An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales Volume I Part 44

[* John Baughan, alias Buffin, alias Bingham. He had served the term of his transportation, and had for a considerable time been employed in the direction of the carpenters and sawyers at this place.]

The sentinel being confined, the company to which he belonged, indignant at the injury done to their comrade, and too much irritated either to act with prudence, or to consider the conduct they determined to pursue, repaired the following morning to Baughan's house (a neat little cottage which he had built below the hospital), where in a few minutes they almost demolished his house, out-houses, and furniture, and Baughan himself suffered much personal outrage.

They were so sudden in the execution of this business, that the mischief was done before any steps could be taken either by the civil or military power to prevent it.

Baughan, after some days had elapsed, swearing positively to the persons of four of the princ.i.p.als in this transaction, a warrant was made out to apprehend them; but before it could be executed, the soldiers expressing themselves convinced of the great impropriety of their conduct, and offering to indemnify the sufferer for the damage they had done him, who also personally pet.i.tioned the governor in their behalf, the warrant was withdrawn.

It was observed, that the most active of the soldiers in this affair had formerly been convicts, who, not having changed their principles with their condition, thus became the means of disgracing their fellow-soldiers.

The corps certainly was not much improved by the introduction of people of this description among them. It might well have been supposed, that being taken as good characters from the cla.s.s of prisoners, they would have felt themselves above mixing with any of them afterwards; but it happened otherwise; they had nothing in them of that pride which is termed _l'esprit du corps_; but at times mixed with the convicts familiarly as former cornpanions; yet when they chose to quarrel with, or complain of them, they meanly a.s.serted their superiority as soldiers.

This intercourse had been strongly prohibited by their officers; but living (as once before mentioned) in huts by themselves, it was carried on without their knowledge. Most of them were now, however, ordered into the barracks; but to give this regulation the full effect, a high brick wall, or an inclosure of strong paling, round the barracks, was requisite; the latter of these securities would have been put up some time before, had there not been a want of the labouring hands necessary to prepare and collect the materials.

On the 11th of this month the ship _Marquis Cornwallis_ anch.o.r.ed in the cove from Ireland, with two hundred and thirty-three male and female convicts of that country. We understood from her commander, Mr. Michael Hogan, that a conspiracy had been formed to take the ship from him; but, the circ.u.mstances of it being happily disclosed in time, he was enabled to prevent it, and having sufficient evidence of the existence of the conspiracy, he caused the princ.i.p.al part of those concerned to be severely punished, first taking the opinions of all the free people who were on board. A military guard, consisting of two subalterns and a proportionate number of privates of the New South Wales corps (princ.i.p.ally drafts from other regiments), was embarked in this ship. The prisoners were in general healthy; but some of those who had been punished were not quite recovered, and on landing were sent to the hospital. It appeared that the men were for the most part of the description of people termed Defenders, desperate, and ripe for any scheme from which danger and destruction were likely to ensue. The women were of the same complexion; and their ingenuity and cruelty were displayed in the part they were to take in the purposed insurrection, which was the preparing of pulverised gla.s.s to mix with the flour of which the seamen were to make their puddings. What an importation!

A few months provisions for these people, and the remainder* of the mooring chains intended for his Majesty's ships the _Reliance_ and the _Supply_, together with a patent under the great seal for a.s.sembling criminal courts at Norfolk Island, arrived in this ship. She sailed from Cork on the 9th of August last, and touched at the island of St. Helena and the Cape of Good Hope, which latter place, we had the satisfaction of hearing, had surrendered to his Majesty's arms, and was in our possession. General Craig, the commander in chief on sh.o.r.e, and Commodore Blankett, each sent an official communication of this important circ.u.mstance to Governor Hunter, and stated their desire to a.s.sist in any circ.u.mstance that might be of service to the settlement, when the season should offer for sending the ships under his orders to the Cape for supplies.

[* Some part had arrived in the _Reliance_ and _Supply_.]

With infinite regret we heard of the death of Colonel Gordon, whose attentions to this settlement, when opportunities presented themselves, can never be forgotten. He was a favoured son of science, and liberally extended the advantages which that science gave him wherever he thought they could promote the welfare of his fellow-creatures.

