by Paul Collins
In his Diary Scott mentions a number of storms, but he does not describe them in detail. So I have constructed an imaginary storm, but have directly drawn on several first-hand accounts of extreme conditions in the Southern Ocean. One source was the journal of James Finucane which has been edited by Anne-Maree Whitaker in Distracted Settlement: New South Wales after Bligh. From the Journal of Lieutenant James Finucane 1808–1810, Melbourne University Press, 1998, pp. 3–17 and pp. 31–53, where he describes aspects of the journey to Sydney. Other sources were Andrew Hassam, No Privacy for Writing: Shipboard Diaries 1852–1879, Melbourne University Press, 1995, and Liz Byrski, Spectacular Australian Sea Rescues, French’s Forest: New Holland Publishers, 1997.
For the processes involved in transportation to Australia after conviction in Ireland, but before leaving the country, see The National Archives of Ireland Research Guide, Introduction to the Chief Secretary’s Office Registered Papers. This is available on the very helpful homepage of the National Archives of Ireland. For Cove (which throughout most of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was usually referred to as Queenstown) see Mary Broderick, History of Cobh (Queenstown) Ireland, privately published, second edition, 1994.
For the letters of John England concerning the sending of clergy to New South Wales (and Van Diemen’s Land) see the Orthodox Journal, 7 (1819), pp. 30–40. See also Peter Guilday, The Life and Times of John England, 1786–1842, New York: The America Press,Vol. I, 1927.
Susanna de Vries’s excellent Historic Sydney: The Founding of Australia, Brisbane: Pandanus Press, 1983 is very useful for early Sydney and descriptions of Sydney Harbour and its foreshores. See also her Historic Sydney. As seen by its early artists, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1983, pp. 6–23.
2 Convict No. 102
For Knopwood’s Diary see Mary Nicholls (ed.), The Diary of the Revd. Robert Knopwood, Hobart: THRA, 1977. For a biography of Knopwood see Geoffrey Stephens, Knopwood: A Biography, Hobart: The Print Centre, 1990. See also ADB, II, pp. 66–7. For Thomas Wells see ADB, II, pp. 576–7. His Michael Howe, the last and worst of the Bush Rangers of Van Diemen’s Land was published in December 1818 by Andrew Bent, editor of the Hobart Town Gazette. It was republished twice in Wells’s lifetime and several times in the twentieth century. While its value is small, it was the first literary pamphlet published in Tasmania. The details of the composition of the Knopwood and Cuthbertson narratives are dealt with in the notes on the Prologue. The AOT has confirmed for me that the Bench of Magistrates Book for early 1823 has never been found.
For early Hobart Town see Carolyn R. Stone and Pamela Tyson, Old Hobart Town and Environs 1802–1855, Lilydale,Vic: Pioneer Design Studio, 1978, and Cedric Pearce and Ian Pearce [eds], Hobart Town Album, 1804–1850. By Various Artists, Hobart: Fullers Bookshop, 1967. For Henry Savery see ADB, II, pp. 419–20, as well as The Hermit in Van Diemen’s Land (ed. by Cecil Hardgraft and Margriet Roe), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1964, p. 57. For Bedford see p. 50.
Hotels and inns in the 1820s are described by Grace Karskens in The Rocks: Life in Early Sydney, Melbourne University Press, 1997, and in Alexander Harris, Settlers and Convicts, or, Recollections of sixteen years labour in the Australian backwoods, first published in London in 1847 and republished by Melbourne University Press in 1986. See also Obed West, Memoirs, edited by Edward West Marriot as Memoirs of Obed West. A portrait of early Sydney, Bowral: Barcom Press, 1988, pp. 56–9. For the use of rum in the colony see HRA, Series III, Vol. III, p. 225. For the magistrate A. W. H. Humphrey see ADB, II, pp. 565–66.
Pearce’s appearance is confirmed by two remarkable images of him that have come down to us: they are pencil sketches by the talented convict artist,Thomas Bock, who after emancipation became a well-known and very fashionable portrait painter in Van Diemen’s Land. See Diane Dunbar, Thomas Bock: Convict Engraver, Society Portraitist, Launceston: Queen Victoria Museum, 1991. Bock did two quick but excellent sketches of Pearce’s head and face immediately after he had been hung at 9 a.m. in the yard of the Hobart Town jail on Monday, 19 July 1824. Of course, one can read much too much into faces, especially when the eyes are closed, as in a death-mask. In Bock’s sketches Pearce looks quite a young man in the first drawing, which shows him side-faced. However, he appears much older in the second, almost full-faced drawing. It is a thin face with sunken cheeks and a sharp, prominent nose. Again, it is the ordinariness of Pearce’s appearance that strikes you.The original drawings are held by the State Library of New South Wales in the Dixson Library. See also AOT, CON 23/3/102 for the indent of the Castle Forbes where Pearce’s physical appearance is described. For Pearce’s conduct record see AOT, CON 31/34.
