An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales Volume II Part 1

An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales.

by David Collins.

VOLUME II.

CHAPTER I

Recapitulation A log prison begun Various impositions practised at the store October Regulations and proceedings of the governor A man found dead A woman murdered Discontents among the Irish, followed by an order Character of the settlers at the river Houses numbered at Sydney Bennillong claims protection from the governor Weather in October November Two victuallers arrive from England Constables elected The _Francis_ returns from Norfolk Island Civil appointment A criminal court held Executions One man hung in chains Effect of this upon the natives Public works December Convicts secreted on board the _Sylph_ Reflections A general muster Regulations A native child murdered Weather

1796.]

September.] In the former account of the English Colony of New South Wales, which was brought up to the 29th September, 1796, it will be seen, that on that day His Majesty's ship the _Reliance_ and the _Britannia_ hired transport, sailed, with the _Francis_ colonial schooner, for Norfolk island; whence, being there joined by the _Supply_, the _Reliance_ was to sail to the Cape of Good Hope, to return with cattle for the colony, and the _Britannia_ was to proceed to England.

The frequent commission of the most atrocious crimes, together with the dissipated, turbulent, and abandoned disposition of the convicts, which had more than ever at this time been manifest, determining the governor to enforce the most rigid discipline, he resolved on constructing a strong and capacious Log Prison at each of the towns of Sydney and Parramatta. It being absolutely necessary that these should be erected as expeditiously as possible, the safety of the inhabitants and security of their property, rendering any delay extremely dangerous, and the public gangs being very weak, he called upon every officer, settler, and housekeeper within the above-mentioned districts, to furnish a certain number of logs for this purpose, which were to be delivered at Sydney, or Parramatta, as might be most convenient to each person's residence; and he had, in a very short time, the satisfaction of seeing the materials which were required brought in much faster than the carpenters could put them together.

Among other crimes committed by these people, must be mentioned a variety of impositions which were practised to deceive the commissary in the issue of provisions. To detect these, an order was given about the end of the month, which directed that every person belonging to each different mess should attend personally at the store on the next serving-day. The convicts had always been divided into messes, containing a certain number of persons; one of whom out of each mess was to attend at the store, and receive provisions for the whole number belonging to it.

On the day appointed, it appeared that many were victualled both at Sydney and Parramatta, and several other impositions were detected and abolished.

In a settlement which was still in a great measure dependant upon the mother country for food, it might have been supposed that these people would have endeavoured by their own industry to have increased, rather than by robbery and fraud to have lessened, the means of their support: but far too many of them were most incorrigibly flagitious. The most notorious of these were formed into a gaol gang, which was composed of such a set of hardened and worthless characters, that, although Sat.u.r.day was always given up to the convicts for their own private avocations, as well as to enable them to appear clean and decent on Sunday at church, this gang was ordered, as an additional punishment, to work on the Sat.u.r.day morning in repairing the roads and bridges near the town.

At the close of this month the stone tower of the Wind Mill, and the stone foundation of the Log Prison, were much advanced.

October.] The governor, still turning his thoughts toward rectifying the abuses which had imperceptibly crept into the colony, arranged in the beginning of the following month (October) the muster lists which had lately been taken; and, many more impositions being detected, he ordered the delinquents to labour, after inflicting on them such punishments as their respective offences seemed to demand; by which means he was enabled considerably to increase the number of labouring people in the public gangs. On his going up to Parramatta, whither he was attended by Captain Johnston as his aid-de-camp, and Mr. Balmain (the surgeon) as a magistrate, he recovered at least one hundred men for government work.

Exclusive of the advantage which attended the recruiting of the public gangs in this way, another point was established by this examination, the discovering of several who had been victualled from the stores beyond the period (eighteen months) which had been fixed and considered by government as a sufficient time to enable an industrious man to provide for himself.

Directing his attention also toward the morality of the settlement, a point which he could not venture to promise himself that he should ever attain, he issued some necessary orders for enforcing attendance on divine service, and had the satisfaction of seeing the Sabbath better observed than it had been for some time past. But there were some who were refractory. A fellow named Carroll, an Irishman, abused and ill treated a constable who was on his duty, ordering the people to church; saying, that he would neither obey the clergyman nor the governor; for which, the next day, he was properly punished.

On the morning of the 16th, the people of a boat which had been sent to the north sh.o.r.e for wood found a man's hat, and a large hammer lying by it. One side of the hat had apparently been beaten in with the hammer, which was b.l.o.o.d.y; and much blood was also found in the hat, as well as about the spot where it was discovered. It was immediately conjectured, that a man who had been working there with some carpenter's tools had been murdered; and upon its being made known to the governor, he sent several persons to search for the body, which was found thrown over the cliff, and near the water side. On its being examined by the surgeons, the skull was found beaten in, which must have been effected with the hammer, and occasioned his death. Some suspicion falling upon two people, they were secured, and an examination was the next day taken before the magistrates; but nothing transpired that could fix the offence upon them.