On Monday the 15th a criminal court was held for the trial of two prisoners, William Britton a soldier, and John Reid a convict, for a burglary in the house of the Rev. Mr. Johnson, committed in the night of Sunday the 7th of this month. The evidence, though strong, was not sufficient to convict them, and they were acquitted. While this court was sitting, however, information was received, that black Caesar had that morning been shot by one Wimbow. This man and another, allured by the reward, had been for some days in quest of him. Finding his haunt, they concealed themselves all night at the edge of a brush which they perceived him enter at dusk. In the morning he came out, when, looking round him and seeing his danger, he presented his musket; but before he could pull the trigger Wimbow fired and shot him. He was taken to the hut of Rose, a settler at Liberty Plains, where he died in a few hours. Thus ended a man, who certainly, during his life, could never have been estimated at more than one remove above the brute, and who had given more trouble than any other convict in the settlement.

On the morning of the 18th the _Otter_ sailed for the north-west coast of America. In her went Mr. Thomas Muir (one of the persons sent out in the _Surprise_ for sedition) and several other convicts whose sentences of transportation were not expired. Mr. Muir conceived that in withdrawing (though clandestinely) from this country, he was only a.s.serting his freedom; and meant, if he should arrive in safety, to enjoy what he deemed himself to have regained of it in America, until the time should come when he might return to his own country with credit and comfort. He purposed practising at the American bar as an advocate; a point of information which he left behind him in a letter. In this country he chiefly pa.s.sed his time in literary ease and retirement, living out of the town at a little spot of ground which he had purchased for the purpose of seclusion.

A few days after the departure of this ship, the _Abigail_, another American, arrived. As several prisoners had found a conveyance from this place in the _Otter_, the governor directed the _Abigail_ to be anch.o.r.ed in Neutral Bay (a bay on the north sh.o.r.e, a little below Rock Island), where he imagined the communication would not be so easy as the ships of that nation had found it in Sydney Cove. Her master, Christopher Thornton, gave out that he was bound to Manilla and Canton, having on board a cargo for those places. For part of that cargo, however, he met with purchasers at this place, notwithstanding the glut of articles which the late frequent arrivals must have thrown in. He expected to have found here a snow, named the _Susan_, which he knew had sailed from Rhode Island with a cargo expressly laid in for this market. He came direct from that port without touching any where.

The frequent attacks and depredations to which the settlers situated on the banks of the Hawkesbury, and other places, were exposed from the natives, called upon them, for the protection of their families, and the preservation of their crops, mutually to afford each other their a.s.sistance upon every occasion of alarm, by a.s.sembling without delay whenever any numerous bodies of natives were reported to be lurking about their grounds; but they seldom or never showed the smallest disposition to a.s.sist each other. Indolent and improvident even for their own safety and interest, they in general neglected the means by which either could be secured. This disposition being soon manifested to the governor, he thought it necessary to issue a public order, stating his expectations and directions, that all the people residing in the different districts of the settlemerits, whether the alarm was on their own farms, or on the farm of any other person, should upon such occasions immediately render to each other such a.s.sistance as each man if attacked would himself wish to receive; and he a.s.sured them, that if it should be hereafter proved, that any settlers or other persons withdrew or kept back their a.s.sistance from those who might be threatened, or who might be in danger of being attacked, they would be proceeded against as persons disobeying the rules and orders of the settlement. Such as had fire-arms were also positively enjoined not wantonly to fire at, or take the lives of any of the natives, as such an act would be considered a deliberate murder, and subject the offender to such punishment as (if proved) the law might direct to be inflicted. It had been intimated to the governor, that two white men (Wilson and Knight) had been frequently seen with the natives in their excursions, and were supposed to direct and a.s.sist in those acts of hostility by which the settlers had lately suffered. He therefore recommended to every one who knew or had heard of these people, and particularly to the settlers who were so much annoyed by them, to use every means in their power to secure them, that they might be so disposed of as to prevent their being dangerous or troublesome in future. The settlers were at the same time strictly prohibited from giving any encouragement to the natives to lurk about their farms; as there could not be a doubt, that if they had never met with the shelter which some had afforded them, they would not at this time have furnished so much cause to complaint.

Those natives who lived with the settlers had tasted the sweets of a different mode of living, and, willing that their friends and companions should partake, either stole from those with whom they were living, or communicated from time to time such favourable opportunities as offered of stealing from other settlers what they themselves were pleased with.

At this time several persons who had served their term of transportation were applying for permission to provide for themselves. Of this description were Wilson and Knight; but they preferred a vagrant life with the natives; and the consideration that if taken they would be dealt with in a manner that would prevent their getting among them again, now led them on to every kind of mischief. They demonstrated to the natives of how little use a musket was when once discharged, and this effectually removed that terror of our fire-arms with which it had been our constant endeavour to inspire them.

