to procure boats, and get on board the transports after they had left the cove. An officer with a party was immediately sent out from Parramatta in pursuit of them, who traced them as far down the harbour as Lane Cove, whence he reached the settlement at Sydney, without seeing or hearing any thing more of them. A few days afterward the people in a boat belonging to the _Albemarle_ transport, which had been down the harbour to procure wood on the north shore, met with the wretched female who had accompanied the men. She had been separated from them for three days, and wandered by herself, entirely ignorant of her situation, until she came to the water side, where, fortunately, she soon after met the boat. Boats were sent down the next day, and the woman’s husband was found and brought up to the settlement. They both gave the same absurd account of their design as before related, and appeared to have suffered very considerably by fatigue, hunger, and the heat of the weather. The man had lost his companions forty eight hours before he was himself discovered; and no tidings of them were received for several days, although boats were constantly sent in to the north west arm, and the lower part of the harbour.
Three of these miserable people were some time after met by some officers who were on an excursion to the lagoon between this harbour and Broken Bay; but, notwithstanding their situation, they did not readily give themselves up, and, when questioned, said they wanted nothing more than to live free from labour. These people were sent up to Parramatta, whence, regardless of what they had experienced, and might again suffer, they a second time absconded in a few days after they had been returned. Parties were immediately dispatched from that settlement, and thirteen of those who first absconded were brought in, in a state of deplorable wretchedness, naked, and nearly worn out with hunger. Some of them had subsisted chiefly by sucking the flowering shrubs and wild berries of the woods; and the whole exhibited a picture of misery, that seemed sufficient to deter others from the like extravagant folly. The practice of flying from labour into the woods still, however, prevailing, the governor caused all the convicts who arrived this year to be assembled, and informed them of his determination to put a stop to their absconding from the place where he had appointed them to labour, by sending out parties with orders to fire upon them whenever they should be met with; and he declared that if any were brought in alive, he would either land them on a part of the harbour whence they could not depart, or chain them together with only bread and water for their subsistence, during the remainder of their terms of transportation. He likewise told them, that he had heard they were intending to arm themselves and seize upon the stores (such a design had for some days been reported); but that if they made any attempt of that kind, every man who might be taken should be instantly put to death. Having thus endeavoured to impress them with ideas of certain punishment if they offended in future, he forgave some offences which had been reported by the magistrate, exhorted them to go cheerfully to their labour, and changed their hours of work, agreeably to a request which they had made.
Four hundred and two of these miserable people had received medicines from the hospital in the morning of the day when the governor had thus addressed them. The prevailing disease was a dysentery, which was accompanied by a general debility.
The _Queen_ sailed early in the month with an officer and a detachment of the New South Wales corps, some convicts, stores and provisions, for Norfolk Island. The _Salamander _sailed at the same time on her fishing voyage.
From her intended trial of the whale-fishery on the coast the _Britannia_ arrived on the 10th, and was followed the next day by the _Mary Ann_. Mr. Melvill killed, in company with the _William and Ann_, the day after he went out, seven spermaceti whales, two only of which they were able to secure from the bad weather which immediately succeeded. From the whale which fell to the _Britannia’s_ share, although but a small one, thirteen barrels of oil were procured; and in the opinion of Mr. Melvill, the oil, from its containing a greater proportion of that valuable part of the fish called by the whalers the head-matter, was worth ten pounds more per ton than that of the fish of any other part of the world he had been in. He thought that a most advantageous voyage might be made upon this coast, as he was confident upwards of fifteen thousand whales were seen in the first ten days that he was absent, the greater number of which were observed off this harbour; and he was prevented from filling his ship by bad weather alone, having met with only one day since he sailed in which he could lower down a boat.
The success and report of the master of the _Mary Ann_ were very different; he had been as far to the southward as the latitude of 45 degrees without seeing a whale; and in a gale of wind shipped a sea that stove two of his boats, and washed down the vessels for boiling the oil, which were fixed in brick-work, and to repair which he came into this harbour.
The _Matilda_ came in a few days afterwards from Jervis Bay, in latitude 35 degrees 6 minutes S and longitude 152 degrees 0 minutes E, where she had anchored for some days, being leaky. The master of this ship, Mr. Matthew Weatherhead, saw many whales, but was prevented from killing any by the badness of the weather.
The _William and Ann_ came in soon after, confirming the report of the great numbers of fish which were to be seen upon the coast, and the difficulty of getting at them. She had killed only one fish, and came in to repair and shorten her main-mast.
A difference of opinion prevailed among the masters of the ships which had been out respecting the establishing a whale-fishery upon this coast. In one particular, however, they all agreed, which was, that the coast abounded with fish; but the major part of them thought that the currents and bad weather prevailing at this season of the year, and which appeared to be also the season of the fish, would prevent any ships from meeting with that success, of which on their setting out they themselves had had such sanguine hopes. One of them thought that the others, in giving this opinion, were premature, and that they were not sufficiently acquainted with the weather on the coast to form any judgment of the advantage to be derived from future attempts. They were determined, nevertheless, to give it another trial, on the failure of which they meant to prosecute their voyage to the coast of Peru. Having set up their rigging, they went out again toward the latter end of the month.
About the middle of the month an alteration took place in the ration; two pounds of flour were taken off, and one pint of peas and one pint of oatmeal were issued in their stead; the full ration, which was first served on the 27th of August last, having been continued not quite three months.
The _Supply_ armed tender, having completed her repairs, sailed for England on the 26th, her commander, Lieutenant Ball, purposing to make his passage round Cape Horn, for which the season of the year was favourable. Lieutenant John Creswell of the marines went in her, charged with the governor’s dispatches.
The services of this little vessel had endeared her, and her officers and people, to this colony. The regret which we felt at parting with them was, however, lessened by a knowledge that they were flying from a country of want to one of abundance, where we all hoped that the services they had performed would be rewarded by that attention and promotion to which they naturally looked up, and had an indisputable claim.
At this time the public live stock in the settlement consisted of one stallion aged, one mare, two young stallions, two colts, sixteen cows, two calves, one ram, fifty ewes, six lambs, one boar, fourteen sows (old and young), and twenty-two pigs.
The ground in cultivation at and about Parramatta amounted to three hundred and fifty-one acres in maize, forty-four in wheat, six in barley, one in oats, two in potatoes, four in vines, eighty-six in garden ground, and seventeen in cultivation by the New South Wales corps. In addition to these there were one hundred and fifty acres cleared to be sown with turnips, ninety-one acres were in cultivation by settlers, twenty-eight by officers civil and military at and about Sydney; and at Parramatta one hundred and forty acres were inclosed and the timber thinned for cattle; making a total of nine hundred and twenty acres of land thinned, cleared, and cultivated.
The platform at the west point of the cove was completed during this month. The flag-staff had been for some time erected, and the cannon placed on the platform. A corporal’s guard was also mounted daily in the building which had been used as an observatory by Lieutenant Dawes.
The mortality during this month had been great, fifty male and four female convicts dying within the thirty days. Five hundred sick persons received medicines at the end of the month. That list however was decreasing. The extreme heat of the weather during the month had not only increased the sick list, but had added one to the number of deaths. On the 4th, a convict attending upon Mr. White, in passing from his house to his kitchen, without any covering upon his head, received a stroke from a ray of the sun which at the time deprived him of speech and motion, and, in less than four-and-twenty hours, of his life. The thermometer on that day stood at twelve o’clock at 943/4 degrees and the wind was at NW.
By the dry weather which prevailed our water had been so much affected, beside being lessened by the watering of some of the transports, that a prohibition was laid by the governor on the watering of the remainder at Sydney, and their boats were directed to go to a convenient place upon the north shore. To remedy this evil the governor had employed the stone-mason’s gang to cut tanks out of the rock, which would be reservoirs for the water large enough to supply the settlement for some time.
December.] On the 3rd of this month the ships _Albemarle_ and _Active_ sailed for India. After their departure several people were missing from the settlement; some whose sentences of transportation had expired, and others who were yet convicts. Previous to their sailing (it having been reported that the seamen intended to conceal such as had made interest among them to get off) the governor instructed the master to deliver any persons whom he might discover to be on board without permission to quit the colony, as prisoners to the commanding officer of the first British settlement they should touch at in India. About this time a boat belonging to Mr. White was taken from its mooring; and it was for a time supposed that she had been taken off by some runaways to get on board one of the ships then about to sail, and afterwards set adrift; but she was found by some gentlemen of the _Gorgon_ the day after their departure, between this harbour and Broken Bay, with two men in her, who on the appearance of the party which found her ran into the woods. The gentlemen left her with a plank knocked out, an oar and the rudder broken, and otherwise rendered useless to the people who ran away with her. They also fell in with a convict, an Irishman, who had been absent five weeks from Parramatta, and who had set off with some others to proceed along the coast in search of another settlement. The boat was brought up a few days afterwards.
Two of the whalers, the _Matilda_ and _Mary Ann_, came in from sea the day on which the other ships sailed. The former landed a boat in a bay on the coast about six miles to the southward of Port Stephens, where the seine was hauled and a large quantity of fish taken; but of the fish which they went to procure (whales) they saw none.
The _Mary Ann_ was rather more fortunate. By going to the southward, she killed nine fish; of five of them she secured enough to procure about thirty barrels of oil; but was prevented by bad weather from getting more. These ships sailed again immediately, and both ran down the coast as far to the southward as 36 degrees 30 minutes, and returned on the 16th without killing a fish. The masters attributed their bad success to currents; and, giving up all hopes of a fishery here, they determined, after refitting, to quit the coast. The _Salamander_ and _Britannia_ whalers came in at the same time, and with like ill fortune. Melvill the master of the _Britannia_, who had been formerly so sanguine in his hopes of a fishery, seemed now to have adopted a different opinion, and hinted to some in the colony, that he did not think he should try the coast any longer. It must be remarked however, that the whalers were not out of port at any one time long enough to enable them to speak with any great degree of precision either for or against the probability of success. They seemed more desirous of obtaining a knowledge of the harbours on the coast; the _William and Ann_ had been seen in Broken Bay; others had visited Botany Bay and Jervis Bay; the _Salamander_ had remained long enough in Port Stephens (an harbour to the northward, until then not visited by any one) to take an eye-sketch of the harbour and of some of its branches or arms; and Port Jackson was found to have its conveniences. After a well-manned and well-found whaler should have kept the sea for an entire season, the success might be determined.
The _Queen_ transport having returned from Norfolk Island, with the lieutenant-governor and the officers and soldiers of the marine corps, who were to take their passage to England in the _Gorgon_, the greatest part of the marine detachment embarked on board of that ship on the 13th. Those who did not embark were left for the duty of the place until the remainder of the New South Wales corps should arrive.
By the _Queen_ several convicts whose sentences of transportation had expired were allowed to return to this settlement, pursuant to a promise made them on their going thither; and we were informed, that the _Atlantic_ sailed from Norfolk Island for Calcutta on the 13th of the last month. Both ships landed safely every article they had on board for the colony, being favoured by very fine weather while so employed. Lieutenant-governor King, on taking upon him the government of the island, pardoned all offenders whom he found in custody.