For Lieutenant-Governor Sorell see ADB,Vol. II, pp. 459–62. For Kemp’s complaints see HRA, Series III, Vol. II, pp. 684, 686 and HRA, Series III,Vol. III, pp. 220–21.
For Pearce’s convict assignments in Van Diemen’s Land I have followed the order given in Sprod, pp. 16–21. For the widespread drunkenness see William Bernard Ullathorne, The Catholic Mission in Australia, Liverpool, 1837, pp. 29–30. For Ullathorne’s comments about bestiality, see his evidence to the Molesworth House of Commons Select Committee (1838).
Major Thomas Bell’s evidence to Bigge can be found in HRA, Series III, Vol. III, pp. 230–43. For bushrangers see Robson, pp. 78–105.The executions of bushrangers are dealt with in Richard P. Davis, The Tasmanian Gallows:A Study of Capital Punishment, Hobart: Cat and Fiddle Press, 1974, pp. 1–12.
Macquarie’s report to the Colonial Office on the state of the Van Diemen’s Land colony can be found in HRA, Series I,Vol. X, pp. 500–16. For the March 1826 population figures see HRA, Series III, Vol. V, pp. 699–701. For the 1821 Muster see HRA, Series I, Vol. X, p. 578. For the 1835 population figures, see Robson, p. 168.
I am indebted to Sprod’s reconstruction of Pearce’s career as a convict. See Sprod, pp. 14–21.
For the inconsistencies between Humphrey’s and Chief Constable Richard Pitt’s evidence concerning the numbers of lashes per floggings see HRA, Series III,Vol. III, pp. 272 and 486.
For Ernest Augustus Slade’s evidence see the Appendix to the Report from the Select Committee on Transportation, in Great Britain, Parliamentary Papers, 1837, Vol. XIX, Paper 518, pp. 89–90. Ullathorne discusses flogging in his On The Management of Criminals, London: Thomas Richardson, 1866, see especially pp. 18–21. Also Ullathorne’s The Horrors of Transportation Briefly Unfolded to the People, Dublin: Richard Coyne, 1838 discusses the whole general question of transportation. For a present-day discussion of flogging and its effects on nineteenth-century convicts see David Neal, The Rule of Law in a Penal Colony: Law and Power in Early New South Wales, Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 1991, especially pp. 49–53.
For the complex system of barter and exchange as it operated in New South Wales and Van Diemen’s Land see the Sydney Gazette, 10 October 1812. The complexities of getting some form of stable currency in the colonies is described by Edward Shann in his Economic History of Australia, Australian edition, Melbourne: Georgian House, 1948, pp. 51–61.
3 Through Hell’s Gates
For Macquarie Harbour and Sarah Island I am deeply in the debt of Richard Davies, whose knowledge of the whole history of the penal settlement and the other historical sites around Macquarie Harbour is unsurpassed. A tour of the island with Richard brings the place alive and he shares his knowledge generously. See also Ian Brand’s reliable Sarah Island:An account of the penal settlements of Sarah Island, Tasmania, Launceston: Regal Publications, third printing, 1995. Thomas James Lemprière’s The Penal Settlements of Early Van Diemen’s Land, republished by the Royal Society of Tasmania (Northern Branch) in 1954, pp. 9–51 gives an account by an eyewitness who lived at Sarah Island from 1826 onwards. Lemprière has also left a sketchbook of extremely valuable pencil drawings of Macquarie Harbour which is held in Hobart at the Allport Library and Museum of Fine Arts.
Much of the information on the geology, vegetation and weather pat
terns of western Tasmania comes from various articles in Gee and Fenton’s The South West Book and Ken Collins’s South-West Tasmania.
For a detailed archaeological analysis of Sarah Island see Jack McIlroy, Excavations at the New and Old Penitentiaries, Sarah Island Historic Site, Hobart: Department of Lands, Parks and Wildlife, Occasional Paper 18, 1989. For the area around Kelly’s Basin see David Bannear’s King River to Kelly Basin Archaeological Survey, Hobart: Department of Lands, Parks and Wildlife, Occasional Paper 29, 1991.
