On probation stations
Mar. 3rd, 2010 08:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xenithActually, I'm not going to talk about probation stations as such as I don't know that much about them, but the convict system in general as it applied to VDL. And let's see if I can dispel a few myths while I'm at it.
I'd suggest you read this, because in any future posts on related subjects I will assume you have read it and therefore not add necessary explanations. So you're been warned :)
OK from 1803 to 1853, there were approximately 75,000* prisoners sent to Van Diemens Land (which is usually shortened to VDL, becauseit's too hard to spell it it's easier to type). In the 1850s the total population on the island was about 50,000 people and by 1900 it was about 100,000. Now I think it's just gone over 500,000. For the first few decades, the number of convicts outnumbered the number of free settlers, and men significantly outnumbered women. I can pull out exact figures, which are interesting, to me anyway. At first prisoners came via NSW, but from 1818 (and one shipload on the Indefatigible in 1812) they started coming direct from Britain.
This post will be focusing on the men though, because I've dealt with women elsewhere. Sort of. The first thing to deal with is the idea that people were transported for just stealing a bit of food (or similar sentiments). If you were male and English, most likely you weren't. You were probably a repeat offender or had committed a serious crime. (If you were Irish or female, that's different but that can keep or another day.) However, what was considered a serious crime then was a bit different to now. Somewhere in the late 18th century, in an attempt to curb a rapidly rising crime rate, the British authorities increased the severity of sentences. Although rather than reducing crime though, they instead found their prisons were filling up very quickly.
Now I'm not saying that people weren't transported for poverty-related crimes. Of course they were, and sending away a family's main bread-winner certainly didn't improve a family's situation. But "just for stealing a loaf bread"? Not really.
Second idea that I hear too often, is they were all sent to Port Arthur. Definitely not. Port Arthur, like Sarah Island, Port Macquarie, Moreton Bay and some others I'm blanking on right now, were places of secondary punishment. Once you arrived in the colonies, if you kept offending or absconding or otherwise causing problems, you got sent off to one of these places. Sarah Island, in Macquarie Island, was established about 1823 but it was too remote, too hard to get to, so it was closed down and Port Arthur, on the Tasman Peninsula, was developed instead. A second penal settlement was established on Maria Island in 1825 for those not quite troublesome enough to be sent to sent to Sarah Island, but this too was closed down after a few years in favour of Port Arthur. The majority of men transported were assigned out to work for settlers and a number were retained for public works. Lt Gov Arthur formalised the Assignment System in the 1820s. So there were seven classes and if you behaved yourself, you moved up, if you caused trouble, you moved down.
Class 1 Ticket of leave. Could own property, work for wages (and often for higher wages than a free man, because it was proof of good conduct). About 10% were in this class
Class 2 Assigned servants. Settlers had to feed/clothe them and in return they did whatever work was required. About 50% were in this class
Class 3 Employed in public works by the government
Class 4 Road Gangs. 20% were in classes 3 & 4
Class 5 Hard labour in chains about 5%
Class 6 Convicted of offences in the colony. Hard labour in penal settlements (as above)
Class 7 Same as 6 but served sentence in chains. 5% were in classes 6 & 7
Of course, this system was open to abuse and was seen as very effective in its goals of deterrence and reform, so about 1840 Gov Franklin brought in the Probation System. The idea here was you got sent off to a remote part of the island with a few hundred other men and built roads, bridges or whatever was required for a number of years. The period being dependent on your sentence.
Sentence --> Period of Probation
7 - 9 years --> 2 years
10 - 13 years --> 2.5 years
14 - 19 years --> 3 years
20 + years --> 3 years
Life --> 4 years
At the end of this time, you were given a Probation Pass and were able to be hired out to settlers. If you behaved yourself, you were given a Ticket of Leave, which meant you could earn money for yourself, and then a Conditional Pardon, which gave you all the right of a free man except you couldn't go back to the UK.
There were 78 probation stations built around the island. Of these, about a dozen still remain in some form like the mud walls at Jericho or the sheep paddock at Ross. The one at Darlington is the most substantial.
This system also had its problems. Mostly due to an economic depression which reduced the opportunities for paid work. And the large land owners weren't too happy about losing their cheap labour either. This fed into he anti-transportation movement, which is an interesting subject to get into, especially as how it is viewed today as being a socially positive thing whereas the reality might have been a bit different. That's for another time though.
