Tag: American Revolution

English: source: Immigrant Servants Database a... — Immigrant Servants Database author: signed by Henry Mayer, dated 1738 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Throughout the 1600s, English courts had relied on the colonies to alleviate the overwhelming criminal population. Jails were filled to capacity as crime rates burgeoned. Because the criminal justice system was so overwhelmed, convicts were often offered a choice between death or exile. While many obviously chose emigration over death, the colonies quickly became unhappy with the arrangement. By 1697, many colonial ports simply refused entry to convict ships.

To compound the problem, the justice system was wildly unregulated to the extent that criminals were often expected to arrange and pay for their own transportation. No one kept track of where they went or how they got there; so many convicts simply hopped a boat to Ireland and came back as soon as the coast was clear.

Despite the problems, Parliament still saw the colonies as a viable solution to Britain’s overwhelmed justice system. To that effect, they drafted and passed the Transportation Act of 1718. This act offered a systematic, standardized process by which criminals could be sentenced and shipped to America and the West Indies.

Under this new legislation, merchant companies were paid a fixed sum to ship boatloads of convicts to the New World colonies. Upon arrival in the New World, merchants and ship captains were free to sell off the convicts as indentured servants.

While the Transportation Act standardized the processing and exile of convicts, there was little regulation once ships set sail. Many captains treated the convicts brutally, keeping them chained below decks and subjecting them to horrible abuses. It was fairly common for a cargo of convicts to mutiny and try to kill the captain and crew.

Depending on the severity of their crimes, convicts were sentenced to seven or fourteen years of indentured labour in the colonies. A few richer convicts were able to simply buy their freedom upon arrival; however, most convicts were penniless, unskilled and uneducated. One boatload of felons was surveyed and out of ninety-eight convicts, forty-eight had no marketable skill, and the rest were either too young to have learned a trade or too old to work.

These unskilled felons were forced to serve the duration of their sentence under whoever paid their purchase price. Most were put to work by small plantation owners; however, others were bought by shipbuilders, manufacturers and tradesmen.

Once a convict had served his sentence, he was set free to start a new life for himself. Some of the ex-convicts established themselves throughout the colonies and became productive in society. Many, however, went right back to criminal activities. In the West Indies in particular, a released convict had very little recourse for survival, as by law he could never have land of his own.

The Transportation Act resulted in more than 52,000 convicts being forcibly transported to America and the West Indies. About 80 percent were sent to Maryland and Virginia, while the rest were scattered throughout other New World colonies. The flow of convict labourers continued unabated for decades, and only stopped with the advent of the American Revolution in 1776.

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Relics of Empire: Bermuda

June 5, 2013

Alec Tritton

Relics of Empire No Comments

While Bermuda was originally discovered by Spanish navigator Juan Bermudez around 1511, the island went untended and unclaimed for nearly a century. The beginnings of English settlement were established almost by accident when a shipwreck left the flagship of English Admiral Sir George Somers shattered on Bermuda’s reefs in 1609.

Somers’ expedition had set out with the intention of colonizing the New World for Britain. He saw the New World as a potential fresh start for many citizens of Britain’s overcrowded cities. He had engineered the initiative, and the voyage had gone smoothly for the first few days.

The crew of the Sea Venture was en route to Jamestown, Virginia when they met their misfortune of the coast of Bermuda. On July 25, 1609, the ship was caught in a hurricane and tossed hundreds of miles off course, until she wrecked on the reefs of Bermuda’s Discovery Bay.

Fortunately, no lives were lost, and Somers took the opportunity to explore and map the islands. The men built makeshift boats and spent months charting the mainland and its surrounding islands.

Eventually, the crew of 150 survivors was able to build a couple of ships, and in these Bermuda-built ships, the survivors carried on with their voyage to the Jamestown colony. Three sailors were so enchanted by the island, however, that they volunteered to be left behind. These three British sailors became the first European settlers on Bermuda.