Governor Phillip having no further occasion for the services of the _Gorgon_, that ship sailed for England on Sunday the 18th. Two convicts had the folly to attempt making their escape from the colony in this ship, but they were detected and brought back. A woman was also supposed to have effected her escape; but she was found disguised in men’s apparel at the native’s hut on the east point of the cove.
On board of the _Gorgon_ were embarked the marines who came from England in the first ships; as valuable a corps as any in his Majesty’s service. They had struggled here with greatly more than the common hardships of service, and were now quitting a country in which they had opened and smoothed the way for their successors, and from which, whatever benefit might hereafter be derived, must be derived by those who had the easy task of treading in paths previously and painfully formed by them.
The cove and the settlement were now resuming that dull uniformity of uninteresting circumstances which had generally prevailed. The _Supply_ and the _Gorgon_ had departed, and with them a valuable portion of our friends and associates. The transports which remained were all preparing to leave us, and in a few days after the _Gorgon_, the _Matilda_ and _Mary Ann_ sailed for the coast of Peru. These ships had some convicts on board, who were permitted to ship themselves with the masters.
A further reduction of the ration was directed to take place at the end of the month, one pound being taken from the allowance of flour served to the men. From the state of the provision stores, the governor, on Christmas Day, could only give one pound of flour to each woman in the settlement. On that day divine service was performed here and at Parramatta, Mr. Bayne, the chaplain of the new corps, assisting Mr. Johnson in the religious duties of the morning. There were some among us, however, by whom even the sanctity of this day was not regarded; for at night the marine store was robbed of twenty-two gallons of spirits.
At Parramatta various offences were still committed, notwithstanding the lenity which had been shown to several offenders at the close of the last month. Many of the convicts there not having any part of their ration left when Tuesday or Wednesday night came, the governor directed, as he had before done from the same reason, that the provisions of the labouring convicts should be issued to them daily. This measure being disapproved of by them, they assembled in rather a tumultuous manner before the governor’s house at Parramatta on the last day of the month, to request that their provisions might be served as usual on the Saturdays. The governor, however, dispersed them without granting their request; and as they were heard to murmur, and talk of obtaining by different means what was refused to entreaty (words spoken among the crowd, and the person who was so daring not being distinguishable from the rest), he assured them that as he knew the major part of them were led by eight or ten designing men to whom they looked up, and to whose names he was not a stranger, on any open appearance of discontent, he should make immediate examples of them. Before they were dismissed they promised greater propriety of conduct and implicit obedience to the orders of their superiors, and declared their readiness to receive their provisions as had been directed.
This was the first instance of any tumultuous assembly among these people, and was now to be ascribed to the spirit of resistance and villany lately imported by the new comers from England and Ireland.
Among the public works of the month the most material was the completing and occupying the new store on the east side, which was begun in October last; its dimensions were eighty by twenty-four feet; and as it was built for the purpose of containing dry stores, the height was increased beyond that commonly adopted here, and a spacious loft was formed capable of containing a large quantity of bale goods. This was by far the best store in the country.
In the course of the month a warrant of emancipation passed the seal of the territory to John Lowe, Henry Cone, Richard Chears, Thomas Fisk, Daniel Cubitt, Charles Pass, George Bolton, William Careless, William Curtis, John Chapman Morris, Thomas Merrick, William Skinner, and James Weavers, convicts who left England in the _Guardian_, on condition of their residing within the limits of this government, and not returning to England within the period of their respective sentences. Instructions to this effect had been received from home, Lieutenant Riou having interested himself much in their behalf. They were to be at liberty to work at any trade they might be acquainted with; but during their continuance in the country they were to be disposed of wherever the governor should think proper. They were also at liberty to settle land upon their own account.
The numbers who died by sickness in the year 1791 were, one of the civil establishment (H. E. Dodd); two soldiers; one hundred and fifty-five male and eight female convicts; and five children: in all one hundred and seventy-one persons (twenty-eight more than had died during the preceding year).
In the above time one male convict was executed; one drowned; four lost in the woods (exclusive of the Irish convicts who had absconded, of whom no certain account was procured); one destroyed himself, and eight men, one woman, and two children, had run from the settlement; making a loss of one hundred and eighty-nine persons.
CHAPTER XVI
The _Queen_ sails for Norfolk Island
Whalers on their fishing voyages
Convicts missing
Various depredations
Dispensary and bake-house robbed
Proclamation
A criminal court held
Convict executed
Transactions
The _Pitt_ with Lieutenant-Governor Grose arrives Military duty fixed for Parramatta
Goods selling at Sydney from the _Pitt_ The _Pitt_ ordered to be dispatched to Norfolk Island Commissions read
Sickness
The _Pitt_ sails
Mr. Burton killed
Stormy weather
Public works
Regulations respecting persons who had served their terms of transportation Natives
1792.]
January.] Early in this month sixty-two people, settlers and convicts, with Mr. Bayne, the chaplain of the New South Wales corps, who offered his services, as there never had been a clergyman there, embarked on board the _Queen_ transport for Norfolk Island, the master of that ship having engaged to carry them and a certain quantity of provisions thither for the sum of L150. Of the settlers twenty-two were lately discharged from the marine service, and the remainder were convicts; some of the latter, whose terms of transportation had expired, had chosen Norfolk Island to settle in, and others were sent to be employed for the public.
This ship, with the _Admiral Barrington_ for India, sailed on the 6th; and the _Salamander_ and _Britannia_ whalers on the 7th, the masters of the two latter ships signifying an intention of cruising for three months upon this coast; at the end of which time, according to their success, they would either return to this port, or pursue their voyage to the northward.
Several convicts attempted to escape from the settlement on board of these ships, some of whom were discovered before they sailed, and, being brought on shore, were punished; but there was great reason to suppose that others were secreted by the connivance of the seamen, and eluded the repeated searches which were made for them.
In addition to this exportation, the colony lost some useful people whom it could ill spare; but who, their terms of transportation having expired, would not be induced to remain in the settlement, and could not be prevented from quitting it.
By the commissary’s report of the muster it appeared, that forty-four men and nine women were absent and unaccounted for; among which number were included those who were wandering in the woods, seeking for a new settlement, or endeavouring to get into the path to China! Of these people many, after lingering a long time, and existing merely on roots and wild berries, perished miserably. Others found their way in, after being absent several weeks, and reported the fate of their wretched companions, being themselves reduced to nearly the same condition, worn down and exhausted with fatigue and want of proper sustenance. Yet, although the appearance of these people confirmed their account of what they had undergone, others were still found ignorant and weak enough to run into the woods impressed with the idea of either reaching China by land, or finding a new settlement where labour would not be imposed on them, and where the inhabitants were civil and peaceable. Two of these wretches at the time of their absconding met a convict in their way not far from the new grounds, whom they robbed of his provisions, and beat in so cruel a manner that, after languishing for some time, he died in the hospital at Parramatta. He described their persons, and mentioned their names, with the precise circumstances attending their treatment of him, and it was hoped that they would have lived to return, and receive the reward of their crime; but one of their companions who survived them brought in an account of their having ended a wicked and miserable existence in the woods.
Depredations being nightly committed at the skirts of the town, and at the officers’ farms, by some of these vagrants, who were supposed to lurk between this place and Parramatta, it was thought necessary to send armed parties out at night for a certain distance round the settlement, with orders to seize, or fire on, all persons found straggling; and several were detected by them in the act of robbing the gardens at the different farms. Indeed neither the property nor the persons of individuals were safe for some time. Two villains came to a hut which was occupied by one Williams a sawyer, and which he had erected at a spot at some distance from the town where he could have a little garden ground, and attempted to rob him; but the owner surprised them, and, in endeavouring to secure them, was wounded so severely in the arm with a tomahawk, that the tendon was divided; and it was supposed that he never would recover the perfect use of the limb. They even carried their audacity so far, as to be secretly meditating an attempt upon the barrack and storehouse at Parramatta; at least, information of such a plan was given by some of the convicts; and as there had been seen among them people silly enough to undertake to walk to the other side of this extensive continent, expecting that China would be found there, it was not at all improbable that some might be mad enough to persuade others that it would be an easy matter to attempt and carry the barracks and stores there. But no other use was made of the report than the exertion of double vigilance in the guards, which was done without making public the true motive. To the credit of the convicts who came out in the first fleet it must be remarked, that none of them were concerned in these offences; and of them it was said the new comers stood so much in dread, that they never were admitted to any share in their confidence.
As the Indian corn began to ripen the convicts recommenced their depredations, and many were punished with a severity seemingly calculated to deter others, but actually without effect. They appeared to be a people wholly regardless of the future, and not dreading any thing that was not immediately present to their own feelings. It was well known that punishment would follow the detection of a crime; but their constant reliance was on a hope of escaping that detection; and they were very rarely known to stand forward in bringing offenders to punishment, although such rewards were held out as one would imagine were sufficient to induce them. It being necessary to secure four dangerous people, who, after committing offences, had withdrawn into the woods, a reward of fifty pounds of flour was offered for the apprehension of either of them, but only one was taken.
The easy communication between Sydney and Parramatta had been found to be a very great evil from the time the path was first made; but since the numbers had been so much augmented at Parramatta, it became absolutely necessary to put a stop to the intercourse. The distance was about sixteen miles; and, unless information was previously given, a person would visit Sydney and return without being missed: and as stolen property was transferred from one place to another by means of this quick conveyance, orders were given calculated to cut off all unlicensed intercourse.
A report having been falsely propagated at Parramatta, that it was intended by the governor to take the corn of individuals on the public account, the settlers and convicts who had raised maize or other grain, and who were not provided with proper places to secure it in, were informed, that they might send it to the public store, and draw it from thence as their occasions required; and farther, that they were at liberty to dispose of such live stock, corn, grain, or vegetables, which they might raise, as they found convenient to themselves, the property of every individual being equally secured to him, and by the same law, whether belonging to a free man or a convict. Such of the above articles as they could not otherwise dispose of, they were told, would be purchased by the commissary on the public account at a fair market-price.
Toward the latter end of the month some villains broke into the dispensary at the hospital, and stole two cases of portable soup, one case of camomile flowers, and one case containing sudorific powder. These articles had been placed in the dispensary on the very evening it was broken into, to be sent to Parramatta the following morning. The cases with the camomile and sudorific powder (which perhaps they had taken for sugar or flour) were found at the back of the hill behind the hospital; and, in order to discover the persons concerned in this theft, as well as those who maimed the sawyer, as before related, a proclamation was published, offering to any person or persons giving such information as should convict the principal offenders, a free pardon for every offence which he, she, or they might have committed since their arrival in this country; and that a full ration of provisions should be issued to such person or persons during the remainder of their respective terms of transportation.
Several people died at Parramatta, some of whom were at labour, apparently in health, and dead in twenty-four hours. An extraordinary circumstance attended, though it was not the cause of the death of one poor creature: while dragging with others at a brick cart he was seized with a fainting fit, and when he recovered was laid down under a cart which stood in the road, that he might be in the shade. Being weak and ill, he fell asleep. On waking, and feeling something tight about his neck, he put up his hand, when, to his amazement and horror, he grasped the folds of a large snake which had twined itself round his neck. In endeavouring to disengage it, the animal bit him by the lip, which became instantly tumid. Two men, passing by, took off the snake and threw it on the ground, when it erected itself and flew at one of them; but they soon killed it. The man who had fainted at the cart died the next morning, not, however, from any effect of the bite of the snake, but from a general debility.
