Tales from the Quarterdeck

Category: Pirates

  • Who Robbed the Nelson gold ship?

    The Nelson Gold Robbery. The World’s News, 5 Aug 1950, p. 9.

    In April 1852, thieves stole a gold shipment bound for London from the barque Nelson anchored at Hobson’s Bay, Melbourne.  Arguably, it ranks among Australia’s largest robberies, as the gang got away with some £24,000 worth of gold weighing an astonishing 8,100 ounces, or 250 kg. That amount of gold would be worth around $50 million today in Australian currency.

    I wrote a blog about it back in 2024, but the story kept playing on my mind. I figured there was more to discover than I had then unearthed. The writer Marcus Clarke, author of “For the Term of His Natural Life,” wrote an article for the Sydney Morning Herald in 1879 where he outlined the basic facts, added some literary flourishes that could not have been true and proclaimed that, after the passage of 27 years, “it is now unlikely that the true story of the Nelson gold robbery will ever be told.”

    Well. Challenge accepted. I started digging through Trove’s digitised newspaper archives among other sources and came across several clues that shed light on who might have been behind the robbery. After the passage of 175 years, I might just have something approximating the truth.

    Ships, deserted by their crews, lying in Hobson’s Bay, By E Thomas.

    To quickly rehash my original blog: around 1.30 on the morning of Friday 2 April 1851, a gang of thieves climbed aboard the Nelson, overpowered the crew, and made off with the gold after locking everyone in the lazarette.   The plan worked flawlessly but for someone accidentally shooting the Nelson’s first officer, Henry Draper, in the leg.

    But most of the robbers quickly realised stealing the gold was the easy part. Getting away with the heist and holding onto their ill-gotten gains would prove far more challenging.

    Embarrassed that such an audacious crime was carried out right under their noses, the police rounded up scores of petty criminals and vagrants in the days that followed, hoping they would net the culprits.

    Then, only days later, constables swooped on seven of the robbers who were living it up in Geelong, a short 60 km from where the robbery had taken place. Police arrested four at the Ocean Child on Geelong’s outskirts, while two others were apprehended at the Union Inn moments before they left to join their mates. A pair of mounted troopers caught the seventh on the road shortly after.  He had been galloping towards the Ocean Child most likely to warn his mates of the arrests at the Union Inn.1

    Dan Fegan and Stephen Rawlings, two more robbers, travelled cross-country towards the South Australian border, but were caught in Portland while awaiting a ship to take them the rest of the way to Adelaide. Their undoing seems similar to that of their comrades in Geelong. As the Geelong Advertiser would report, “Every part of their apparel indicated something unnatural; their clothes new and unsuited to their station; … and on the line of road they came, they appear to have left an impression that they had formed two belonging to the gang of the Nelson robbers.”2

    The Argus 3 Apr 1852, p. 5.

    Of the nine detained, four faced court and only three were found guilty. James Morgan, James Duncan and Stephen Rawlings (aka Fox) would all be identified by one or other of the officers on the Nelson at the time of the robbery and sentenced to 15 years’ hard labour. A jury found insufficient evidence to convict Dan Fegan (aka William Smith).

    The other members of the gang who were arrested – James Grimes, John Hutchinson, Tom Quin, William Barnes, James Ball – were eventually released without charge.   However, the money they had on them, amounting to some £3,000 in total, was confiscated. A further £1,200 was taken from Rawlings and Fegan. That amounted to little more than 15 per cent of what had been stolen. The remainder was never recovered, and that begs the question: where did it go?

    For years, rumours swirled around Melbourne speculating on who else might have been involved in the robbery. After all, some £20,000 worth of gold was still unaccounted for.  One persistent rumour suggested that one or more of Melbourne’s more prominent citizens had orchestrated the robbery and had benefited enormously from it.

    Then, a light fell on the robbers’ inner workings from a very surprising source. Owen Suffolk, an educated man who befriended the Nelson robbers while serving time in Pentridge Prison, later wrote that an escaped convict named Dan Fegan (aka William Smith) had led the gang.    He was going by the name William Smith when he was captured in Portland, and later stood trial for the robbery. He would eventually be released for lack of evidence, but he was returned to Tasmania to stand trial for absconding. A search of Convict Records and the Tasmanian Archive confirms his existence.3

    Apparently, Fegan had learned from an ex-convict who had done carpentry work on the Nelson that the gold had recently been loaded onto the barque and that it was only lightly crewed. Realising the ship could sail any day, Fegan hastily got to work. According to Suffolk, the robbery was planned, and the robbers set out for the Nelson from an unnamed Melbourne public house. He also wrote that Duncan and Morgan were recruited as last-minute replacements for two gang members who had failed to turn up for the robbery.4

    The Sun, 30 May 1948, p. 3.