This shocking circ.u.mstance was followed shortly after by another equally atrocious: a murder which was committed by a man on the person of a woman with whom he cohabited. It appeared that they had both been intoxicated, and had quarrelled on the night preceding and in the morning of the murder.

This made the fifth circ.u.mstance of the kind which had occurred within the last twelve months; and so excessively abandoned were the people, that it was scarcely possible to obtain sufficient proof to convict the offenders. Strong presumptive proof, indeed, was frequently adduced; but the kind of evidence necessary to establish the offence was almost constantly withheld.

About this time, some dissatisfaction appearing among the Irish convicts who were ordered to labour, and some threats having been made use of by them, the governor thought it necessary to inform the inhabitants of the colony in general, that, after having pointed out a number of people who had, by false pretences, and various impositions, obtained certificates of discharge from the commissary's books, he did not expect so soon to have occasion to enter again upon the same subject. He then, taking notice of those who had not hesitated to hold a language which implied a determination to resist all authority, declared, that if any officer, civil or military, any settler, or other person within the colony, should, after Monday, the 7th of November, retain in his or their service any one or more of the persons described in a former order, such persons should be considered as encouraging a set of lawless and seditious people, to the total subversion of all order and government, and to the weakening of His Majesty's authority in the settlement. He next informed the people whose conduct had occasioned this order, that if they were of opinion, that to threaten would be the best means of obtaining what they desired, they might repent that opinion when too late. That there would not be any difficulty found in furnishing them with a situation in the colony, or in some of its dependencies, where they would not be able to disturb the peace of their neighbours; and that if they were troublesome here, they should certainly be placed in that situation very soon. He concluded this order by informing all the inhabitants of the colony, whether in a civil or a military capacity, that he expected, as they valued His Majesty's authority, or the peace and civil government of the settlement, that they would exert every effort to preserve good order; and, to that end, that they should aid and a.s.sist the civil power when and wherever it might be necessary, and report all such persons as they might know to be in any way acting in opposition to this order.

It was hoped by the governor, that this order would convince the people particularly styled defenders, that, if they continued to be troublesome, they would not very readily escape from the punishment to which their turbulent and restless conduct might ent.i.tle them.

From the accession of numbers to the public gangs, the different works in hand at Sydney and Parramatta went rapidly on. At the former of these places the erection of a granary, 72 feet in length and 22 in breadth, was begun on the west side of the main street, there not being a building for the reception of grain yet prepared in that township.

Boats were sent round to the Hawkesbury, for various articles wanted at Sydney. From that part of the settlement, the timber most useful for boat and other buildings was occasionally received; shingles also of a good sort were brought round; and frequently the boats returned loaded with grain. It has been shown, in the account of this colony already published, that the farms upon the fertile banks of that river were superior, in point of soil, to any near the princ.i.p.al settlement; and that, had they been in the hands of good and industrious characters, they would have produced abundant crops, and enriched their owners. But every day's experience evinced, that the people thus fortunately situated were, unluckily, some of the most profligate wretches in the colony; and their distance from the immediate seat of government added much to the inconvenience. Such of these farms as were situated on the low grounds were often overflowed after very heavy falls of rain; but this circ.u.mstance was in no way injurious to the farmer, unless it happened when the grain was ripening.

Among other local arrangements which took place, and were extremely useful, must be reckoned the numbering of the houses of the towns of Sydney and Parramatta, and dividing them into portions; with a princ.i.p.al inhabitant at the head of each division, who was charged with the peace and good order of the district in which he lived.

The frame of the Log Prison at Sydney was got up in the course of this month, to the great annoyance of the worthless, who seemed to antic.i.p.ate the lodging in it which they merited.

At Parramatta and Toongabbie a very few old stacks of wheat belonging to government were opened for the purpose of being thrashed out, when they were found to have been much injured by vermin.

In the course of this month, Bennillong, who had returned to all the habits of savage life, claimed the protection of the governor from the menaces of several of his countrymen, who, he with much agitation informed him, had a.s.sembled in a considerable body near the Brickfields*, to lie in wait for him; and where, if possible, they intended to kill him; he having, as they suspected, killed a man near Botany Bay. This he positively denied having done, and the governor dispatched him to the place, guarded by some of the military, where he explained to his countrymen that he had not killed the man in question, or any man; and that the soldiers were sent with him, to convince them that the governor would not suffer him, his old friend and fellow voyager (it must be remembered that Bennillong returned from England with the governor in His Majesty's ship _Reliance_), to be ill treated by them on any false pretence; and that he was determined to drive every native away from Sydney who should attempt it. This threat had a good effect. Many of them were much alarmed when they saw in what manner and by whom Bennillong was attended; and to be driven from a place whence they derived so many comforts, and so much shelter in bad weather, would have been severely felt by most of them.

