Prisons Over Seas / Deportation and Colonization; British and American Prisons of To-day

by Arthur Griffiths

Until later years the men's barracks had been very negligently supervised. There was no attempt to enforce discipline within the walls. The convicts were not even kept under lock and key. Half at least were absent as a general rule all night, which they spent in prowling about, stealing anything they could lay hands upon. The officers at the barracks were tampered with, and winked for substantial reasons at the nightly evasions of the prisoners in their charge. Even in the day time, and inside the walls, drunkenness was very rife, and with it perpetual pilfering from one another, and much general misconduct. Naturally in this universal slackness of control the lower officials fattened and grew rich at the public expense. Gross peculation and embezzlement were continually practised. The storekeeper was known to have abstracted supplies from government stock; and others on small salaries were found to have amassed considerable fortunes, building themselves fine villas in the best part of the town, and living on the fat of the land. Having thus full scope for license and depravity, it will be conceded that there was no attempt at punishment and restraint in this the first halting-place of the transport in the land of exile.

The condition of the Parramatta factory, the depot for females, was even more disgraceful. The building, not unlike an English workhouse, was large and stood amidst spacious courtyards and gardens. The accommodation provided was of the best. There was plenty of food and comfortable raiment. The women were not confined always within the walls, they had money in plenty, and there was little or no work to be done, even by those in the lower stages or classes. A few were made to wheel sand or gravel for gardening purposes, but the barrows used were of light construction, and the women laughed openly and made a joke of the labour imposed. The administration of the establishment was entrusted for years to a matron, whose character, to say the least of it, hardly entitled her to so responsible a charge. It was alleged that she misappropriated the labour of the convicts, keeping back the best prisoners to employ them for the benefit of herself and her daughters. It was openly said, also, that these daughters were not a bit better than they should have been. There was some attempt at classification among the female convicts according to conduct and character, but the lowest of these classes was filled with women who had been returned from service or who were sentenced to remain at Parramatta till further orders. This was just what they wished. All the women much preferred to be at the factory. It was far better, they said, than at service. If any servant misbehaved, and was taken by her master before a magistrate, she said at once, "Send me back to the factory. Send me back." These scenes in court supply curious evidence of the condition of affairs. The women constantly made use of the most desperate and disgusting language. One, after threatening her master, suddenly spat in his face. Another, when sentenced to ten days on bread and water, was so insolent that the punishment was increased to thirty. "Oh! thank you," she said coolly; "couldn't you make it thirty-one?"—knowing perfectly well that thirty days was the limit of the magistrate's power. No wonder that, with such material to choose from, decent people refused to receive convict maid-servants into their families. As a rule their characters were so bad, they gave so much annoyance, and disturbed to such an extent the peace and quiet of households, that the settlers would rather be without their assistance altogether. "They make execrable servants," says a Mr. Mudie, speaking from long experience. In many years he had only met one or two who were well behaved. Some were exceedingly savage, and thought nothing of doing serious mischief to any one. The most flagrant case of this was the assault on Captain Waldron, a retired officer and settler. Having reason to find fault with a woman for not cleaning his veranda, he threatened to send her back to the factory. "If you send her, you must send me too," cried another woman coming forward directly. High words followed; after which the two women threw themselves without warning on their master, got him down, and mauled him so seriously that he died of the injuries he received. Other servants, convicts also, were within earshot, but not one stirred a finger to help their master.

Not a pleasant picture this of the actual consequences of female transportation. Perhaps all the women were not originally bad, but the voyage out was a terrible ordeal to those who had still some faint glimmering left of the distinctions between right and wrong. Another observer remarks that the character and condition of these women was "as bad as it was possible for human beings to be; they were shockingly dissolute and depraved, steeped to the very core in profligacy and vice." But I will now leave them and return to the men, who formed the bulk of the convict population.