    So far, nine robbers have been identified. Suffolk says ten were in on the robbery. Other estimates ranged as high as 20 or more. But the balance of evidence suggests that the gang likely numbered about a dozen. The rest were hired to row the robbers out to the Nelson. Whether they were paid for their services or received a cut of the loot is anyone’s guess.

    One important name, however, is missing from the list of suspects: the “prominent citizen” rumoured to have taken part.    While Suffolk did not name the public house where the robbery was planned, and the robbers set out from, others have.

    For instance, Edmund Finn, writing as Garryowen in Chronicles of Early Melbourne, published in 1888, claims the Nelson robbery was planned at the Woolpack Inn. And he is not alone in linking the same pub to the robbery. At the time, John Milton Dascombe owned and ran that establishment.

    Dascombe is a very interesting character in this saga. He had served several years in Pentonville Prison in England before being exiled to Melbourne in 1846. Over the next five years, his fortunes and social standing rose quickly in his adopted home, and by late 1851 he was the proud proprietor of the Woolpack Inn. In that class-conscious era, that was no small achievement for a former “Pentonvillian.” After the robbery, Dascombe suddenly appears flush with money. He bought several more properties around Melbourne, including a prestigious commercial building on Collins Street. He later sold the Woolpack Inn and took his family to England, where he settled in the upmarket suburb of St John’s Wood in London. Dascombe was never charged in connection with the robbery, but a short while after his death in 1868, speculation arose that the missing proceeds from the Nelson gold robbery might yet be recovered.5

    In Fool’s Gold, I have taken the known facts and woven them together with the rumours and a degree of literary licence to tell the story of one of Australia’s greatest robberies.

    SOURCES

    1. See The Argus 10 April 1852, p.4.
    2. See Geelong Advertiser 20 Apr 1852, p. 2.
    3. Tasmanian Archives: Daniel Fegan convict conduct record – CON33-1-36 p. 84.  Fegan’s conduct record shows he absconded from Van Diemen’s Land before the robbery and was sent back shortly after.  
    4. See The Australasian, 5 Oct 1867, p. 5.
    5. See The Argus 14 Mar 1872, p. 5.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2026.

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  • The Frederick: Stealing the Ship That Never Was

    Example of a merchant Brig of the era. (Water colours by Frederic Roux 1827-1828)

    By December 1833, the penal settlement at Macquarie Harbour in southwest Tasmania was all but deserted.   Only a dozen convicts remained to complete the 120-ton brig Frederick.   She would be the last of nearly 100 vessels to be built there.   Once launched, they were supposed to sail her around to the newly established station at Port Arthur.   However, ten of the convicts had a much more distant destination in mind.

    But, to seize the ship involved overpowering the soldiers and officers left behind to watch over them.   Tackling armed men with just bare hands was daunting, but they had a plan.   One of the convicts, John Barker, happened to be a master blacksmith.   He manufactured two flintlock pistols using discarded scraps of metal and a musket barrel found in the blacksmith shop.   He also forged a pair of tomahawks to add to their small arsenal.  

    The Frederick was finished on 10 January 1834, and at 10 am the next day they set sail.   Captain Taw sailed down the length of Macquarie Harbour but dropped anchor inside the heads.   He judged the weather too foul to safely pass through the narrow passage of Hells Gate and out to sea.    So they waited.   Then, on Monday, 13 January, the wind eased, signalling their imminent departure.    

    For the ten convicts, the time to strike had arrived.    If they did not seize the ship now, they likely never would.    However, they were up against nine men, seven of whom were armed. 

    Then, good fortune smiled upon them, and the odds shifted in their favour.   Two of the soldiers went fishing and took a boat out with a convict at the oars.     He was one of two prisoners not in on the plan.   So, with them gone, nine had been reduced to six.     

    Boat building Yard on Sarah Island, Macquarie Harbour by William Gould, 1833, Courtesy State Library of NSW.