Several articles having been brought for sale in the _Marquis Cornwallis_, a shop was opened on sh.o.r.e. As money, or orders on or by any of the responsible officers* of the colony, were taken at this shop for goods, an opportunity was afforded to some knowing ones among the prisoners to play off, not only base money, as counterfeit Spanish dollars and rupees, but forged notes or orders. One forged note for ten pound ten shillings, bearing the commissary's name, was pa.s.sed at the shop, but fortunately discovered before the recollection of the persons who offered it was effaced, though not in time to recover the property.

The whole party was apprehended, and committed for trial.

[* Such as the commissary, paymaster of the corps, and officers who paid companies.]

Discharging the storeships formed the princ.i.p.al labour of this month; which being completed, the a.s.sistants required from the farms to unload them were returned.

The bricklayers' gang were employed in erecting a small hut for the accommodation of an officer within the paling of the guardhouse at Sydney, the main guard being now commanded by a subaltern officer.

Mr. Henry Brewer, the provost-marshal of the territory, worn out with age and infirmities, being incapable of the duties of his office, which now required a very active and a much younger man to execute, and at this time very much indisposed, the governor appointed to that situation Mr. Thomas Smyth, then acting as a storekeeper at this place, until Mr. Brewer should be able to return to the duties of it.

During one or two hot days in this month the shrubs and brushwood about the west point of the cove caught fire, and burnt within a few yards of the magazine. On its being extinguished, the powder was removed for a few days on board the _Supply_, until some security against any future accident of that kind could be thrown up round the building.

March.] Late in the evening of the 5th of March his Majesty's ship the _Reliance_ returned from Norfolk Island. In her came Mr. D'Arcy Wentworth. This person arrived at New South Wales in the _Neptune_ transport, and went immediately to Norfolk Island, where he was employed, first as a superintendant of convicts, and afterwards as an a.s.sistant to the surgeon at the hospital there, having been bred to that profession.

By letters received from Mr. Bampton, who sailed from his place in the _Endeavour_ in the month of September last, we now heard, that on his reaching Dusky Bay in New Zealand his ship unfortunately proved so leaky, that with the advice and consent of his officers and people she was run on sh.o.r.e and scuttled. By good fortune the vessel which had been built by the carpenter of the _Britannia_ (when left there with Mr. John Leith the mate, and others, in that ship's first voyage hence to the Cape of Good Hope) being found in the same state as she had been left by them, they completed and launched her, according to a previous agreement between the two commanders. It may be remembered, that in addition to the large number of persons which Mr. Bampton had permission to ship at this port, nearly as many more found means to secrete themselves on board his ship and the _Fancy_. For these, as well as his officers and ship's company, he had now to provide a pa.s.sage from the truly desolate sh.o.r.es of New Zealand. He accordingly, after fitting as a schooner the vessel which he had launched, and naming her the _Providence_, sailed with her and the _Fancy_ for Norfolk Island, having on board as many of the officers and people who reached Dusky Bay with him as they could contain, leaving the remainder to proceed in a vessel which one Hatherleigh (formerly a carpenter's mate of the _Sirius_, who happened to be with him) undertook to construct out of the _Endeavour's_ long-boat. The _Fancy_ and _Providence_ arrived safe at Norfolk Island, whence they sailed for China on the 31st day of January last.

This unlucky termination of the voyage of the _Endeavour_ brought to our recollection the difficulties and dangers which Mr. Bampton met with in the _Shah Hormuzear_, when, on his return to India from this country, he attempted to ascertain a pa.s.sage for future navigators between New Holland and New Guinea.

In the course of this narrative, the different reports received respecting the fate of the boat which landed on Tate Island have been stated. In a Calcutta newspaper, brought here by Mr. McClellan in the _Experiment_, we now found a printed account of the whole of that transaction, which filled up that chasm in the story which the parties themselves alone could supply.

By referring to the account given in the month of July 1794, as communicated by Mr. Dell, it will appear, that the ship, having been driven to leeward of the island after the boat left her, was three days before she could work up to it. When Mr. Dell went on sh.o.r.e to search for Captain Hill and his companions, he could only, at his return, produce, what he thought incontestable proofs of their having been murdered; such as their greatcoats, a lanthorn, tomahawk, etc. and three hands, one of which, from a certain mark, was supposed to have belonged to Mr. Carter.