At Parramatta the public bakehouse was broken into, and robbed of a large quantity of flour and biscuit. The robber had made his way down the chimney of the house, and, though a man and woman slept in the place, carried off his booty undiscovered.
The convicts having assembled there at the latter end of the last month in an improper and tumultuous manner, the governor now thought proper to issue a proclamation, directing that ‘in case of any riot or disturbance among the convicts, every one who was seen out of his hut would (if such riot or disturbance should happen in the night, or during the hours of rest from labour, or if he were absent from his labour during the hours of work) be deemed to be aiding and assisting the rioters, and be punished accordingly.’
The convicts were strictly forbidden ever to assemble in numbers under any pretence of stating a complaint, or for any other cause whatever, all complaints being to be made through the medium of the superintendants or overseers.
A disobedience to this proclamation was to be punished with the utmost severity; and any person who, knowing of any intended riot or tumultuous and unlawful assembly among the convicts, did not take the first opportunity of informing either the commanding officer of the military or one of the superintendants thereof, would be deemed and punished as a principal in such riot.
An instance of the profligacy of the convicts which occurred at this time is deserving of notice: a woman who had been entrusted to carry the allowance of flour belonging to two other women to the bakehouse, where she had run in debt for bread which she had taken up on their account, mixed with it a quantity of pounded stone, in the proportion of two-thirds of grit, to one of flour. Fortunately, she was detected before it had been mixed with other flour at the bakehouse, and was ordered to wear an iron collar for six months as a punishment.
February.] A criminal court was held at Parramatta on the 7th of this month for the trial of James Collington, who, as before mentioned, had broken into the public bakehouse at that place by getting down the chimney in the night. It appeared that he had taken off about fifty pounds of flour, which he tied up in an apron that he found in the room, and the leg of a pair of trousers. He deposited the property under a rock, and occasionally visited it; but it was soon seized by some other nocturnal adventurer, and Collington then broke into another hut, wherein eight people were sleeping, and took thereout a box containing wearing apparel and provisions, without disturbing them, so soundly did fatigue make them sleep; but he was detected in a garden with the property, and secured. Being found guilty, he received sentence of death, and was executed early the following morning. At the tree he addressed the convicts, warning them to avoid the paths he had pursued; but said, that he was induced by hunger to commit the crime for which he suffered. He appeared desirous of death, declaring that he knew he could not live without stealing.
Information having been received, that a great body of convicts at the new grounds intended to seize some arms which had been given to the settlers for their protection against the natives, and (after robbing their huts) to proceed to the sea-coast, where, destroying every person who should oppose them, they were to build a vessel, a convict who was said to be a ringleader was taken up, and, upon the information which he gave, five others were apprehended and chained together; in which situation they continued for some time, when their scheme having been defeated, and other steps taken to prevent their putting it in execution, they were liberated, and returned to their usual labour.
Information would have been at all times more readily procured from these people, had they not been constantly apprehensive of receiving ill-treatment not only from the parties concerned, but from others who were not; and although every assurance of protection was given by those who were authorised to hold it out, yet it was not found sufficient to do away the dread they were said to labour under. Accident, or a quarrel among themselves, sometimes furnished information that was not otherwise to be procured; and in general to one or other of these causes was to be attributed every information that was received of any malpractices among them.
A person who had been employed under one of the superintendants at Parramatta, and in whom, from an uniformity of good conduct during his residence in this country, some trust was at times placed, was detected in giving corn to a settler from the public granary, to which he had occasional access. The offence being fully proved, he was sentenced to receive three hundred lashes, and the person to whom he had given the corn two hundred lashes. It was seen with great concern, that there were but few among them who were honest enough to resist any temptation that was placed in their way.
A convict who had absconded five weeks since was apprehended by some of the military at the head of one of the coves leading from Parramatta. He had built himself a hut in the woods, and said when brought in, that he had preserved his existence by eating such fish as he was fortunate enough to catch, rock oysters, and wild berries; and that the natives had more than once pursued him when employed in these researches. But very little credit was given to any account he gave, and it was generally supposed that he had lived by occasionally visiting and robbing the huts at Sydney and Parramatta. He had taken to the woods to avoid a punishment which hung over him, and which he now received.
Early in the month eight settlers from the marines received their grants of land situated on the north side of the harbour near the Flats, and named by the governor the Field of Mars.
The convicts employed in cultivating and clearing public ground beyond Parramatta, having been landed in a weak and sickly state, wore in general a most miserable and emaciated appearance, and numbers of them died daily. The reduced ration by no means contributed to their amendment; the wheat that was raised last year (four hundred and sixty-one bushels) after reserving a sufficiency for seed, was issued to them at a pound per man per week, and a pound of rice per week was issued to each male convict at Sydney.
On Tuesday the 14th the signal was made for a sail, and shortly after the _Pitt_, Captain Edward Manning, anchored in the cove from England. She sailed the 17th of last July from Yarmouth Roads, and had rather a long passage, touching at St. Iago, Rio de Janeiro, and the Cape of Good Hope. She had on board Francis Grose, esq the lieutenant-governor of the settlements, and major-commandant of the New South Wales corps, one company of which, together with the adjutant and surgeon’s mate, came out with him.
She brought out three hundred and nineteen male and forty-nine female convicts, five children, and seven free women; with salt provisions calculated to serve that number of people ten months, but which would only furnish the colony with provisions for forty days. The supply of provisions was confined to salt meat, under an idea that the colony was not in immediate want of flour, and that a supply had been sent from Calcutta, which, together with what had been procured from Batavia, that which had been sent before from England, and the grain that might have been raised in the settlements, would be adequate to our consumption for the present. The dispatches, however, which had been forwarded from this place by the _Justinian_ in July 1790 having been received by the secretary of state, what appeared from those communications to be necessary for the colony were to be sent in one or more ships to be dispatched in the autumn of last year, with an additional number of convicts, and the remaining company of the New South Wales corps. A sloop in frame, of the burden of forty-one tons, was sent out in the _Pitt_; to make room for which, several bales of clothing, and many very useful articles, were obliged to be shut out.
By this conveyance information was received, that the _Daedalus_ hired storeship, which was sent out to carry provisions to the Sandwich islands for two ships employed in those parts on discovery, was directed to repair to this settlement after performing that service, to be employed as there should be occasion, and that she might be expected in the beginning of the year 1793.
The _Pitt_ brought in many of her convicts sick; and several of her seamen and fifteen soldiers of the New South Wales corps had died shortly after her leaving St. Iago, owing to her having touched there during an unhealthy season.
The whole of the New South Wales corps, except one company, being now arrived, the numbers requisite for the different duties were settled; and one company, consisting of a captain, two lieutenants, one ensign, three sergeants, three corporals, two drummers, and seventy privates, was fixed for the duty of Parramatta; a like number for Norfolk Island, and the remainder were to do duty at Sydney, the head quarters of the corps.
Permission having been obtained, a shop was opened at a hut on shore for the sale of various articles brought out in the _Pitt_; and notwithstanding a fleet of transports had but lately sailed hence, notwithstanding the different orders which had been sent to Bengal, and the high price at which every thing was sold, the avidity with which all descriptions of people grasped at what was to be purchased was extraordinary, and could only be accounted for by the distance of our situation from the mother country, the uncertainty of receiving supplies thence, and the length of time which we had heretofore the mortification to find elapse without our receiving any.
March.] It being necessary to send to Norfolk Island a proportion of what provisions were in store, the Pitt was engaged for that purpose; and for performing this service her owners were to receive L651, a sum equal to six weeks demurrage for that ship. From Norfolk Island she was to proceed, upon her owners account, to Bengal; and her commander was charged with duplicates of the letters and instructions given to Lieutenant Bowen. In the event of any accident having prevented the arrival of that officer at Calcutta, Captain Manning was to cause the service with which he was entrusted to be executed, by applying to the governor-general, and the house of Messrs. Lambert, Ross, and company, for the supply of provisions, which the _Atlantic_ was to have brought, to be forwarded to this country either by the _Pitt_, or by vessels to be hired by that house at Calcutta.
This precaution was taken rather to guard against the worst that might happen, than from any probability that the _Atlantic_ would not have reached Calcutta, that ship being well fitted for such a voyage, strong, well manned, and under the direction of an able and an active officer. To her arrival, however, we looked forward at this period with some anxiety, as the flour and salt provisions in the settlement already occupied but a small portion of the stores which contained them, there being only fifty-two days flour, and twenty-one weeks salt meat in store at the ration now issued.
On the morning of Saturday the 17th the marines and New South Wales corps formed under arms on the parade in front of the quarters, when his Majesty’s commission appointing Francis Grose, Esquire, to be lieutenant-governor of this territory, and the letters patent under the great seal for establishing the civil and criminal courts of judicature, were publicly read by the judge-advocate. The governor and the principal officers of the settlement attended, and his excellency received from the corps under arms the honours due to his rank in the colony. At the conclusion of the ceremony, the _Pitt_, by a well-concerted signal, saluted with fifteen guns, as a compliment to the lieutenant-governor.
A person who came out to this country in the capacity of a carpenter’s mate on board the _Sirius_, and who had been discharged from that ship’s books into the _Supply_, having been left behind when that vessel sailed for England, offered his services to put together the vessel that arrived in frame in the _Pitt_; and being deemed sufficiently qualified as a shipwright, he was engaged at two shillings _per diem_ and his provisions to set her up. Her keel was accordingly laid down on blocks placed for the purpose near the landing-place on the east side. As this person was the only shipwright in the colony, the vessel would much sooner have rendered the services which were required of her, had she been put together, coppered, and sent out manned and officered from England; by these means too the colony would have received many articles which were of necessity shut out of the _Pitt_ to make room for her stowage.
About this time a malady of an alarming nature was perceived in the colony. Four or five of the convicts were seized with insanity; and, as the major part of those who were visited by this calamity were females, who on account of their sex were not harassed with hard labour, and who in general shared largely of such little comforts as were to be procured in the settlement, it was difficult to assign a cause for this disorder.
April.] With a dreadful sick list, and with death making rapid strides among us, the month of April commenced: a lamentable circumstance to those who had to provide by their labour for the support of a colony, in which, from its great distance, not only from the parent country, but from every port where supplies could be procured, it became an object of the first magnitude and importance to endeavour speedily, and by every possible exertion, to place its inhabitants in a situation that accident or delay might not affect. His Majesty’s ship _Guardian_ afforded a melancholy recollection how much this colony had already felt from misadventure, and the delay which occurred in the voyage of the _Lady Juliana_ transport had proved equally calamitous. The recent circumstance of a ship arriving without a supply of flour, and other contingencies, spoke with a warning voice, and loudly demanded that every arm which could be raised should be exerted to make provision against the hour of want. Few, however, in comparison with the measure of our necessities, were the numbers daily brought into the field for the purpose of cultivation; and of those who could handle the hoe or the spade by far the greater part carried hunger in their countenances; but it was earnestly hoped and anxiously expected, that by the speedy arrival of supplies from England the full ration of every species of provisions would be again issued, when labour would be renewed with additional vigour and effect; health and strength be seen residing among us; and the approaches of independence on Great Britain be something more than a sanguine hope or visionary speculation.