Intentional settlement began a few years later, when Bermuda was incorporated into the Virginia Company charter. In 1612, around 60 colonists arrived from England, and they soon established St. George Town as the first official settlement. St. George’s became Bermuda’s first capital, and remains today as the oldest continually inhabited English town in the Americas.

In 1615, Bermuda was handed over to the Somers Isles Company. Shortly thereafter, Bermuda officially gained status as a British colony, when the first parliament convened in 1620. In 1684, King Charles II appointed Sir Robert Robertson as the colony’s first governor and designated Bermuda as British Crown Colony.

Colonization continued throughout the 17^th and 18^th centuries, bolstered in part by the slave trade. Most slaves were brought in from Africa, though quite a number of Scots were sent for their part in fighting against Cromwell, and many more Irish slaves followed in 1651. Fortunately, all slaves on Bermuda were freed under the British Emancipation Act of 1834.

Bermuda gained particular prominence during the American Revolution. Since Britain lost its colonial ports, strong naval bases were established in Bermuda. The island also went on to play a key role during WWII as a base for refueling and a hotbed of espionage.

As the island gained prominence over the years, its relationship with England gradually shifted. After nearly two hundred years of occupation, the British government decided to grant the colony self-government. In 1957, Britain withdrew its armies.

Bermuda has long held status as Britain’s oldest colony. Today, Bermuda is not officially a country, and while it is self-governing, it forms part of the Commonwealth. As such, the island’s Governor is appointed by the Crown and Britain directly manages internal security and police systems. As a British Overseas Territory, Bermuda is represented by Britain in all foreign affairs.

Relics of Empire: The Turks and Caicos Islands

May 2, 2013

Alec Tritton

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The Turks and Caicos Islands passed from hand to hand for some time before they were ever settled. Throughout the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, the French, Spanish and English all held control over the islands; however, for a long time, none established settlements of any kind.

Juan Ponce de Leon was the first European to discover the islands, though no move toward settlement was made. After the islands’ discovery in 1512, the islanders of Turks and Caicos were subjected to frequent raids by Spanish slavers, and within a year, the entire island range had been depopulated.

Throughout the 17th century, the islands served as little more than pirate bays. Buccaneers would hide out in the island cays and attack passing Spanish treasure ships en route to Europe. Such infamous rogues as Francoise L’Olonnois and Anne Bonny often used French Cay as their pirate bases for raiding passing ships.

Finally, toward the late 17th century, salt collectors from Bermuda set up an official settlement. In 1681, the first settlement was established on Grand Turk Island, and the salt collectors would spend six months out of each year raking salt from the shallow waters around the island. Since Bermuda was an established British colony, this settlement of salt collectors effectively established British dominance over the Turks and Caicos.

In 1765, the islands fell under French occupation. This French rule lasted until around 1783, when the Royal Navy sent Horatio Nelson to retake the islands. While the Admiral was unsuccessful in his attempts, many British loyalists began arriving from America following the American Revolution.

The displaced loyalists found a safe haven in the Caribbean colonies, and in 1790, the Crown began granting land to British loyalist refugees. The loyalists formed the first settlement on Caicos Island, and established themselves across Providenciales, Parrot Bay, Middle Caicos, and North Caicos.

By 1799, the Turks and Caicos Island groups were once again firmly under British control as an annexed part of the Bahamas. The move toward consolidation saw little success, however, as most residents on Turks and Caicos were Bermudian, and strongly resisted any Bahamian rule. Ultimately, the Turks and Caicos Islands remained independent from the Bahamas.

In 1873, Queen Victoria officially recognized this fact and granted the Turks and Caicos Islands with a royal charter, making them an independent colony, no longer attached to the Bahamas. This independence was fairly short-lived, as 1874 saw the islands annexed instead to Jamaica. This connection lasted nearly 100 years; however, it provided Turks and Caicos with needed medical and technical assistance as well as substantial financial grants.

While Jamaica gained its independence from Britain in 1962, Turks and Caicos had little interest in the separation. The Turks and Caicos Islands decided to maintain their status as a British Crown Colony, and have no real plans for future independence.

The population is made up of very few Britons. