Convict servitude

The Convict records give us a few snippets of William Ward's life as a serving Convict in Tasmania. Joan Taylor discovered a muster of Convicts which includes the details of any offences committed after arrival in Australia and between 1817 and 1821. Joan listed only one offence for William - the theft of an iron pot in 1817. I found this record and thought I had confirmed Joan's findings - I was wrong!

I discovered a second set of records listing offences for each convict, which begins in 1820. This record shows four offences for William in 1820 and 1821 as well as another 5 in 1823. So I went back to the record that Joan found and had a closer look.

The original records span a complete opening in the book, but the microfilm copies shown only one page at a time. In this case, the second page was at a bit of an angle, and it was very hard to line up the two pages correctly. I was finally able to do some magic with the computer and reassemble the two pages into one, with the lines correctly aligned. Then it made sense!

Once the pages were aligned correctly, the two records matched perfectly on the date and basic details of each offence, although the new one gave a few more details. The upshot is a correction to Joan's work (the only one I have found sop far):

• May 1819 Refusing to do duty and abuse - 25 lashes.
• May 1820 Neglect of duty - 4 days in irons.
• Nov 1820 Out after hours - 25 lashes.
• Dec 1820 Striking a constable - 50 lashes.
• Jun 1820 Disobey Commandant - 50 lashes, 3 months goal.
• Jan 1823 Neglect of duty - acquitted
• Apr 1823 Drunk and disorderly - reprimanded
• Jun 1823 Drunk again and assault - 25 lashes.
• Nov 1823 Disobedience - reprimanded

The conduct record and two Convict musters place William in Port Dalrymple or Georgetown for most of his sentence. Port Dalrymple was the name used for the moth of the Tamar River, but most of the population at that time were in Launceston.

I have loaded up the source documents with my transcripts on my the website. See 1817-ward-william-convict-register.pdf (the document Joan quoted) and 1817-ward-wm-conduct-record.pdf (the later conduct record).

To me, this new conduct record paints the picture of a young man possibly sullen about his unjust conviction in England. The more he is punished, the more sullen he becomes. I like this picture more than the petty thief in Hobart.

William gained his freedom in February 1824 and the website also includes the clipping from the Hobart paper which announces William's release.