Remember Me

by Lesley Pearse

  Just a few days ago an elderly convict had died while getting his rations in the store, and when Surgeon White examined his body he found his stomach to be completely empty. The only reason Mary still had some fight left in her, and milk in her breasts for Emmanuel, was because of fish Will brought home from the day’s catch, and the grubs and berries the natives had introduced her to.

  Bennelong had finally made his escape from the settlement, once the food and rum he had become used to grew short. Gardens, even the Governor’s own, had been constantly plundered for vegetables, despite the severe flogging that resulted if the culprit was caught. It wasn’t only convicts that did it, a seaman from the Supply was caught, and one of the Marines. Will had been compelled to dig a hole under their hut to keep their own meagre rations safe. He’d made it like the ones smugglers used back in Cornwall, lined with wood, and a false floor laid down on it.

  Yet Mary thrived and still managed to feed her family because she refused to give way to utter despair as some were doing. As she told Will, it was just a case of hanging on, being helpful and pleasant to the officers so that when ships did arrive, as they surely must, she and Will would be in positions of trust. That way they could make opportunities to get the things they needed.

  The days crept on, the misery of hunger growing more acute with each one. The weather turned very cold too, the wind eerily rustling the paper-dry leaves of the gums, and all public work ground to a halt because there was no one fit enough to do it any longer.

  The convicts merely shuffled around now, every gaunt face illustrating the nature of real starvation. At night Mary often heard small children wailing pitifully from hunger. It was the worst sound she’d ever heard.

  Will had appeared to heed Mary’s advice, for he made himself increasingly popular with the officers and troops by his diligence in fishing. For this he was rewarded with a share of the catch, and being allowed to pick his own helpers. James Martin, Jamie Cox and Sam Bird, his most trusted friends, often went with him, and although there were usually a couple of Marines along too, this wasn’t always the case. Will fished the waters beyond the Heads frequently, sometimes going several miles out to sea. He also struck up friendships with some of the natives as they fished from their canoes. Often it was they who directed him to large shoals.

  Will sometimes saw Bennelong as he sailed down the harbour. He would paddle out in his canoe and occasionally climb aboard the cutter for a chat. Mary was sure that if she and Will managed to get their hands on some spirits, he could easily be bribed into helping them escape.

  Just when it looked as if all hope of rescue was gone, in the afternoon of 3 June the flag was struck on South Head. As the cry went up that a ship was coming, pandemonium broke out. Men downed tools and cheered, women came hobbling out of their huts and hugged one another.

  Watkin Tench, along with Surgeon White and Captain Phillip, took his boat and went off down the harbour. All three of them were as excited and emotional as the rest of the settlement, despite the discomfort of heavy rain and a stiff wind. As they drew closer to the Heads and saw the big ship coming in flying English colours, Phillip transferred on to a fishing boat to go back, leaving Tench and White to go and collect welcome news from home.

  ‘Look at that magical word on her stern,’ White said, pointing to the painted sign that read ‘London’. ‘I had begun to doubt I would ever see such a thing again.’

  The ship was the Lady Juliana, and because of the strong winds she was forced to anchor in Spring Cove just inside North Head, but Tench and White went alongside and called out a welcome to the ship’s officers.

  ‘You can’t know how welcome you are,’ Tench called out. ‘We feared we’d never get the provisions we need so desperately. Can you tell us what you are carrying so we can take the good news back to the settlement?’

  ‘Two hundred and twenty-five women felons, whores every one of them,’ came the shouted reply from one of the officers.

  Tench laughed, he thought it was a joke. But his laughter stopped abruptly when a group of tow-haired women suddenly appeared on deck, shouting obscenities.

  ‘You have provisions too?’ White yelled, aware that Tench was too stunned to resume any further questions. ‘And the medicine we need?’

  ‘Seventy-five barrels of flour,’ the ship’s officer called back. ‘That’s all. We set sail with the Guardian, she carried the stores, but she got holed by an iceberg.’

  By nightfall all the convicts were in despair.

  Captain Phillip had returned to the harbour with a beam on his face, confirming to them that it was exactly as the fishermen had reported, a big English ship, anchored at Spring Cove.

  The convicts waited, expecting Lieutenant Tench and Surgeon White to arrive back an hour or two later looking happier still. Many of their number hastily ate the last of their rations, in the belief that by the following day they would be given more than they usually ate in a week.

  But Tench and White came back grim-faced and silent, going straight up to Government House without a word to anyone. When one of the men who had been on the cutter reported that there were over 200 women on the new ship and no provisions, they were not believed. Some laughed, assuming it had to be a joke. Yet as they watched other officers speeding up to Government House, and no sounds of revelry wafting out, they slowly realized that it had to be true.

  The male convicts were far too weak with hunger to be excited by a huge number of new women descending on them. Their reaction was only fear that their rations would be cut even more drastically. But to most of the women it was a calamity. Bad though it was to be forced to share rations with strangers, the prospect of new women stealing their men away was even worse.

