Prisoners their own warders

by John Frederick Adolphus McNair; W. D. Bayliss

Referring to difficulties which had to be encountered on the establishment of the freedom of the port, he says, "In the commanding station in which my public duty has placed me, I have had an opportunity of, in a great measure, investigating and determining the merits of the case, and the result renders it a duty on my part, and which I perform with much satisfaction, to express my most unqualified approbation of the honourable principles which actuated the merchants of Singapore on that occasion."

We give the above extracts to show the rapid advance that had been made in the first five years of the settlement's existence, owing mainly to the sagacity, forethought, and wisdom of its eminent founder, and we have added the population up to this period to show its steady rise and progress.

It was, however, in January, 1824, that the first regular census was taken. The population then consisted of 74 Europeans, 16 Armenians, 15 Arabs, 4,580 Malays, 3,317 Chinese, 756 natives of India, and 1,925 Bugis, making a total of 10,683. It was in this year that Singapore was first mentioned in the House of Commons, in a remark made by Mr. Canning, who had been nominated Governor-General of India in 1822, but did not go out to that country, that "Singapore in six years would produce spices sufficient for the consumption of Great Britain and her colonies"—a prophecy not yet fulfilled.

In May of the same year the Resident made a voyage round the island in the ship Malabar, 380 tons burden, to view the boundary of the island and to take formal possession; and it was while on this voyage that the British flag was planted on the island of "Pulo Obin," an island which has since largely supplied the town of Singapore with granite for making roads and also for building purposes. The Government quarries situated upon it were subsequently worked almost entirely by transmarine convicts, of which more will be said hereafter.

ORIGINAL HUTS FOR CONVICTS, SINGAPORE
(From Life of Sir Stamford Raffles).

Plate IX.

On the 18th of April, 1825, the first batch of convicts transported from India to Bencoolen were transferred from there to Singapore. They arrived in the brig Horatio, and consisted of 80 convicts transported from Madras, of whom 73 males and 1 female were for life, and 6 male convicts on short sentences. On the 25th of the same month another batch was received, also convicts from Bencoolen. These consisted of 122 convicts transported from Bengal, of whom 88 males and 1 female were for life, and 33 for short terms. When these Indian convicts were landed at Singapore they were placed at first in an open shed, or godown (from the Malay word "godong," a shed), which stood on the site where the present public offices stand, with only four free petty officers, or "peons," natives of Chittagong in the Bengal presidency, in charge of them. Subsequently temporary buildings, to contain 1,200 to 2,000 convicts, were erected near the Hindu temple, then situated near the Brass Basa Canal, and at a considerable cost it is given as £13,199 (see [Plate IX].). They were all located in these sheds, and there was little or no prison control over them; only, occasionally, an officer of the police came and called the roll in order to report to Government that all were present. These convicts were afterwards detailed to the work of filling up the mud flat before referred to as the site of the present "Commercial Square." For this purpose they carried the soil from near the Hindu temple and from Pearls Hill. Mr. Bonham, the Resident, finding that the convicts worked willingly, and were well behaved, discharged the free "peons," or warders, and selected five Madrasees and five Bengalees from their number to supervise their fellow-convicts. This was, as far as we gather, the first trial of the system of convict warders at Singapore, possibly the first venture of the kind made in any penal establishment. As convicts continued to arrive from India, many of those from Bencoolen were constituted warders over their fellows, in the proportion of one warder to every twenty convicts. Each warder was granted a monthly wage of $3.00 in addition to his rations and clothing, with the usual blanket given to each convict once a year. In addition to his ordinary rations, clothing, and annual blanket, each convict received a monthly allowance of 50 cents (say 2s.) a month, to purchase condiments and salt. A European overseer was placed in immediate charge of the convicts, and a Superintendent over the whole convict establishment, this responsible duty first falling upon Lieutenant Chester, of the Bengal Native Infantry.

The convicts from Bencoolen were not sent over to the Straits of Malacca in chains, but those received from India in the earliest times were manacled with light leg fetters, in which they had to work for a probationary period of three months. As, however, they were granted, equally with the others, the privilege of going about the town to make their purchases, it is said they ceased to consider their fetters a mark of degradation, being so completely overwhelmed with the thought of banishment from their country and kindred; and to many men of caste it must be remembered that transportation alone was a severe punishment.