CHAPTER XXVIII

Gangs sent to till the public grounds
The Francis sails
Regulations for the Hawkesbury
Natives
Works
Weather
Deaths
Produce at the river
Transactions there
Natives
The Francis arrives from the Cape
The Fancy from New Zealand
Information
The Experiment sails for India
A native killed
Weather
Wheat
Criminal Court
Ration reduced
The Britannia hired to procure provisions
Natives at the Hawkesbury
The Endeavour arrives with cattle from Bombay
Deaths
Returns of ground sown with wheat
The Britannia sails for India
The Fancy for Norfolk Island
Convicts
Casualties

1795.]

January.] From the great numbers of labouring convicts who were employed in the town of Sydney, and at the grounds about Petersham; of others employed with officers and settlers; of those who, their terms of transportation having expired, were allowed to provide for themselves; and of others who had been permitted to leave the colony, public field-labour was entirely at a stand. The present commanding officer wishing to cultivate the grounds belonging to government, collecting as many labourers as could be got together, sent a large gang, formed of bricklayers, brickmakers, timber-carriage men, etc. etc. to Parramatta and Toongabbie, there to prepare the ground for wheat for the ensuing season. At the muster which had been lately taken fifty people were found without any employment, whose services still belonged to the public; most of these were laid hold of, and sent to hard labour; and it appeared at the same time that some few were at large in the woods, runaways, and vagabonds. These people began labouring in the grounds immediately after New Year's day, which as usual was observed as a holiday.

On the 22nd, the convict women who had children attended at the store, when they received for each child three yards of flannel, one shirt, and two pounds of soap.

On the day following, the colonial schooner sailed for the river, having on board a mill, provisions, etc. for the settlers there. A military guard was also ordered, the commanding officer of which was to introduce some regulations among the settlers, and to prevent, by the effect of his presence and authority, the commission of those enormities which disgraced that settlement. For the reception of such quantity of the Indian corn and wheat grown there this season as might be purchased by government, a store-house was to be erected under the inspection of the commissary; and Baker, the superintendant who arrived in the Surprise, was sent out to take the charge of it when finished. The master of the schooner was ordered, after discharging his cargo, to receive on board Mr. Charles Grimes, the deputy surveyor-general, and proceed with him to Port Stephens, for the purpose of examining that harbour.

About the middle of the month a convict, on entering the door of his hut, was bit in the foot by a black snake; the effect was, an immediate swelling of the foot, leg, and thigh, and a large tumour in the groin. Mr. Thompson, the assistant-surgeon, was fortunately able to reduce all these swellings by frequently bathing the parts in oil, and saved the man's life without having recourse to amputation. While we lived in a wood, and might naturally have expected to have been troubled with them, snakes and other reptiles were by no means so often seen, as since, by clearing and opening the country about us, the natives had not had opportunities of setting the woods so frequently on fire. But now they were often met in the different paths about the settlements, basking at mid-day in the sunshine, and particularly after a shower of rain.

We heard and saw much of the natives about this time. At the Hawkesbury a man had been wounded by some of the Wood tribe. Two women (natives) were murdered not far from the town of Sydney during the night, and another victim, a female of Pe-mul-wy's party (the man who killed McIntyre), having been secured by the males of a tribe inimical to Pe-mul-wy, dragged her into the woods, where they fatigued themselves with exercising acts of cruelty and lust upon her.

The principal labour performed in January was preparing the ground for wheat. The Indian corn looked every where remarkably well; it was now ripening, and the settlers on the banks of the Hawkesbury supposed that at least thirty thousand bushels of that grain would be raised among them.

Several native boys, from eight to fourteen years of age, were at this time living among the settlers in the different districts. They were found capable of being made extremely useful; they went cheerfully into the fields to labour, and the elder ones with ease hoed in a few hours a greater quantity of ground than that generally assigned to a convict for a day's work. Some of these were allowed a ration of provisions from the public stores.

In consequence of the heavy rains, the river at the Hawkesbury rose many feet higher than it had been known to rise in other rains, by which several settlers were sufferers. At Toongabbie the wheat belonging to government was considerably injured. At Parramatta the damage was extensive; the bridge over the creek, which had been very well constructed, was entirely swept away; and the boats with their moorings carried down the river. At Sydney some chimneys in the new barracks fell in.

