded to these outcasts, tended to reform the chief part; and after the expiration of their servitude they mingled in the society of the country, under circumstances highly beneficial to themselves and even to the colony, possessed in general (as every adroit thief must be) of good natural abilities, they availed themselves of the habits of industry they acquired in the years of their servitude—became farmers and planters on their own account; and many of them, succeeding in these pursuits, not only acquired that degree of respectability which is attached to property and industry; but also in their turn became masters, and purchased the servitude of future transports sent out for sale."

It will be remembered that the writer was speaking of the system as it worked when America was the place of servitude. By the Acts 4th and 6th of George I, previously cited, the persons contracting for the transportation of convicts to those colonies had an interest in the service of each, for seven or fourteen years, according to the term of transportation. For some years previous to the commencement of the American War of Independence the adjudged services of convicts became so valuable in Maryland, that contracts were made to convey them without any expense whatever to Government, who had formerly allowed £5 per head. And the Home authorities were not slow to avail themselves of the opportunity of making money in place of spending it. Planters in the later years of the operation of the system readily gave £20 per head to the Government for these outcast human beasts of burden, and one writer declares that England derived at this time as much as £40,000 per year from this species of trade.

The following brief sketch will shew to what extent the system of white slavery was carried on in England in the days preceding these:—Although it was one of the requisitions of Magna Charta that the subject should be protected from imprisonment otherwise than in due course of law, history records that arbitrary and illegal punishments were frequently perpetrated with impunity for a period of three or four hundred years, and that the liberty of the subject was not materially secured until the passing of the Habeas Corpus Act in the reign of Charles the Second, by which it is illegal to detain in prison any person who claims to be tried. During the reign of James II. tumultuous meetings disturbed the peace of England. Protestants plotted to declare the Duke of Monmouth heir to the throne, while the Papists plotted to secure the succession of the Duke of York, who had been banished. Monmouth, with 6,000 followers, was defeated on July 5th, 1685, at Sedgemore. Ten days afterwards Monmouth was beheaded, and the atrocities perpetrated on his followers were such as England never before witnessed. Colonel 'Kirke's Lambs,' as the Feversham troops were called, pillaged and committed every species of debauchery in the western counties, while Chief Justice 'Jeffries' Campaign,' as James II. loved to call it, exceeded the military atrocities. Jeffries executed 240 of the political offenders in one sessions at Somerset, and it was his boast that he hanged more traitors than all his predecessors since the Conquest. General orders were given Jeffries and the judges to convict as many as they could, in order that the convicts might be bestowed as rewards on the courtiers. One of the orders directed that Sir Phillip Howard was to have 200, Sir Richard White 200, Sir W. Booth 100, Mr. Kendall 100, Mr. Nipps 100, Sir W. Stappleton 100, Sir C. Musgrave 100, and——, a merchant, 100. Jeffries estimated the worth of each convict, after paying all charges, from £10 to £20, consequently there was an angry competition for grants among the courtiers, the aldermen and the magistrates. The courtiers proved victorious, and 841 of Monmouth's followers (who were generally regarded as martyrs who sealed with their blood the truth of the Protestant religion) were handed over to 'the rapacious bloodsuckers,' who were required to give security that the convicts should be sold as slaves to work in the King's plantations at Jamaica, Barbadoes, or any of the Leeward islands in America for the term of 10 years. About the same time the followers of the Duke of Argyle (who was beheaded in Scotland for heading a rebellion in that country) were, by order of the Privy Council, transported as slaves to Jamaica. Owing to the brutal disposition of the judges, and the arbitrary power they were armed with, few of those indicated escaped terrible punishment. Those transported were crowded together in the holds of small vessels, where all was starvation, lamentation, disease, and death. More than one-fifth were flung to the sharks before the voyage terminated, and the survivors, when landed, were mere skeletons, necessitating their being fattened by the merchants to whom they were consigned before they could be sold in the slave market.