Let us take first the case of those assigned to settlers in the interior. The assignee, as I have said, attended and carried off his quota to dispose of them on his station, or otherwise, according to his discretion. To get the men home—often a long way off—was no easy matter. Sometimes the convict was given money and told to find his own way, and again the master assumed charge, and they marched in company. Then it happened, either that those left to themselves made straight for the nearest public-house, or that those under escort gave their masters the slip and traveled in the same direction. The next the assignee heard of his new servants was a demand made upon him to take them "out of pawn." Joining with old pals, these new chums, fresh from the restraint of the convict ship, had soon launched out into drunkenness or worse. As often as not, the master found them in the lock-up, with half their clothing gone, and charged with felony. Having cost money already, they now cost more; and the process might be repeated over and over again. Nevertheless, sooner or later, all or a part of the new labourers reached their destination. Here their position was quite that of slaves. The Transportation Act gave the governor of the colony a property in the services of every convict, and this property he made over to the assignee. The authority with which the settler became thereupon vested was not exactly absolute, but it was more than an ordinary master has over his apprentice. Nevertheless, the Australian master was bound to maintain and to protect his convict servant. He could not flog him, nor was he supposed to ill-treat him; besides, the law gave the convict the right of appeal and complaint against ill-usage. Maintenance was likewise provided by law. The regulation rations consisted weekly of seven pounds of fresh meat—beef or mutton—and eight pounds of flour, with salt, also soap and other necessaries; but this minimum allowance was often largely increased. The meat issue rose to eight or nine pounds; the flour to fourteen pounds; tea and sugar were added, and occasionally rum and tobacco. In spite of the danger of supplying such men with spirits, rum was openly given—as at time of sheep shearing, and so forth, when it was supposed to be needed medicinally. The occasion of a harvest-home was often the excuse for a general jollification. Many masters found that it was to their interest to feed their convict servants well. This was bribing them to do good work, and not a few people had more confidence in the efficacy of such treatment than in purely strict and coercive measures. Mr. Mudie, again, when before the Parliamentary Committee of 1837, confessed to having provided one servant with a flute, just to keep him in good humour. A good master was anxious to make his servants forget, if possible, that they were convicts. Really profitable labour, they argued, could only be got out of them by making them comfortable. Here at once was a departure from the very first principles of penal discipline. It was hardly intended that the felons who were transported as a punishment beyond the seas should be pampered and made much of, simply to put money into the pockets of private individuals. As a matter of fact the average actual condition of the convict servant, as far as food and lodging were concerned, was far superior to that of the honest field labourer at home, and under a good master, as we have seen, he was much better off than a soldier. He might be under some personal restraint, and there was a chance of being flogged if he misbehaved, but he had a great many comforts. He was allowed to marry, could never starve, and if industrious, might look forward in no remote period of time to rise to a position of ease, if not of actual affluence.

At all the large stations the daily routine of life was somewhat as follows: The big bell on the farm rang out an hour before sunrise, a second bell half an hour later, and a third when the sun appeared. It was the night watchman's business to ring the bells. At the last summons all hands turned out. The mechanics went to their various works, the bullock drivers to their carts, the herdsmen to their cattle and pigs. As a general rule the heaviest labour to be performed was kept for the newest comers, so as to break them in. It was their business to clear the land, fell timber, and burn it. At eight came the breakfast bell, and with it an hour's rest. Dinner was at one, after which work was continued until sunset. At 8 or 9 P. M., according to the season, a night bell recalled every one, and after that no convict was supposed to leave his hut. On the surface, then, no great amount of rest appeared to be allowed, except at actual meal times or after sundown; but the whole character of the work performed was desultory and far from satisfactory. A convict servant's value was estimated by people of experience at something much less than that of a free labourer; so much so that there were settlers who declared they would rather pay wages, as they lost rather than saved by this gratuitous labour. The convicts worked unwillingly almost always; sometimes they executed their tasks as badly as they could, on purpose to do injury. What leisure they had was not very profitably employed. One convict in twenty might read, and some few spent their time in plaiting straw hats for sale; but the greater number preferred to be altogether idle, unless they could get a pack of cards—forbidden fruit at every station, and yet generally attainable—in which case they were prepared to gamble and quarrel all the night through. There was little or no supervision over them in their huts. It was quite impossible to keep them inside. No kind of muster was feasible or even safe. The overseers were really afraid to visit the men's huts much after dark, fearing to be attacked or openly maltreated. It would have been far better if a strong stockade, with high palisading, had been in all cases substituted for the huts. The latter were open always, so that after the last bell at night, any—and they were not a few—who chose crept out and spent the whole of the dark hours on the prowl. Of course the convicts were incorrigible thieves, and the whole country side was laid under contributions by them while thus nightly at large. Sunday was another day which gave these idle hands abundant opportunities for mischief. Of course there was no regular work done on the farm on that day; but there was no attempt, either, to enforce religious observances in lieu thereof. The want of provision for public worship was at this time largely felt throughout the colony, and seldom were churches at hand for the convicts to attend, even if such attendance had been insisted upon. Some few superintendents of farms took their convicts to church, if there was one in the neighbourhood, but cases of this were few and far between. Even if there was a church, all who could do so, sneaked out of the way on pretence of going to bathe, and so escaped the service.