  A relationship with someone, whether you were legally married or not, eased the misery of life in the colony. In most cases the partnerships were a compromise, especially for the women. Back home few of them would have chosen the mate they had here. But choice was limited, plain girls were grateful for being wanted, the prettier girls felt safer with a protector, and where a baby was a result of the arrangement, it gave some purpose to their life.

  Mary was more nervous than most when she heard the news of the Juliana and its cargo of women. She knew it wasn’t her beauty or her cleverness that had kept Will with her for two years. He had stayed with her purely because there was a shortage of women, and by the time he’d got to know the prettier ones better, he found most had serious flaws in their characters.

  Death, and men being moved to Norfolk Island, had decimated their numbers. There weren’t more than seventy men left here now, and a great many of those were physical wrecks. Among 200 new women who had been cooped up on a ship for months, there were almost certainly going to be dozens who would set their sights on Will.

  Chapter nine

  Every single woman in the settlement turned out to see the women from the Juliana being rowed ashore. Apart from the weather, it was almost like a re-enactment of their first day here, for they could hear the same kind of excited laughter and the ribald remarks they’d made themselves. But whereas they had arrived in early February, which in this upside-down country meant summer with blazing sunshine, so hot that many of them ran into the sea to cool down, the new arrivals were experiencing winter. The sky was grey, a keen wind was blowing, making the sea choppy, and it was very cold.

  There should have been sisterly concern for the new women. After all, they had been through a long, gruelling voyage, and now they were about to enter hell. Yet just the way they looked, even from a distance, was enough to make the old-timers forget any kindly thoughts and band together in antipathy and resentment. The new arrivals’ clothes were vivid colours, many wore hats trimmed with flowers and feathers, they were plump and healthy, and they looked for all the world like a troupe of actresses, not convicts.

  Mary clutched Emmanuel closer to her breast in fear. Her first exposure to the convicts from the other transport ships in the fleet was printed indelibly on her m
ind. They had all seemed so much tougher than her, conniving and ruthless too. Time and the hardships here had made all the survivors equal now, but she was afraid these new women would alter everything.

  ‘Lots of ladies,’ Charlotte said, looking up at her mother with undisguised glee. ‘Pretty ladies.’

  At her child’s innocent words Mary felt a pang of shame. They were, after all, just women like herself. All of them had known chains and the horrors of prison and had been wrenched from their families and friends. She didn’t want Charlotte to grow up in a climate of bitterness and hate. She decided she must put aside her fear and jealousy and welcome the newcomers.

  ‘I thought we might have had a few fights on our hands,’ Surgeon White said to Tench over dinner at White’s house the following evening. ‘But thanks to the actions of Mary Bryant the new women appear to be settling in well.’

  The two men had become friends on the Charlotte, despite a twenty-year age gap. Their interests and family backgrounds were similar, and though the surgeon was more concerned with the general health of the colony, and Tench with the challenge of making it a success, they were both intensely fascinated by this new, as yet unexplored land. They had gone on several exploratory trips into the bush together, and shared the same curiosity about its natives. Both of them also had compassion for the convicts, something few of the other officers felt.

  By candlelight, White’s dining room would pass for being much like any country doctor’s back home in England, with its whitewashed walls, snowy table-cloth, plain, serviceable china, laden bookshelves and a couple of treasured landscapes on the walls. By daylight, however, the crudeness of the building showed. The walls were wattle and daub, and in heavy rain holes often appeared. The floor beneath a rug was uneven boards. But whatever its shortcomings, it was a haven of civilization for White and his dinner guests.

  While Charles White often regretted his decision to come out here with the fleet, it was mainly because of the lack of medical equipment and medicine rather than the absence of comforts. A widower for over ten years, he had grown used to the bachelor life, and he had two convict women, Anne and Maria, who cooked and kept house for him. He also had little Nunburry, the native boy he’d adopted, to take care of, and some very good friends. Tonight his mood was mellow. He had managed to acquire a bottle of brandy, and he and Tench had dined on a first-class sea bass, with some carrots and potatoes from White’s own garden. It was truly miraculous that the vegetables hadn’t been stolen, but perhaps by showing Anne and Maria a little kindness, and giving them some extra food, he had gained their loyalty.

  ‘Mary’s a good woman,’ Tench agreed. ‘I daresay she remembered how hard it was for her to adjust when she first arrived here. If only all the women had her practical nature and generosity of spirit!’

  He had been surprised and touched to see Mary helping with the allocation of huts for the new arrivals. She seemed to be making a real effort to make the new women feel welcome. He wished her attitude was a general one; already there had been reports of clothing and other personal possessions being stolen.

  ‘There’s a fair few trouble-makers among the new ones,’ White sighed, remembering the two women he’d separated for fighting and the profanities they’d screamed at him. ‘According to the reports, they carried on their whoring with the sailors all the way here. A great number of them are with child. But they are healthy at least, save for the pox of course.’

  Tench smiled. White was always ranting about the scourge of venereal diseases. They were rife here of course, but Tench couldn’t believe as White did that the whole future of this new land was at risk because of it.