    Around 6 o’clock in the evening, a prisoner beckoned a sentry to join him by the forecastle hatchway.   When the unsuspecting soldier obliged, he was jabbed in the chest with one of Barker’s pistols and ordered down the ladder into the crew’s cabin.   Meanwhile, two other convicts armed with hatchets pounce on the only other two men on deck.  They subdued the remaining soldier and the terrified mate, bundling them too into the forecastle cabin.   A convict stood guard, and a heavy kedge anchor was dragged across the hatchway cover in case they tried to escape.   The convicts now had control of the deck.   Three men were confined in the forecastle, and another three were out fishing, oblivious to what was unfolding on the Frederick.    This just left Captain Taw, David Hoy the shipyard supervisor, and the convict steward William Nicholls.   All were in the captain’s cabin

    The convicts, now armed with the soldiers’ muskets, were ready to confront the last men standing between them and liberty.   Three men stormed down the ladder and attacked Captain Taw and the others, hoping to quickly get the best of them.   However, Taw and Hoy fought back.   Hoy wrestled a pistol from one of the convicts, and the attackers retreated back up the ladder, leaving Taw, Hoy and Nicholls trapped in the cabin, bloodied and bruised from the brief but violent encounter.

    Taw and Hoy were trapped in the cabin.   The convicts would pay dearly if they attacked again, but the captain knew he could not retake the ship.   They were at a stalemate.   But Captain Taw had one small bargaining chip.   He had possession of the Frederick’s navigation instruments, items the convicts would need to escape.  The impasse lasted about ninety minutes, with occasional shots fired through the cabin’s skylight and each side calling for the other to surrender.  

    The Globe (London), 9 Jul 1834, p. 4.

    Around 7.30 in the evening, someone called for the pitch pot to be brought over and threatened to empty its boiling contents into the cabin if the trio did not immediately surrender.    Hoy and Taw agreed there was nothing to be gained by holding out any longer and gave themselves up.  

    Meanwhile, the fishing party had returned to the brig after hearing gunfire, only to find the prisoners already in charge.   The rest of Frederick’s men joined them in the boat, and they were sent ashore with half the ship’s provisions.

    Taw and Hoy assessed their situation.    There was plenty of food, so they would not be going hungry any time soon.    However, how long would it be before a ship was sent to investigate the whereabouts of the Frederick?     Taw had no intention of waiting to find out.   They set off on foot for the nearest settlement, 150 kilometres away.  It would take Taw over two weeks to eventually reach Hobart to report the incident.

    In those two weeks, the mutineers did not waste any time making good their escape. James Porter, one of the convicts, wrote the only record of what happened to the Frederick next.  

    Porter was not a typical convict transported to Australia.    For a start, he was born into a respectable middle-class family.  When he was 12, he dropped out of school and, by his own account, began mixing with the wrong kind of people.   Porter soon got himself in trouble with the law, but his father pulled some strings, and the charges were dropped.   However, to prevent Porter from getting into any more trouble, he was sent to sea to serve an apprenticeship and found himself bound for Rio de Janeiro.   

    So began his career as a seaman.   After changing ships several times, Porter claimed he had spent 12 months on the armed schooner Liberta helping the Chileans win their independence from Spanish rule.   However, by late 1821, he had had enough of life in South America and returned to England. 

    A year later, Porter was caught breaking into a house and was transported to Van Diemen’s Land for life.   He landed in Hobart in January 1824 but was soon caught stealing and sent to Macquarie Harbour.   

    When he was chosen to remain behind to finish work on the Frederick, a plan started to take shape in his mind, and South America once again beckoned.   His companions comprised a mix of experienced seamen like himself, shipwrights and the blacksmith John   Barker who had been schooled in celestial navigation, though he proved to be no seafarer.

    The Frederick was sailed from Macquarie Harbour to South America where it was left to sink. Courtesy Google Maps.

    The Frederick no sooner made it out to sea when the wind freshened to a heavy gale.      It blew hard with mountainous seas for the next nine days as they bore south, then east under much-reduced canvas.   The burden of sailing fell heavily on the shoulders of the seasoned sailors.   The rest of the men, unused to such sea conditions, rarely left their bunks, suffering severely from sea sickness.    Barker was particularly prone to the malady, only coming on deck periodically to make observations and plot their course.  

    After being at sea for about three weeks with few opportunities to take observations, Barker found they had strayed too far south into the dangerous icy waters of the “Furious Fifties”.   He set a northeasterly course for the helmsmen and then retired to his quarters again.   Shortly after this, their voyage nearly came to an end when the Frederick was heeled over on her side by a powerful wind gust.  

    Fortunately, the ship righted herself once the canvas had been brought in.      Then, about six weeks out, they spotted land for the first time since leaving Tasmania.  They had sailed nearly 5,400 nautical miles (10,000 km) and arrived off the coast of South America.  

    On 27 February, they boarded the longboat and left the Frederick to sink as, by now, she was taking on a lot of water.    The next morning, they made landfall near the mouth of the Rio Bueno in Chile.       A week later, they arrived at the provincial capital of Valdivia, where they were promptly thrown in gaol for entering the country in a “clandestine manner.” 