Mr. Jones, the quarter-master sergeant of the New South Wales corps, a person of much respectability, and whose general demeanor indicated an education far beyond what is met with in the sphere of life in which he moved, died this month.

A convict lad, in the service of Mr. William Smith the store-keeper, died on the 26th, having swallowed arsenic. It was remarkable in his untimely end, that he himself placed the poison with a view of destroying the rats with which the house was infested, and was particularly cautioned against it. How he came, after that, to take it himself, was not to be accounted for.

February.] Early in February, the storehouse at the Hawkesbury being completed, the provisions which had been sent round in the schooner were landed and put under the care of Baker. Some officers who had made an excursion to that settlement, with a view of selecting eligible spots for farms, on their return spoke highly of the corn which they saw growing there, and of the picturesque appearance of many of the settlers' farms. The settlers told them, that in general their grounds which had been in wheat had produced from thirty to thirty-six bushels an acre; that they found one bushel (or on some spots five pecks) of seed sufficient to sow an acre; and that, if sown as early as the month of April or May, they imagined the ground would produce a second crop, and the season be not too far advanced to ripen it. Their kitchen gardens were plentifully stocked with vegetables. The master of the schooner complained that the navigation of the river was likely to be hurt. The settlers having fallen many trees into the water, he was apprehensive they would drift ashore on some of the points of the river where, in process of time, sand, etc. might lodge against them, and form dangerous obstructions in the way of craft which might be hereafter used on the river. No doubt remained of the ill and impolitic conduct of some of the settlers toward the natives. In revenge for some cruelties which they had experienced, they threatened to put to death three of the settlers, Michael Doyle, Robert Forrester, and ---- Nixon; and had actually attacked and cruelly wounded two other settlers, George Shadrach and John Akers, whose farms and persons they mistook for those of Doyle and Forrester. These particulars were procured through the means of one Wilson, a wild idle young man, who, his term of transportation being expired, preferred living among the natives in the vicinity of the river, to earning the wages of honest industry by working for settlers. He had formed an intermediate language between his own and theirs, with which he made shift to comprehend something of what they wished him to communicate; for they did not conceal the sense they entertained of the injuries which had been done them. The tribe with whom Wilson associated had given him a name, Bun-bo-e, but none of them had taken his in exchange. As the gratifying an idle wandering disposition was the sole object with Wilson in herding with these people, no good consequence was likely to ensue from it; and it was by no means improbable, that at some future time, if disgusted with the white people, he would join the blacks, and assist them in committing depredations, or make use of their assistance to punish or revenge his own injuries. Mr. Grimes purposed taking him with him in the schooner to Port Stephens.

There were at this time several convicts in the woods subsisting by theft; and it being said that three had been met with arms, it became necessary to secure them as soon as possible. Watchmen and other people immediately went out, and in the afternoon of the 14th a wretched fellow of the name of Suffini was killed by one of them. This circumstance drove the rest to a greater distance from Sydney, and they were reported, some days afterwards, to have been met on their route to the river. Suffini would not have been shot at, had he not refused to surrender when called to by the watchman while in the act of plundering a garden.

About the latter end of the month the natives adjusted some affairs of honour in a convenient spot near the brick-fields. The people who live about the south shore of Botany Bay brought with them a stranger of an extraordinary appearance and character; even his name had something extraordinary in the sound--Gome-boak. He had been several days on his journey from the place where he lived, which was far to the southward. In height he was not more than five feet two or three inches; but he was by far the most muscular, square, and well-formed native we had ever seen. He fought well; his spears were remarkably long, and he defended himself with a shield that covered his whole body. We had the satisfaction of seeing him engaged with some of our Sydney friends, and of observing that neither their persons nor reputations suffered any thing in the contest. When the fight was over, on our praising to them the martial talents of this stranger, the strength and muscle of his arm, and the excellence of his sight, they admitted the praise to be just (because when opposed to them he had not gained the slightest advantage); but, unwilling that we should think too highly of him, they assured us, with horror in their countenances, that Gome-boak was a cannibal.*

[* Gome-boak, we learned, was afterwards killed among his own people in some affair to the southward.]

