An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales Volume I Part 31

As intentions of this kind had been talked of in several ships, the military guard should never have been less than an officer's command, and that guard (especially when embarked for the security of a ship full of wild lawless Irish) ought never to have been composed either of young soldiers, or of deserters from other corps.

This ship had a quick pa.s.sage from Rio de Janeiro, arriving here in sixty-five days from that port. She brought the following quant.i.ty of provisions and stores for the colony:

Beef 46 tierces 15,496 ) 31,496 pounds; Shipped at Cork 80 barrels 16,000 ) Pork 92 tierces 29,440 ] 45,440 pounds; Shipped at Cork 80 barrels 16,000 ]

Flour 192 barrels, 64,512 pounds; Lime-stone, shipped at Cork 44 tons; Clothing and necessaries 17 bales and 5 cases

The convicts arrived in a very healthy state, nor was any one lost by sickness during the voyage.

Captain Paterson, of the New South Wales corps, an account of whose journeys in Africa appeared in print some years ago, conceiving that he might be able to penetrate as far as, or even beyond, the western mountains (commonly known in the colony by the name of the Blue Mountains, from the appearance which land so high and distant generally wears), set off from the settlement with a small party of gentlemen (Captain Johnston, Mr. Palmer, and Mr. Laing the a.s.sistant-surgeon) well provided with arms, and having provisions and necessaries sufficient for a journey of six weeks, to make the attempt. Boats were sent round to Broken Bay, whence they got into the Hawkesbury, and the fourth day reached as far as Richmond Hill. At this place, in the year 1789, the governor's progress up the river was obstructed by a fall of water, which his boats were too heavy to drag over. This difficulty Captain Paterson overcame by quitting his large boats, and proceeding from Richmond Hill with two that were smaller and lighter. He found that this part of the river carried him to the westward, and into the chasm that divided the high land seen from Richmond Hill. Hither, however, he got with great difficulty and some danger, meeting in the s.p.a.ce of about ten miles with not less than five waterfalls, one of which was rather steep, and was running at the rate of ten or twelve miles an hour. Above this part the water was about fifteen yards from side to side, and came down with some rapidity, a fall of rain having swollen the stream. Their navigation was here so intricate, lying between large pieces of rock that had been borne down by torrents, and some stumps of trees which they could not always see, that (after having loosened a plank in one boat, and driven the other upon a stump which forced its way through her bottom) they gave up any further progress, leaving the western mountains to be the object of discovery at some future day. It was supposed that they had proceeded ten miles farther up the river than had ever before been done, and named that part of it which until then had been unseen, 'the Grose;' and a high peak of land, which they had in view in the chasm, they called 'Harrington Peak.'

Captain Paterson, as a botanist, was amply rewarded for his labour and disappointment by discovering several new plants. Of the soil in which they grew, he did not, however, speak very favourably.

He saw but few natives, and those who did visit them were almost unintelligible to the natives of this place who accompanied him. He entertained a notion that their legs and arms were longer than those of the inhabitants of the coast. As they live by climbing trees, if there really was any such difference, it might perhaps have been occasioned by the custom of hanging by their arms and resting on their feet at the utmost stretch of the body, which they practise from their infancy. The party returned on the 22nd, having been absent about ten days.

In their walk to Pitt Water, they met with the boat which had been stolen by some of the Irish convicts; and a few days after their return some of those who had run into the woods came into Parramatta, with an account of two of their party having been speared and killed by the natives. The men who were killed were of very bad character, and had been the princ.i.p.als in the intended mutiny on board the _Boddingtons_. Their destruction was confirmed by some of the natives who lived in the town.

The foundation of another barrack for officers was begun in this month.

For the privates one only was yet erected; but this was not attended with any inconvenience, as all those who were not in quarters had built themselves comfortable huts between the town of Sydney and the brick-kilns. This indulgence might be attended with some convenience to the soldiers; but it had ever been considered, that soldiers could no where be so well regulated as when living in quarters, where, by frequent inspections and visitings, their characters would be known, and their conduct attended to. In a multiplicity of scattered huts the eye of vigilance would with difficulty find its object, and the soldier in possession of a habitation of his own might, in a course of time, think of himself more as an independent citizen, than as a subordinate soldier.

