At Her Majesty’s Pleasure |
A journey into the unknown Thomas James Chard and his eldest son James Atkins Chard travelled the same route three years apart. Their respective journeys were far from similar. |
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| Convict Shipping Route. London / Plymouth to the colonies in Australia and New Zealand. Map courtesy of Paul Buddee. |
Thomas James Chard: Aged 29. Sentenced to 10 years in colonial custody. On the 30th of November 1841, Thomas, together with 219 other “shipmates,” found himself aboard HMS Somersetshire heading to Van Diemen’s Land. Although the journey typically took about four months, this trip extended to nearly five months [1] due to the need to suppress a mutiny among several prisoners. According to the Sydney Herald in June 1842, the mutineers, with the help of some soldier guards, tried to seize control of the Somersetshire and escape to South America. The revolt was quelled, and the offenders were tried when the ship reached Cape Town. The leader of the mutiny was sentenced to death and promptly executed, while the soldier guards faced court martial and received life sentences, being transported as convicts to their destination. The Somersetshire arrived in Tasmania on the 30th of May 1842. |
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James Atkins Chard: aged 13. Sentenced to 10 years in colonial custody. James' journey aboard HMS Stratheden was far less eventful than that of his fathers. Crossing two oceans with stops in Rio de Janeiro and Cape Town for supplies, Stratheden arrived at Sullivans Cove, Hobart Town on Christmas Day 1845 - a voyage of 147 days [2]. Hardly a celebration as James and his fellow Parkhurst boys disembarked alongside 103 adult convicts. |
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| Sullivans Cove, Hobart Town (c1880). Sailing vessels moored at what is now known as Salamanca Wharf. Sketch by Thomas J. Nevin; courtesy of the University of Tasmania. |
The British Penal Settlement at Port Arthur The early decades of the nineteenth century proved especially challenging for the free settlers of Van Diemen’s Land. Although general supplies from Port Jackson (New South Wales) were fairly dependable, weather conditions aside, the colony faced a pressing need to become self-sufficient, with the primary shortage being a workforce. Upon settlement in New South Wales, the colonial government effectively employed the labour of British and Irish convicts, prompting the settlers of Tasmania to submit a petition requesting that local authorities finance a comparable scheme on the island. After gaining coronial consent a penal settlement, under the governorship of George Arthur, was commissioned. Thus, in 1830, on territory used by a modest timber station on the Tasman Peninsula, located south of Hobart Town, the basic structure of a prison stockade was set up. |
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| Convict labour in action. Perimeter fence construction around the original stockade. Sketch courtesy of The Port Arthur Historic Site. |
It wasn't until the first English and Irish convicts landed in 1833 that the stockade began it's transformation into a penitentiary constructed by tradesmen convicts. Over the next seven years it grew to house over 1000 inmates and became regarded as the strictest of all British Prisons – the infamous Port Arthur. |
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| Port Arthur Prison Complex. Men's Penitentiary (right) and Point Puer (left) for adolescent males. Sketch from the Rex Nan Kivell Collection, courtesy of The National Library of Australia. |
This was the place where Thomas and James Chard would begin the next phase of their lives. |
Thomas James Chard Inmate: 4968 (Somersetshire). Period of Servitude: 1842 – 1851. Prisoner Assessment:– Height: 5 foot 3¾ inches. Eye Colour: Grey. Hair Colour: Dark brown. Visage: Round chubby face with dark brown beard. Religion: Protestant. Literacy: Cannot read and with limited writing skill. Trade: Farm labourer complete. When prisoners arrived at Port Arthur, they were evaluated based on their behavior and sorted accordingly. Individuals deemed difficult to manage were sent to prison cells, whereas those who behaved well were placed in supervised work groups. Thomas Chard was initially assigned [3] to such a gang logging timber in Victoria Valley, Tasmania's central highland’s region. |
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| Convict logging in Victoria Valley, Tasmania. The gang system at work. Sketch courtesy of The Port Arthur Historic Site. |
Next he laboured for a farmer named Frederick Vigar [4] at a Richmond property named Woodside before completing his probation period at the end of 1843. To this point of time his prison record was unblemished. In 1844, Thomas was indentured as a labourer to John McPhail [5], a store trader located on Bridge Street in Richmond. McPhail, a married man with two children, employed three male convicts (Thomas and two others) as well as a housekeeper/convict – an Irish widow named Honora “Nora” Daly [6]. Thomas discovered early in 1845 that freedom as a convict was a relative idea. For “leaving the township (presumably Richmond) on a Sunday and being in a public house,” he was summoned before a magistrate, accused of misconduct, and sentenced to six days of hard labour. By May of that year, shopkeeper McPhial reported another public house offence, resulting in Thomas receiving five days of hard labour. Honora Daly’s prison record indicates that shopkeeper McPhial had also accused her of similar “public house” offences. Now clearly a “couple,” Thomas and Nora were now courting trouble by attracting the attention of the parole board. For Thomas, this occurred in August of that same year when McPhail once more reported his “absence without leave.” On this occasion, the judge sentenced him to 10 days in prison with hard labour and terminated his connection with the Richmond shopkeeper. By March 1846 Thomas found himself labouring at Cartwrights farm, a property in Enfield (just north of Richmond) run by Simon and Peter McCullock [7]. Unfortunately a change of employer did not improve Thomas' behaviour as he was once again reported to the authorities for misconduct. Even though they were now working apart it may well have been the case that Nora was not a good influence on Thomas, or visa-versa. The remainder of this year saw him move from property to property working just weeks at each. In 1847, Thomas received a third-class pass and was sent to the Jerusalem hiring depot and agricultural station, located sixteen miles north of Richmond. Later that year, on October 12th, he was granted his ticket of leave. |
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| Thomas Chard's Prison Record. Ticket of leave granted on the October 12th 1847 and freedom on October 8th 1851. Image courtesy of Libraries Tasmania. |
Although Thomas had some restrictions eased, a ticket of leave (TOL) [8] did not equate to freedom or a pardon. He was still required to check in regularly with a magistrate and stay within a designated district of the colony. While Nora kept working in the Richmond area (but not for John McPhail anymore), Thomas was registered as a “dealer (labourer for hire)” in the same community. Nora was granted her ticket of leave on October 31st 1848, and following a year free of offences, was given permission to marry on December 4th 1849. |
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| Thomas Chard's marriage to Nora Daly. This image combines the two official documents relating to the marriage of these two convicts. The upper portion is the application for permission to marry, whilst the lower portion is the official record of the event performed by the Reverend Arthur Davenport at St Luke’s Church Richmond. It should be noted that Honora was actually aged 56, having been born in 1793. Image courtesy of Libraries Tasmania. |
So, with his Irish bride at his side, Thomas embarked on a new phase of his life with his sentence expiration becoming official on October 8th 1851. Although their freedom was guaranteed, it might have been expected that neither Thomas nor Nora would want any further involvement with the authorities. However, this was not true, as Thomas was arrested again in mid-1859, this time for a much graver offense than livestock theft. On November 5th 1859, he appeared before the Supreme Court Magistrate in Hobart Town, charged with the indecent assault of a young Richmond girl named Salina Cross. Fortunately, he was found not guilty. |
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| The trial details regarding the Court's case against Thomas Chard. Sketch of the Supreme Court in Hobart Town by James Watt Beattie, 1838. Courtesy of Tasmania Museum and Art Gallery. |
It appears that Thomas was never meant to escape the grasp of the authorities, as ten years later he was apprehended for larceny. This incident involved the supposed theft of a basket and a pair of boots from the Star and Garter Inn on Bridge Street, Richmond. The case, which was reported in the newspaper on July 8th, 1869, was considered a “petty” misdemeanour, and Thomas Chard was found not guilty but was ordered to pay £5 in court costs. |
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| The trial details regarding the Court's case of larceny against Thomas Chard. (inset) Image of what was the Star and Garter Inn, Richmond, showing a renovated shopfront replacing the facade of the original colonial building. Photograph by Claire Baker in 1995. |
Honora Chard passed away on August 16th of the following year, with her death recorded [9] in Richmond. There is no documentation of where she was buried, but it is most probable that she was laid to rest in a pauper’s grave in Richmond. Interestingly, Thomas’ first wife, Mary, had died earlier that same year in Wellington, Devon — a detail Thomas would have been unaware of at the time. Thomas outlived his wife by three years but died alone and impoverished, and was buried [10] by the state in a pauper’s grave at Cornelian Bay cemetery in Hobart Town. |
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| Thomas Chard's death certificate. Registered in The Hobart General Hospital, Thomas died of Phthisis Pulmonalis (aka Tuberculosis). There may have been a post mortem on the body given the significant gap between Thomas' date of death and the certificate registration date. Image courtesy of Libraries Tasmania. |
The Point Puer Prison for Juveniles at Port Arthur Although the British Government had been transporting convicts to Botany Bay for many years, by the mid-1840s they were persuaded by the New South Wales authorities to stop. This left Lord Howe Island and Van Diemen’s Land as the only remaining locations for sending Parkhurst boys. However, there was a solution to the issue, as Paul Buddee [11] wrote:— “This matter was of considerable concern to Sir James Graham, the Secretary of State for the (British) Home Office, which oversaw Parkhurst. In 1842, he wrote a letter [12] to the Parkhurst Prison authorities suggesting that although the Australian mainland states would no longer accept convicts, they would welcome trained labour.” Consequently:— “Parkhurst boys were categorized into four classes (transportation categories): free emigrants; colonial apprentices (ticket-of-leave boys); an orderly but unreliable group (third-class boys); and boys with sentences over ten years (fourth-class boys), and this proposal of 'free' trained labour was submitted with his recommendation to his colonial counterpart Lord Stanley.” While some boys were sent to New Zealand (then under New South Wales jurisdiction) and Western Australia, most arrived in Van Diemen’s Land and the penal settlement of Port Arthur. The juveniles, however, were kept in a separate compound on the Point Puer peninsula. |
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| The Point Puer Juvenile Prison. Located on an isolated peninsula and separated from the Port Arthur penitentiary. Sketches by N. Remand (c 1840) courtesy of the University of Tasmania. |
Point Puer (named after the French word for “boy”) was established in 1834 and became the second reformatory exclusively for juvenile male offenders within the British Empire. Although high construction standards were applied at Port Arthur, this was not the case at Point Puer, where most of the building [11] was carried out by the boys themselves and focused more on practicality than comfort. While it was modelled after Parkhurst Prison, the dress code was quite different (as shown in the sketch above), and the regime enforced strict discipline alongside severe punishment. The boys’ seven and a half hour workday [13] started at 5 am with tasks such as hauling wood and general labour. They were also trained in various trades, including carpentry, sawing, tailoring, stone cutting, painting, shoemaking, baking, nail making, blacksmithing, boatbuilding, and gardening. This physical labour was balanced with academic studies and religious education. |
Thomas James Chard Inmate: 17088 (Stratheden). Period of Servitude: 1845 – 1847. Prisoner Assessment:– Height: 5 foot 0¾ inches. Eye Colour: Blue. Hair Colour: Brown. Visage: Round full face with fair complexion. Religion: Protestant. Literacy: Can read and write. Trade: Painter. It was not a particularly memorable Christmas Day, but on this date in 1845, James Chard and his fellow Stratheden convicts were brought ashore in Hobart Town to begin the prison intake process. Known as the Assignment Scheme, this system allocated convict labour to specific demanding tasks considered essential for the establishment and growth of the new colony. While adult convicts were assigned jobs such as tree-felling, quarrying, road construction, and coal mining, most boys were too small and undernourished for these roles. Instead, they were enrolled in the Probation Gang System. After two years working in a labour gang and demonstrating good behaviour, convicts could earn a probation pass (TOL), allowing them to work for wages. |
Despite James's life being drastically changed, there was still much for him to be grateful for. Thanks to the discipline at Her Majesty’s Parkhurst and his own willingness to cooperate and learn, James could now read and write and had acquired a trade as a painter. He was also fortunate that his final year at Parkhurst counted towards his probation period, meaning he only had to spend one year at Point Puer. His ticket of leave was issued on January 20th, 1846, and he was assigned to work in Hobart Town. James Chard’s life proceeded smoothly, and he was recommended for a conditional pardon on December 1st, 1846. Unfortunately, the administrative process was delayed due to two turbulent years marked by controversy over the failure of the Convict Probation system and a constitutional crisis that led to Lieutenant-Governor Sir John Eardley-Wilmot, who had established the system, being removed from office. |
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| James Chard's Prison Record. Ticket of leave granted on the December 1st 1846 and freedom on November 30th 1847. Image courtesy of Libraries Tasmania. |
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| James Chard's Conditional Pardon. The condition being that he could not be ever found in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Published in Hobart's Colonial Times, Tuesday 7 December 1847. |
Having served almost 2 years in the colonial penal system, eighteen year old James Atkins Chard was a free man. |
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