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Over the next few months I am going to publish a series of short historical biograpahies of selected infdividuals who are all of some interest to me, beginning with my convict ancestor William Mallett (1797-1852). I hope you find them as intriguing as I do - CWM.
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William Mallett was 18 years old when he was arrested for burglary in Penryn, Cornwall in 1815. (1) In the morning of 16 November, William was observed leaving the Anchor Inn and heading in the direction of the nearby custom house. William was pursued by the owner, Henry Plint, to a docked vessel at the Quay, the Commerce. Located hiding in the forecastle he was found in possession of a silver teaspoon which Plint asserted was his property. On 25 March 1816, William was tried for burglary and robbery at the Cornwall Assizes, Launceston before Sir Robert Graham and James Allan Park and sentenced to death. (2) Fortunately for William, his sentence was subsequently reprieved. (3) When he was received aboard the hulk Leviathan on 24 May 1816 he had turned 19 and his sentence had been commuted to ‘Life’. (4) William was described as a shoemaker, and being 5 foot 7 inches in height, having a dark complexion with brown hair and hazel eyes. (5) He was variously listed as William Mallett junior or William Mallett the younger. (6) He was transported via the Fame, departing from Spithead, London on 9 October 1816. The Fame arrived in Sydney on 8 March 1817. (7)
Before
transportation to New South Wales ceased in 1840, the ‘worst characters’ were
often transferred to Van Diemen’s Land. (8) William was indeed
transferred to Hobart Town, Van Diemen’s Land via the Pilot on 11
September 1817 along with 104 other male convicts. (9) His identifying police
number was 42. (10) Over the next several years William began to improve his life in Van Diemen’s Land
and impress as a participant in the ‘assignment system’. This system was
designed to provide cheap labour to the emerging colonial economy as well as
provide a reformative influence to the convict population.(11) Even so, William experienced
his first rematch with authority in 1823: while working on a ticket of leave, he
was charged with stealing tools from a Doctor McNab and on the 29 March he was
fined 3 pounds. (12) He married convict Jane Brickhill at St. John’s Church, Launceston on 9
September 1828.(13) Between July 1828 and May 1830, William was working for settler Andrew Barclay on
a Ticket-of-Leave. (14) He likely participated in
Governor Arthur’s infamous black line project which was compulsory for all
convicts who had been granted a ticket of leave. (15) When three of William and
Jane’s children were baptised together in the Christchurch Parish at 'Camperdown' on 3 October 1832, he listed his occupation as ‘Fencer’. (16) William’s conduct record
indicates that he was granted a conditional pardon (No. 379) on 21 August 1832. (17)
However,
by the end of the decade, William’s life was to suffer a significant setback. On
20 October 1837, William was found in possession of £20 worth of bank notes
belonging to a Michael Connolly of Launceston. Connolly had just received a
large quantity of bank notes from the Tamar Bank in Launceston, dropped some on
his way home and realising his mistake, turned back to see a boy running away
with a handful of them. He followed the boy home inside found the boy’s father,
William, holding the notes. (18) William
was charged with stealing and sentenced on 3 Jan 1838 to seven years
transportation with two years of his sentence to be served at Port Arthur Penal
Station. (19) Established in 1830 as a place of secondary punishment for recidivists, Port
Arthur employed convicts in timber felling, milling and coal mining. While not
as austere as Macquarie Harbour and Norfolk Island, discipline could be still
be strict. (20) William was officially punished three times during his sentence, including being
confined on bread and water for being found ‘improperly in possession of
potatoes’ on 4 July 1839. (21)
William’s
conviction had a severe impact on his family, although there are indications
that there were pre-existing tensions in his marriage. In December 1830, William
reported Jane for being absent and drunk and she was sentenced to 10 days
solitary confinement on bread and water. While also pregnant with their last