The convicts, and such stores and provisions as the governor thought it necessary to send to Norfolk Island, being embarked, the _Pitt_ sailed on the 7th. Previous to her departure, a female convict was found secreted on board, who declaring in her justification that the fourth mate of the ship had assisted her in her escape, he was tried by the civil court of judicature for taking a convict from the settlement, but, for want of sufficient proof, was acquitted.
The practicability of being secreted on board of ships would always operate as an inducement to wretches who saw a long term of servitude before them to attempt their escape; but it certainly behoved every master of a merchantman bound from this port to be very vigilant and sedulous to prevent their succeeding, as the safety of the ship might be very much endangered by having numbers of such people on board mixing with their ship’s company.
On Friday the 13th died Mr. David Burton, of a gunshot wound which he received on the preceding Saturday. This young man, on account of the talents he possessed as a botanist, and the services which he was capable of rendering in the surveying line, could be but ill spared in this settlement. His loss was occasioned by one of those accidents which too frequently happen to persons who are inexperienced in the use of fire-arms. Mr. Burton had been out with Ensign Beckwith, and some soldiers of the New South Wales corps, intending to kill ducks on the Nepean. With that sensation of the mind which is called presentiment he is said to have set out, having more than once observed, that he feared some accident would happen before his return; and he did not cease to be tormented with this unpleasant idea, until his gun, which he carried rather awkwardly, went off, and lodged its contents in the ground within a few inches of the feet of the person who immediately preceded him in the walk through the woods. Considering this as the accident which his mind foreboded, he went on afterwards perfectly freed from any apprehension. But he was deceived. Reaching the banks of the river, they found on its surface innumerable flocks of those fowl of which they were in search. Mr. Burton, in order to have a better view of them, got upon the stump of a tree, and, resting his hand upon the muzzle of his piece, raised himself by its assistance as high as he was able. The butt of the piece rested on the ground, which was thickly covered with long grass, shrubs, and weeds. No one saw the danger of such a situation in time to prevent what followed. By some motion of this unfortunate young man the piece went off, and the contents, entering at his wrist, forced their way up between the two bones of his right arm, which were much shattered, to the elbow. Mr. Beckwith, by a very happy presence of mind, applying bandages torn from a shirt, succeeded in stopping the vast effusion of blood which ensued, or his patient must soon have bled to death. This accident happened at five in the afternoon, and it was not till ten o’clock at night of the following day that Mr. Burton was brought into Parramatta. The consequence was, such a violent fever and inflammation had taken place that any attempt to save life by amputation would only have hastened his end. In the night of the 12th the mortification came on, and he died the following morning, leaving behind him, what he universally enjoyed while living, the esteem and respect of all who knew him.
A person of a far different character and description met with an accidental death the following day. He had been employed to take some provisions to a settler who occupied a farm on the creek leading to Parramatta, and was killed by a blow from the limb of a tree, which fell on his head and fractured his skull, without having allowed him that time for repentance of which a sinful life stood so much in need. His companions and fellow prisoners (for he was a convict) declared him to have been so great a reprobate, that he was scarcely ever known to speak without an oath, or without calling on his Maker as a witness to the truth of the lie he was about to utter.
The weather had been for some days extremely bad, heavy storms of wind and rain having generally prevailed from Monday the 9th till Friday the 13th, when fair weather succeeded. At Parramatta the gale had done much damage; several huts which were built in low grounds were rendered almost inaccessible, and the greater part of the wattled huts suffered considerably. A large portion of the cleared ground was laid under water, and such corn as had not been reaped was beaten down. At Sydney the effects of the storm, though it had been equally violent, were not so severe. Most of the houses were rendered damp, and had leaks in different parts; seeds which had been recently sown were washed out of the ground, and the bridge over the stream was somewhat injured. In the woods it had raged with much violence; the people employed to kill game reported that it was dangerous to walk in the forests; and the ground, covered with huge limbs or whole trunks of trees, confirmed the truth of their report.
The bricklayers were immediately sent up to Parramatta, to repair the damages effected by the storm; and the bridge at Sydney was not only repaired, but considerably widened.
On Saturday the 13th an alteration took place in the ration. Three pounds of flour, and two pounds of maize, with four pounds of pork, were served to each man, and three pounds of flour, and one pound of maize, with four pounds of pork, were served to each woman in the settlement.The children received the usual proportion. To such alterations the settlement had now for some years been habituated; and although it was well known that they never were imposed but when the state of the stores rendered them absolutely necessary, it was impossible to meet the deduction without reflecting, that the established ration would have been adequate to every want; the plea of hunger could not have been advanced as the motive and excuse for thefts; and disease would not have met so powerful an ally in its ravages among the debilitated and emaciated objects which the gaols had crowded into transports, and the transports had landed in these settlements.
The works in hand were, building brick huts at Sydney for convicts, consisting of two apartments, each hut being twenty-six feet in front, and fourteen feet in width, and intended to contain ten people, with a suitable allotment of garden ground; completing tanks for water; widening the bridge, etc. One day in each week was dedicated to issuing provisions, and the labour of the other five (with interruptions from bad weather, and the plea of the reduced ration) did not amount in all to three good working days.
At Parramatta the principal labour was the getting in and housing the maize, and preparing ground for the next year’s grain. The foundations of two material buildings were laid, a town-hall and an hospital. The town-hall was intended to include a market-place for the sale of grain, fish, poultry, live stock, wearing apparel, and every other article that convicts might purchase or sell. An order establishing this regulation had been given out at Parramatta, and a clerk of the market appointed to register every commodity that was brought for sale or barter; directing, in the case of non-compliance, the forfeiture both of the purchase-money and of the article, to be given, one moiety to the informer, and the other to the hospital for the benefit of the sick.
This order was meant to prevent the selling or interchanging of stolen goods among the convicts; a measure that appeared to be daily becoming more necessary. The depredations which were committed, hourly it might be said, upon the maize, were very serious, and called for the interposition of some measure that might prevent them, as punishments, however severe, were not found effectually to answer the end. A convict who lived as a servant with an officer was tried by the criminal court for robbing his master, and being found guilty was sentenced to receive three hundred lashes.
The colony had now been so long established, that many convicts who had come out in the first fleet, and might be termed the first settlers in the country, had served the several terms of transportation to which they had been sentenced. Of the people of this description, some had become settlers; some had left the country; others, to use their own expressions, had taken themselves off the stores, that is to say, had declined receiving any farther provisions from the public stores or doing any public labour, but derived their support from such settlers or other persons as could employ and maintain them; while others, with somewhat more discretion, continued to labour for government, and to receive their provisions as usual from the commissary. Of the latter description, fourteen who were indulged with the choice of the place where they were to labour, preferred the settlement at Sydney, and there had one hut assigned to them for their residence. To prevent any imposition on the part of those who professed to be supported by settlers, they were directed to render an account at the end of each week of their respective employments; for people who had not any visible means of living would soon have become nuisances in the settlement.
It required something more than common application to adapt remedies to the various irregularities which from time to time grew up in the settlement, and something more than common ingenuity to counteract the artifices of those whose meditations were hourly directed to schemes of evasion or depredation.
The natives had not lately given us any interruption by acts of hostility. Several of their young people continued to reside among us, and the different houses in the town were frequently visited by their relations. Very little information that could be depended upon respecting their manners and customs was obtained through this intercourse; and it was observed, that they conversed with us in a mutilated and incorrect language formed entirely on our imperfect knowledge and improper application of their words.
CHAPTER XVII
Mortality in April
Appearance and state of the convicts Ration again reduced
Quantity of flour in store
Settlers
State of transactions with the natives Indian corn stolen
Public works
Average prices of grain, etc at Sydney, and at Parramatta Mortality decreases
King’s birthday
The _Atlantic_ returns from Bengal
Account received of Bryant and his companions Ration farther reduced
_Atlantic_ cleared
Sheep-pens at Parramatta attempted
Quality of provisions received from Calcutta The _Brittania_ arrives from England
Ration increased
A convict emancipated
Public works
May.] The mortality in the last month had been extremely great. Distressing as it was, however, to see the poor wretches daily dropping into the grave, it was far more afflicting to observe the countenances and emaciated persons of many that remained soon to follow their miserable companions. Every step was taken that could be devised to save them; a fishery was established at the South Head, exclusively for the use of the sick, under the direction of one Barton, who had been formerly a pilot, and who, in addition to this duty, was to board all ships coming into the harbour and pilot them to the settlement. The different people who were employed by individuals to kill game were given up for the use of the hospital; and to stimulate them to exertion, two pounds of flour in addition to the ration were ordered for every kangaroo that they should bring, beside the head, one forequarter, and the pluck of the animal.
The weakest of the convicts were excused from any kind of hard labour; but it was not hard labour that destroyed them; it was an entire want of strength in the constitution to receive nourishment, to throw off the debility that pervaded their whole system, or to perform any sort of labour whatever.
This dreadful mortality was chiefly confined to the convicts who had arrived in the last year; of one hundred and twenty-two male convicts who came out in the _Queen_ transport from Ireland, fifty only were living at the beginning of this month. The different robberies which were committed were also confined to this class of the convicts, and the wretches who were concerned in the commission of them were in general too weak to receive a punishment adequate to their crimes. Their universal plea was hunger; but it was a plea that in the then situation of the colony could not be so much attended to as it certainly would have been in a country of greater plenty.
The quantity of Indian corn stolen and destroyed this season was not ascertained, but was supposed to have been at least one sixth of what was raised. The people employed in bringing it in daily reported that they found immense piles of the husks and stalks concealed in the midst of what was standing, having been there shelled and taken off at different times. This was a very serious loss, and became an object of immediate consideration in such a scarcity as the colony then experienced; most anxiously it expected supplies from England, which did not arrive, though the time had elapsed in which they should have appeared had their departure taken place at the period mentioned by the secretary of state (the autumn of last year). His excellency therefore thought it prudent still farther to abridge the ration of flour which was then issued; and on the 9th of the month directed the commissary to serve weekly, until further orders, one pound and an half of flour with four pounds of maize to each man; and one pound and an half of flour with three pounds of maize to each woman, and to every child ten years of age; but made no alteration in the ration of salt provisions.
This ration was to take place on Saturday the 12th; and as maize or Indian corn was now necessarily become the principal part of each person’s subsistence, hand-mills and querns were set to work to grind it coarse for every person both at Sydney and at Parramatta; and at this latter place, wooden mortars, with a lever and a pestle, were also used to break the corn, and these pounded it much finer than it could be ground by the hand-mills; but it was effected with great labour.
