Transcript of Module 33 – Convict Life

Between 1788 and 1868, around 162,000 convicts were transported (1) from Britain to different penal colonies (2) in Australia. The majority of these convicts were transported for petty crimes (3) often for the theft of trivial items (4) such as a handkerchief or some feathers or some cheese. Imagine getting seven years of hard labour (5) for that.

Most convicts were men, even though one in seven were women, and there were also children as young as nine, and the elderly (6) as old as 82, who were sentenced (7) to transportation (8) to Australia.

The trip Down Under (9)

In the early days of transportation, conditions on board the convict ships were horrendously poor and many died during the four to six-month journey on the way Down Under. Many convicts were already disease-ridden (10) before they were brought aboard rat-infested ships (11) in iron chains, led below deck, and locked away in filthy (12) and cramped conditions (13) with little to no fresh air or light for the entirety of their journey.

Many of these convicts died of diseases like typhoid (14) and cholera (15) in these abhorrent conditions (16) onboard these ships. For those lucky enough to survive the trip alive, they were often severely weakened by scurvy (17), dysentery, and fever.

As the years rolled on (18), conditions began to slowly improve, and surprisingly few convicts died on the voyage towards the end of the 80-year convict transportation period.

Arrival in Australia

On their arrival Down Under to a prison the size of a continent that most would never leave, convicts were brought ashore and marched to a location such as the Government Lumber Yard where they were stripped, washed, and inspected with officers taking their vital statistics for record. Things like age and height.

If a given convict had a skill, for instance, being a carpenter (19), a cobbler (20), a blacksmith (21), a stonemason (22), they could be retained (23) and employed on government work programs. Otherwise, and most commonly, they were assigned to hard labour or given over as workers to property owners, merchants, or farmers, many of whom happened to be ex-convicts themselves.

Daily life and doing hard labour

Convicts assigned to hard labour, in places such as Hyde Park Barracks in Sydney, slept in hammocks (24) that were tightly packed into small rooms. Each morning convicts were awoken by a bell that tolled (25) at sunrise in the courtyard telling men that it was time to get out of bed and head downstairs for brekky (26), most often a form of porridge (27) that might be your only meal for the day.

The second time the bell rang meant it was time to line up in the yard to be inspected by the superintendent (28), who checked everyone was present and that they hadn't stolen anything. You know, these pesky convicts. And this all occurred before beginning a day's hard labour.

There was a vast amount of work that could be done in the rapidly growing penal colonies dotted (29) across the Australian coastline, and convicts could find themselves making bricks, building walls, roads, or buildings, carving stones or smashing stones, cutting down trees and working with the timber, making buckets, water barrels, or cartwheels.

If you were a female convict, you might find yourself working as a domestic servant for an officer in the colony. Or if you are less fortunate, you might find yourself in the Female Factory making rope, spinning (30), or carding wool (31), or maybe the less difficult work of laundry or needlework (32).

Punishment

Needless to say, convict discipline was brutal. Where if you mucked up (33) or misbehaved, you were likely to find yourself lashed to a flogging triangle (34), a wooden tripod that would hold you up when you were too weak to stand, and you were given a flogging with a cat of nine tails whip (35).

The minimum punishment was 25 lashes, which convicts affectionately nicknamed 'the tickler' (36), right? 'Cause it only 'tickled'. I don't reckon. However, the more severe punishments could see you receiving as many as 300 lashes.

Another punishment was called 'the treadmill' (37), which was a wooden hut under which a rotating cylinder of wooden planks was housed. As many as 16 men could be forced to climb upwards on this device, similar to a giant wheel made of steps, in order to turn grinding stones (38) that ground the flour to be made into porridge or bread, the food that they might eat the next day.

From convict to free citizen

Convicts were freed and given a certificate of freedom (39) at the end of their sentences, which often ranged between seven and fourteen years in length. However, convicts were able to reduce their sentences if they worked hard and stayed out of trouble.

So, if you'd put in the hard yakka (40) and you'd kept your nose clean (41), you might receive a ticket-of-leave (42) or even a pardon (43) generally after serving two-thirds of your sentence.

Ticket-of-leave holders could work for themselves and even acquire property on the condition that they lived within a specified area and reported regularly to a magistrate (44). Failure to do so or any misbehaviour could see the ticket-of-leave confiscated (45).

And there were two types of pardons. A conditional pardon (46), which was granted by the Governor on the condition that you stayed within the colony, and an absolute pardon (47), that gave a convict unconditional freedom to travel wherever he or she desired in the world.

Returning to Britain

For the majority of convicts, once they had been set free or earned their freedom, Australia was now home and they would never return to Britain. Returning to Britain was prohibitively expensive for most. And after so many years cultivating (48) and becoming accustomed to a new way of life in a foreign land, which had many more opportunities now than Britain, there was little incentive (49) even for those with the means of returning to Britain.