Thus far I have described only the pleasant side of a convict's life up the country. On the whole it was far from irksome. Nevertheless, as a set-off against the home comforts and the comparative idleness, there was the total want of freedom of action, coupled with strictly enforced submissiveness of demeanour. A convict was expected to be even cringingly subservient in manner. For insolent words, nay, looks, as betraying an insubordinate and insurgent spirit, he might be incontinently scourged. In this way he was subject to the capricious temper, not only of his master, but of the whole of the master's family. Then the local magistrates had great powers. Singly a magistrate could sentence any man to be flogged for drunkenness, disobedience, neglect of work, or absconding; with others assembled in petty sessions, they had power, however, to inflict heavier punishments for graver offences. In "Byrne's Travels" I find mention made of several convicts who had received in the aggregate many thousand lashes. The same writer asserts that he once had an assigned servant upon whom 2,275 had been inflicted. This man was said to have grown so callous that he was heard to declare he would rather suffer a thousand lashes than the shortest term of imprisonment. Life could not be very enjoyable to men liable to such treatment. And this code was for the convicts and for them alone. Another law applied to the masters, in whom, indeed, was vested a tremendous power for good or evil. Some, as I have before remarked, were quite unfit persons to have the charge of felon servants, being themselves little better than convicts, and prepared at any time to consort with them and make them their intimate friends. Others of the better classes often delegated their authority to overseers, being either non-resident on their farms, or not caring to exercise personal control. In many cases these overseers were ex-convicts, and although it might be considered advisable that the master should not make himself too cheap, and that a middleman should be employed to come into direct communion with the convict himself, still every precaution should have been taken to prevent any abuse of power. In point of fact every well-ordered establishment should have been uniformly under the eye of its resident owner.

But in reality the lot of the convict in assignment was left altogether to chance. According to his luck in masters, he might be very miserable, or as happy as the day was long: one master might be lenient, giving good food and exacting but little labour in return; another, a perfect fiend. It was quite a lottery into which sort of hands the convict fell, for until 1835 there was little or no inquiry into the character of applicants for servants, and except in the most flagrant cases requisitions were never refused.

This, indeed, comprised one of the chief objections to the system of assignment. It was altogether too much a matter of haphazard. No system of penal discipline ought to be left thus to chance; yet as we have seen, there was no supervision and little attempt to enforce hard labour or any stringent code of discipline. This neglect fostered evil courses, and tended to increase the temptations to crime. Nor was the style of labour provided that which was always most suited to the persons for whom it was intended. In some few cases it was proper enough. Men employed as shepherds were perforce compelled to drop into regular habits from being obliged to go out and return with their herds at fixed hours, and they lived much alone. But these were only a small proportion of the whole number, and the balance working in association had many opportunities for developing vicious qualities by this corrupting intercourse. Especially was this the case with the mounted herdsmen, who were free to gallop about the country, collecting together in large numbers at the squatters' huts to drink and gamble and plot schemes of depredation.

These squatters, who about this period—1825-35—sprang up in rank growth round about the principal stations, did much to give annoyance, and to increase the difficulties of the settlers. They were mostly emancipists or ticket-of-leave men, who occupied crown pastures without paying for them, or spent their energies in stealing horses and cattle. Sometimes they established themselves at the corners of the settlers' own grants of land, getting as near to estates as they could without detection. Their principal object in life seemed to make themselves useful to the convicts employed near them, for whom they kept "sly grog-shops," where they sold or bartered liquor for stolen goods. This ready market for stolen property was a source of great loss to the settlers. One calculated that it cost him £200 or £300 a year. Pigs, sheep, harness in bags, flour on its way to market—all these were purloined in large quantities, and passed at once to the receivers, who gave rum in exchange, and sometimes tea, sugar, and tobacco. The squatters were fined if caught at these illicit practices, but to recover money from them was like getting blood out of a stone. Another favourite modus operandi was to knock up a sort of shanty close by some halting-place on the main line of road, where there was water handy and the drays could be made snug for the night. The draymen naturally flocked to the grog-shop, and naturally also obtained the sinews of war by making free with their masters' property.

In the foregoing pages I have dwelt chiefly on assignment to the country districts. But every convict did not of course go to the interior. Many were assigned in the towns. Now, whatever evils may have surrounded the system as carried out inland, the practice of town assignment was infinitely worse in every respect. In the first place, it led to the congregation of large numbers in places where there were many more temptations to profligacy and crime. And just as these were increased, so were the supervision and control that would check them diminished till they sank to almost nothing at all. Country convicts, as we have seen, were not much hampered by rules; but those in towns were free to do just as they pleased. It was impossible for the masters to enforce any regulations. In the hours of work, such as they were, the convicts might perhaps be kept out of harm's way more or less, according to the character and style of their employment; but labour over, they had great license and were practically free men. Household servants were as well off as servants at home in England: they frequented theatres and places of amusement, and the badge of their disgrace was kept altogether in the background. Masters were not compelled by law to enforce any particular discipline; nor would the most strict among them dare to exercise much surveillance over their servants. Such conduct would have been rare and singular, and it would have drawn down upon them the animosity, or worse, of the whole convict class. Such was the state of affairs that this body really possessed some power, and could not openly be affronted.