March.] On the 1st of March the Francis returned from Port Stephens. Mr. Grimes reported, that he went into two fresh-water branches, up which he rowed, until, at no very great distance from the entrance, he found them terminate in a swamp. He described the land on each side to be low and sandy, and had seen nothing while in this harbour which in his opinion could render a second visit necessary. The natives were so very unfriendly, that he made but few observations on them. He thought they were a taller and a stouter race of people than those about this settlement, and their language was entirely different. Their huts and canoes were something larger than those which we had seen here; their weapons were the same. They welcomed him on shore with a dance, joined hand in hand, round a tree, to express perhaps their unanimity; but one of them afterwards, drawing Mr. Grimes into the wood, poised a spear, and was on the point of throwing it, when he was prevented by young Wilson, who, having followed Mr. Grimes with a double-barrelled gun, levelled at the native, and fired it. He was supposed to be wounded, for he fell; but rising again, he attempted a second time to throw the spear, and was again prevented by Wilson. The effect of this second shot was supposed to be conclusive, as he was not seen to rise any more. Mr. Grimes got back to his boat without any other interruption.

Mr. House in his way thither ran close along the shore, and saw not any shelter for a ship or vessel from Broken Bay to Port Stephens. The schooner was only fourteen hours on her return.

About this time, the spirit of inquiry being on foot, Mr. Cummings, an officer of the corps, made an excursion to the southward of Botany Bay, and brought back with him some of the head bones of a marine animal, which, on inspection, Captain Paterson, the only naturalist in the country, pronounced to have belonged to the animal described by M. de Buffon, and named by him the Manatee. On this excursion Mr. Cummings received some information which led him to believe that the cattle that had been lost soon after our arrival were in existence. The natives who conversed with him were so particular in their account of having seen a large animal with horns, that he shortly after, taking some of them with him as guides, set off to seek them, but returned without success, not having met with any trace that could lead him to suppose they might ever be found.

On the 4th the Britannia returned from the Cape of Good Hope, having been absent six months and three days. Mr. Raven brought alive to his employers, one stallion, twenty-nine mares, three fillies, and twelve sheep. He sailed from the Cape with forty mares on board; but those that died were the worst, and had not been kept up long enough on dry food before they were embarked.

It was evident, on visiting the ship, that every attention had been paid to their accommodation; but horses were generally supposed better calculated than other cattle to endure the weather usually met with between the Cape and this country*.

[* It may be remembered, that in a former voyage to the Cape on a similar errand, she lost twenty-nine cows.]

We had the gratification of hearing that our fleet under Earl Howe had been victorious in a gallant and severe action with the enemy.

On the 15th, when anxiously expecting an arrival from England, we saw Mr. Dell come to anchor in the cove from Norfolk Island.

Though this arrival proved a disappointment to most of us, yet the information we received by it was rather interesting. We now learned, that Mr. Dell had been at New Zealand, where he passed three months in the river named by Captain Cook the Thames, employed in cutting spars, for the purpose (as was conjectured here at the time of his departure) of freighting such ship as might arrive from India on Mr. Bampton's account. In the course of that time they cut down upwards of two hundred very fine trees, from sixty to one hundred and forty feet in length, fit for any use that the East India Company's ships might require. The longest of these trees measured three feet and a half in the butt, and differed from the Norfolk Island pines in having the turpentine in the centre of the tree instead of between the bark and the wood. From the natives they received very little interruption, being only upon one occasion obliged to fire on them. Like other uncivilised people, these islanders saw no crime in theft, and stole some axes from the people employed on shore, gratifying thereby their predilection for iron, which, strange as it may sound to us, they would have preferred to gold. Unfortunately, iron was too precious even here to part with, unless for an equivalent; and it became necessary to convince them of it. Two men and one woman were killed, the seamen who fired on them declaring (in their usual enlarged style of relation) that they had driven off and pursued upwards of three thousand of these cannibals. They readily parted with any quantity of their flax, bartering it for iron. As the valuable qualities of this flax were well known, it was not uninteresting to us to learn, that so small a vessel as the Fancy had lain at an anchor for three months in the midst of numerous and warlike tribes of savages, without any attempt on their part to become the masters; and that an intercourse might safely and advantageously be opened between them and the colonists of New South Wales, whenever proper materials and persons should be sent out to manufacture the flax, if the governor of that country should ever think it an object worthy of his attention.