    It was obvious to the Chilean officials that the men claiming to be shipwrecked sailors were not what they claimed to be.   Now that they were behind bars and facing an uncertain future, Porter and his comrades decided to admit to being runaway convicts and beg the Governor for asylum.  

    Illustration of a brig. Source: Nautical Dictionary by Arthur Young, published in 1863.

    They found a sympathetic ear in Governor Sanchez, and he agreed to petition the President of Chile in Santiago on their behalf.    They were released from gaol after promising not to leave town.   All ten men found work at the local shipbuilding yard, where their skills were much in demand.   As time passed, they settled into their new lives and felt their troubles had been put behind them.  

    But the British Consul in Santiago had learned of their presence in Valdivia unbeknownst to Porter and his colleagues.   He, in turn, had called on the Royal Navy to dispatch a ship to apprehend the runaways.   

    Eight months later, in February 1835, HMS Blonde dropped anchor at the mouth of the Valdivia River to collect the runaway convicts.   However, Governor Sanchez refused to hand them over, and the British warship left empty-handed.   While Porter and the others had avoided arrest this time, it was clear to them that the British knew where they were.  

    Life settled back into its regular routines until a few months later, when Governor Sanchez was replaced by a man far less sympathetic to the runaway convicts.    Within a month, three of the convicts departed on a merchant ship bound for North America.   Then Barker and two others left in the dead of night in a whaleboat they had been building for the new governor.    The governor was furious and gaoled Porter and the other three until they could be handed over to the Royal Navy.

    They were put on board the next British warship that stopped at Valdivia and returned to England.   As they had escaped from Van Diemen’s Land, it was decided to return them there to stand trial for piracy.   They arrived back in Hobart on 29 Mar 1837 after an absence of more than three years.  

    In a novel legal argument, Porter contended that because the Frederick had never been officially registered, it could not be considered a ship.  Instead, it was just a collection of timber, ropes, canvas and such like, which just happened to resemble a brig.    Consequently, he argued, they could not be found guilty of piracy.    The jury was unconvinced, and after 30 minutes of deliberation, they returned a guilty verdict, and the four men were banished to Norfolk Island for life.    

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2025.

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  • William Swallow and the 1829 Cyprus mutiny

    Detail reputedly showing the brig Cyprus (centre) from a panorama of Hobart 1828 – watercolour drawings by Augustus Earle, Courtesy State Library of NSW.

       In August 1829, the brig Cyprus sailed from Hobart bound for Macquarie Harbour with provisions and 31 convicts sentenced to serve hard labour at that infamous penal settlement. However, while windbound at Recherche Bay in Tasmania’s south, the prisoners rose up, overpowered their guards and seized control of the ship. Thus began one of the most extraordinary escapes of Australia’s convict era.

       Their leader was a 37-year-old convict named William Swallow. He was likely the only man among the prisoners who had any seagoing experience, so in true pirate tradition, the men voted for him to be their captain. Swallow had once earned a living as a seaman on colliers plying England’s coastal waters. That was until he tired of the seagoing life and found it was more lucrative to break into portside houses or ships moored in harbour. He finally came undone when the police suspected him of being involved in several recent burglaries and raided his house. A large haul of stolen property was found in the house, and Swallow was whisked off to gaol. This took place in 1821 when Swallow was going by the name William Walker. He was found guilty of housebreaking and sentenced to be transported to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) for seven years.

       William Swallow, however, had no intention of going quietly, leaving his wife and three children to fend for themselves. His first attempt to escape took place even before he had left England. He and a fellow prisoner jumped from the ship carrying them to the prison hulks to await the next Australia-bound convict transport.  His mate drowned in the attempt, but Swallow survived and returned to his hometown. However, he was quickly recaptured and charged with returning from transportation. This time, he was loaded on a ship and sent to Van Diemen’s Land.  

    Swallow made a second attempt to escape eight months after arriving in Hobart. He and three other convicts seized a small schooner, crossed Bass Strait and made it to within 80 kilometres of Sydney before they ran aground and were taken back into custody. Swallow received 150 lashes and was sentenced to serve hard labour at Macquarie Harbour Penal Settlement. But he escaped again before ever setting foot in that much-feared hellhole. This time, he escaped from gaol and stowed away on a merchant ship bound for England. There, he lived free until being discovered in 1828. This time, he was sent to Van Diemen’s Land for life. But Swallow was still not ready to give up and accept his fate. Shortly after arriving back in Hobart, he stowed away on the very ship that had so recently brought him from England. By now, guards were masters at finding stowaways, and Swallow was taken off before it left port. He was flogged again and was on his way to Macquarie Harbour on the Cyprus when, in 1829, he and the other convicts seized the ship.