For the dispatches to London concerning Macquarie Harbour see HRA, Series I,Vol. X, pp. 527–8. Sorell’s dispatch to Goulburn is in HRA, Series III,Vol. III, pp. 17–20. Arthur spelled out his vision for Macquarie Harbour in a letter to Lieutenant Wright on 16 June 1824 in HRA, Series III,Vol. 5, pp. 630–1. For Kelly’s and King’s opinions of Macquarie Harbour see HRA, Series III,Vol. III, pp. 464–6 and pp. 506–7. For the rather sketchy biographical details that are available on Cuthbertson, see ADB, I, pp. 273–4. For details of people first sent to Sarah Island see HRA Series III, Vol. IV, pp. 43–4. For Cuthbertson’s Commission as Commandant see AOT, CSO 1/134/3229, and for his first report on the settlement and Deputy-Surveyor Evans report on Macquarie Harbour see the Hobart Town Gazette, 9 February 1822. For an interesting book on the King River area see Patsy Crawford, King:The story of a river, Dynnyrne, Tasmania: Montpelier Press, 2000.
Details of charges and sentences of some of the convicts sent to Macquarie Harbour in the first few months can be found in the court reports of the Hobart Town Gazette, 22 December 1821, 5 January 1822, 12 January 1822, 26 January 1822, 9 February 1822.
For information on the seven other convicts who accompanied Pearce on the first escape attempt see Sprod, pp. 56–9. Further information on the escapees can be gleaned from their transportation ships’ indents and the convict Conduct Registers held in AOT. Specific information on the charge of larceny against Greenhill can be found in The London and Middlesex Calendar of Prisoners in H.M. Jail of Newgate for the Session Commencing on Wednesday 28 June 1820 in the London Metropolitan Archives at XO71/039. Surgeon James Spence’s 8 February 1823 letter to the Colonial Surgeon, James Scott, can be found at AOT, CSO 1/134/3230.
For flogging rates, see David Neal’s Rule of Law, pp. 49–50.
4 The Transit of Hell
There are two books that are very helpful for the landscape, flora and fauna, weather patterns and natural history of south-west Tasmania: Gee and Fenton’s (eds) The South West Book; and C. J. Binks’ Explorers of Western Tasmania. Chris Binks’s book is also excellent and very reliable for the history of the exploration of the region; Ken Collins’s South West Tasmania is also full of information about the south-west. Leon Costermans, Trees of Victoria and the Adjoining Areas is helpful. For the Gordon and Franklin rivers see especially Flanagan’s excellent A Terrible Beauty. For fauna see R. M. Green, The Fauna of Tasmania: Mammals, Launceston: Potoroo Publishing, no date.
Here I want to acknowledge that some of my most helpful sources for this chapter were the recorded interviews that I conducted with (1) Mr Terry Reid, Senior Ranger (Queenstown) for the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service on 12 November 2001 in Queenstown; (2) with Ms Sue Rundle, Research Officer – Statistics, and with Dr Jon Marsden-Smedley, Fire Officer, Fire Management Section, both of the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service, in Hobart on 14 November 2001; and (3) on 15 November 2001 with Mr Geoff Law of the Wilderness Society, Hobart. (The Parks and Wildlife Service is a division of the Department of Primary Industries, Water and Environment, Tasmania.) All of these people have a vast knowledge and practical experience of walking in the south-west, and they provided me with invaluable material. I have taken the liberty of quoting them throughout the text of this chapter. I have also had helpful discussions with Dr Simon Kleinig of Burnside, South Australia, who is at present completing a history of the Frenchman’s Cap region. See his article ‘Journeys to the Ivory Tower’ in Wild magazine, Winter 2000, pp. 28–32.
I have largely followed Dan Sprod’s reconstruction of the route taken by the Pearce party in Sprod, pp. 61–81. For the exploration of the area see S. M. Franks, ‘The First Track to the West Coast’, THRA Journal, 6/3 (December 1957), pp. 65–9.
However, here I must again mention Chris Binks’s excellent Explorers of Western Tasmania. The book reflects Binks’s intimate knowledge of the area, both geographical and historical. He apparently offers a third alternative route for the escapees. It is my understanding from some private correspondence shared with me that he thinks that, despite their toughness, the Pearce party would not have been able to cross such a succession of ranges, gorges, rivers and forests and still survive. His view apparently is that the ‘grain’ of the country would have deflected them northward right from the start. He sees them crossing the Darwin Range and going north up the King River valley and then heading north of Frenchman’s Cap following the natural breaks in the mountains to Wombat Glen. This means that the escape party pretty much followed the course taken by the present-day Lyell Highway from just east of present-day Queenstown to the King William Saddle. If this accurately reflects Binks’s view it is an interesting conjecture made by someone who knows the country intimately. This may also fit in with the convict remains found by Calder at Wombat Glen. However, in my view, this admittedly much easier route does not really fit in with the Knopwood and Cuthbertson narratives.