On comparing this ration with that issued in the month of April 1790, it will appear that the allowance then received from the public store was in most respects better than that now ordered. We then received, in addition to two pounds and a half of flour, two pounds of rice, which taken together yielded more nutritive substance than the four pounds of maize and one pound and a half of flour; for the maize when perfectly ground, sifted, and divested of the unwholesome and unprofitable part, the husk, would not give more than three pounds of good meal; and the rice was used by the convicts in a much greater variety of modes than it was possible to prepare the maize in.
As at this period the flour in store was reduced to a very inconsiderable quantity, twenty-four days at the new ration (one pound and a half per week), and the salt provisions at the present ration not affording a supply for a longer time than three months, it became a melancholy, although natural reflection, that had not such numbers died, both in the passage and since the landing of those who survived the voyage, we should not at this moment have had any thing to receive from the public stores; thus strangely did we derive a benefit from the miseries of our fellow creatures!
Several of the settlers who had farms at or near Parramatta, notwithstanding the extreme drought of the season preceding the saving of their corn, had such crops that they found themselves enabled to take off from the public store, some one, and others two convicts, to assist in preparing their grounds for the next season. The salt provisions with which they supplied them they procured by bartering their corn for that article, reserving a sufficiency for the support of themselves and families, and for seed. Mr. Schaffer from a small patch of ground got in about two hundred bushels of Indian corn; and with the assistance of four convicts expected to have thirty acres in cultivation the next season. But others of the settlers, inattentive to their own interests, and more desirous of acquiring for the present what they deemed comforts, than studious to provide for the future, not only neglected the cultivation of their lands, but sold the breeding stock with which they had been supplied by order of the governor. Two settlers of the former description having clearly forfeited their grants, and it being understood that they did not intend to proceed to cultivation any further than to save appearances till they could get away, their grants were taken from them, and other settlers placed on the grounds. But exclusive of the idle people, of which there were but few, the settlers were found in general to be doing very well, their farms promising to place them shortly in a state of independence on the public stores in the articles of provisions and grain; and it must not be omitted in this account, that they had to combat with the bad effects of a short and reduced ration nearly the whole of the time that they had been employed in cultivating ground on their own account.
Many complaints having been made by the settlers, of depredations committed on their Indian corn by some of the convicts, it was ordered, that every convict residing at Parramatta, who should be fully convicted before a magistrate of stealing Indian corn, should, in addition to such corporal punishment as he might think it necessary to adjudge, be sent from Parramatta to the New Grounds, there to be employed in cultivation. Mr. Richard Atkins, who came out in the Pitt, and who had been sworn a Justice of the peace, went up to Parramatta to reside there, the constant presence of a magistrate being deemed by the governor indispensable at that settlement.
It was soon perceived, that the punishment of being sent from Parramatta was more dreaded by the convicts than any corporal correction, however severe, that could have been inflicted on them. The being deprived of a comfortable hut and garden, and quitting a place whence the communication with Sydney was frequent, particularly when shipping were in the cove, operated so powerfully with one offender, who was ordered out to the New Grounds, that he chose rather to make an attempt to destroy himself than be sent thither; and had very nearly effected his purpose, having made an incision in his neck of such depth as to lay bare the carotid artery.
In addition to the depredations of our own people, the natives had for some time been suspected of stealing the corn at the settlements beyond Parramatta. On the 18th a party of the tribe inhabiting the woods, to the number of fifteen or sixteen, was observed coming out of a hut at the middle settlement, dressed in such clothing as they found there, and taking with them a quantity of corn in nets. The person who saw them imagined at first from their appearance that they were convicts; but perceiving one of them preparing to throw a spear at him, he levelled his piece, which was loaded with small shot, and fired at him. The native instantly dropped his spear, and the whole party ran away, leaving behind them the nets with the corn, some blankets, and one or two spears. It was supposed that the native was wounded; for in a few days information was received from Parramatta, that a convict who was employed in well-digging at Prospect Hill, having come in from thence to receive some slops which were issued, was on his return met midway and murdered, or rather butchered by some of the natives. When the body was found, it was not quite cold, and had at least thirty spear wounds in it. The head was cut in several places, and most of the teeth were knocked out. They had taken his clothing and provisions, and the provisions of another man which he was carrying out to him. The natives with whom we had intercourse said, that this murder was committed by some of the people who inhabited the woods, and was done probably in revenge for the shot that was fired at the natives who some time before were stripping the hut.
Toward the end of the month the corn was all got in and housed at Parramatta. As the grounds were cleared of the stalks, the depredations which had been committed became visible; and several of the convicts were detected by the night-watch in bringing in large quantities of shelled corn which had been stolen, buried or concealed in the woods, and shelled as they could find opportunity. Seven bushels were recovered in one night by the vigilance of the watch; and as different quantities were found from time to time in the huts, the people who resided in them were all ordered to the New Grounds.
The works during this month, both at Sydney and at Parramatta, went on but slowly. At Sydney a tank that would contain about seven thousand nine hundred and ninety-six gallons of water, with a well in the centre fifteen feet deep, was finished, and the water let into it. Brick huts were in hand for the convicts in room of the miserable hovels occupied by many, which had been put up at their first landing, and in room of others which, from having been erected on such ground as was then cleared, were now found to interfere with the direction of the streets which the governor was laying out. People were also employed in cutting paling for fencing in their gardens. At Parramatta and the New Grounds, during the greatest part of the month, the people were employed in getting in the maize and sowing wheat. A foundation for an hospital was laid, a house built for the master carpenter, and roofs prepared for the different huts either building, or to be built in future.
The following were the prices of grain and other articles, as they were sold during this month at Sydney, and at the market-place at Parramatta.
AT SYDNEY
Flour from 6d to 1s per lb.
Maize per bushel from 12s 6d to 15s. Laying hens from 7s to 10s each.
Cocks for killing from 4s to 7s each. Half grown chickens from 2s 6d to 3s 6d each. Chickens six weeks old 1s each.
Eggs 3s per dozen, or 3d a-piece.
Fresh pork 1s per lb.
Potatoes 3d per lb.
Good white heart cabbages 1d each.
Greens per dozen 6d.
Turnips 6d per dozen.
Sows in pig from L4 10s to L6 6s.
Sows just taken the boar from L3 to L4 4s. Growing pigs from L1 to L2 10s each.
Sucking pigs 10s each.
Moist sugar from 1s 6d to 2s 6d per lb. Coffee 2s to 2s 6d per lb.
Salt pork per lb. from 8d to 9d.
Tobacco, Brazil, per lb. from 3s to 5s.
AT PARRAMATTA
Flour 1s per lb.
Maize per bushel from 11s to 13s.
Laying hens from 7s 6d to 10s each. Cocks for killing from 4s 6d to 5s each. Chickens two months old 3s each.
Eggs per dozen 3s.
Fresh pork per lb. from 1s 1d to 1s 3d. Salt pork per lb. from 10d to 1s.
Potatoes per lb. from 3d to 4d.
A lot of cabbages, per hundred 10s. Tea per lb. from 16s to L1 1s.
Coffee per lb. from 2s to 3s.
Moist sugar from 2s to 2s 6d per lb. Tobacco grown in the country from 1s 6d to 2s per lb. Virginia or Brazil from 4s to 6s.
Soap from 1s 6d to 2s 6d per lb.
Cheese from 1s 6d to 2s per lb.
June.] With infinite satisfaction it was observed at the beginning of the month, that the mortality and sickness among the people had very much decreased. This was attributed by the medical gentlemen to the quantities of fresh meat which had been obtained at Parramatta by the people who were employed to shoot for the hospital; a sufficiency having been brought in at one time to supply the sick with fresh meat for a week; and for the remainder of the month in the proportion of twice or three times a week. Great quantities of vegetables had also been given to those who were in health, as well as to the sick, both from the public ground at the farther settlement (which had been sown, and produced some most excellent turnips) and from the governor’s garden.
4th.] The anniversary of his Majesty’s birthday was observed with as much distinction as was in our power. The governor always wished to celebrate that day in the year in a manner that should render it welcome to all descriptions of people in the different settlements. Heretofore on the same occasion he had increased the ration of provisions; but the situation of the public stores not admitting of such increase at the present, the commissary was directed to issue on that day half a pint of rum to each person of the civil and military department, and a quarter of a pint of rum to each female in the settlement. At noon the New South Wales corps fired three volleys, and the governor received the compliments of the day; after which the officers of each department were entertained by his Excellency at dinner at government-house. Bonfires were made at night, and the day concluded joyfully, without any interruption to the peace of the settlement.
The small allowance of spirits which was given for the day to the convalescents, and to such sick in the hospital as the surgeon judged proper, being found of infinite service to them, the governor directed that the surgeon should receive a certain quantity, and at his discretion issue it from time to time to such sick under his care as he thought would derive benefit from it; the remainder was ordered to be reserved for the use of the sloop when it might be necessary to send her to sea. The spirits at this time in the colony were the surplus of what had been sent out for his majesty’s ship _Sirius_, and the _Supply_ armed tender.
As it had been customary too, on this day, to grant a pardon to such offenders as might be in custody or under sentence of corporal punishment, his Excellency was pleased a few days after to release such convicts as were sentenced to work in irons for a limited time at Parramatta and the New Grounds, and who were not very notorious offenders. This lenity was the rather shown at this time, as the convicts were in general giving proofs of a greater disposition to honesty than had for some time been visible among them. The convicts at the New Grounds being assembled for this purpose, the governor acquainted them, ‘that the state of the colony requiring a still farther reduction in the ration, it would very shortly take place; but that he hoped soon to have it in his power to augment it. The deficiencies in the established ration, he informed them, should at a future period be made up; but in the meantime he expected that every man would continue to exert himself and get the corn into the ground to insure support for the next year.’ Indeed these exertions became every day more necessary. On the 6th of this month there was only a sufficiency of flour in store to serve till the 2nd of July, and salt provisions till the 6th of August following, at the ration then issued; and neither the _Atlantic_ storeship from Calcutta, nor the expected supplies from England, had arrived.
Notwithstanding the mortality and sickness which had prevailed among the convicts who came out in the last ships, much labour had been performed at the New Grounds by those who were capable of handling the hoe and the spade. At this time the quantity of ground in wheat, and cleared and broken up for maize, there and at Parramatta, was such as (if not visited again by a dry season) would at least, computing the produce even at what it was the last year, yield a sufficiency of grain for all our numbers for a twelvemonth. But every one doubted the possibility of getting all the corn into the ground within the proper time, unless the colony should be very speedily relieved from its distresses, as the reduction in the ration would inevitably be followed by a diminution of the daily labour.
On the 20th however, to the inexpressible joy of all ranks of people in the settlements, the _Atlantic_ storeship anchored safely in the cove, with a cargo of rice, soujee, and dholl, from Calcutta, having been much longer performing her voyage than was expected, owing to some delays at Calcutta, in settling and arranging the contract for the supply of provisions which had been required. The merchants who, in the year 1790, had made a tender to supply this colony with certain articles at a stipulated price, were, from several concurring circumstances, unable to furnish what was required by Lieutenant Bowen, agreeable to the prices then stipulated; it was therefore determined by the members of the council at Calcutta, to whom Lieutenant Bowen delivered his letters and instructions (Earl Cornwallis, who had, several months previous to his arrival, been desired by the secretary of state to direct any supplies which might be required for this settlement, being absent with the army), to invite offers for supplying the different articles which were required by contract. Lieutenant Bowen arrived at Calcutta on the 4th of February, and it was not till the 27th of the following month that the business was finally arranged, and a contract entered into by the house of Lambert, Ross, and Co. satisfactory to the council and to Lieutenant Bowen.