Of the boat, after the most diligent search round the island, he could find no trace. By the account now published, and which bore every mark of authenticity, it appeared, that when the boat, in which these unfortunate gentlemen were, had reached the island (on the 3rd of July 1793), the natives received them very kindly, and conducted them to a convenient place for landing. After distributing some presents among them, with which they appeared very much satisfied, it was proposed that Mr. Carter, Shaw (the mate of the _Chesterfield_), and Ascott, should proceed to the top of a high point of land which they had noticed, and that Captain Hill should stay by the boat, with her crew, consisting of four seamen belonging to the _Chesterfield_.

The inland party, taking the precaution to arm, and provide themselves with a necessary quant.i.ty of ammunition, set off. Nothing unfriendly occurred during their walk, though several little circ.u.mstances happened, which induced Ascott to suspect that the natives had some design on them; an idea, however, which was scouted by his companions.

On their return from the hill, hostile designs became apparent, and the natives seemed to be deterred from murdering them merely by the activity of Ascott, who, by presenting his musket occasionally, kept them off; but, notwithstanding his activity and vigilance, the natives at length made their attack. They began by attempting to take Ascott's musket from him, finding he was the most likely to annoy them; directly after which, Mr. Carter, who was the foremost of the party, was heard to exclaim, 'My G.o.d, my G.o.d, they have murdered me.' Ascott, who still retained his musket, immediately fired, on which the natives left them and fled into the bushes. Ascott now had time to look about him, and saw what he justly deemed a horrid spectacle, Mr. Carter lying bleeding on the ground, and Mr. Shaw with a large wound in his throat under the left jaw. They were both however able to rise, and proceed down the hill to the boat. On their arrival at the beach they called to their companions to fire; but, to their extreme horror, they perceived Captain Hill and one of the seamen lying dead on the sand, cut and mangled in a most barbarous manner. Two others of the seamen they saw floating on the water, with their throats cut from ear to ear. The fourth sailor they found dead in the boat, mangled in the same shocking manner. With much difficulty these unhappy people got into their boat, and, cutting her grapnel, pulled off from this treacherous sh.o.r.e. While this was performing, they clearly saw the natives, whom in their account they term voracious cannibals, dragging the bodies of Captain Hill and the seamen from the beach toward some large fires, which they supposed were prepared for the occasion, yelling and howling at the same time most dismally.

These wretched survivors of their companions having seen, from the top of the hill whither their ill-fated curiosity had led them, a large sand-bank not far from the island, determined to run under the lee of it, as they very reasonably hoped that boats would the next morning be sent after them from the ship. They experienced very little rest or ease that night, and when daylight appeared found they had drifted nearly out of sight of the island, and to leeward of the sand-bank.

Deeming it in vain to attempt reaching the bank, after examining what was left in the boat, (a few of the trifles which they had put into her to buy the friendship of the natives, and Ascott's greatcoat, but neither a compa.s.s nor a morsel of provisions,) they determined, by the advice of Shaw, who of these three miserable people was the only one that understood any thing of navigation, to run direct for Timor, for which place the wind was then happily fair. To the westward, therefore, they directed their course, trusting (as the printed account stated) to that Providence which had delivered them from the cannibals at Tate Island.*

[* The narrative of this most horrible affair, as printed at Calcutta, was reprinted entire in the _European Magazine_ for May and June 1797.]

Without provisions, dest.i.tute of water, and almost without bodily strength, it cannot be doubted that their sufferings were very great before they reached a place of safety and relief. They left the island on the 3rd of July, the day on which their companions were butchered. On the 7th, having the preceding day pa.s.sed a sand-bank covered with birds, they providentially, in the morning, found two small birds in the boat, one of which they immediately divided into three parts, and were considerably relieved by eating it. On the 8th they found themselves with land on both sides. Through these straits they pa.s.sed, and continued their course to the westward. All that could be done with their wounds was to keep them clean by opening them occasionally, and washing them with salt water. On the 11th they saw land, and pushed their boat into a bay, all agreeing that they had better trust to the chance of being well received on sh.o.r.e, than to that of perishing in the course of a day or two more at sea. Here they procured some water and a roasted yam from the natives, who also gave them to understand that Timor was to the southward of them.

Not thinking themselves quite so safe here as they would be at Coupang, they again embarked. They soon after found a proa in chase of them, which they eluded by standing with their boat over a reef that the proa would not encounter. On the morning of the 13th they saw a point of land ahead, which, with the wind as it then was, they could not weather. They therefore ran into a small bay, where the natives received them, calling out 'Bligh! Bligh!' Here they landed, were hospitably received, and providentially saved from the horror of perishing by famine.