On the 23rd the first part of the cargo of the _Sugar Cane_ was delivered, and in a very few days all that she had on board on account of government was received into the store, together with some surplus provisions of the contractor's. The convicts which she brought out were, very soon after her arrival, sent to the settlements up the harbour. At these places the labouring people were employed, some in getting the Indian corn for the ensuing season into such ground as was ready, and others in preparing the remainder. At the close of the month, through the favourable rains which had fallen, the wheat in general wore the most flattering appearance, giving every promise of a plenteous harvest. At Toongabbie the wheat appeared to bid defiance to any accident but fire, against which some precautions had however been judiciously and timely taken. From this place, and from the settlers, a quant.i.ty of corn sufficient to supply all our numbers for a twelvemonth was expected to be received into the public granaries, if those who looked so far forward, and took into their calculation much corn not yet in ear, were not too sanguine in their expectations.

CHAPTER XXIII

The _Boddingtons_ and _Sugar Cane_ sail A mill erected Thefts committed Convicts emanc.i.p.ated Two persons killed by lightning The _Fairy_ arrives Farms sold Public works The _Francis_ returns from New Zealand The _Fairy_ sails Ration altered Transactions Harvest begun Criminal Court held A convict executed Provisions Mill at Parramatta Christmas Day Natives Convicts Boats Grants of land Settlers Public works Expenses how to be calculated Deaths in 1793 Prices of grain, stock, and labour

October.] The _Boddingtons_ and _Sugar Cane_ being both bound for the same port in India (Bengal) the masters agreed to proceed together; and on the 13th, the _Sugar Cane_ having set up her rigging, and hurried through such refitting as was indispensably necessary, both ships left the harbour with a fair wind, purposing to follow in the _Atlantic's_ track. The master of the _Boddingtons_ was furnished by us with a copy of a chart made on board the _Pitt_ Indiaman, and brought hither by the _Britannia_, of a pa.s.sage or channel found by that ship in the land named by Lieutenant Shortland New Georgia; which channel was placed in the lat.i.tude of 8 degrees 30 minutes S and in the longitude of 158 degrees 30 minutes E and named 'Manning's Straits,' from the commander of the _Pitt_.

The master of the _Sugar Cane_, had he been left to sail alone, determined to have tried the pa.s.sage to India by the way of the South Cape of this country, instead of proceeding to the northward, and seemed not to have any doubt of meeting with favourable winds after rounding the cape. By their proceeding together, however, it remained yet to be determined, whether a pa.s.sage to India round the South Cape of this country was practicable, and whether it would be a safer and a shorter route than one through Endeavour or Torres Strait, the practicability of which was likewise undetermined as to any knowledge which was had of it in this colony.

Seven persons whose terms of transportation had expired, were permitted to quit the colony in these ships, and the master of the _Sugar Cane_ had shipped Benjamin Williams, the last of the _Kitty's_ people who remained undisposed of. One free woman, the wife of a convict, took her pa.s.sage in the _Sugar Cane_.

Notwithstanding the facility with which pa.s.sages from this place were procured (very little more being required by the masters than permission to receive them, and that the parties should find their own provisions) it was found after the departure of these ships that some convicts had, by being secreted on board, made their escape from the colony; and two men, whose terms as convicts had expired, were brought up from the _Sugar Cane_ the day she sailed, having got on board without permission; for which the lieutenant-governor directed them to be punished with fifty lashes each, and sent up to Toongabbie.

Early in the month an alteration took place in the weekly ration, the four pounds of wheat served to the convicts were discontinued, and a subst.i.tution of one pint of rice, and two pints of gram (an East India grain resembling dholl) took place. The serving of wheat was discontinued for the purpose of issuing it as flour; to accomplish which a mill had been constructed by a convict of the name of James Wilkinson, who came to this country in the _Neptune_. His abilities as a millwright had hitherto lain dormant, and perhaps would longer have continued so, had they not been called forth by a desire of placing himself in compet.i.tion with Thorpe the millwright sent out by government.

