Bound to Sarah

by Craig Brennan

  Pat and Joe knew nothing of their arrival until the following day, when they spotted each other at morning muster. John was desperate for a shave; as such privileges as shaving had stopped on leaving Hobart town. It had taken eighteen days to reach Sarah Island and now he was only permitted to shave on Sundays. After their greeting came a serious warning about the harshness of their new home, and in particular, about Silas, who always targeted newcomers and they would be forced to spend their first week with him in the sawpits.

  With shoulders hunched and teeth chattering through foggy breath, their cold hands took shelter in the sleeves of their shirts, like turtles in their shells. They stood thus while the weak dawning sun appeared over the horizon. Many of the convicts would wake up on those winter mornings with their wet clothes from the day before frozen stiff by the night frost, but they would still be forced to wear them, letting them thaw out on their bodies. In those months a dry convict was a very rare thing, and rheumatism was rife.

  Sure enough, before the week was out, John was sporting a black eye and Charlie was nursing bruised ribs. John was disgusted that there was no way to make a complaint. There were convict overseers, or constables, who were good conduct prisoners. They were entrusted to keep order over their fellow convicts and prevent bullying and intimidation, but they had little power, simply because they were housed in the same cells as their subordinates. The reality of it was that when trouble broke out, a single constable was powerless to step in and stop it. If he was unwise enough to attempt it, the violence could, and often did, turn on him and life could be made very uncomfortable through constant taunts such as ‘traitor’, ‘do gooder’, or ‘betrayer’. Life was hard enough without having to contend with all that, but if he did not try and stop the trouble, he could face the lash from the military guard, for failing in his duty. They were stuck in the middle, and either way, the constable overseers could not win, so nobody wanted to do the job for just a few extra rations at mealtimes. The ideal men for the job would have been the tougher villains, like Wilson, but there was no chance of him complying with the law.

  The months rolled by, until one dismal day Pat spontaneously decided to make a break for it. He needed to know what was out there and whether it was possible to escape, but he would soon regret his curiosity. He disappeared into the woods, leaving Joe behind, and there he managed to crush his ankle fetters into an oval shape, in order to slip out of the chains. He frantically searched for a way through the woods, pushing himself through brambles and tangled undergrowth, getting cut and grazed in the process. He quickly discovered that that part of the forest was impenetrable and all hope faded fast. At least he knew now not to choose that way again. He had been gone for four hours and when he hurried back to the shoreline he found the boat had already left and he was forced to stay there overnight in the freezing cold. The next day Pat gave himself up as soon as the boats arrived. Hungry and cold, he was ordered to work for the day without food or drink, as provisions were not allowed to be taken from the island, then he would go back to face his punishment.

  On arrival at the island he was taken straight to the commandant’s office and then to the triangle to receive fifty lashes, administered by Sergeant Turnbull. The injuries inflicted were so severe that he had to spend two weeks in the hospital quarters. At first, Charlie and John lacked sympathy for Pat, angry that he had attempted to bolt, leaving Joe behind, but he was quickly forgiven when they saw the price he had had to pay. Pat had not intended to be selfish, he had merely let desperation and curiosity get the better of him – another tough lesson.

  The very name Sarah used to make him feel warm and safe, but now it had taken on a new meaning, of heartbreak, torment and torture. The little island that sat in the waters of Macquarie Harbour was blackening his mind and he sighed bitterly as he surveyed his scrawny, undernourished body; Sarah and Sam might not even recognise him if they were to see him now. He had shed half his body weight and his sunken eyes were circled with dark rings. His skin was blotchy and aging, his hair came out in clumps and his eyes were jaded.

  Charlie was suffering quite badly, his frail frame unsuited to hard labour, the chains and shackles impeding him still further. He received two dozen lashes, in an effort to perk him up a bit, but they only served to increase his bitterness. John, on the other hand, worked on through blistered fingers, splintered shoulders, biting ankle shackles and aching limbs. Like all the other prisoners on the island, he learned to exist in a life without hope, taking each day as it came. At last, the soothing summer sun returned, by which time Pat, Joe, John and Charlie were well worn in, their skin now calloused and weather worn and as thick as leather. Hard skin had developed on the most tormented parts of their bodies, particularly the hands and shoulders; the body’s natural way of protecting itself from the wear and tear of daily toil.

  The warmer weather had the convicts on the mainland working topless, revealing their stringy muscles and not an ounce of fat between them. The four were still classed as newcomers in the eyes of their fellow convicts, because they did not yet bear the marks of the crocodile. On the backs of many of their fellow inmates were the scars of repeated lashings, only really revealed in the warmer weather, like the pattern of a crocodile’s skin. Great stringy lumps of ugly scar tissue, sickening to look at, had formed after numerous disciplines of the lash. Pat was already halfway there, having been flogged the most out of the four. John was the only one not to have felt the Cat and he intended to keep it that way. For Joe, the thought of going through that again terrified him. Noticing the shocked look on Charlie’s face on seeing the scars on his back, the convict said.

  ‘Take a good look, lad, ‘cos ye’ll not leave this place wi’out takin’ these with ye.’