child, Jane was also charged with being complicit in the Connolly affair but avoided
conviction. (22) Although he was the second eldest son, William’s namesake was the only child placed
in Queen’s Orphanage in New Town following the conviction. (23) Their last child, Joseph, died aged two months
of a ‘visitation by God’ and was buried in March 1838 in the Anglican cemetery
in Cypress Street, Launceston. (24) Over the next few years
there was an exodus of their surviving children to colony of Victoria: the
eldest son George was the first to transfer to Portland in 1840 (and again in
1842); the younger surviving children James and Thomas were employed by the
Henty family and travelled there in 1841. (25) There are indications
that Jane may have struggled to cope with increased poverty, increasing
drunkenness, often finding herself at odds with the local police. (26) Following William’s
second conviction, between 1838 and 1846, Tardif reports that Jane was charged
on no less than 17 occasions for drunkenness or obscene language or both! (27) Although she departed for
Port Fairy, Victoria in 1848, she may have returned and been the ‘Jane Mullett’,
servant, who died in Launceston in 1853. (28)
Over
the next several years, William progressed through the system for the second
time. His second sentence had coincided with the instigation of the probation
system. Although this system claimed to be just and be designed to reward good
conduct, it insisted that prisoners be treated according to the severity of
their sentence and be subjected to successive stages of punishment utilising
such methods as solitary confinement and hard labour which overall contributed
to ‘increased misery’. (29) In April 1842 he was
discovered drunk and out after hours and sentenced to 6 days solitary
confinement. He was granted a ticket of leave on 10 March 1843. The following
October he was reported for visiting a public house and absenting himself
without leave for 10 days. William’s journey through the judicial system
finally ended when his conditional pardon was extended on 21 October 1845. (30) Little is known of
William’s later years regarding his personal productivity and independence but
when he died in 1853, the informant was his daughter-in-law, Ann Mallett, who
have her address as Bourke Street, Launceston. Although only 54, he had survived
the transportation system twice, so he may have been ailing and in the care of what
was left of his family. (31) William was buried from
the colonial hospital in the Anglican cemetery at Cypress Street, Launceston,
perhaps near the remains of his wife and their last child together. (32)
Endnotes
(1) ‘Cornwall Assizes’, Royal Cornwall Gazette, Falmouth Packet and Plymouth Journal (Truro, England), Issue 664, 16 March 1816, p 2, British Library Newspapers, accessed 24 May 2023.
(2) ‘Second Day’, Royal Cornwall Gazette, Falmouth Packet and Plymouth Journal (Truro, England), Issue 667, Thursday 6 April 1816, p 4, British Library Newspapers, accessed 24 May 2023.
(3) ‘Multiple News Items’, Royal Cornwall Gazette, Falmouth Packet and Plymouth Journal, Issue 666, Thursday 30 March 1816, p 2, British Newspapers, accessed 24 May 2023.
(4) Hulk record for William Mallett, The National Archives (UK): Home Office; Convict Prison Hulk Registers and Letter Books, HO9/8, 1802-1849, hulk register no. 3295, Ancestry.com, accessed 7 June 2023.
(5) State Archives NSW: New South Wales Government; Bound manuscript indents, NRS12188 4/4005 1788-1842, Ancestry.com, accessed 7 June 2023.
(6) ‘Cornwall Assizes’ & Criminal register for William Mallett junior, The National Archives (UK): Home Office; Criminal Registers for England and Wales, HO27/12 1791-1892, p 96, accessed 7 June 2023 & Transportation register for William Mallett the younger, The National Archives (UK): Home Office; Convict Transportation Registers, HO11/2 1791-1868, Ancestry.com, accessed 2 June 2023. He was even referred to once as Hugh Mallett but that was clearly an error: ‘Multiple News Items’.
(7) The Fame was 464 ton and built at Quebec in 1812. The Ship’s Master was Henry Dale and Surgeon was John Mortimer. The voyage lasted 150 days, transporting 200 male convicts among whom there were 2 deaths. See: Charles Bateson, The Convict Ships 1787-1868, Library of Australian History, North Sydney, 2004, pp 340,382.