His machine was a walking mill, the princ.i.p.al wheel of which was fifteen feet in diameter, and was worked by two men; while this wheel was performing one revolution, the mill-stones performed twenty. As it was in opposition to the public millwright that he undertook to construct this mill, he of course derived no a.s.sistance whatever from Thorpe's knowledge of the business, and had to contend not only with his opinion, but the opinion of such as he could prejudice against him. The heavy part of the work, cutting and bringing in the timber, and afterwards preparing it, was performed by his fellow-prisoners, who gave him their labour voluntarily. He was three months and five days from taking it in hand to his offering it for the first trial. On this trial it was found defective in some of the machinery, which was all constructed of the timber of the country, and not properly seasoned. Its effects in grinding were various; at first it would grind no more than two bushels an hour; with some alteration, it ground more, and did for some time complete four bushels; it afterwards ground less, and at the end of the month produced not more than one bushel. Had the whole of the machinery been upon a larger scale, there was reason to suppose it would have answered every expectation of the most interested. The constructor, however, had a great deal of merit, and perceiving himself what the defects were in this, he undertook to make another upon a larger scale at Sydney, and on an improved plan. For this purpose, all the artificers and a gang of convicts were brought down from Parramatta, and were first employed in forming a timber-yard at Petersham, two hundred feet square.

At that place, a small district in the neighbourhood of Sydney so named by the lieutenant-governor, nine huts for labouring convicts were built, and sixty acres of government ground cleared of timber, twenty of which were sown with Indian corn. This was the only addition made to the public ground this season; and the sole difference that was observable in the progress of our cultivation consisted in sowing this year with wheat a large portion of that ground which last year grew Indian corn. The weather throughout the month continued extremely favourable for wheat.

The number of convicts which it was intended to receive for the present into the New South Wales corps being determined, a warrant of emanc.i.p.ation pa.s.sed the seal of the territory, giving conditional freedom to twenty three persons of that description, seven of whom were transported for life, and three had between six and nine years to serve, having been sent out for fourteen. The condition of the pardon was, their continuing to serve in the corps into which they had enlisted until they should be regularly discharged therefrom.

Several instances of irregularity and villainy among the convicts occurred during this month. From Parramatta, information was received, that in the night of the 15th four people broke into the house of John Randall, a settler, where with large bludgeons they had beaten and nearly murdered two men who lived with him. The hands and faces of these miscreants were blackened; and it was observed, that they did not speak during the time they were in the hut. It was supposed, that they were some of the new-comers, and meant to rob the house; and this they would have effected, but for the activity of the two men whom they attacked, and for the resistance which they met with from them. At this time seven of the male convicts lately arrived from Ireland, with one woman, had absconded into the woods. Some of these people were afterwards brought in to Parramatta, where they confessed that they had planned the robbing of the millhouse, the governor's, and other houses; and that they were to be visited from time to time in their places of concealment by others of their a.s.sociates who were to reside in the town, and to supply them with provisions, and such occasional information as might appear to be necessary to their safety. They also acknowledged that the a.s.sault at Randall's hut was committed by them and their companions.

About the same time the house of Mr. Atkins at Parramatta was broken into, and a large quant.i.ty of provisions, and a cask of wine, removed from his store-room to the garden fence, where they left them on being discovered and pursued. They, however, got clear off, though without their booty.

At Sydney, in the night of the 26th, a box belonging to John Sparrow (a convict) was broke open, and three watches stolen out, one of which with the seals had cost thirty-two guineas, and belonged to an officer. This theft was committed at the hospital, where Sparrow was at the time a patient, although able to work occasionally at his business; and being a young man of abilities as a watchmaker, and of good character, was employed by most of the gentlemen of the settlement. Suspicion fell upon a notorious thief who was in the same ward, and who had some time before proposed to another man to take the box. On his examination he accused two others of the theft, but with such equivocation in his tale as clearly proved the falsehood of it. As there was no evidence against him, except the proposal just mentioned, he was discharged, and during the month nothing was heard of the watches. An old man belonging to the hospital was robbed at the same time of eight guineas and some dollars, which he had got together for the purpose of paying for his pa.s.sage and provisions in any ship that would take him home.