    A tranquil Recherche Bay in southern Tasmania in 2019. Photo CJ Ison.

       On 13 August, while the Cyprus was windbound in Recherche Bay, the convicts pounced, catching their guards by surprise and wresting control of the ship. They put the soldiers, captain and crew ashore and the following morning, hauled up the anchor, unfurled the sails and gave three hearty cheers as they got underway. The castaways would remain stranded in that remote and inhospitable corner of Tasmania for two weeks before they were discovered. That gave Swallow and his men ample time to get far away from Van Diemen’s Land before the alarm was raised.

       It was supposed by the authorities that the runaways would try to make their way across the Pacific, where they would scuttle the Cyprus and pass themselves off as shipwrecked sailors at some unsuspecting South American port. But Swallow and the others had another idea in mind as Van Diemen’s Land disappeared over the horizon behind them.

       The Cyprus was well stocked with food, for it carried sufficient supplies to see the Macquarie Harbour Penal Settlement through the coming winter months when it was all but cut off from the outside world. Swallow set a course to take them to New Zealand, where the men painted the vessel’s hull black and renamed her the Friends of Boston. Passing themselves off as an American-flagged ship, they then sailed north towards the Friendly Islands, known today as Tonga.

       However, this leg of their voyage was far from smooth sailing. One man was lost overboard during a powerful storm, and the common purpose that had seen the convicts unite to capture the brig had begun to dissipate. After they reached the island of Tongatapu, present-day Nukualofa, seven men chose to remain there when the Cyprus set sail. Swallow continued north across the equator and eventually reached southern Japan after an impressive voyage of nearly 12,500 km. They pulled into a sheltered bay on the island of Shikoku in January 1830, hoping to resupply with firewood and fresh water. However, at the time, Japan was unwelcoming of foreigners. Despite the language barriers, the Japanese made it clear that the Cyprus had to be gone by sunset; otherwise, it would be fired upon.

    A watercolour of what is beieved to be the Cyprus by low-ranking Samurai artist Makita Hamaguchi in documents from the Tokushima prefectural archive. CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59397258

       Swallow heeded the warning, hoping to resupply somewhere more friendly, but as the sun dipped towards the horizon, the wind dropped and the ship was becalmed. The Japanese coastal battery opened fire as they warned they would, and one of the cannonballs struck the vessel on the waterline. But before any more damage could be inflicted, a breeze sprang up, and Swallow wasted no time getting the ship underway. They followed the Ryukyu Island chain south before crossing the East China Sea, all the time taking on water.   

    In February 1830, the Cyprus was off the coast of China, near the estuary of the Pearl River (Zhu Jiang River). By now, the leak had worsened, and the pumps had to be manned constantly to keep the ship afloat. Several of the runaways had had enough and wanted to abandon the ship. However, Swallow wasn’t ready to give up on the Cyprus just yet, despite the risk of being discovered by British naval vessels in the area. He hoped they might repair the ship and soon be on their way. However, those wishing to go ashore went below and punched a hole in the hull. They then boarded a lifeboat and left the Cyprus to sink. Swallow and his few remaining loyalists could not stem the steady inflow of water and were forced to abandon the ship a few hours later in the remaining lifeboat and make their way to Canton (Guangzhou).

    View of the Canton factories by William Daniell, circa early 1800s. Courtesy British National Maritime Museum via Wikipedia.

       The unexpected arrival of British subjects in the trading enclave raised the interest of the local East India Company officials. William Swallow was asked to visit their offices, where he was questioned at length.

       As news of the seizure of Cyprus had yet to reach that port, Swallow passed himself off as Captain William Waldon and late master of the 200-ton English brig Edward. His story was a mixture of fact and fiction. He said that they had left London on 14 December 1828, bound for Rio de Janeiro and had then rounded Cape Horn and crossed the Pacific to Japan, where they were fired upon. The Edward, he said, had steadily taken on water as he tried to make for Manila, but his ship had finally foundered near Formosa (Taiwan).

       He told the East India Company officials that he and his crew had boarded two lifeboats and headed for the Chinese mainland, but on the way, he lost contact with the second boat. On the strength that Swallow, AKA Waldon, had a sextant engraved with the ship’s name in his possession, and he had arrived in a longboat bearing the name “Edward of London,” his story was accepted. The East India Company officials gave Swallow and his men free passage to London on a merchant ship about to depart from Canton. The escaped convicts might just have got away with the subterfuge but for a stroke of bad luck.