[* Adjacent to the town of Sydney.]

In the first part of the month the weather was not very good; about the middle some showers fell very seasonably for the harvest; and towards the latter part the regular land and sea breezes had set in, which kept the weather cool and pleasant.

November.] The month of November opened with the arrival of the _Prince of Wales_, victualler, from England. She had been close in with Botany Bay the preceding day; but, there being little wind, the master had been obliged to stretch out from the land during the night; and the next morning, a pilot getting on board, she was brought in. She had sailed in company with the _Sylph_, which also had provisions for the settlement on board, but which did not arrive until the 17th. They brought the information, that a Dutch fleet, consisting of ten sail of ships of war, bound to the East Indies had been captured off the Cape of Good Hope, by His Majesty's fleet, under Admiral Sir Geo. Keith Elphinstone (now Lord Keith), which had followed them from England.

The useful regulation of numbering the different houses in the town of Sydney, particularly those in the occupation of the convicts, was followed up by another equally serviceable, which directed the inhabitants of each of the four divisions of the town (for into that number it was portioned off) to meet, and from among themselves elect three of the most decent and respectable characters, who were to be approved by the governor, and were to serve for the ensuing year as watchmen, for the purpose of enforcing a proper attention to the good order and tranquillity of their respective divisions. Many of the soldiers being allowed to occupy houses for their families in the vicinity of the barracks, the commanding officer was desired to appoint his own watchmen for the military division of the town, and to order them to report to him.

A few days previous to the arrival of the _Sylph_, the Colonial schooner returned from Norfolk Island, and brought letters from the _Reliance_, _Supply_, and _Britannia_, which ships left that island on the 25th of the last month, and the day following her arrival (the 14th) Richard Atkins, esq was directed to officiate as judge-advocate of the colony, in the absence of the gentleman who had filled that situation since the first establishment of the settlement, and who had now proceeded to England in the _Britannia_.

This judicial appointment having taken place, a criminal court was held on the 23rd, and continued sitting, by adjournment, until the 29th, when sentence of death was pa.s.sed upon eight prisoners who were capitally convicted; one, of the wilful murder of the man whose body had been found on the north sh.o.r.e the 16th of last month, and seven of robbing the public store-houses at Sydney, and the settlement at the Hawkesbury. Two others were found guilty of manslaughter.

Of these miserable people five were executed pursuant to the sentence of the court. At Sydney*, Francis Morgan, for wilful murder, with Martin McEwen (a soldier) and John Lawler (a convict), for robbing the public stores. Matthew McNally and Thomas Doyle, convicts, suffered at Parramatta, on the following day, for the same offence.

[* On the 30th of November, and the others on the 9th and 10th of December.]

Having thus satisfied the public justice of the country, the governor extended the hand of mercy to the three others who had been capitally convicted of the same crime, viz John McDouall (another soldier), Thomas Inville, and Michael Doland (convicts), by granting them a conditional pardon.

It was much to be lamented, that these people were not to be deterred by any example from the practice of robbing the public stores, which had of late been more frequent than heretofore, and for which there could not be admitted the shadow of an excuse; as the whole of the inhabitants of every description were at this very time on a full and liberal allowance of provisions and clothing, neither of which were in any scarcity in the settlement. But the cause was to be found in the too great indulgence in the use of spirituous liquors which had been obtained among them for a considerable time past. The different capital crimes which had lately been brought before the court of criminal judicature, together with the various petty offences that daily came under the cognisance of the magistrates, did not proceed from an insufficiency either of food or clothing; but from an inordinate desire of possessing, by any means whatsoever, those articles with which they might be able to procure spirits, 'that source--as the governor expressed himself in an order which he published directly after these executions--that source of the misfortunes of all those whom the laws of their country, and the justice that was due to others, had launched into eternity, surrounded with the crimes of an ill-spent life.'

The court having ordered that Francis Morgan should be hung in chains upon the small island which is situated in the middle of the harbour, and named by the natives Mat-te-wan-ye, a gibbet was accordingly erected, and he was hung there, exhibiting an object of much greater terror to the natives, than to the white people, many of whom were more inclined to make a jest of it; but to the natives his appearance was so frightful--his clothes shaking in the wind, and the creaking of his irons, added to their superst.i.tious ideas of ghosts (for these children of ignorance imagined that, like a ghost, this man might have the power of taking hold of them by the throat), all rendering him such an alarming object to them--that they never trusted themselves near him, nor the spot on which he hung; which, until this time, had ever been with them a favourite place of resort.

The _Prince of Wales_, having been cleared of her cargo, sailed on the 23rd for China. Previous to her departure, the master having complained of the conduct of his ship's company, the governor appointed a day for their appearing before him; when the differences which subsisted between them were inquired into by his excellency, and settled to the satisfaction of all parties.