Come 1853, transportation ended. 1856 the island's name was changed to Tasmania. And everything was quietly brushed under the ruguntil people realised they could make money from it.
Any questions?
*The exact number isn't known but one of the guide to records on the state archives site gives 3 ways of estimating the and comes up with 73323, 74265 and 73566.
I'd suggest you read this, because in any future posts on related subjects I will assume you have read it and therefore not add necessary explanations. So you're been warned :)
OK from 1803 to 1853, there were approximately 75,000* prisoners sent to Van Diemens Land (which is usually shortened to VDL, because
This post will be focusing on the men though, because I've dealt with women elsewhere. Sort of. The first thing to deal with is the idea that people were transported for just stealing a bit of food (or similar sentiments). If you were male and English, most likely you weren't. You were probably a repeat offender or had committed a serious crime. (If you were Irish or female, that's different but that can keep or another day.) However, what was considered a serious crime then was a bit different to now. Somewhere in the late 18th century, in an attempt to curb a rapidly rising crime rate, the British authorities increased the severity of sentences. Although rather than reducing crime though, they instead found their prisons were filling up very quickly.
Now I'm not saying that people weren't transported for poverty-related crimes. Of course they were, and sending away a family's main bread-winner certainly didn't improve a family's situation. But "just for stealing a loaf bread"? Not really.
Second idea that I hear too often, is they were all sent to Port Arthur. Definitely not. Port Arthur, like Sarah Island, Port Macquarie, Moreton Bay and some others I'm blanking on right now, were places of secondary punishment. Once you arrived in the colonies, if you kept offending or absconding or otherwise causing problems, you got sent off to one of these places. Sarah Island, in Macquarie Island, was established about 1823 but it was too remote, too hard to get to, so it was closed down and Port Arthur, on the Tasman Peninsula, was developed instead. A second penal settlement was established on Maria Island in 1825 for those not quite troublesome enough to be sent to sent to Sarah Island, but this too was closed down after a few years in favour of Port Arthur. The majority of men transported were assigned out to work for settlers and a number were retained for public works. Lt Gov Arthur formalised the Assignment System in the 1820s. So there were seven classes and if you behaved yourself, you moved up, if you caused trouble, you moved down.
Class 1 Ticket of leave. Could own property, work for wages (and often for higher wages than a free man, because it was proof of good conduct). About 10% were in this class
Class 2 Assigned servants. Settlers had to feed/clothe them and in return they did whatever work was required. About 50% were in this class
Class 3 Employed in public works by the government
Class 4 Road Gangs. 20% were in classes 3 & 4
Class 5 Hard labour in chains about 5%
Class 6 Convicted of offences in the colony. Hard labour in penal settlements (as above)
Class 7 Same as 6 but served sentence in chains. 5% were in classes 6 & 7
Of course, this system was open to abuse and was seen as very effective in its goals of deterrence and reform, so about 1840 Gov Franklin brought in the Probation System. The idea here was you got sent off to a remote part of the island with a few hundred other men and built roads, bridges or whatever was required for a number of years. The period being dependent on your sentence.
Sentence --> Period of Probation
7 - 9 years --> 2 years
10 - 13 years --> 2.5 years
14 - 19 years --> 3 years
20 + years --> 3 years
Life --> 4 years
At the end of this time, you were given a Probation Pass and were able to be hired out to settlers. If you behaved yourself, you were given a Ticket of Leave, which meant you could earn money for yourself, and then a Conditional Pardon, which gave you all the right of a free man except you couldn't go back to the UK.
There were 78 probation stations built around the island. Of these, about a dozen still remain in some form like the mud walls at Jericho or the sheep paddock at Ross. The one at Darlington is the most substantial.
This system also had its problems. Mostly due to an economic depression which reduced the opportunities for paid work. And the large land owners weren't too happy about losing their cheap labour either. This fed into he anti-transportation movement, which is an interesting subject to get into, especially as how it is viewed today as being a socially positive thing whereas the reality might have been a bit different. That's for another time though.
Come 1853, transportation ended. 1856 the island's name was changed to Tasmania. And everything was quietly brushed under the rug
Any questions?
*The exact number isn't known but one of the guide to records on the state archives site gives 3 ways of estimating the and comes up with 73323, 74265 and 73566.