It is not necessary to deal more fully with this part of the subject; and I have simply used it as an introduction to the larger and more comprehensive portions. America having shut the doors on that side, the authorities in England were compelled to look out for some other place that could be used as a moral rubbish heap. Convicts were accumulating rapidly, and it became indispensably necessary to adopt fresh expedients for their disposal; and in the choice of difficulties the system of the Hulks was suggested, and first adopted in 1776, under the authority of an Act of Parliament. Close following this another Act was passed (16 Geo. III. cap. 43) by the Legislature, empowering the justices of every county in England to prepare Houses of Correction for the reception of convicts under sentence of death, to whom His Majesty should extend his Royal Mercy, to be kept at hard labour for a term not exceeding ten years. Three years afterwards another Act was passed, providing for the erection of two large Penitentiaries, one to hold 600 male and the other 300 female convicts. Power was given to the Court before whom any person was convicted of a transportable offence to order the prisoner, in lieu thereof, to be confined in any of these penitentiary houses, there to be kept to hard labour in the proportion of five years instead of seven years' transportation, and not exceeding seven years in lieu of fourteen years' transportation. The Act also provided for the continuation of the system of the Hulks; and declared that 'for the more effectual punishment of atrocious male offenders liable to be transported, the Court may order such convicts as are of proper age, and free from bodily infirmity, to be punished by being kept on board ships or vessels, and employed in raising sand, soil and gravel, and cleansing the river Thames, or any other river or port approved by the Privy Council; or in any other works upon the shores or banks of the same, for a term not less than one year nor more than five; except an offender be liable to transportation for 14 years, in which case his punishment may be commuted to seven years on board the Hulks. Neither of these Acts were, however, carried fully into execution, and the authorities again began to consider how best to get the criminals out of the Kingdom.

In the year 1784 the system of transportation was again revived by Act 24th Geo. III. Stat. 2, Cap. 26, which empowered the Court before whom a male felon should be convicted, to order the prisoner 'to be transported beyond the seas, either within his Majesty's dominions, or elsewhere; and his services to be assigned to the contractor who shall undertake such transportation.' The same Act continued the Hulks for a further length of time, by directing the removal of convicts under sentence of death, and reprieved by His Majesty, and also such as were under sentence of transportation (being free from infectious disorders) to other places of confinement, either inland, or on board of any ship or vessel in the River Thames, or any other navigable river; and to continue them so confined until transported according to law, or until the expiration of the term of the sentence should otherwise entitle them to their liberty. This plan of transportation, however, does not seem to have answered, from the great difficulty of finding any place where the service of convicts could be rendered reproductive or profitable to merchants who would undertake to transport them. Some few were sent to Africa, but the scheme did not work well, and it was abandoned—not, however, before the Government had incurred considerable expense, as is proved by the following extract from one of the reports of the Select Committee on Finance:—

£ s. d.

In 1785, George Moore, Esq., received

for transporting convicts............................................................1,512 7 6

John Kirby, for expenses..............................................................540 19 4

In 1786, John Kirby, further expenses..................................................................578 10 1

Anthony Calvert, for

transportation................................................................................285 14 0

Thomas Cotton, Esq., clothing, &c., .............................................303 2 7

__________

£3,721 13 6

Then it was that the authorities turned their eyes to the land which Cook had discovered in the South. They formed the idea of 'making an Establishment' for the outcasts in New South Wales; and that idea was followed up by determination, which found force in the year 1787, when an Act was passed (27 Geo. III. Cap. 2) authorising the establishment of a Court of Judicature for the trial of offenders who should be transported to the then unknown land. Another Act of the following year (28 Geo. III. Cap. 24), empowered His Majesty, under his Royal Sign Manual, to authorise any person to make contracts for the transportation of offenders, and to direct to whom security should be given for the due performance of the contract. Thus it was that the system of transportation to New South Wales was authorised and carried into execution.