  The convict, Paddy Allen, was in his forties, and from Ireland. He had been sentenced to Botany Bay in New South Wales, and later transferred to Sarah for a secondary offence. His only crime in the first place was ‘Loitering with intent’ whatever that meant; he had always insisted that he was just waiting for his wife. Such was his bitterness at being transported, that he went out of his way to be awkward, though, of course, he only made life worse for himself. He was thrown on to Grummet Rock, endlessly flogged, and had his rations halved, but still he refused to bend. He simply became immune to suffering, and during his ten years’ of toil in irons, he had received over one thousand lashes. By the time he was released, after fourteen years, he had received one thousand five hundred lashes.

  The monotonous hardship of life on the island increased with the years and Pat, along with many others, had completely given in to despair. All hope of seeing Sarah and Sam again, and being a family, had long since diminished. Pat had made more futile attempts to break through the impenetrable terrain and again he had been tied to the triangle to receive fifty merciless lashes from Sergeant Turnbull. Since the last attempt, he had become a broken man and spent months in a depressed state, never making conversation, or showing any interest in anything. He did not even rise to Silas’s provocations, and simply took the torrents of abuse, both physical and mental.

  Pat only began to revive after months of this despair. He had hit the bottom, so he could not go any lower unless he killed himself and he made a conscious decision not to do so, probably because he still retained a tiny glimmer of hope that he would one day be reunited with Sarah and Sam. As his despair lifted, his bitterness at the island’s authority increased and started leading him into more trouble and more floggings. He had an argument with Sergeant Turnbull after he threatened Joe with a flogging. Joe was an easy target and Turnbull had discovered some time ago that he could pretty much push him to the limits if he threatened him with the lash, and got great gratification out of doing it. So Pat made a comment and the comment turned to an argument, which inevitably resulted in punishment.

  His verbal attack on Turnbull was the most anyone had heard him utter for months, but his tirade was cut short when he was dragged to the commandant’s office. There he was give
n the option of yet another flogging, or thirty days on Grummet Rock. He chose the latter, much to the disappointment of Turnbull. Thirty days of solitary was preferable any day to another fifty scars on his back, so off to the island he went, to be tormented by absolute solitude, locked away with his own thoughts.

  CHAPTER 11

  THE FEMALE FACTORY

  At the foot of Mount Wellington, the tranquil valley of the Cascades was a far cry from the busy fast growing fishing town of Hobart. At the foot of the valley lay a morass, and through the morass ran the trickling waters of a little creek. Alongside the creek there was a disruption in the picturesque scenery – an ugly blot on the landscape – the miserable damp rotting walls of the old TY Lowes distillery, now transformed by the government into the Female Factory. Behind those dismal walls were kept the detestables of the female convicts, who wasted away endless dreary days amongst the numerous buildings and courtyards, with nothing to occupy their restless minds, ignorant of the surrounding beauty, because the walls that fenced them in were about twelve feet high.

  It was here that many of the women would bear witness to the most terrible pain and suffering of the human soul, until, in time, even the tenderest heart would find itself turning to stone. Fighting, bullying and bitching were a daily occurrence, mainly due to the overcrowding, which gave the most incorrigible characters an opportunity to form little packs, in order to terrorise their fellow inmates. The majority of the inmates were quiet and orderly but even they had their moments, when they were pushed too far. There was little to do once they had finished work, so most of their days were spent idling, or trying to provoke trouble to ease their boredom. Their diet was also very inadequate, which left many looking scabby and pale. Then there were the maternity quarters, where the high infant mortality rate was of great concern. A baby trying to feed on its mother’s deflated breast was lucky to get anything out of it, not to mention goodness. Sometimes death was due to neglect, but often to simple malnutrition. In addition, those assigned to work in the nursery section would often steal the children’s food, as they were half starved themselves. The high death rate was reflected in the sheer number of infant graves that were scattered around the cemeteries of Hobart.

  These women were regarded as society’s vermin, forgotten souls thrown into confinement in the hope that they would disappear. The matron and the governor of the prison were also in a dreadful situation; though sometimes harsh and cruel, they did their utmost to secure funding to try and improve conditions. They tried to bring work to the factory to keep the convicts occupied, but most of the time their efforts were wasted, due to a general lack of interest and government finance, yet prisoner numbers were fast increasing. The current governor of Van Dieman’s land, George Arthur, was under considerable pressure to keep convict expenditure down to an absolute minimum, and he did just that.

  Sarah had arrived at this desolate place by horse and cart, along with five other female convicts, all were given coarse flannel convict dress, with the letter C in yellow covering the back of the dress and embroidered on the sleeves. But this was not the lowest rank of the prison and out of the six, only Sarah was going to the lowest. She had to suffer the humiliation of having her head shaved, and was then forced to wear an iron collar, as a sign of her lowly status. Sarah fought like a wild cat to stop them shaving her head, but she was eventually pinned down by three of the higher ranking women. She had scratches on her arms, face and neck and was bleeding from the mouth, where she had received a hard slap from the matron whilst pinned to her chair. Then the matron took a pair of scissors and started hacking away at her beautiful long locks. At that moment she had lost all her fight and sat silent and still while droplets of capitulation fell on cheeks and rolled down her face.