It appearing that the flour of Bengal, unless it was dressed for the purpose, which would have taken a great deal of time, was not of a quality to keep even for the voyage from Calcutta to this country a large proportion of rice, of that sort which was said to be the fittest for preservation, was purchased. A small quantity of flour too was put on board, but merely for the purpose of experiment. It was called soujee by the natives, but was much inferior in quality to the flour prepared in Europe, and more difficult to make into bread.
The _Atlantic_ left Calcutta the 28th of March, and on her passage met with much bad weather, and some heavy gales of wind. She brought two bulls and a cow of the Bengal breed, together with twenty sheep and twenty goats; but these were of so diminutive a species, that, unless the breed could be considerably improved by that already in the country, very little benefit was for a length of time to be expected from their importation. Various seeds and plants also were received from the company’s botanical garden; and much commendation was due to Colonel Kydd, the gentleman who superintended the selection and arrangement of them for the voyage; as well as to Lieutenant Bowen, for his care, and for the accommodation which he gave up, both to them and to the cattle, in the cabin of the ship.
Information was received by the Calcutta papers of the loss of his Majesty’s ship _Pandora_, Captain Edwards, who had been among the Friendly islands in search of Christian and his piratical crew, fourteen of whom he had secured, and was returning with the purpose of surveying Endeavour Straits pursuant to his instructions, when he unfortunately struck upon a reef in latitude 23 degrees S eleven degrees only to the northward of this port. By his boats he providentially reached Timor with ninety-nine of his officers and people, being the whole of his ship’s company which were saved. At Timor, on his arrival, he found Bryant and his companions, who made their escape from this place in the fishing cutter in the night of the 28th of March 1791. These people had framed and told a plausible tale of distress, of their having been cast away at sea; and this for a time was believed; but they soon, by their language to each other, and by practising the tricks of their former profession, gave room for suspicion; and being taken up, their true characters and the circumstances of their escape were divulged. The Dutch governor of Timor delivered them to Captain Edwards, who took them on with him to Batavia, whence he was to proceed to England. The circumstance of these people having reached Timor confirmed what was suggested immediately after their departure, that the master of the snow _Waaksamheyd_ had furnished Bryant with instructions how to proceed, and with every thing he stood in need of for his voyage; and it must be remembered, that though this man, during his stay in this port, had constantly said that every sort of refreshment was to be procured at Timor, yet when Captain Hunter, while at sea, proposed to steer for that island, he declared that nothing was to be got there, and so prevented that officer from going thither. There cannot be a doubt that, expecting to find his friends at Timor, he did not choose either to endanger them, or risk a discovery of the part he had acted in aiding their escape.
Had it not been for the fortunate discovery and subsequent delivery of these people to a captain of a British man of war, the evident practicability of reaching Timor in an open boat might have operated with others to make the attempt, and to carry off boats from the settlements; which, during the absence of the king’s ships belonging to the station, was never difficult; and it was now hoped, that the certainty of every boat which should reach that or any other Dutch settlement under similar circumstances being suspected and received accordingly, would have its due effect here.
The supply of provisions received by the Atlantic being confined to grain, it became necessary to reduce the ration of salt meat. It was therefore ordered on the 21st, that after the Friday following only two pounds of pork should be issued in lieu of four. The allowance of one pound and a half of flour and four pounds of maize was continued, but one pound of rice and one quart of peas were added.
The general order given out on this occasion stated,
That the arrival of ships with further supplies of provisions might be daily looked for; but as it was possible that some unforeseen accident might have happened to the ships which were expected to have sailed from England shortly after the departure of the _Pitt_, it became necessary to reduce the ration of provisions then issued, in order that the quantity in store might hold out till the arrival of those ships, which might be supposed to have sailed for this country about the months of January or February last; it having been the intention of government that ships should sail from England for this colony twice in every year. And as all deficiencies in the ration were to be made good hereafter, the following extract from the instructions which fixed the ration for the colony was inserted, viz
Ration for each marine and male convict for seven days successively: 7 pounds of bread, or in lieu thereof 7 pounds of flour; 7 pounds of beef, or in lieu thereof 4 pounds of pork; 3 pints of peas; 6 ounces of butter; 1 pound of flour, or in lieu thereof half a pound of rice:
Being the same as are allowed his Majesty’s troops serving in the West-India Islands, excepting only the allowance of spirits.
And two thirds of the above ration were directed to be issued to each woman in the settlement.
So far the general order.
As, however, a sufficient quantity of rice could not be landed in time to issue on the Saturday, one pound of maize was issued in lieu of the same quantity of rice.
At this ration the rice and flour or soujee were calculated to last five months; and the peas or dholl for nearly a twelvemonth. But if the _Atlantic_ had not arrived, the prospect in the colony would have been truly dreary and distressing; as it was intended to have issued only one pound and a half of flour, three pounds of maize, and two pounds of pork per week, on Saturday the 23rd; a ration that would have derived very little assistance from vegetables, as at that season of the year the gardens had scarcely any thing in them. Gloomy and unpromising, however, as was the situation of the settlements before her arrival, that event, which happened the very day on which, two years before, the colony had been relieved by the arrival of the _Justinian_ storeship, cast a gleam of sunshine which penetrated everyone capable of reflection, and, by effecting a sudden change in the ideas, operated so powerfully on the mind, that we all felt alike, and found it impossible to sit for one minute seriously down to any business or accustomed pursuit.
A black, the same who had secreted himself on board the _Supply_ when she went to Batavia, having found means to conceal himself on board the _Atlantic_ on her departure for Calcutta, and to remain concealed until she had left Norfolk Island, was brought back again to the settlement, notwithstanding he endeavoured to escape from the ship in the Ganges. As it appeared that he had served the term for which he was sentenced to be transported even before he got off on board the _Atlantic_, of which Lieutenant Bowen had only his assertion, no punishment was inflicted upon him, and he was left at liberty to get away in any ship that would receive him on board.
The little live stock that was received by the _Atlantic_ was landed at Parramatta directly after her arrival, and placed in an inclosure separated from the others.
About two hundred and fifty gallons of Bengal rum having been received, the governor directed, that in consequence of the ration being reduced, that quantity, together with what was in store, and had been intended for the use of the sloop at a future time, should be issued to the civil and military, reserving a proportion for those at Norfolk Island.
The flag-staff which had been erected at the South Head under the direction of Captain Hunter, in the month of January 1790, being found too short to show the signal at any great distance, a new one was taken down the harbour, and erected the day the _Atlantic_ arrived, within a few feet of the other; its height above ground was sixty feet.
It was not found that the return of the _Atlantic_ had caused any diminution in the price of grain or stock, either at Parramatta or at Sydney. At this latter place a market had been established for the sale of grain, fish, or poultry, similar to that at Parramatta; a clerk being appointed to superintend it, and take account of the different articles brought for sale, to prevent the barter of goods stolen by the convicts.
On the last day of the month, some natives residing at the south shore of Botany Bay, whether from a hope of reward, or from actually having seen some ships at a distance, informed the governor that a few days before they had perceived four or five sail, one of which they described to be larger than the others, standing off the land, with a westerly wind. Little credit was however given to their report.
July.] As the merchants who supplied the provisions received by the _Atlantic_ were only to be paid for such part of the cargo as was actually landed, and found to be in a merchantable condition, it became necessary to weigh and survey the whole of the cargo; for which purpose two surveyors were appointed by the governor. This of course proved a very tedious business, from the weakness of the gangs at Sydney. Seldom more than four hundred bags, each bag containing one hundred and sixty-four pounds, were at first landed in a day; latterly, this number was by great exertions got up to somewhat more than five hundred in a day. It was not, however, till the 21st of the month that she was cleared.
Having discharged her cargo, she began the serious labour of ballasting, and it being wished to expedite her preparations for Norfolk Island, her ship’s company were assisted with twelve convicts from the settlement, and the occasional use of such boats as could be spared to convey the ballast to the ship. The governor was anxious to learn the state of that dependency, not having heard from it since the return of the _Queen_ transport early in the last December.
The maize being all got in, it was hoped that the convicts would not find any new object for their depredations, and that order and tranquillity would for a time at least be restored among them. But the houses of individuals soon became their prey, and three or four daring burglaries were committed this month: I say daring burglaries, as the houses which were broken into were either within the view of a sentinel, or within the round of a watchman. This, however, must not be otherwise understood than as a proof of the perseverance and cunning of these people, who could find means to elude any vigilance that was opposed to their designs. An attempt to steal some of the sheep at Parramatta was also made by two notorious offenders, who, from being deemed incorrigible, were not included in the pardon which the governor granted to the wretches in irons after his Majesty’s birthday, but were ordered to be chained together for some longer time. Being fortunately overheard by the person who lived in the inclosure, and had the care of the stock, he snapped a piece at them, and, finding it miss fire, gave an alarm to the watch, by whose activity they were apprehended two miles from the place. They were provided with every thing necessary for their design, such as a tomahawk, an iron kettle, knives, spoons, platters, and a quantity of vegetables. It was found, that with the assistance of the tomahawk they had divided the chain that linked them together, and had secured round the leg the iron that remained with each, so as not to be heard when they moved.
The different species of provisions which had been received from Calcutta were not much esteemed by the people. The flour or soujee, from our not knowing the proper mode of preparing it for bread, soon became sour, particularly if not assisted with some other grain; the dholl, or peas, were complained of as boiling hard, and not breaking, though kept on the fire for a greater length of time than the impatience of those who were to use it would in general admit of; and the rice, though termed the best of the cargo, was found to be full of husks, and ill dressed. Some pork also, of which eight casks had been sent as an experiment, was, on being issued, found to be for the most part putrid, and, in the language of surveyors of provisions, not fit for men to eat. These circumstances, together with the extreme minuteness of the Bengal breed of cattle, excited a general hope, that these settlements would not have to depend upon that country for supplies. To the parent country every one anxiously looked for a speedy and substantial assistance; and day after day used to pass in a fruitless hope that the morrow would come accompanied with the long wished-for arrival of ships.
The natives who lived among us assured us from time to time, that the report formerly propagated of ships having been seen on the coast had a foundation in reality; and as every one remembered that the _Justinian_, after making the heads of Port Jackson, had been kept at sea for three weeks, a fond hope was cherished that the sun had shone upon the whitened sails of some approaching vessel, which had been discovered by the penetrating eyes of our savage neighbours at Botany Bay. In this anxiety and expectation we remained till the 26th, when the long-wished-for signal was made, and in a few hours after the _Britannia_ storeship, Mr. William Raven master, anchored in the cove, after a passage of twenty-three weeks from Falmouth, having sailed from thence on the 15th of last February, the day after the arrival of the _Pitt_ in this country.