(8) David T. Hawkings, Bound for Australia, Phillimore & Co. Ltd., Chichester, Sussex, 1987, p 2.
(9) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment Lists and associated papers, CON 13-1-1 1812-1859, p 96, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON13-1-1$init=CON13-1-1P85 , accessed 7 June 2023.
(10) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON31-1-29$init=CON31-1-29P18 , accessed 7 June 2023.
(11) Richard Tuffin, ‘Assignment’, Companion to Tasmania History online, https://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/A/Assignment.htm , accessed 23 May 2023.
(12) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON31-1-29$init=CON31-1-29P18 , accessed 7 June 2023. This could have been Alexander McNab who was granted land on the island. Refer to: Land grant for Alexander McNab, granted 30 June 1823, State Records Authority New South Wales: New South Wales Government; New South Wales various Land Records, Fiche 3262 4/438 1788-1963, p 63, Ancestry.com, accessed 7 June 2023.
(13) Tasmanian Archives: Register General’s Department, Registers of Marriage (Pre Civil Registration), RGD 36/1/1, no. 1185, https://stors.tas.gov.au/NI/818391 , accessed 7 June 2023. Jane Brickhill’s own background and convict career is documented in Philip Tardif’s Notorious Strumpets and Dangerous Girls, Convict Women in Van Diemen’s Land 1820-1829, Angus and Robertson, North Ryde, 1990, pp 849-850.
(14) Register of passes to travel granted to William Mallett, 9 July 1829 & 8 May 1830, Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Passenger and Land Records, CON 81-1-1 1828-1833, Ancestry.com, accessed 7 June 2023 & G. H. Stancombe, ‘Andrew Barclay (1759-1839)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography online, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/barclay-andrew-1739 , accessed 18 May 2023.
(15) Lyndall Ryan, ‘The Black Line in Tasmania: success or failure?’, Journal of Australian Studies, 2013, 37(1):3-11, p 11, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14443058.2012.755744 , accessed 18 May 2023. Ryan informs us that all convicts granted a ticket of leave were ordered to take part unless they could afford to provide a substitute. Of the 2200 men who took part in the operation it is estimated that 700 were convicts.
(16) Baptisms of George, William and Elizabeth Mallett, baptised 3 October 1832, Christchurch Parish Register, Longford, Tasmania, Australia, No. 98-100.
(17) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON31-1-29$init=CON31-1-29P18 , accessed 7 June 2023. The pardon though does not appear to have been gazetted until 1835. See: ‘Classified Advertising’, Hobart Town Courier, 30 January 1835, p 4, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article4181902 , accessed 24 May 2023.
(18) ‘Quarter Sessions’, Cornwall Chronicle (Tasmania), 6 January 1838, p 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article65950265 , accessed 24 May 2023. Connolly found four in William’s hand and four more under his hat! In his defence, William reportedly told Connolly he was intending to use the notes to make a kite for the boy!! The boy in question was likely William’s namesake who had been born in 1830.
(19) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON31-1-29$init=CON31-1-29P18 , accessed 7 June 2023. Connolly was a local entrepreneur who part owned a shipping agency that imported sheep and cattle and facilitated sealing and whaling. See: Author Unknown, ‘Griffiths, Jonathan (1773-1839)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography online https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/griffiths-jonathan-2128 , accessed 23 May 2023. Money appears to have continued to slip through his grasp as he was declared insolvent in 1843: ’Advertising’, Launceston Courier (Tasmania), 27 March 1843, p 5, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article84674158 , accessed 24 May 2023.
(20) Lloyd Robson & Michael Roe, A Short History of Tasmania, Oxford University Press, South Melbourne, 1997, pp 15-16.
(21) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON31-1-29$init=CON31-1-29P18 , accessed 7 June 2023.
(22) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Comprehensive Registers of Convicts, Supplementary Conduct Registers, CON 40-1-1 1828-1853, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON40-1-1$init=CON40-1-1P115, accessed 7 June 2023.