  ‘That’s enough now, girls,’ said the matron to the mocking wenches that still roughly pinned Sarah down. ‘Let her alone, I don’t think she will go anywhere now.’

  The three woman backed away, still ready to pounce should she dare move, but she just sat with her head down weeping inconsolably, as they sniggered – a pitiful sight, but one to which the matron was hardened.

  ‘Quiet now, girls! Enough is enough,’ she snapped. She was a firm believer in discipline, but even she knew how far to push the limits. Finally she took a razor and some soap and went to work on shaving Sarah’s head, while she sobbed silently. ‘You can grow it back when you start behaving yourself,’ said the matron, as she wiped Sarah’s now completely bald head dry.

  The three girls were ordered to leave the room, followed by the matron, and Sarah was left alone on her chair for a few moments. She could not bear the shame of having no hair, and her impulse was to run away to find Pat and throw herself into his protective arms. But she could not, and nor could she deal with this situation she was now in. She was fast becoming afraid of what was in store for her in this dull grey world that imprisoned her.

  She soon found that she could not bear the solitude of such a depressing place and was grateful when the matron reappeared with Jane Alsop, a slightly older woman from the higher rank, who was wearing her own clothes, and showed a little more compassion than the others. She was to take Sarah round to her bed space, which was just that – a space on the floor in the corner of a large damp room, which slept about fifteen women. The room was completely bare, with no space for any personal belongings – just a stone floor and four walls – the place where Sarah would go at the end of the day, along with fourteen or so other girls, to fight it out for sleeping space. Newcomers always got thrown into the far corner, then when they got used to things they would have to find their own way.

  Sarah was then shown the menial duties she would have to perform, which included cleaning out the privies and washing the blood-stained muslin rags that were used for their monthly periods and the nappy rags from the maternity quarters. This was all apart from the usual chores, such as scrubbing floors and general cleaning duties. On that first night, amidst the constant bitching and arguing, she went almost unnoticed and curled up into a ball of self- pity and cried herself to sleep.

  The days dragged on and Sarah kept herself to herself and got on with whatever she had to do. There were no friends to be made in the lower ranks. You were on your own, and life was hard, but Sarah knew she had to endure it in order to move on. She felt that she was no longer living, merely existing in that living hell. She heeded Jane Alsop’s good advice when she said.

  ‘If anyone shouts ye down, girl, ignore ‘em, no matter ‘ow much it ‘urts ye, or ye’ll not move on from ‘ere and ye’ll go mad wi’ it. Matron’ll not give ye a chance for ye ‘air to grow back neither. She’ll keep shavin’ it an’ shavin’ it. Mark my words, I’ve been ‘ere long enough.’

  Margaret Lappin and her little bunch were ones to avoid, Sarah had been forewarned. Sly she was, and careful not to get caught out by the matron. She belonged to the merit class, and like so many others had never suffered the indignity of being in the lower class, as she had never been caught. A lot of the women came in straight to the merit class, unless they had committed a serious offence, though most were just sent back to the Female Factory, because their duties had finished, or their masters had tired of them.

  It had been a month since Sarah’s arrival at the factory and though life was cheerless and bleak, she was gradually hardening herself to it. She was very happy that her hair had started to grow back, often running the palm of her hand over her head to feel the stubby bristles with an excited little smile. It was the only comfort to be had.

  There was a new arrival to swell the ranks of the unfortunate. Her name was Annie Goodwin, twenty years of age and heavily pregnant. She had a pretty look about her, even when her golden hair had been shaved. Annie would become Sarah’s first worthwhile friend since arriving. For the first few weeks they would work together and Sarah passed on the same advice that Jane Alsop had given her. Annie took it all in, but she was becoming very distressed about bearing a child in such awful conditions. But t
here was something else troubling Annie and one afternoon when she and Sarah had finished their work, they went out into the courtyard to bask in the warmth of the sun. Annie proceeded to tell Sarah how she had been transported from Bristol for petty theft and had fallen in love with an officer whom she went to work for, and it was his child she was bearing. Once he had found out that she was with child, he had sent her back to the house of correction and from there she was transferred to the Female Factory.

  It was becoming such a common story in there; the abuses of the military officers, picking up and dropping vulnerable girls whenever they chose. It was all so painful for Sarah to hear, especially when she found out the officer’s name – Lieutenant Gerard Flynn. She held her tongue, while Annie confessed that she still had feelings for Flynn, even after he had thrown her out. Sarah chose not to reveal her own experiences at Flynn’s hands, and instead simply comforted her in her hour of need. How many lives was this man going to ruin, for the sake of his own selfish pleasure?

  Their afternoon of relaxation and friendship was rudely interrupted when six girls from the merit class appeared on the scene. They had got a name for themselves by going around bullying and harassing their fellow inmates. The ‘Flash Mob’, as they called themselves, ruled by intimidation. The matron was kept unaware of it, because if anyone dared tell her, life really would not be worth living.

  ‘Oi! You! Ye baldy slag! Shift yeself, we’re sittin’ ‘ere,’ blurted out the front woman of the gang, in an attempt to intimidate Annie.