The _Britannia_ was the first of three ships that were to be dispatched hither, having on board twelve months clothing for the convicts, four months flour, and eight months beef and pork for every description of persons in the settlements, at full allowance, calculating their numbers at four thousand six hundred and thirty-nine, which it was at home supposed they might amount to after the arrival of the _Pitt_. It was still a matter of uncertainty in England, even at the departure of the _Britannia_, whether the merchants of Calcutta had supplied this country with provisions; and under the idea that some circumstance might have prevented them, this supply was ordered to be forwarded. The _Kitty_ transport, one of the three ships which were to contain these supplies, had sailed from Deptford, at the time the _Britannia_ passed through the Downs; her arrival therefore might be daily expected, and in her, or on board of the other ship, it was imagined that fifteen families of Quakers, who had made proposals to government to be received in this country as settlers, were to take their passage.
It was with great pleasure heard in the colony, that some steps had been taken toward prosecuting Donald Trail, the master of the _Neptune_ transport, for his treatment of the convicts with which he sailed from England for this settlement in the year 1790. The sickness and mortality which prevailed among them excited a suspicion that they had been improperly treated; and information upon oath was soon procured of many acts of neglect, ill usage, and cruelty toward them.
In the consequence of the arrival of the _Britannia_, the commissary was on the following day directed to issue, _until further orders_, the following weekly ration, viz to each man 4 pounds of maize, 3 pounds of soujee, 7 pounds of beef, or in lieu thereof 4 lbs. of pork, 3 pints of peas or dholl, and 1/2 a pound of rice.
Two thirds of the man’s ration was directed to be issued to each woman and to every child above ten years of age; one half of the man’s ration to each child above two, and under ten years of age; and one fourth of the man’s ration to each child under two years of age.
Thus happily was the colony once more put upon something like a full ration of provisions; a change in our situation that gave universal satisfaction, as at the hour of the arrival of the _Britannia_ there were in the public store only twenty-four days salt provisions for the settlement at the ration then issued. A delay of a month in her voyage would have placed the colony in a state that must have excited the commiseration of its greatest enemies; a vast body of hard-working people depending for their support upon one pound and a half of soujee, or bad Bengal flour, four pounds of maize, one pound of rice, and one quart of peas for one man per week, without one ounce of meat! But with this new ration all entertained new hopes, and trusted that their future labours would be crowned with success, and that the necessity of sending out supplies from the mother country until the colony could support itself without assistance would have become so evident from the frequency of our distresses and the reduction of the ration, that the journalist would no longer have occasion to fill his page with comparisons between what we might have been and what we were; to lament the non arrival of supplies; nor to paint the miseries and wretchedness which ensued; but might adopt a language to which he might truly be said to have been hitherto a stranger, and paint the glowing prospects of a golden harvest, the triumph of a well-filled store, and the increasing and consequent prosperity of the settlements.
His excellency this month thought fit to exercise the power vested in him by act of parliament, and by his Majesty’s commission under the great seal, of remitting either wholly, or in part, the term for which felons might be transported, by granting an absolute remission of the term for which Elizabeth Perry had been sentenced. This woman came out in the _Neptune_ in 1790, and had married James Ruse a settler. The good conduct of the wife, and the industry of the husband, who had for some time supported himself, his wife, a child, and two convicts, independent of the public store, were the reasons assigned in the instrument which restored her to her rights and privileges as a free woman, for extending to her the hand of forgiveness.
This power, so pleasing to the feelings of its possessor, had hitherto been very sparingly exercised; and those persons who had felt its influence were not found to have been undeserving. I speak only of such convicts as had been deemed proper objects of this favour by the governor himself; the convicts, however, who came out in the _Guardian_ were emancipated by the King’s command, and of these by far the greater part conducted themselves with propriety.
Preparing roofs for new barracks, bringing in bricks to the spot appointed for their construction, and discharging the _Atlantic_ and the _Britannia_, were the principal works in hand at Sydney during the month. At the settlements beyond Parramatta (which had lately obtained and were in future to be distinguished by the name of Toongabbie) the convicts were employed in preparing the ground for the reception of next year’s crop of maize. At and near Parramatta, the chief business was erecting two houses on allotments of land which belonged to Mr. Arndell the assistant surgeon, and to John Irving (one of those persons whose exemplary conduct and meritorious behaviour both in this country and on the passage to it had been rewarded with unconditional freedom by the governor), each of whom had been put in possession, the former of sixty and the latter of thirty acres of land on the creek leading to Parramatta; erecting chimneys for the different settlers at the ponds, preparing roofs for various buildings, sawing timber, cutting posts and railing for inclosures, and hoeing and preparing ground for maize.
CHAPTER XVIII
The _Britannia_ cleared
Survey of provisions
Total of cargo received from Bengal _Atlantic_ sails with provisions for Norfolk Island Transactions
General behaviour of convicts
Criminal Courts
Prisoner pardoned conditionally
Another acquitted
New barracks begun
Thefts
The _Atlantic_ returns from Norfolk Island Information
Settlers there discontented
Principal works
The _Britannia_ taken up by the officers of the New South Wales Corps to procure stock
The _Royal Admiral_ East Indiaman arrives from England Regulations at the store
A Burglary committed
Criminal Court
The _Britannia_ sails
Shops opened
Bad conduct of some settlers
Oil issued
Slops served
Governor Phillip signifies his intention of returning to England
August.] The Britannia was cleared, and discharged from government employ, on the 17th of this month. A deficiency appearing in the weight of the salt provisions delivered from that ship, a survey was immediately ordered; and it appeared from the report of the persons employed to conduct it, and who from their situations were well qualified to judge, Mr. Bowen, a lieutenant in the navy, and Mr. Raven, the commander of the _Britannia_ and a master of a man of war, that the casks of beef were deficient, on an average, thirty-six pounds and one-third, and the tierces twenty-one pounds and one-third. It also appeared that the meat was lean, coarse, and boney, and worse than they have ever been issued in his Majesty’s service. A deception of this nature would be more severely felt in this country, as its inhabitants had but lately experienced a change from a very short ration of salt provisions; and every ounce lost here was of importance, as the supply had been calculated on a supposition of each cask containing its full weight.
It having been covenanted, as already mentioned, by Messrs. Lambert, Ross, and Company, that only such part of the cargo as on its arrival here should be found to be in a merchantable state should be paid for, the following quantity, having been deemed merchantable by the persons appointed to take the survey, was received into the store; viz
Tons Cwt Qrs lbs
Rice 190 3 2 3
Dholl 152 18 2 13
Peas 15 9 2 23
Soujee 57 3 0 4
Wheat 1 15 1 24
———————
Total of Grain 417 10 1 11
———————
[28lb=1qr, 4qr=1cwt, 20cwt=1ton. 67lb=2qr+11lb, etc.]
Eight casks of pork (as an experiment) from Lambert and Company; and two casks of rum containing one hundred and twenty-six gallons, supplied at 3s per gallon. Four casks of flour, and four casks of soujee from Mr. Cockraine (sent likewise as an experiment) were also received into the store.
The unmerchantable articles, consisting of soujee, dholl, and rice, were sold at public auction; and though wholly unfit for men to eat, yet being not too bad for stock, were quickly purchased, and in general went off at a great price. Several lots, consisting of five bags of the soujee, each bag containing about one hundred and fourteen pounds, sold for L4 14s. The whole quantity of damaged grain which was thus disposed of amounted to nine hundred and ninety-one bags, and sold for L373 9s making a most desirable and acceptable provision for the private stock in the colony. For this sum of L373 9s credit was given to the merchants at the final settling of the account; at which time it appeared, that the whole of the _Atlantic’s_ cargo of rice, dholl, peas, soujee, wheat, and rum, which was to be paid for by government, amounted to the sum of L7538 14s 4d.
This cargo might be termed an experiment, to which it was true we were driven by necessity; and it had become the universal and earnest wish that no cause might ever again induce us to try it.
The maize being expended, except a certain proportion which was reserved for seed, seven pounds of soujee were issued per week to each man; but as the quantity of this article which had been received from India was but small (fifty-seven tons) compared with the rice and dholl, toward the latter end of the month it became necessary to make up a new ration compounded of the various grain which had been introduced from Calcutta, and the different articles of food which had been received from England.
One third of the provisions received from Bengal by the _Atlantic_, and the like proportion of the stores add provisions which had been landed from the _Britannia_, having been put on board the former of those ships, she sailed on the 19th for Norfolk Island, having also on board two settlers from the marine detachment, twenty-two male convicts, an incorrigible lad who had been drummed out of the New South Wales corps, three natives, and a free woman, wife to one of the convicts. Among the latter description of persons were some of very bad character; others who were supposed to have formed a design of escaping from the colony; some who professed to be flax dressers, and a few artificers who might be useful at that island.
At the head of a party of convicts who were said to have formed a design of seizing a boat and effecting their escape, was J. C. Morris, one of those convicts who left England in the _Guardian_, and who, from their meritorious behaviour before and after the disaster that befel that ship, received conditional emancipation by his Majesty’s command. Morris was at Norfolk Island when the intimation of the royal bounty reached this country. Being permitted to return to this settlement, he obtained a grant of thirty acres of land at the Eastern Farms, in an advantageous situation on the northside of the creek leading to Parramatta. Here it soon became evident that he had not the industry necessary for a _bona fide_ settler, and that, instead of cultivating his own ground, he lent himself to his neighbours, who were to repay his labour by working for him at a future day. The governor deemed this a clear forfeiture of his grant, in which it was unequivocally expressed, that he held the thirty acres on condition of his residing within the same, and proceeding to the improvement and cultivation thereof. Being no longer a settler, he declared himself able to procure his daily support without the assistance of the public stores, from which, it must be remarked, he had been maintained all the time he held his grant. Soon after this, it was said, he formed the plan of going off with a boat; yet not so cautiously, but that information was given of it to the governor, who resolved to send him back to Norfolk Island, whence an escape was by no means so practicable as from this place; and he was, very much against his inclination, put on board the _Atlantic_ for that purpose. He found means, however, to get on shore in the night preceding her departure; and she sailed without him. A reward being offered for apprehending him, he was soon taken, and sent up to Parramatta, there to be confined on a reduced ration, until an opportunity offered of sending him to Norfolk island.
During the month the governor thought it necessary to issue some regulations to be observed by those convicts whose sentences of transportation had expired. The number of people of this description in the colony had been so much increased of late, that it had become requisite to determine with precision the line in which they were to move. Having emerged from the condition of convicts, and got rid of the restraint which was necessarily imposed on them while under that subjection, many of them seemed to have forgotten that they were still amenable to the regulations of the colony, and appeared to have shaken off, with the yoke of bondage, all restraint and dependence whatsoever. They were, therefore, called upon to declare their intentions respecting their future mode of living. Those who wished to be allowed to provide for themselves were informed, that on application to the judge-advocate, they would receive a certificate of their having served their several periods of transportation, which certificate they would deposit with the commissary as his voucher for striking them off the provision and clothing lists; and once a week they were to report in what manner and for whom they had been employed.
Such as should be desirous of returning to England were informed, that no obstacle would be thrown in their way, they being at liberty to ship themselves on board of such vessels as would give them a passage. And those who preferred labouring for the public, and receiving in return such ration as should be issued from the public stores, were to give in their names to the commissary, who would victual and clothe them as long as their services might be required.
