Our Penal Colony Beginnings

[Bob Crowley]

I must have been in a morbid mood, but for some reason I looked up the record for hangings in Australia. There's been a lot of them. I might have been thinking about Ned Kelly or whatever.

In contrast to the American experience where Christian Pilgrim Fathers were the first British settlers, the Australian experience was of a convict fleet ("First Flee") which landed at Sydney Cove.

They landed on the 26th January, 1788, now known as Australia Day, which has attracted controversy in recent years amongst indigenous people.

What intrigued me though was that in less than two years, by November 1789, there had been 13 hangings in Sydney Cove alone, six of them British Marines. The first hanging was about five weeks after they put foot on shore. It didn't take long for the gallows to be built.

Those were the days of the British Penal Laws.

You could say the official church, the Anglican Church, did not imbue the locals with the same sort of spiritual enthusiasm that the US Pilgrim Fathers might have experienced.

The Pilgrim Fathers and the First Fleet represent two very different origins for two nations.

List of people legally executed in Australia - Wikipedia

Sydney Cove[edit]

• Thomas Barrett – 27 February 1788 – Barrett was publicly hanged at Sydney Cove for stealing or conspiring to steal from government stores. He was the first person hanged in the colony of New South Wales.
• John Bennett – 2 May 1788 – A 20-year-old convict who was publicly hanged at Sydney Cove for theft.
• Samuel Payton – 28 June 1788 – Hanged at Sydney Cove for stealing shirts, stockings and combs. He was a 20-year-old convict and stonemason.[11]
• Edward Corbett – 28 June 1788 – Hanged at Sydney Cove for the theft of four cows.[11]
• James Daly – December 1788 – Hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of a handkerchief from a fellow convict using force and arms.
• James Baker – 27 March 1789 – One of six Marines hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of government stores.
• James Brown – 27 March 1789 – One of six Marines hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of government stores.
• Richard Lukes – 27 March 1789 – One of six Marines hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of government stores.
• Thomas Jones – 27 March 1789 – One of six Marines hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of government stores.
• Luke Haines/Haynes – 27 March 1789 – One of six Marines hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of government stores.
• Richard Askew/Asky – 27 March 1789 – One of six Marines hanged at Sydney Cove for theft of government stores.
• Ann/Anne Davis (alias Judith Jones) – 23 November 1789 – The first woman hanged in Australia. A First Fleet convict, she was found guilty of theft from a fellow convict at Sydney Cove. She claimed to be pregnant to avoid the noose and some old women were instructed to inspect her. One of the women told the court, "Gentlemen, she is as much with child as I am."[12]

 

[Tanj]

You could say the official church, the Anglican Church, did not imbue the locals with the same sort of spiritual enthusiasm that the US Pilgrim Fathers might have experienced.

Well I guess you could say that. On the other hand....

Salem witch trials - Wikipedia
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than two hundred people were accused. Thirty were found guilty, nineteen of whom were executed by hanging (fourteen women and five men). One other man, Giles Corey, was pressed to death for refusing to plead, and at least five people died in jail.

That's just Massachusetts, in one year.

The question remains which is worse, being hanged for theft or being hanged for being a witch.

 

[disciple Clint]

Well I guess you could say that. On the other hand....

Salem witch trials - Wikipedia
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than two hundred people were accused. Thirty were found guilty, nineteen of whom were executed by hanging (fourteen women and five men). One other man, Giles Corey, was pressed to death for refusing to plead, and at least five people died in jail.

That's just Massachusetts, in one year.

The question remains which is worse, being hanged for theft or being hanged for being a witch.

Some how I do not think that the question you asked was at all significant to those who were being hung.

 

[Tanj]

Some how I do not think that the question you asked was at all significant to those who were being hung.

Lucky I wasn't asking them then.