From New Zealand the Fancy proceeded to Norfolk Island, and now came hither in the hope of meeting with, or hearing of Mr. Bampton.

From that settlement we gained the following information:

The Salamander touched there, and the Resolution appeared off the island, but had no communication with the shore.

A heavy gale of wind, accompanied with a slight shock of the earth, had done considerable damage, washing away a very useful wharf and crane at Cascade, but which the governor meant immediately to replace.

The produce of the wheat this season on government's account amounted to three thousand bushels, and that of settlers to fifteen hundred. The Indian corn promised a very plentiful crop; but the settlers were much discouraged by their bills of the last year remaining still unpaid. Much of that corn was obliged to be surveyed, and two thousand bushels had been condemned.

Swine were increasing so rapidly on Phillip Island, now stocked by government, that Mr. King thought he should be able for some time to issue fresh pork during four days in the week. The flour was expended; of salt meat there was a sufficiency in store for eight months. The whole number of persons on the island amounted to nine hundred and forty-five.

A convict well known in this settlement, Benjamin Ingraham, being detected in the act of housebreaking, put an end to his own existence by hanging himself, thus terminating by his own hand a life of wretchedness and villany.

On the 17th St. Patrick found many votaries in the settlement. Some Cape brandy lately imported in the Britannia appeared to have arrived very seasonably; and libations to the saint were so plentifully poured, that at night the cells were full of prisoners.

Settlers, and other persons who had Indian corn to dispose of, were this month informed, that they would receive five shillings per bushel for all they might bring to the public stores. They were likewise told, that a preference would be given to those who had disposed of their wheat to government.

On the 23rd the Experiment sailed for India. Mr. McClellan had been with his vessel to the Hawkesbury, where he had taken in sixty large logs of the tree which we had named the cedar. He had also purchased some of the mahogany of this country. Whether cedar and mahogany were or were not to be readily procured at Bengal, ought to have been well known to this gentleman before he put himself to the trouble, delay, and expence of procuring such a quantity*; but it was here generally looked upon as a speculation that would not produce him much profit.

[* He was to allow one hundred pounds for as many trees; but we understood that it was to be in the way of barter with articles, sugar, spirits, etc.]

On the day of his sailing, suspecting (as was reported) some design to seize his vessel, he sent on shore three people whom he had shipped here. They rendezvoused at a hut in the town occupied by one John Chapman Morris; and, on searching it, in the bed of one of them were found a dozen of new Indian shirts marked D. W.; twenty-two new pulicate handkerchiefs; and three pieces of striped gingham. On the possessor being questioned, he said, that they were sold to him while he was at Norfolk Island by the steward of Captain Manning's ship, the Pitt. As this was a very improbable story, the house they were in was ordered by the commanding officer to be pulled down. The property, having been disclaimed by Mr. McClennan, was lodged with the provost-marshal; and the parties given to understand, that a reference would be made to Norfolk Island by the first opportunity.

On the 26th, some of our people witnessed an extraordinary transaction which took place among the natives at the brick-fields. A young man of the name of Bing-yi-wan-ne, well known in the settlement, being detected in the crisis of an amour with Maw-ber-ry, the companion of another native, Ye-ra-ni-be Go-ru-ey, the latter fell upon him with a club, and being a powerful man, and of superior strength, absolutely beat him to death. Bing-yi-wan-ne had some friends, who on the following day called Ye-ra-ni-be to an account for the murder; when, the affair being conducted with more regard to honour than justice, he came off with only a spear-wound in his thigh.

The farmers began gathering their Indian corn about the latter end of this month. The weather during the former and latter part of it was wet. About the time of the equinox, the tides in the cove were observed to be very high.

On the 28th Thomas Webb, a settler, who had removed from his farm at Liberty Plains to another on the banks of the Hawkesbury, was dangerously wounded there, while working on his grounds by some of the wood natives, who had previously plundered his but. About the same time a party of these people threw a spear at some soldiers who were going up the river in a small boat. All these unpleasant circumstances were to be attributed to the ill treatment the natives had received from the settlers.

At Prospect Hill a woman was bitten by a snake; but by the timely application of some volatile salts by Mr. Irving, her life was saved.