Of those, here and at Parramatta, who had fulfilled the sentence of the law, by far the greater part signified their intention of returning to England by the first opportunity; but the getting away from the colony was now a matter of some difficulty, as it was understood that a clause was to be inserted in all future contracts for shipping for this country, subjecting the masters to certain penalties, on certificates being received of their having brought away any convicts or other persons from this settlement without the governor’s permission; and as it was not probable that many of them would, on their return, refrain from the vices or avoid the society of those companions who had been the causes of their transportation to this country, not many could hope to obtain the sanction of the governor for their return.
With very few exceptions, however, the uniform good behaviour of the convicts was still to be noted and commended.
September.] The month of September was ushered in with rain, and storms of wind, thunder, and lightning. At Parramatta and Toongabbie too, as well as at Sydney, much rain fell for several days. On the return of fine weather, it was seen with general satisfaction that the wheat sown at the latter settlement looked and promised well, and had not suffered from the rain.
Early in the month the criminal court was assembled for the trial of Benjamin Ingram, a man who had served the term for which he was ordered to be transported. He had broken into a house belonging to a female convict, in which he was detected packing up her property for removal. Being found guilty, he received sentence of death; but, on the recommendation of the court, the governor was induced to grant him a pardon, upon condition of his residing for life on Norfolk Island. With this extension of mercy the culprit was not made acquainted till that moment had arrived which he thought was to separate him from this world for ever. Upon the ladder, and expecting to be turned off, the condition on which his life was spared was communicated to him; and with gratitude both to God and the governor, he received the welcome tidings. He afterwards confessed, that he had for some time past been in the habit of committing burglaries and other depredations; for, having taken himself off the stores to avoid working for the public, he was frequently distressed for food, and was thus compelled to support himself at the expense perhaps of the honest and industrious. He readily found a rascal to receive what property he could procure for sale, and for a long time escaped detection. This depraved man had two brothers in the colony; one who came out with him in the first fleet, and who had been for some time a sober, hard-working, industrious settler, having also served the term of his transportation; the other brother came out in the last year, and bore the character of a well-behaved man. There was also a fourth brother; but he was executed in England. It was said, that these unfortunate men had honest and industrious people for their parents; they could not, however, have paid much attention to the morals of their family; or, out of four, some might surely have laid claim to the character of the parents.
The criminal court was again assembled on the 20th of this month, for the trial of William Godfrey, who was taken up on a suspicion of having seized the opportunity of some festivity on board of the _Britannia_, then nearly ready for sea, and taken half a barrel of powder out of the gun-room, about nine o’clock at night. Proof however was not brought home to him; although many circumstances induced every one to suppose he was the guilty person.
This month was fixed for beginning the new barracks. For the private soldiers there were to be five buildings, each one hundred feet by twenty-four in front, and connected by a slight brick wall. At each end were to be two apartments for officers, seventy-five feet by eighteen; each apartment containing four rooms for their accommodation, with a passage of sixteen feet. Of these barracks, one at each end was to be constructed at right angles with the front, forming a wing to the centre buildings. Kitchens were to be built, with other convenient offices, in the rear, and garden ground was to be laid out at the back. Their situation promised to be healthy, and it was certainly pleasant, being nearly on the summit of the high ground at the head of the cove, overlooking the town of Sydney, and the shipping in the cove, and commanding a view down the harbour, as well of the fine piece of water forming Long Cove, as that branching off to the westward at the back of the lieutenant governor’s farm.
The foundation of one of the buildings designed for an officer’s barrack having been dug, and all the necessary materials brought together on the spot, the walls of it were got up, and the whole building roofed and covered in, in eleven days.
Their situation being directly in the neighbourhood of the ground appropriated to the burial of the dead, it became necessary to choose another spot for the latter purpose; and the governor, in company with the Rev. Mr. Johnson, set apart the ground formerly cultivated by the late Captain Shea of the marines.
Several thefts were committed at Sydney and at Parramatta, from which latter place three male convicts absconded, taking with them the provisions of their huts, intending, it was supposed, to get on board the _Britannia_. Rewards being offered, some of them were taken in the woods. It had been found, that the masters of ships would give passages to such people as could afford to pay them from ten to twenty pounds for the same, and the perpetrators of some of the thefts which were committed appeared to have had that circumstance in view, as one or two huts, whose proprietors were well known to have amassed large sums of money for people in their situations, were broken into; and in one instance they succeeded. On the night of the 22nd the hut of Mary Burne, widow of a man who had been employed as a game-killer, was robbed of dollars to the amount of eleven pounds; with which the pillagers got off undiscovered.
On the 30th the _Britannia_ left the cove, dropping down below Bradley’s Point, preparatory to sailing on her intended voyage to Dusky Bay in New Zealand; and while every one was remarking, that the cove (being left without a ship) again looked solitary and uncomfortable, the signal was made at the South Head, and at ten o’clock at night the _Atlantic_ anchored in the cove from Norfolk Island, where, we had the satisfaction to learn, the large cargo which she had on board was landed in safety, although at one time the ship was in great danger of running ashore at Cascade Bay. We now learned that the expectations which had been formed of the crops at Norfolk Island had been too sanguine; but their salt provisions lasted very well. Governor King, however, wrote that the crops then in the ground promised favourably, although he would not venture to speak decidedly, as they were very much annoyed by the grub. This was an enemy produced by the extreme richness of the soil; and it was remarked, that as the land was opened and cleared, it was found to be exposed to the blighting winds which infest the island.
The great havoc and destruction which the reduced ration had occasioned among the birds frequenting Mount Pitt had so thinned their numbers, that they were no longer to be depended upon as a resource. The convicts, senseless and improvident, not only destroyed the bird, its young, and its egg, but the hole in which it burrowed; a circumstance that ought most cautiously to have been guarded against; as nothing appeared more likely to make them forsake the island.
The stock in the settlement was plentiful, but, from being fed chiefly on sow thistle during the general deficiency of hard food, the animals looked ill, and were as badly tasted. The _Pitt_, however, took from the island a great quantity of stock; barrow pigs and fowls, pumpkins and other vegetables; for which Captain Manning and his officers paid the owners with many articles of comfort to which they had long been strangers.
The convicts in general wore a very unhealthy cadaverous appearance, owing, it was supposed, not only to spare diet, but to the fatigue consequent on their traversing the woods to Mount Pitt, by night, for the purpose of procuring some slender addition to their ration, instead of reposing after the labours of the day. They had committed many depredations on the settlers, and one was shot by a person of that description in the act of robbing his farm.
Governor King, having discovered that the island abounded with that valuable article lime-stone, was building a convenient house for his own residence, and turning his attention to the construction of permanent storehouses, barracks for the military, and other necessary buildings.
The weather had been for some time past very bad, much rain having fallen accompanied with storms of wind, thunder, and lightning. In some of these storms the wreck of his Majesty’s ship _Sirius_ went to pieces and disappeared, no part of that unfortunate ship being left together, except what was confined by the iron ballast in her bottom.
On board of the _Atlantic_ came sixty-two persons from Norfolk Island, among whom were several whose terms of transportation had expired; thirteen offenders; and nine of the marine settlers, who had given up the hoe and the spade, returned to this place to embrace once more a life to which they certainly were, from long habit, better adapted than to that of independent settlers. They gave up their estates, and came here to enter as soldiers in the New South Wales corps.’
Mr. Charles Grimes, the deputy-surveyor, arrived in the _Atlantic_, being sent by Mr. King to state to the governor the situation of the settlers late belonging to the _Sirius_, whose grounds had, on a careful survey by Mr. Grimes, been found to intersect each other. They had been originally laid down without the assistance of proper instruments, and being situated on the side of the Cascade Stream, which takes several windings in its course, the different allotments, being close together, naturally interfered with each other when they came to be carried back. The settlers themselves saw how disadvantageously they were situated, and how utterly impossible it was for every one to possess a distinct allotment of sixty acres, unless they came to some agreement which had their mutual accommodation in view; but this, with an obstinacy proportioned to their ignorance, they all declined: as their grounds were marked out so would they keep them, not giving an inch in one place, though certain of possessing it with advantage in another. These people proved but indifferent settlers; sailors and soldiers, seldom bred in the habits of industry, but ill brooked the personal labour which they found was required from them day after day, and month after month. Men who from their infancy had been accustomed to have their daily subsistence found them were but ill calculated to procure it by the sweat of their brows, and must very unwillingly find that without great bodily exertions they could not provide it at all. A few months experience convinced them of the truth of these observations, and they grew discontented; as a proof of which they wrote a letter to the judge-advocate, to be submitted to the governor, stating, as a subject of complaint among other grievances, that the officers of the settlement bred stock for their own use, and requesting that they might be directed to discontinue that practice, and purchase stock of them.
Very few of the convicts at Norfolk Island whose terms of transportation had expired were found desirous of becoming permanent settlers; the sole object with the major part appearing to be, that of taking ground for the purpose of raising by the sale of the produce a sum sufficient to enable them to pay for their passages to England. The settler to benefit this colony, the _bona fide_ settler, who should be a man of some property, must come from England. He is not to be looked for among discharged soldiers, shipwrecked seamen, or quondam convicts.
Governor King finding, after trying every process that came within his knowledge for preparing and dressing the flax-plant, that unless some other means were devised, it never would be brought to the perfection necessary to make the canvas produced from it an object of importance, either as an article of clothing for the convicts or for maritime purposes, proposed to Mr. Ebor Bunker, the master of the _William and Ann_, who had some thoughts of touching at Dusky Bay in New Zealand, to procure him two natives of that country, if they could be prevailed on to embark with him, and promised him one hundred pounds if he succeeded, hoping from their perfect knowledge of the flax-plant, and the process necessary to manufacture it into cloth, that he might one day render it a valuable and beneficial article to his colony; but Captain Bunker had never returned.
Norfolk Island had been visited by all the whalers which sailed from this port on that fishery. The _Admiral Barrington_ and _Pitt_ left with Mr. King eleven men and two female convicts, who had secreted themselves at this port on board of those ships.
October.] The _Britannia_, which had quitted the cove on the last day of September, preparatory to her departure on a fishing voyage (a licence for which had been granted by the East India Company for the space of three years), returned to the cove on the third of this month for the purpose of fitting for the Cape of Good Hope, the officers of the New South Wales corps having engaged the master to proceed thither and return on their account with a freight of cattle, and such articles as would tend to the comfort of themselves and the soldiers of the corps, and which were not to be found in the public stores. Mr. Raven, the master, let his ship for the sum of L2000; and eleven shares of L200 each were subscribed to purchase the stock and other articles. The ship was well calculated for bringing cattle, having a very good between-decks; and artificers from the corps were immediately employed to fit her with stalls proper for the reception and accommodation of cows, horses, etc. A quantity of hay was put on board sufficient to lessen considerably the expense of that article at the Cape; and she was ready for sea by the middle of the month. Previous to her departure, on the 7th, the _Royal Admiral_ East-Indiaman, commanded by Captain Essex Henry Bond, anchored in the cove from England, whence she had sailed on the 30th of May last. Her