The public works in which the people at Sydney had been employed during this month, consisted in receiving the cargoes of the two victuallers, and in clearing out the tanks or reservoirs for water, which had become a necessary work, as they never had been emptied or cleansed since they were first cut and filled in the year 1792.*

[* The princ.i.p.al tank contained about 7996 gallons of water.

Vide Vol I, Chapter XVII. "The works during this month ..."]

December.] On the 6th of December the _Sylph_, having been discharged from government employ, proceeded on her voyage to China. On searching her, two male convicts were found concealed, who were brought on sh.o.r.e, and punished for their attempt to escape from the place of their transportation.

The ill success with which these attempts were attended might have been expected to deter others from risking the certain punishment which followed their being detected; but, as some were known to have eluded the strictest search, every one who could find a friend among the seamen to conceal him, hoped that he might prove the fortunate one who should escape. Although they every day saw that no obstacle was thrown in the way of the convict who had got through the period of his transportation with credit and a good character, but that he was suffered to depart with the master of any ship who would receive him, and a certificate given to him of his being a free man; yet, thoughtless, and dissatisfied with their present situation, be it what it might, they preferred encountering the hazard of being discovered and punished, or, even if they reached another country, the discredit with which they must appear, if it should be known that they were convicts from 'Botany Bay,' to waiting with patience until they could be dismissed from the colony with the reputation of having deserved the state of freedom at which they had arrived.

On the 16th of the month, a general muster of all descriptions of persons took place over every part of the colony at the same hour; for it had been found, that in mustering one district at a time, a deception had been successfully practised by some, of running from one place to another, and answering to their names at each, thereby drawing provisions from both stores, having previously imposed themselves on the store-keepers as belonging to their district. This could not, indeed, have long continued, if the store-keepers had been properly attentive to the directions which they received; but it was almost impossible to guard against the artful and well-contrived deceptions which these people were constantly playing off, to impose upon propriety, regulation, and good order.

It being at this time much wished to get four or five hundred acres of the ground belonging to government in a state to be sown the next season with wheat, the governor went up to Parramatta, to settle some necessary concerns there, and to endeavour, if possible, to get strength sufficient for that purpose. While here, he had the satisfaction of knowing that the stock of large cattle belonging to government were in excellent condition, having been sent to Toongabbie, where they had met with better food and more care than elsewhere. The preservation of these animals was an object of the greatest importance, as, independent of the large sums of money with which they had been purchased, their utility as a stock both for present labour, and future consumption, was incalculable.

Several of the settlers having last year had occasion, from the failure of the preceding crop, to borrow seed for sowing their ground again with wheat, an order was issued on the 21st, reminding those settlers who had received this a.s.sistance from government, that it was expected they would, out of their first crops, pay this debt, and take up the receipts which they had given. That if any evasion should be attempted, or any delay made in the payment, such steps as the law pointed out would be taken against them, and the defaulters marked as undeserving of the aid of government on any future occasion; and, what was calculated to meet a trick which some of them had played, they were finally informed, that if any among them, in contemplation of getting rid of the debt, had sold their farms since receiving the grain from government, the land would still be considered as the debtor, and the purchaser responsible for the payment.

The savage inhabitants of the country, instead of losing any part of their native ferocity of manners by an intercourse with the Europeans among whom they dwelt, seemed rather to delight in exhibiting themselves as monsters of the greatest cruelty, devoid of reason, and guided solely by the impulse of the worst pa.s.sions.

Toward the latter end of the month, the governor received information, that a little native girl, between six and seven years of age, who for some time had lived at the governor's house, had been most inhumanly murdered by two of her savage countrymen. The father and mother of this child belonged to a party of natives who had committed so many depredations upon the settlers at the Hawkesbury, attended with such acts of cruelty as to render them extremely formidable: insomuch that it became necessary to send an armed party in pursuit of them. They were soon found, and, being fired upon, the father and mother of this little female were among those who fell. She was with them at the time, and readily accompanied our people to the settlement, where she was received; and, being a well disposed child, soon became a great favourite with her protectors. This, and her being a native of the country near Broken Bay, excited the jealousy of some of the natives who lived at and about Sydney, which manifested itself in their putting her to death in the most cruel manner. The body was found in the woods near the governor's house, speared in several places, and with both the arms cut off; whence it was brought in and buried.

No other conjecture could be formed of this atrocious act than what has been already mentioned. As she belonged to a tribe of natives that was hostile to the Sydney people, they could not admit of her partaking in those pleasures and comforts which they derived from their residence among the colonists, and therefore inhumanly put her out of the way. The governor was very much incensed at this proceeding; and, could he have found the offenders, would have most severely punished them; but they had immediately withdrawn into the woods.