1791 11 Feb. Shoes and shirts. The situation deplorable. by the wreck of the Sirius. And as it has been reported to the troops here by some of their comrades at Port Jackson that your Excellency have been pleased to order a pair of shoes and a blanket to be issued to each of them, they have to request that your Excellency will think them no less deserving of favour; and I can assure your Excellency that no troops, perhaps, ever stood so much No bedding. in need or felt the want of covering; there is not a bed or blanket among them that is fit to preserve the powers which sustain life from being congealed by any degree of cold which they may hereafter be obliged to encounter. I must here beg leave to assure your Excellency that, had there been a sufficient quantity of shoes sent here for the convicts as would admit the issuing of a pair per man to the troops, I would certainly have taken it upon myself to do it; and if shoes, shirts, and other necessaries could have been purchased for them, I should not have given your Excellency the trouble of this application, for I should have ordered them to have been purchased and have drawn on the Admiralty for the amount. I have therefore to request that by the return of the Supply your Excellency will please to direct such things to be supplied the troops serving here as can be spared from the public stores at Sydney, and which, from their present deplorable situation, I hope your Excellency will think renders it essentially necessary to be done. And as the two companies here under my command have been also informed that since the return of the Supply from Batavia the other two companies under the command of Captain Campbell, together with the new troops serving in New South Wales, have been served spirits, and that they still expect to have it while it lasts, they conceive that the small proportion sent to Norfolk can by no means be adequate to their share for such a length of time as the troops at Sydney have been supplied, notwithstanding there has not been a drop of spirits issued at Norfolk since the 29th of last May. I have therefore to hope that your Excellency, having been made acquainted with the circumstances of their case, will please to order an equal proportion for them, to be sent at such time as may appear to you convenient; for, Discontent. indeed, their distress at present has occasioned more discontent and murmuring among them than ever were observed in their greatest apprehensions of famine. They say they know not how they have been less deserving of favour, or why they should not share in every necessary of life with their comrades at Port Jackson, and that the duties they have had to perform were no less severe than theirs, which is all very true and just; and upon my word I cannot see any impropriety in their claim to an equal share of the necessaries of life with their comrades, as well as an equal share of service. The troops are also in great want of cooking utensils; there are but a few small pots among them all, which had been saved from the wreck of the Sirius, which are by No spirits. Dearth of cooking utensils. no means sufficient for such a number, as there is not a pot to every twelve men, which must make it very inconvenient for them to wait for one another in the use of the pots. It is nearly night before some of them can have cooked their dinners. Therefore I hope you will see the necessity of sending such utensils as can be spared from the stores at Sydney. 1791 11 Feb. Gorgon. Agreeable to your Excellency's orders with respect to having a proper number of spars in readiness to be put on board his Majesty's ship Gorgon on her arrival here, I have to acquaint you Spars for the that Captn. Hunter, being the best judge of what spars were necessary to be sent, has taken care to give his carpenters the proper directions on that head, and they are now in readiness laying on the beach, in order to be put on board such vessel as may be sent for them; and, of course, he will give such information as you may think necessary on that head. Prior to the arrival of Moses Tucker, the carpenters of the Sirius built us a very good coble, under the inspection of Cap- Boats. tain Hunter; since then Tucker has built two very good cobles, altho' one of them is not yet quite finished; but I hope it will be prior to his embarkation on board the Supply, according to your Excellency's directions. And here I beg leave to assure your Excellency that since his arrival here Tucker's behaviour has been such as to merit some mitigation in the punishment which he has deserved by behaving in the manner that he had done, for which I beg leave to refer you to Captain Hunter on that head. The superintendant which your Excellency has sent here as being acquainted with the management of the flax I have kept constantly employed on that manufacture, with such a number of the male and female convicts as he thought necessary, and every other assistance which could possibly be procured or made in the Manufacture settlement. He has so far succeeded as to have wove two pieces of it into a coarse cloth, which shall be sent your Excellency as samples; and as I do not understand myself anything of that manufacture, I shall refer you to his opinion on that head. of flax. c'oth Since writing the above, I understand that Mr. Hume has taken the liberty of giving a piece of the cloth away, which probably A sample of will make its appearance at Port Jackson; but had I known his given away. intentions, I would have prevented any such thing to have been done, as I did not wish that any samples should have been committed to the hands of any person until it had been sent for your Excellency's inspection. I have collected some of the flax seed, which is in excellent preservation, and have put it up in an eighteen-gallon keg, addressed to your Excellency, and some of which had been scat- Seeds and tered about the yard here promiscuously has immediately grown flax-plant. up. I have some time ago transplanted several of the roots, roots of the 1791 11 Feb. Land cleared. Early sowing. Wheat and maize. Vines. Bananas. Tropical plants. which I had taken from the seaside, into the interior parts of the country, and I find they thrive as well as in their natural soil and situation. I have likewise to acquaint your Excellency that since my arrival on the island there has been one hundred and fifteen acres of land properly cleared, exclusive of what is in the possession of the convicts, in addition to what I had found clear here on my arrival. And as I have every reason to suppose that the great destruction which happened to our crops of grain would have been prevented could it have been sown and planted at a much earlier period, I have therefore taken care to direct that the wheat shall be sown from the latter end of April to the beginning of June, and maize from the beginning of May to the latter end of August. Agreeable to your directions I have ordered that twenty-five acres of land shall be appropriated for wheat and the rest for maize. I shall likewise, if I am here at the proper season, furnish the convicts, both male and female, with a sufficiency of maize to crop their grounds, which I expect at that time will amount to one acre p'r head with a very few exceptions. The grape vines which came from Sydney last August were immediately planted, and which, together with some cuttings that I had