April.] It was determined to let the Toongabbie Hills remain fallow for a season, they being reported to be worn out. Other ground, which had been prepared, was now sown; a spot called the Ninety Acres, and the hills between Parramatta and Toongabbie.

On the 15th, a criminal court was assembled for the trial of John Anderson and Joseph Marshall, settlers; and John Hyams, Joseph Dunstill, Richard Watson, and Morgan Bryan, convicts; for a rape committed on the body of one Mary Hartley, at the Hawkesbury. The court was obliged to acquit the prisoners, owing to glaring contradiction in the witnesses, no two of them, though several were examined, agreeing in the same point. But as such a crime could not be passed with impunity, they were recommitted, and on the 22nd tried for an assault, of which being very clearly convicted, the two settlers and Morgan Bryan were sentenced to receive each five hundred lashes, and the others three hundred each; of which sentence they received one half, and were forgiven the remainder. This was a most infamous transaction; and, though the sufferer was of bad character, would have well warranted the infliction of capital punishment on one of the offenders, if the witnesses had not prevaricated in their testimony. They appeared to have cast off all the feelings of civilised humanity, adopting as closely as they could follow them the manners of the savage inhabitants of the country. One prisoner, John Rayner, was also tried for a burglary, and being convicted received sentence of death.

On the 29th, a liberal allowance of slops was issued to the male and female convicts in the different settlements, among which were some soap to the men, and some thread, tape, and soap to the women.

A shed for the purpose of receiving their Indian corn was this month begun by the settlers at the river, they and their servants bringing in the materials, and government supplying the carpenters, tools, nails, etc.

The farmers now every where began putting their wheat into the ground, except at the river, where they had scarcely made any preparations, consuming their time and substance in drinking and rioting; and trusting to the extreme fertility of the soil, which they declared would produce an ample crop at any time without much labour. So silly and thoughtless were these people, who were thus unworthily placed on the banks of a river which, from its fertility and the effect of its inundations, might not improperly be termed the Nile of New South Wales.

May.] From the reduced state of the salted provisions, it became necessary (such had often been the preamble of an order) to diminish the ration of that article weekly to each person, and half the beef and half the pork was stopped at once. In some measure to make this great deduction lighter, three pints of peas were added. This circumstance induced the commanding officer, on the day this alteration took place, to hire the Britannia to proceed to India for a cargo of salted provisions. Supplies might arrive before she could return; but the war increased the chances against us. He therefore took her up at fifteen shillings and sixpence per ton per month; and, in order to save as much salt meat as was possible, he directed the commissary to purchase such fresh pork as the settlers and others might bring in good condition to the store, issuing two pounds of fresh, in lieu of one of salt meat. During the time this order continued, a barrow was killed and part sent to the store, which weighed five hundred pounds, and a sow which weighed three hundred and thirty-six pounds. They had both been fed a considerable time* on Indian corn, and, according to the rate they sold at (the pork one shilling per pound, and the corn five shillings per bushel) could neither of them have repaid the expence of their feed.

[* The barrow two years and a half, and the sow about two years.]

On the 21st the colonial schooner returned from the Hawkesbury, bringing upwards of eleven hundred bushels of remarkably fine Indian corn from the store there. The master again reported his apprehensions that the navigation of the river would be obstructed by the settlers, who continued the practice of falling and rolling trees into the stream. He found five feet less water at the store-wharf than when he was there in February last, owing to the dry weather which had for some time past prevailed.