       A second boat arrived at the docks just days after they left. The men on that boat also claimed to be survivors from the Edward. But their version of the story was at odds with the one provided by Swallow. One of the new arrivals was immediately detained, but the rest fled Canton on an outbound ship one step ahead of the law. Then, two more men from the Cyprus turned up in Canton. They had been found on one of the Ryukyu islands and taken to Canton for questioning. When news of the seizure of the Cyprus finally reached the British enclave, the men in custody were questioned more closely, and they eventually confessed to who they were.

    A watercolour by samurai Makita Hamaguchi showing one of the mutineers. CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59845977

       A letter was dispatched to London on the next ship to leave, warning the police to be on the lookout for Swallow and the others. That ship arrived in London before Swallow, and the police were waiting. However, by pure luck, he had disembarked at Margate rather than travel up the River Thames to London.   The rest of Swallow’s travelling companions were arrested at the dock, and a couple of weeks later, Swallow was tracked down to a Lambeth boarding house, living under an assumed name.

       In October 1830, Swallow and four others stood trial for piracy. The jury found the others guilty as charged, but acquitted William Swallow after he convincingly pleaded that he had been forced to take part in the mutiny against his will. Although Swallow escaped punishment for piracy, there was still the matter of his returning to England illegally. He was once again sent to Van Diemen’s Land, where he died at Port Arthur Penal Settlement on 12 May 1834.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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  • The search for the Sydney Cove – 1797

    On the night of 2 October 1797, fourteen convicts stole a boat and made their way down the Paramatta River across Sydney harbour and out through the Heads.  When the men were discovered missing, the authorities sent boats in pursuit, but they returned a few days later, having never caught sight of the runaways.    As a storm had swept the area shortly after they had escaped, it was thought the bolters had died at sea.   However, that was no more than wishful thinking.    Their story is one of desperation, betrayal, and ultimately defeat.

    The runaways’ leaders were John Boroughbridge and Michael Gibson.   They had been labouring away in the back blocks of Paramatta when they convinced 12 other desperate men to join them in an audacious escape.    Their plan was to find the remains of the 250-ton Sydney Cove, a ship that had recently been wrecked somewhere far to the south of Sydney.   Boroughbridge and Gibson were sure they could build a new vessel from the timbers and fittings and make for some distant port far from the clutches of British law.   That the Sydney Cove had been carrying a massive cargo of rum and other alcoholic spirits added to its allure.

    Painting of Sydney, Port Jackson. circa 1804.

    Boroughbridge was serving 14 years for some unspecified crime and had landed in New South Wales only four months earlier and was keen to leave at the first opportunity.  Gibson had already spent five long years there, but with nine more to serve, he was no less eager to put the place behind him.     It seems they had little difficulty finding 12 others willing to join them.

    With nothing more than a small pocket compass and the knowledge that the wreck lay somewhere far to the south, they headed out through Sydney Heads and turned right.    A day or so later, the weather turned nasty, but Boroughbridge and his mates ploughed on.   Twice, their boat was driven ashore, and both times, they were lucky to avoid serious damage.  

    In time, the weather eased, and they continued following the coast and unknowingly strayed into Bass Strait.   In 1797, no one knew that a body of water separated Van Diemen’s Land from the rest of Australia.    All Boroughbridge and the others would have known was that the Sydney Cove was aground on an island somewhere off the coast.   They likely had no accurate idea how far they had come or how much further they had to go.   They certainly could not have known that they needed to cross 200 km of open water to reach the beached ship.   By now, the compass would have shown that they were heading in a south-westerly rather than southerly direction as they doggedly follow the contours of the coast.

    Finally, they ran out of food and fresh water.   In desperation, they put ashore on one of the small islands in the vicinity of Wilson’s Promontory.   There, they found a ready supply of fresh water, while seabirds and seals made easy prey for the starving men.    But, the trying conditions took their toll.   By now, many of the runaways would have gladly returned to Sydney to face any punishment short of death if it meant an end to their suffering.  

    Any sense of common purpose they may have once possessed had since evaporated.   They could not agree on what they should do next.   Should they stick to their original plan and continue searching for the elusive Sydney Cove?   Or should they abandon the search and head back north?   Then, one night, in a callous act of betrayal, Boroughbridge, Gibson and five others quietly set off in the boat, abandoning the rest of the men as they slept. 

    After leaving their comrades to their fate and giving up the search for the Sydney Cove, they returned north again.   Bypassing the entrance to Sydney Harbour, they continued on to the mouth of the Hawkesbury River, where it emptied into Broken Bay.   It cannot have been lost on the weary men that after three or four months on the run, they were now barely a day’s sailing from where they had started.   