During a storm of rain and thunder which happened in the afternoon of Sat.u.r.day the 26th, two convict lads Dennis Reardon and William Meredith, who were employed in cutting wood just by the town when the rain commenced, ran to a tree for shelter, where they were found the next morning lying dead, together with a dog which followed them. There was no doubt that the shelter which they sought had proved their destruction, having been struck dead by lightning, one or two flashes of which had been observed to be very vivid and near. One of them, when he received the stroke, had his hands in his bosom; the hands of the other were across his breast, and he seemed to have had something in them. The pupils of their eyes were considerably dilated, and the tongue of each, as well as that of the dog, was forced out between the teeth. Their faces were livid, and the same appearance was visible on several parts of their bodies. The tree at the foot of which they were found was barked at the top, and some of its branches torn off. In the evening they were decently buried in one grave, to which they were attended by many of their fellow-prisoners. Mr. Johnson, to a discourse which he afterwards preached on the subject, prefixed as a text these words from the first book of Samuel, chap xx verse 3. 'There is but a step between me and death.'

This was the first accident of the kind that, to our knowledge, had occurred in the colony, though lightning more vivid and alarming had often been seen in storms of longer duration.

While every one was expecting our colonial vessel, the _Francis_, from New Zealand. the signal for a sail was made on the 29th; and shortly after the _Fairy_, an American snow, anch.o.r.ed in the cove from Boston in New England, and last from the island of St. Paul, whence she had a pa.s.sage of only four weeks. The master, Mr. Rogers, touched at False Bay; but from there not having been any recent arrivals from Europe, he procured no other intelligence at that port, than what we had already received. At the island of St. Paul he found five seamen who had been left there from a ship two years before, and who had procured several thousand seal-skins. They informed him, that Lord Macartney in his Majesty's ship the _Lion_, and the _Hindostan_ East-Indiaman, had touched there in their way to China, and Mr. Rogers expected to have heard that his lordship had visited this settlement.

The _Fairy_ was to proceed from this place to the north-west coast of America, where the master hoped to arrive the first for the fur market.

Thence he was to go to China with his skins, and from China back to St.

Paul, where he had left a mate and two sailors. Their success was to regulate his future voyages.

Mr. Rogers expressed a surprise that we had not any small craft on the coast, as he had observed a plentiful harvest of seals as he came along.

He came in here merely to refresh, not having any thing on board for sale, his cargo consisting wholly of articles of traffic for the north-west coast of America.

Charles Williams, the settler so often mentioned in this narrative, wearied of being in a state of independence, sold his farm with the house, crop, and stock, for something less than one hundred pounds, to an officer of the New South Wales corps, Lieutenant c.u.mmings, to whose allotment of twenty-five acres Williams's ground was contiguous. James Ruse also, the owner of Experiment farm, anxious to return to England, and disappointed in his present crop, which he had sown too late, sold his estate with the house and some stock (four goats and three sheep) for forty pounds. Both these people had to seek employment until they could get away; and Williams was condemned to work as a hireling upon the ground of which he had been the master. But he was a stranger to the feelings which would have rendered this circ.u.mstance disagreeable to him.

The allotment of thirty acres, late in the possession of James Richards, a settler at the Ponds, deceased, was put into the occupation of a private soldier of the New South Wales corps; and a grant of thirty acres at the Eastern Farms was purchased for as many pounds by another soldier.

The greatest inconvenience attending this transfer of landed property was the return of such a miscreant as Williams, and others of his description, to England, to be let loose again upon the public. The land itself came into the possession of people who were interested in making the most of it, and who would be more studious to raise plentiful crops for market.

Building and covering the new barrack, and bringing in timber for the new mill-house, which was not to be built of brick, formed the princ.i.p.al labour of this month at Sydney. The shipwrights were employed in putting up the frame of a long-boat purchased of the master of the _Britannia_, and repairing the hoy, which had been lying for some months useless for want of repairs, having been much injured by the destructive worm that was found in the waters of this cove.

At the other settlements the convicts were employed in planting the Indian corn. About four hundred and twenty acres were planted with that article for this season's crop.

November.] In the night of Thursday the 7th of November, the _Francis_ schooner anch.o.r.ed in the cove from Dusky Bay in New Zealand; her long absence from this place (nearly nine weeks) having been occasioned by meeting with contrary and heavy gales of wind. The alteration which had been made in this vessel by rigging her as a schooner instead of a sloop, for which she was built, was found to have materially affected her sailing; for a schooner she was too short, and, for want of proper sail, she did not work well. Four times she was blown off the coast of New Zealand, the _Britannia_ having anch.o.r.ed in Dusky Bay sixteen days before the _Francis_.