This place was called by the natives Sarrett, and was distinct from Timor Land, which was the first place they refreshed at. They were also informed, that there was another small island to the northward, called by them Fardatte, but which in some charts was named Ta-na-bor. They also understood that a proa came yearly from Banda to trade at Tanabor, and that her arrival was expected in the course of seven or eight months.

They were much gratified with this information, and soon found that they had fallen into the hands of a hospitable and humane race of people.

On the 25th of July Mr. Carter's wound was entirely healed, after having had thirteen pieces of the fractured skull taken out. But this gentleman was fated not long to survive his sufferings. He remained in perfect health until the 17th of November, when he caught a fever, of which he died on the 10th of December, much regretted by his two friends (for adversity makes friends of those who perhaps, in other situations, would never have shaken hands).

The two survivors waited in anxious expectation for the arrival of the annual trading proa from Banda. To their great joy she came on the 12th of March 1794.

For Banda they sailed on the 10th of April, and arrived there on the 1st of May following, where they were received with the greatest hospitality by the governor, who supplied them with every thing necessary for people in their situation, and provided them with a pa.s.sage on board an Indiaman bound to Batavia, where they arrived on the 10th of the following October; adding another to the many instances of escape from the perils which attend on those whose hard fate have driven them to navigate the ocean in an open boat.

Hard indeed was the fate of Captain Hill and Mr. Carter. They were gentlemen of liberal education, qualified to adorn the circles of life in which their rank in society placed them. How lamentable thus to perish, the one by the hands and rude weapons of barbarous savages, cut off in the prime of life and most perfect enjoyment of his faculties, lost for ever to a mother and sister whom he tenderly loved, his body mangled, roasted, and devoured by cannibals; the other, after escaping from those cannibals, to perish* in a country where all were strangers to him, except his two companions in misery Shaw and Ascott, to give up all his future prospects in life, never more to meet the cheering eye of friendship or of love, and without having had the melancholy satisfaction of recounting his perils, his escape, and sufferings, to those who would sympathise with him in the tale of his sorrows.

[* It is evident, if this account be true, that Mr. Dell must have been mistaken in his opinion of having carried on board the _Shah Hormuzear_ a hand which, from a certain mark on it, he knew to have belonged to Mr.

Carter.]

On the 17th the vessel built by the shipwright Hatherleigh at Dusky Bay arrived, with some of the people left behind by Mr. Bampton. They were so distressed for provisions, that the person who had the direction of the vessel could not bring away the whole; and it was singularly fortunate that he arrived as he did, for with all the economy that could be used, his small stock of provisions was consumed to the last mouthful the day before he made the land.

This vessel, which the officer who commanded her (Waine, one of the mates of the _Endeavour_) not unappropriately named the _a.s.sistance_, was built entirely of the timber of Dusky Bay, but appeared to be miserably constructed. She was of near sixty tons burden, and was now to be sold*

for the benefit of Mr. Bampton.

[* Notwithstanding all her imperfections, she was valued at and sold for two hundred and fifty pounds.]

The situation of the people still remaining at Dusky Bay was not, we understood, the most enviable; their dependence for provisions being chiefly on the seals and birds which they might kill. They had all belonged to this colony, and one or two happened to be persons of good character.

On the 10th the American sailed for the north-west coast of America. In her went Mr. James Fitzpatrick Knaresbro', a gentleman whose hard lot it was to be doomed to banishment for life from his native country, Ireland, and the enjoyment of a comfortable fortune which he there possessed. He arrived here in the _Sugar Cane_ transport, in the year 1793, and had lived constantly at Parramatta with the most rigid economy and severe self-denial even of the common comforts of life.

It was seen with concern that the crops of this season proved in general bad, the wheat being almost every where mixed with a weed named by the farmers Drake. Every care was taken to prevent this circ.u.mstance from happening in the ensuing season, by cleaning with the greatest nicety not only such wheat as was intended for seed, but such as was received into the public store from settlers. It was occasioned by the ground being overwrought, from a greediness to make it produce golden harvests every season, without allowing it time to recruit itself from crop to crop, or being able to afford it manure. Had this not happened, the crops would most likely have been immense.

At the Hawkesbury, where alone any promise of agricultural advantages was to be found, the settlers were immersed in intoxication. Riot and madness marked their conduct; and this was to be attributed to the spirits that, in defiance of every precaution, found their way thither.