At that settlement an open war seemed about this time to have commenced between the natives and the settlers; and word was received over-land, that two people were killed by them; one a settler of the name of Wilson, and the other a freeman, one William Thorp, who had been left behind from the Britannia, and had hired himself to this Wilson as a labourer. The natives appeared in large bodies, men, women, and children, provided with blankets and nets to carry off the corn, of which they appeared as fond as the natives who lived among us, and seemed determined to take it whenever and wherever they could meet with opportunities. In their attacks they conducted themselves with much art; but where that failed they had recourse to force, and on the least appearance of resistance made use of their spears or clubs. To check at once, if possible, these dangerous depredators, Captain Paterson directed a party of the corps to be sent from Parramatta, with instructions to destroy as many as they could meet with of the wood tribe (Be-dia-gal); and, in the hope of striking terror, to erect gibbets in different places, whereon the bodies of all they might kill were to be hung. It was reported, that several of these people were killed in consequence of this order; but none of their bodies being found, (perhaps if any were killed they were carried off by their companions,) the number could not be ascertained. Some prisoners however were taken, and sent to Sydney; one man, (apparently a cripple,) five women, and some children. One of the women, with a child at her breast, had been shot through the shoulder, and the same shot had wounded the babe. They were immediately placed in a hut near our hospital, and every care taken of them that humanity suggested. The man was said, instead of being a cripple, to have been very active about the farms, and instrumental in some of the murders which had been committed. In a short time he found means to escape, and by swimming reached the north shore in safety; whence, no doubt, he got back to his friends. Captain Paterson hoped, by detaining the prisoners and treating them well, that some good effect might result; but finding, after some time, that coercion, not attention, was more likely to answer his ends, he sent the women back. While they were with us, the wounded child died, and one of the women was delivered of a boy, which died immediately. On our withdrawing the party, the natives attacked a farm nearly opposite Richmond Hill, belonging to one William Rowe, and put him and a very fine child to death, the wife, after receiving several wounds, crawled down the bank, and concealed herself among some reeds half immersed in the river, where she remained a considerable time without assistance: being at length found, this poor creature, after having seen her husband and her child slaughtered before her eyes, was brought into the hospital at Parramatta, where she recovered, though slowly, of her wounds. In consequence of this horrid circumstance, another party of the corps was sent out; and while they were there the natives kept at a distance. This duty now became permanent; and the soldiers were distributed among the settlers for their protection; a protection, however, that many of them did not merit.

Pemulwy, or some of his party, were not idle about Sydney; they even ventured to appear within half a mile of the brickfield huts, and wound a convict who was going to a neighbouring farm on business. As one of our most frequent walks from the town was in that direction, this circumstance was rather unpleasant; but the natives were not seen there again.

On Sunday the 31st, about one o'clock, the signal was made at the South Head for a sail; and about five there anchored in the cove the Endeavour, a ship of eight hundred tons from Bombay, under the command of Mr. Bampton, having on board one hundred and thirty-two head of cattle, a quantity of rice, and the other articles of the contract engaged by Lieutenant-governor Grose, except the salt provisions. She had been eleven weeks from Bombay.

The cattle arrived, in general, in good condition; and Mr. Bampton had been very successful in his care of them. He embarked one hundred and thirty at Bombay, out of which he lost but one cow, and that died the morning before his arrival.

On visiting the ship, the sight was truly gratifying; the cattle were ranged on each side of the gun-deck, fore and aft, and not confined in separate stalls; but so conveniently stowed, that they were a support to each other. They were well provided with mats, and were constantly cleaned; and when the ship tacked, the cattle which were to leeward were regularly laid with their heads to windward, by people (twenty in number) particularly appointed to look after them, independent of any duty in the ship. The grain which was their food was, together with their water, regularly given to them, and the deck they stood on was well aired, by scuttles in the sides, and by wind sails.*

[* These circumstances are mentioned so particularly, in the hope that they may prove useful hints to any persons intending, or who may be in future employed, to convey cattle from India, or any other part of the world, to New South Wales.]

Of this number of cattle forty were for draught, sixty for breeding, and the remainder calves; but some of them so large, as to be valued and taken at fifteen guineas per head.

On their landing, we were concerned to find that many of the draught cattle were very aged; they were, it was true, in health; but younger animals undoubtedly ought to have been procured; for of little use could toothless, old, and blind beasts be to us.

At the settlement at the Hawkesbury, a woman who had been drinking was found dead in her husband's arms. Webb the settler, who was wounded in March last, died; and one settler (Rowe) and his child were killed in this month.

June.] On the 4th of this month, being the anniversary of his Majesty's birth, the commissary issued to each of the non-commissioned officers and privates of the New South Wales corps, one pound of fresh pork and half a pint of spirits; and to all other people victualled from the store one gill each. At noon the regiment fired three volleys; and at one o'clock the Britannia and Fancy twenty-one guns each in honour of the day.

Preparatory to the departure of the Britannia, some returns were procured, which were necessary to be transmitted with the dispatches then making up. Among others it appeared, that the following quantity of ground had been this season sown with wheat: viz.