  ‘At least the Juliana brought news,’ Tench said cheerfully. ‘I am amazed to hear of the revolution in France. When I was in Paris I confess to being appalled by the excesses of the aristocracy. And good news too that King George has recovered from his madness. What do you know of this sickness he suffered?’

  ‘Very little. I’m just an old saw-bones,’ White shrugged. ‘But I am glad Farmer George is well again. As glad as I was to find the Juliana has enough rations for two years for her convicts.’

  Tench smiled. That news had been the very best, a huge relief for everyone. It was just a shame they hadn’t been told immediately, then there would have been less hostility towards the new arrivals. Now everyone was hoping that the Justinian from Falmouth, which was apparently fully loaded with stores and equipment, would arrive before the next huge influx of convicts.

  But personally Tench was most grateful for the letters from home that were brought out by the ship. He felt he had stood up remarkably well to all the discomforts and deprivations of the settlement, but the sense of isolation from his friends and family had almost broken him at times. Indeed, if he was truthful, there had been times in the past two years when he feared he would never live to see them again.

  ‘Let’s drink a toast to the light at the end of a very dark tunnel,’ he suggested.

  White filled their glasses. ‘Light to banish the darkness,’ he said, and chuckled. ‘Though with another three transports, and a thousand convicts on their way, we’ll need a great deal of light to banish that darkness.’

  Mary and Will stood together at the harbour, quaking as they looked out across the bay to the Neptune and the Scarborough. They could see the longboats being lowered to bring the convicts ashore. But the terrible stench coming from the ships was enough for them to know that what they were about to see was going to be utterly appalling.

  It had been bad enough on the previous day, helping the sick from the Surprise to the hospital. Many of those convicts were so frail that they were unable to walk, having lain in their own vomit and excreta for most of the voyage. But today was going to be even worse.

  The Justinian had arrived on 20 June, bringing joy to everyone in the settlement as she carried ample provisions and much-needed equipment, along with animals. She had left England some time after the Surprise, Neptune and Scarborough, the three transport ships carrying another 1,000 convicts. But she had overtaken them and made the voyage in only five months. Full rations were issued once again, and working hours put back to normal. The Justinian left again as soon as her cargo was unloaded, to take provisions to Norfolk Island.

  On the 23rd the flag was struck again, but it was two days before the ship which had been signalled sailed into the bay. This was the Surprise, carrying 218 male convicts and a detachment of the newly formed New South Wales Corps.

  It was shocking to hear that there had been forty-two deaths during the voyage, and another hundred were sick. And when the Reverend Johnson went aboard, he reported back that the convicts were lying almost naked in the holds, too sick to move or help themselves.

  Mary and Will, along with many other convicts, had come forward willingly to help, but the sights and smells were so awful that many of the volunteers turned tail and ran. Few of the women helpers could stop themselves from crying openly. It was patently obvious that these new arrivals had been half starved and kept below decks for almost the entire voyage. Many of them would never recover.

  They had barely got those men washed, fed and under blankets, before the other two ships arrived. The Reverend Johnson went aboard the Scarborough, but was advised by the captain not to go below decks. The terrible stench coming from the holds was enough to deter him, and he didn’t even attempt to board the Neptune.

  Tents had hurriedly been erected in front of the hospital, and there was food, water, clothes and medicine in readiness. The night before, as Mary tried to sleep, the smell from the ships at anchor made her stomach heave. It was a hundred times worse than anything she’d experienced on the Dunkirk. Although her heart went out to the poor souls in their suffering, she had felt she couldn’t possibly help again today.

  But by dawn, the anger she felt at men putting profit before human life made her strong again. According to conversations she’d overheard between officers, transportation had been put out to private tenders. As
the government offered £17 7s 6d a head for rations, the less the convicts were given to eat, the more food the ships’ owners could sell off once they arrived here. If convicts died en route, this made it even more lucrative.

  Mary heard one officer comparing the transport owners unfavourably with the slave traders. As he pointed out, at least the traders were motivated to keep the slaves fit and healthy, for the better the condition they were in, the more they could be sold for. There was no such incentive even to keep convicts alive.

  ‘They say Captain Trail of the Neptune kept them all chained together,’ Will said in a subdued, shocked voice. ‘When one of the number died, the prisoners kept quiet about it to get the man’s rations. Imagine being so desperate for extra food that you’d lie next to a decomposing body!’

  Mary didn’t answer him, for she knew from personal experience that she would probably do absolutely anything, however repulsive, to keep herself alive. Now she had two children to care for, her survival instinct was even stronger.

  The loading of the longboats began. They watched the first few people climb slowly and hesitantly down the rope ladder, and even from the shore they could see how difficult it was for them. But they were the lucky ones; before long the sailors and troops were practically hurling people into the boats, as if they were sacks of goods, because they weren’t capable of walking, let alone climbing.

  As the boat rowed in closer, a gasp went up, for the people were like skeletons. There was no eager expectancy on their faces, and they lolled as if close to death – indeed, one was dead on arrival. Two more were to take their last breath as they lay where they’d been placed on the wharf.