    After months at sea, their boat was in such a derelict state that they did not trust it to carry them any further.    The men agreed they would continue sailing north, but to do so, they would have to find another boat.     They did not have long to wait.

    Boroughbridge and his men seized a passing vessel and set a course north. Their plan now was to make for Timor in the Dutch East Indies as William Bryant, his wife Mary and others had done some six years earlier.   News that Mary and some of the other runaways had reached England and been pardoned had only recently reached Sydney offering hope for anyone contemplating following in their wake.   

    Nothing more was heard of them for another couple of months.  Then, in late March 1798, they returned to Broken Bay and hailed down a passing boat.  Boroughbridge handed a letter to the boatswain asking him to deliver it to the NSW Governor.   The letter, signed by Boroughbridge, Gibson and three remaining runaways, claimed they wished to give themselves up and begged for clemency.   They wrote that they had sailed about 400 nautical miles (750 km) north, which would have put them on either Stradbroke or Moreton Island.   Then, they claimed, disaster struck.    When they tried to run ashore, their boat was caught in the surf and driven hard onto the beach, where it broke apart with the pounding of successive waves.   They were stranded on an inhospitable stretch of coast.   But all was not lost.   They were able to salvage enough timber from the wreckage to build a smaller craft and put back out to sea.   However, by now, they had all had enough of life on the run.  They decided that rather than continue sailing north, they would return to Sydney and beg for mercy. 

    Their plea for mercy fell on deaf ears, for the Governor had learned that Boroughbridge and the rest of the men seeking clemency had callously abandoned half their mates to die on the island in Bass Strait.   In an unlikely turn of events, they had been found by George Bass while he was endeavouring to prove the existence of the body of water which now bears his name.   Unable to carry all seven back to Sydney on his small boat, he ferried five across to the mainland, gave them a compass, a musket and as much food as he could spare and told them to follow the coast north to Sydney.   They were never heard of again.   Two men, too weak to walk, remained with Bass.   He returned to Sydney on 25 February and handed the pair to the authorities and they reported what had befallen them.     

    In April, Boroughbridge and the four remaining runaways were returned to Sydney, where they were tried for piracy and found guilty.   Jonathon Boroughbridge and Michael Gibson were hanged, while their three companions were only given clemency at the last minute as they stood before the gallows contemplating their final moments of life.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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  • Capture of the Harrington, 1808

    Brig – similar to the Harrington.

    Robert Stewart was not your typical convict born into England’s poverty-stricken underclass and sentenced to transportation for committing some petty crime. Rather, he came from a comfortable though modest middle-class family. Born in 1771, the first ten years of his life would have likely been idyllic, but then his father died, and a year later, his widowed mother enrolled him into the Royal Mathematical Institution. There, he joined the ranks of boys learning maths and celestial navigation, preparing them for apprenticeships in the merchant marine or Royal Navy. Had he graduated, Stewart would have had a respectable and rewarding career that would one day see him master of his own ship. However, Stewart harboured ambitions of one day enjoying the sort of wealth and privileges that “higher-born” gentlemen took for granted.   

    In June 1785, Robert Stewart’s rebellious nature and frequent absences led to his expulsion from the institute.  He then joined the Royal Navy as an ordinary seaman and over the next 12 years rose to the rank of Petty Officer. But in 1798, aged 27, he deserted, likely embittered that he would never be promoted into the officer ranks.  Three years later, he stood trial on fraud and forgery charges. Stewart had purchased goods while posing as a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy and paid for them with a forged cheque. Caught, charged and found guilty, he was sentenced to transportation for life and sent to Van Diemen’s Land.

    Sydney Cove c1809. Courtesy State Library of NSW.

       Stewart arrived in Hobart on the Calcutta in 1803 and did not attract any undue attention for a year or so. However, twice, he attempted to escape by seizing small colonial vessels and setting sail. Both times ended in dismal failure, and he was returned to Hobart to face punishment. After his second attempt, he was sentenced to death. Stewart was only spared that punishment due to a blanket pardon given to all prisoners under capital sentence by the recently appointed Governor of NSW, William Bligh. However, in 1808, he was sent to Sydney to serve a period of time at hard labour.

       But Stewart never gave up hope of regaining his freedom. This time, he had his eye on the 180-ton brig Harrington anchored in Sydney Cove. She had recently returned to Port Jackson from China with her hold filled with tea after delivering a cargo of Fijian sandalwood. So lucrative was the trade that the Harrington’s captain was set to do it again.   The ship was stocked with enough supplies to last the crew several months and was to sail any day.   