For the quotation from Sharland concerning his finding human remains on the Loddon Plains, see his ‘Rough Notes of a Journal of Expedition to the Westward (from Bothwell to Frenchman’s Cap)’, 1832. Legislative Council Journals, 1861, Paper No. 16. For Calder’s discovery of convict remains at Wombat Glen see his ‘Some account of the country lying between Lake St Clair and Macquarie Harbour’ in the Tasmanian Journal of Natural Science, 3/6 (1849), pp. 417–29.
For the Aborigine fire regimen see W. D. Jackson, ‘The Tasmanian Legacy of Man and Fire’ in PPRST, 133/1 (1999), pp. 1–14, and Jon B. Marsden-Smedley, ‘Changes in Southwestern Tasmanian Fire Regimens Since the Early 1800s’, PPRST 132 (1998), pp. 15–29.
For Australian snakes see H. G. Cogger, Reptiles and Amphibians of Australia, Sydney: Reed Books, 1992. See also Gerry Swan, A Photographic Guide to Snakes and Other Reptiles of Australia, Sydney: New Holland, 1995, and Mark Hutchinson, Roy Swain and Michael Driessen, Snakes and Lizards of Tasmania, Hobart: Fauna of Tasmania Committee, 2001.
For the Tasmanian Aborigines at the time of white settlement see Lyndall Ryan’s The Aboriginal Tasmanians, especially pp. 83–100.
Sprod (pp. 68–81) deals in great detail with the possibilities suggested in the Pearce narratives, especially Knopwood and Cuthbertson, concerning the area in which Pearce finally emerged from the bush near the settled districts. The Irishman says several times that his destination was ‘Table Mountain’ which Sprod has identified with a 1095-metre (3560-foot) hill which is still called Table Mountain, situated immediately south of Lake Crescent and to the north-west of the present-day town of Oatlands. Pearce got to know this area when he worked briefly as a shepherd for William Scattergood of New Norfolk, and during the time he was free in the bush after having absconded in early 1821.Table Mountain, significantly, is almost exactly due east of Macquarie Harbour. But Table Mountain proved peculiarly elusive, largely because it was much further east than Pearce seems to have remembered.
After he had killed Greenhill he ‘proceeded for several days’ and then came upon the ducks. I have placed this scene in the area to the north of Brady’s Sugarloaf. Around about this time also he climbed a high hill which he incorrectly took to be Table Mountain and which was most likely to be Brady’s Sugarloaf. At 1023 metres (3356 feet) it is almost the same height as Table Mountain. All of this presupposes that Pearce and the others had continued along a generally westward trajectory from the King William Saddle, down into the now flooded King William Valley to the south of Lake St Clair, and on over the Wentworth Hills. In this scenario,Travis was probably bitten by the
snake somewhere in the King William Valley, and Greenhill was killed somewhere near the Wentworth Hills. Pearce then proceeded onward in an easterly direction until he met his shepherd mate around the confluence of the Ouse and Shannon rivers about 24 kilometres (15 miles) north of the present-day town of Ouse.
There is another possibility that Pearce did not come this way at all, but had followed a more southerly route along the course of the Derwent River. According to this theory Greenhill, Travis and Pearce struck the Derwent after they had crossed over the King William Range and followed the river all the way down to just south of Ouse where the encounter with the shepherd occurs.
The problem is, as Sprod points out, the narratives are so vague that we are uncertain as to the exact route that they took after crossing the King William Range. Virtually nothing in this landscape was named in 1822–23. Certainly,Thomas Scott’s chart of 1824 shows no detail for this frontier area except for the general course of the rivers. Even the February 1832 map in James Bischoff’s Sketch of the History of Van Diemen’s Land and an account of the Van Diemen’s Land Company also gives virtually no detail on the area west of the Ouse River.
In the text I have not tried to reconstruct the details of Pearce’s activities while he was free. Sprod has examined the narratives and all of the possibilities in detail.
5 The Sudden Death of a Shropshire Lad
For a contemporary discussion of homosexuality among the convicts see Thomas Cook’s book The Exile’s Lamentations edited by A. G. L. Shaw, North Sydney: Library of Australian History, published in 1978 from a manuscript in the Mitchell Library.
There is a discrepancy in the dates of the escape of Pearce and Cox from Kelly’s Basin. Barnes told the Molesworth Committee that they escaped on 16 November 1823 and that Pearce surrendered on 21 November. However, at the Supreme Court trial the escape date is given as 13 November and the surrender is dated 22 November. I have followed the dates given at the trial for they are much closer to the event.