(23) While he is not named in any surviving court documents or in the press coverage, William junior may have been placed in the orphanage as a punishment. Tasmanian Archives: Kings/Queens Orphans Schools; Register of Children Admitted and Discharged from the Male and Female Orphan School, SWD 28 1828-1863, orphan no. 3388.
(24) Tasmanian Archives: Register-General’s Department; Register of Burials in Tasmania, RGD34/1/1 1803-1933, no. 5527, https://stors.tas.gov.au/NI/1181125 , accessed 7 June 2023 & Diane Cassidy, Cypress Street Cemetery, self-published, Launceston, 2018, p 99.
(25) Tasmanian Archives: Colonial Secretary’s Office; George Town Port Officer’s Semi-Weekly Reports, CSO 95-1-1 1837-1847 pp 30, 129 & Courier, 13 August 1841, p 2. James Mallett’s recollections of arriving as a boy in Portland were recorded in his dotage in 1896. See: Bunt, ‘Pioneers of the West’, Casterton News, 20 April 1896, http://www.swvic.org/merino/mallett.htm , accessed 23 May 2023. It not known what happened to William and Jane’s daughter Elizabeth born 1832 and it’s assumed she had died, perhaps before they settled in Launceston.
(26) Jane was described as a ‘regular visitor to the police’ in ‘Police Report’, Cornwall Chronicle (Tasmania), 13 March 1844, p 2, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66017630 , accessed 24 May 2023 and as having ‘an extraordinary taste for distilled waters’ in ‘Police Report’, Cornwall Chronicle (Tasmania), 11 December 1844, p 2, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66270795 , accessed 24 May 2023.
(27) Philip Tardif, Notorious Strumpets and Dangerous Girls, Convict Women in Van Diemen’s Land 1820-1829, Angus and Robertson, North Ryde, 1990, p 850.
(28) Tasmanian Archives: George Town Police; Returns of crews and passengers on ships departing from Launceston, POL 220-1-1 1848-1854, p 4, https://stors.tas.gov.au/NI/578848 accessed 7 June 2023 (listed as arriving via Providence and being free by servitude) & Tasmanian Archives: Register General’s Department; Registers of Hobart deaths and Launceston and country districts deaths, RGD35/1/22, no. 980, https://stors.tas.gov.au/NI/1195526 , accessed 2 June 2023.
(29) Michael Sprod, ‘Probation system’, Companion to Tasmania History online, https://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/P/Probation%20system.htm accessed 18 May 2023.
(30) Tasmanian Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843, https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON31-1-29$init=CON31-1-29P18 , accessed 7 June 2023.
(31) It’s not known exactly how Ann was William’s daughter-in-law. It possible that while his son James prospered in Victoria, their son Thomas born around 1833 may have returned at some point to the island and she may have been his wife. A Thomas Mallett born around this time experienced a struggling life as an alcoholic and spent time in prison before he reformed and became a loved and trusted employee of the Shaw family of Castra Road, Ulverstone, dying in 1904. See: ‘Police Court’, Launceston Examiner, 14 September 1869, p 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article36705936 accessed 24 May 2023; North West Advocate and Emu Bay Times, 7 July 1904, p 2, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article64663824 accessed 24 May 2023; Kathleen Cocker, Early Houses of the North West Coast of Tasmania, E. H. Stancombe, Western Junction, 1984, p 66 & Tasmanian Archives, BDM registers; 1707/1904.
(32) Tasmanian Archives: Register General’s Department; Registers of Hobart deaths, Launceston and Country districts deaths, RGD 35-1-17, p 530, https://stors.tas.gov.au/RGD35-1-17P17 , accessed 7 June 2023 & Diane Cassidy, Cypress Street Cemetery, self-published, Launceston, 2018, p 99.
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Archives:
Ancestry.com,
Bound manuscript indents,
NRS12188 4/4005 1788-1842.
Ancestry.com, Convict Prison
Hulk Registers and Letter Books, HO9/8, 1802-1849.