Mr. Raven found in health and safety all the people whom he had left there. They had procured him only four thousand five hundred seal-skins, having been princ.i.p.ally occupied in constructing a vessel to serve them in the event of any accident happening to the _Britannia_. This they had nearly completed when Mr. Raven arrived. She was calculated to measure about sixty-five tons, and was chiefly built of the spruce fir, which Mr. Raven stated to be the fittest wood he had observed there for ship-building, and which might be procured in any quant.i.ty or of any size. The carpenter of the _Britannia_, an ingenious man, and master of his profession, compared it to English oak for durability and strength.

The natives had never molested the _Britannia's_ people: indeed they seemed rather to abhor them; for if, by chance, in their excursions, which were but very few, they visited and left any thing in a hut, they were sure, on their next visit, to find the hut pulled down, and their present remaining where it had been left. Some few articles which Mr. Raven had himself placed in a hut, when he touched there to establish his little fishery, were found three months after by his people in the same spot.

Their weather had been very bad; severe gales of wind from the north-west and heavy rains often impeding their fishery and other labour. A shock of an earthquake too had been felt. They had an abundance of fresh provisions, ducks, wood-hens, and several other fowl; and they caught large quant.i.ties of fish. The soil, to a great depth, appeared to be composed of decayed vegetable substances.

From Mr. Raven, who had waited some days for the appearance of the _Francis_, the master received such a.s.sistance as he stood in need of; and on the 20th of October she sailed from Dusky Bay, in company with the _Britannia_, with whom she parted immediately, leaving her to pursue her voyage to Bengal.

Nothing appeared by this information from Dusky Bay, that held out encouragement to us to make any use of that part of New Zealand. So little was said of the soil, or face of the country, that no judgment could be formed of any advantages which might be expected from attempting to cultivate it; a seal fishery there was not an object with us at present, and, beside, it did not seem to promise much. The time, however, that the schooner was absent was not wholly misapplied; as we had the satisfaction of learning the event of a rather uncommon speculation, that of leaving twelve people for ten months on so populous an island, the inhabitants whereof were known to be savages, fierce and warlike. We certainly may suppose that these people were unacquainted with the circ.u.mstance of there being any strangers near them; and that consequently they had not had any communication with the few miserable beings who were occasionally seen in the coves of Dusky Bay.

A few days after the arrival of the _Francis_, Mr. Rogers sailed for China, taking with him two women and three men who had received permission to quit the colony. On board of the _Fairy_ was found a convict, John Crow, who for some offence had been confined in the military guardhouse at Parramatta, whence he found means to make his escape, and reached Sydney in time to swim on board the American. On being brought on sh.o.r.e he received a slight punishment, and was confined in the black hole at the guardhouse at Sydney, out of which he escaped a night or two after, by untiling a part of the roof. After this he was not heard of, till the watch apprehended him at Parramatta, where he had broken into two houses, which he had plundered, and was caught with the property upon him.

The frequency of enormous offences had rendered it necessary to inflict a punishment that should be more likely to check the commission of crimes than mere flagellation at the back of the guardhouse, or being sent to Toongabbie. Crow, therefore, was lodged in the custody of the civil power, and ordered for trial by the court of criminal judicature.

During the time the _Fairy_ lay at anchor in this cove, a sergeant and three privates of the New South Wales corps were sent and remained on board, for the purpose of preventing all improper visitations from the sh.o.r.e, and inspecting whatever might be either received into or sent from the ship in a suspicious manner: a regulation from which the master professed to have found essential service, as he thereby kept his decks free from idle or bad people, and his seamen went on unmolested with the duty of the vessel.

On Sat.u.r.day the 23rd, the flour and rice in store being nearly expended, the ration was altered to the following proportions of those articles, viz:

To the officers, civil and military, soldiers, overseers, and the settlers from free people, were served, of biscuit or flour 2 pounds; wheat 2 pounds; Indian corn 5 pounds; peas 3 pints.