The idea that Australia was the best country to succeed the American colonies and Africa as the receptacle of convicts from the overcrowded gaols of England originated with Thomas Lord Sydney, who was Secretary of State for the colonies from 1784 to 1789. The objects of the project were:—(1). To rid the mother country of the prisoners whose rapidly increasing numbers in the gaols rendered penal discipline so difficult; (2). to afford a proper place for the safe custody and punishment of the criminals, as well as for their reformation; (3). to form a free colony out of the materials which the prisoners thus reformed would supply, together with the free immigrants who might settle in the country after the work of settlement had been completed. The project was a wise one, but it did not meet with the approval of a few of the leading philanthropists of England, who stoutly opposed it by tongue and pen, and this opposition was only borne down by the Government gagging the press, imprisoning one of the foremost objectors, and carrying on their work in secret. When their scheme was complete, in August, 1786, the Commissioners of the King's navy, having been furnished with a statement shewing all the criminals sentenced to transportation, published advertisements in the official Gazette and the London Observer intimating that the Government intended to charter seven vessels to convey between 700 and 800 felons to Botany Bay. They also posted placards conveying the same intimation at the most popular coffee-houses in London. The result was that the Treasury Board shortly thereafter concluded a contract with the owners of six vessels to convey the criminals to the new country. Three storeships were also engaged to accompany the fleet, and H.M.S. 'Sirius,' mounted with 20 guns, and an armed brig, the 'Supply,' were placed in commission. As it was expected that the voyage would last nearly a year, the work of fitting and equipping the vessels therefor was one of considerable magnitude, and several months elapsed before it was complete.

At different times the transports were loaded with their living freight, until the whole of the convicts had been 'housed' in safety, being placed in irons (the females excepted) in the holds of the vessels, which were divided into compartments. When the squadron was ready to sail the total number of persons on board was 1036, and comprised 11 officials of the civil establishment, 18 officers forming the military staff, 184 marines from which the garrison was formed, 28 women, wives of the marines, with 17 of their children; and 586 male and 192 female convicts.

As it is with the prisoners that I have to chiefly deal, it is necessary that a few particulars concerning their characters should here be given. Many persons have taken it for granted that the men and women who were honoured with the title of 'first fleeters' were necessarily first ruffians—villains of the deepest dye—the worst of all the bad convicts of all England, Scotland, and Ireland. But nothing could be farther from the truth. They were in fact the picked men and women of the gaols, the major part being (to use the words of Captain Tench, who commanded one of the transports) "mechanics and husbandmen, selected on purpose by order of the Government." It must not be forgotten that in those days sentences of death were as frequently passed by the judges as magistrates' orders to inebriates to pay a fine of five shillings are made now-a-days, and the 'crimes' to which the capital sentence was attached were, some of them, not so bad as the offence of drunkenness. Hence transportation was inflicted on hundreds—it may not be beyond the mark to say thousands—who were guilty of offences which in the present age are accounted most trifling, and which are now punished with a small fine, or at most a few weeks' imprisonment. It is on record that in 1789 a wealthy gentleman named Eyre was transported to Botany Bay for stealing a few quires of notepaper, and hundreds were sent across the seas for offences not in any degree greater than that. As late as 1818 a reverend doctor, who was tutor to the Earl of Chesterfield was transported hither for forging a tenpenny postage stamp to a letter. That gentleman—for he was a gentleman in every sense of the word—afterwards became famous in the land to which he was sent as a felon.

As previously stated, the number of convicts brought out in the first fleet was 778. It is stated that only those whose health was robust were chosen as the first Australian exiles, and this no doubt explains how it was that so few of the 'first fleeters' died on the voyage out, and how it was that so many of them lived to become very old colonists. From the returns furnished by the officials I find that of the 778, no less than 265 were convicted in London, 55 in Exeter, 25 in Bristol, 18 in Gloucester, 18 in Launceston, 16 in Kingston, 14 in Maidstone, 13 in Reading, 12 in Winchester, 12 in Shrewsbury, 12 in Manchester, 10 in Worcester, 9 in Warwick, 9 in Dorchester, and several in each of the towns of Liverpool, York, Croydon, Oxford, and other places. Out of the 778 exiles nearly 700 were sentenced to 7 years' imprisonment, and the sentences of 5 of them commenced in 1782, 41 in 1783, 190 in 1784, 209 in 1785, 168 in 1786, and 51 in 1787. There were 4 of the exiles who had in 1786 been sentenced to 5 years' imprisonment, and only 24 sentenced to 14 years in 1785 and 1786. Only 39 were sentenced to penal servitude for life, and 17 of this number were convicted in 1785. So that before the colony had been established five years no less than 650 of the 778 had served their sentences and become free.

Having thus briefly traced the initial steps of the transportation movement, to the point when everything was in readiness for the order to be given for the ships to hoist sail and start on their adventurous journey, it will be interesting to more fully dwell upon the penal laws in operation in England at that time; and this cannot properly be done unless a full chapter is devoted to the subject.