Ancestry.com,
Convict Transportation Registers, HO11/2 1791-1868.
Ancestry.com,
Criminal Registers for England and Wales, HO27/12 1791-1892.
Ancestry.com, New South Wales
various Land Records, Fiche 3262
4/438 1788-1963
1788-1963.
Ancestry.com, Passenger and
Land Records, CON 81-1-1 1828-1833.
Christchurch
Parish Register, Longford, Tasmania, Australia.
Tasmanian
Archives: Colonial Secretary’s Office; George Town Port Officer’s Semi-Weekly
Reports, CSO 95-1-1 1837-1847.
Tasmanian
Archives: Convict Department; Assignment Lists and associated papers, CON 13-1-1 1812-1859.
Tasmanian
Archives: Convict Department; Assignment system – male convicts, CON 31-1-29 1803-1843.
Tasmanian
Archives: Convict Department; Comprehensive Registers of Convicts, Supplementary
Conduct Registers, CON 40-1-1 1828-1853.
Tasmanian
Archives: George Town Police; Returns of crews and passengers on ships
departing from Launceston, POL 220-1-1 1848-1854.
Tasmanian
Archives: Kings/Queens Orphans Schools;
Register of Children Admitted and Discharged from the Male and Female Orphan
School, SWD 28 1828-1863.
Tasmanian
Archives: Register-General’s Department; Register of Burials in Tasmania,
RGD34/1/1 1803-1933.
Tasmanian
Archives: Register General’s Department; Registers of Hobart deaths, Launceston
and Country districts deaths, RGD 35-1-17.
Tasmanian
Archives: Register General’s Department; Registers of Hobart deaths and Launceston
and Country districts deaths, RGD35/1/22.
Tasmanian
Archives: Register General’s Department, Registers of Marriage (Pre Civil
Registration), RGD 36/1/1.
Newspapers:
Casterton
News
Cornwall Chronicle (Tasmania)
Hobart Town Courier
Launceston Courier (Tasmania)
Launceston Examiner (Tasmania)
North
West Advocate and Emu Bay Times
Royal Cornwall Gazette,
Falmouth Packet and Plymouth Journal (Truro, England)
Secondary
Sources
Books:
Bateson, Charles, The
Convict Ships 1787-1868, Library of Australian History, North Sydney, 2004.
Cassidy,
Diane, Cypress Street Cemetery, self-published, Launceston, 2018.
Cocker,
Kathleen, Early Houses of the North West Coast of Tasmania, E. H.
Stancombe, Western Junction, 1984.
Hawkings,
David T., Bound for Australia, Phillimore & Co. Ltd., Chichester,
Sussex, 1987.
Robson,
Lloyd & Roe, Michael, A Short History of Tasmania, Oxford University
Press, South Melbourne, 1997.
Tardif,
Phillip, Notorious Strumpets and Dangerous Girls, Convict Women in Van
Diemen’s Land 1820-1829, Angus and Robertson, North Ryde, 1990.
Journal
Articles:
Ryan,
Lyndall, ‘The Black Line in Tasmania: success or failure?’, Journal of
Australian Studies, 2013, 37(1):3-18, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14443058.2012.755744,
accessed 18 May 2023.
Online Sources
‘Griffiths, Jonathan (1773-1839)’, Australian
Dictionary of Biography online, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/griffiths-jonathan-2128,
accessed on 23 May 2023.
Sprod, Michael,
‘Probation system’, Companion to Tasmania History online, https://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/P/Probation%20system.htm, accessed on 18 May 2023.
Stancombe, G. H., ‘Andrew Barclay (1759-1839)’, Australian
Dictionary of Biography online, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/barclay-andrew-1739 ,
accessed 18 May 2023.
Tuffin, Richard, ‘Assignment’,
Companion to Tasmania History online, https://www.utas.edu.au/library/companion_to_tasmanian_history/A/Assignment.htm, accessed on 23 May 2023.
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