planted just before then, amounts now to between seven and eight hundred, which are all in high perfection, and two or three of the oldest are now bearing. Since my having ordered the bananas to be thinned by transplanting a very great number of them, many are now fruited, and I have great satisfaction in declaring that some of the fruit is not inferior to any that I have met with in any other part of the world. Straberries do not thrive here, but sugar-cane grows in the greatest luxuriency, and likewise the castor-nut, indigo, and orange and lemon trees, altho' I have reason to believe that the latter want either grafting or innoculation, as neither of them shew any blossoms. From my not having a sufficient authority for the more effectually putting a stop to the most shameful, wicked, and abominable Plundering. practice of marauding and plundering among the most abandoned of the convicts, who, whenever they had thought proper, left the public works and took to the woods in order to make a descent by night upon the houses and gardens of private individuals as well as the public grounds, whereby many of them have supported themselves for several months independent of the store, and living Insufficient in defiance of such laws as with which we have been invested for punish. their restraint, well knowing that when appre hended and taken, let their offences be ever so capital, that confinement with corporal punishment was all we were authorised to inflict. power to 1791 11 Feb. There are now, and have been for some months past, in confinement for capital offences five convicts, most notorious offenders, every one of whom is as great a villain as ever graced a Gross gibbet, exclusive of the two men which set fire to the Sirius. offenders. Captain Hunter not having thought proper to direct a prosecution to be carried on against them, and as I had reported them to your Excellency, I did not find myself at liberty to release them from their confinement until I had received your commands how they were to be disposed of, and the very crowded state in which the Supply is in at present renders it necessary still to keep them here. man. Your Excellency I hope will pardon the liberty 1 have again. taken in mentioning how much we owe Arscot, the carpenter, for A valuable the preservation of our lives, as there can be no manner of doubt but for his great and unparalled exertions the Sirius with all her provisions would have been burned; but of this Captain Hunter will give you further information. martial. The martial law which was proclaimed on the Sirius being wrecked continued in force only until the begining of last August, when we received the supply of provisions from Sydney, during which time there was only one general court-martial took place Courtfor the trial of the convicts, whose sentences were only corporal punishment; and which court-martial, together with such other circumstances as have occurred on that occasion, I hope to have the honour of soon laying before your Excellency, as you have been pleased to inform me that I may soon expect a relief to arrive here. court The situation of this settlement at present is such that unless some criminal court or martial law is established, it will scarcely Criminal be possible to prevent constant robberies, as well as all other required. capital offences; and I should hope your Excellency will see it in the same point of view as in which it appears to me; and should you think fit to order the law martial to be proclaimed here, that you will please at the same time to order a sufficient number of military officers, together with those already here, which you may judge adequate for the composing a tribunal, with full powers to try and determine all such offences as may be brought before them. Could I have found any fresh water on Phillip Island, which I Phillip examined for that purpose, I should have been able to have kept those villains in good order, by sending the most notorious of them (for any fresh offences which they may be guilty of) to that island. And as I have been disappointed in that hope, I expect I shall find myself necessitated to send those notorious offenders, as well as all such others who may hereafter deserve it, Banishment to Nepean Island*, first taking care to send as much water as will Island." * An islet, near Sydney Bay, lying between the south part of Norfolk Island and Phillip Island. Island. to Nepean 1791 11 Feb. last them two months, and once a week, when the weather will admit, taking care to keep up the stock. I did hope that the mode I had taken with the people in confinement would have given a much greater check to villainy than I am afraid it has done, which is that of having ordered the comDeprivation missary not to issue them more provisions of any species than what the surgeon thought absolutely necessary to sustain life, and by which you will see what has been saved in store. of food. An absconder. Since the arrival of the supplies which were sent us last August, Thomas Stretch, a convict who prefered an idle and abandoned life in the woods to moderate labour and a full ration, did soon after that time abscond into the woods; and as he has not been seen nor heard of for these four months past, there can be no doubt of his being dead; and about a fortnight ago, John Robins, convict, was drowned, having been washed off the rocks near Ball's Bay, where he had been fishing; and since my arrival here the following is a state of the births and deaths, viz.:Births and Births, fifteen; deaths, twelve. Of the latter, killed by the fall of a tree, one; drowned, eight; died a natural death, three. deaths. Returns. An industrious convict. You will likewise herewith receive the deputy-commissary's return of the expenditure of stores and provisions, together with an account of what he and myself think is necessary to be sent and most wanted on this island, agreeable to your Excellency's order, by the Supply.* I have likewise to inform your Excellency that Richard Philamore, convict, having prior to my arrival here entered into terms with Mr. King, by which he had agreed to become independent of the store at the expiration of one year from such agreement, which period having been elaps'd three weeks ago, and he having reported to me the same, I have agreed to his working for himself untill your Excellency shall please to give directions whether he may be permitted to settle on such terms as Government has held out. He has not only undertaken to maintain himself now independent of the state for provisions, but he has also undertaken to maintain a man and woman which I have given him to assist in clearing more land for him on the above terms; but as he is not yet in possession of a sufficient stock of swine to provide him and the two people with animal food, I have directed the deputy-commissary to assist him with half a ration of salt provisions for himself and two people until he has a greater increase of swine, and for which the Commissary is to stop out of his corn which is now in the public granary as much as may be judged equivalent to the value of the provision which he draws. And I am of opinion that the man will do very well, A deserving as he is a very deserving painstaking person. I wish I could say man. as much for Mr. Smith, for, notwithstanding every encouragement that has been given him by Mr. King, as well as by me *Not recorded. |