    At 10 o’clock on the night of 15 May 1808, Stewart led as many as 30 fellow convicts out to the waiting ship in two boats they had just stolen. They came alongside as quietly as they could so as not to alert any sentries. But when Stewart climbed over the side, he found he had the deck to himself. The rest of the men swarmed over the gunwales. Some went forward to secure the crew. Others went aft to take care of the officers. The Harrington’s Chief Officer, Arnold Fisk, woke to the sight of Stewart holding a pistol to his head. The brig’s captain and owner could not be found, for he had gone ashore earlier that day. As Stewart and his men took control of the ship, the captain was blissfully asleep in his home overlooking Sydney Harbour.

    Sydney Gazette 22 May 1808, p. 2.

        With the ship’s company under guard, the convicts cut away the anchors and used the two stolen boats to tow the Harrington the length of Sydney Harbour. Once they reached the Heads, the sails were unfurled and the wind took them out to sea. By 7 a.m., they were about 20 nautical miles (40 kilometres) off the coast.

       Stewart ordered the Harrington’s crew into the two boats so they could make their way back to Sydney. They pulled into Sydney Cove later that afternoon to learn the alarm had already been raised. Earlier that morning, Captain Campbell had looked out across the Harbour to find his ship was not there.

       It took authorities three days to organise a ship, the Pegasus, to go in pursuit. By then, Stewart and the Harrington were long gone. The Pegasus cruised the Fijian Islands and then sailed on to Tonga before returning to Sydney via New Caledonia. She was gone nine weeks and arrived back empty-handed. For a time, it looked as if Robert Stewart and his band of bolters had made good their escape. Stewart had sailed the brig nearly 8000 kilometres north and was approaching Manila in the Philippines when their luck ran out. HMS Dedaigneuse spotted the unfamiliar vessel, and her captain sent a boarding party across to investigate. By then, the Harrington was flying American colours, and Stewart presented the officer with papers purporting that the ship was of American origin. The forged documents did not fool the officer in charge of the boarding party who seized the ship. Stewart, now calling himself Robert Bruce Keith Stuart, was taken back to the Dedaigneuse while the rest of the convicts were locked in the Harrington’s hold, now under the command of a British naval officer and a prize crew.

       Shortly thereafter, the Harrington ran aground off the island of Luzon. Most of the convicts were reported to have got ashore where they fled on foot. However, there is some evidence to suggest that their “escape” might have been fabricated, and they were actually press-ganged into Royal Navy service.

       Stewart, on the other hand, had a much easier time of it. He spoke and carried himself in a gentleman-like manner, professed to have enjoyed a liberal education and that he had connections to some of Britain’s most prestigious families. Stewart claimed to have once been a lieutenant in the Royal Navy before he fell victim to the penal system. As a result, he was accorded considerable leniency by the Dedaigneuse’s captain.    Captain Dawson allowed Stewart “every reasonable indulgence and forbade to place him under personal restraint.” That was until Stewart tried to escape and came very close to succeeding. After that, he was placed under close confinement. Stewart was eventually delivered to British officials in India, where he continued masquerading as a gentleman in need of help rather than the escaped convict that he was.

    Calcutta circa 1809.

       He knew he could not hide the fact that he had committed an offence serious enough to warrant transportation to New South Wales. So, instead, he fabricated a preposterous story about his conviction. Stewart claimed he had eloped with a young lady from a very respectable family, though chivalry required him to leave her unnamed. But, after they were secretly wed, a junior Baronet who also had desires for the lady broke into their apartment. Stewart said he had shot and injured the young aristocrat in what he described as an affair of honour. Stewart said he had been unfairly found guilty of attempted murder and sent to New South Wales. That sounded more in keeping with a gentleman than being caught for the more tawdry crime of passing a forged cheque. His tale garnered much sympathy from the colonial administrators in Calcutta. The Chief Magistrate even went as far as to champion Stewart’s cause, penning a letter to his superior suggesting he should be released.

       But then, in August 1809, Stewart’s time ran out. The British officials could not ignore that he was a fugitive from justice, and the Governor General ordered him to be returned to Sydney. He was placed on board a ship bound for Australia, but before it sailed, Stewart went missing. At first, the captain claimed he had jumped overboard and likely drowned, but it later transpired he had been whisked away in a boat by one of his many admirers and taken back to Calcutta.

       So, Robert Stewart may have escaped justice and settled in India under yet another assumed name, or caught the next ship leaving port. No one knows for the trail grows cold then. One thing is certain: he never returned to New South Wales to serve out his sentence. Nor did he face punishment for masterminding the seizure of the brig Harrington.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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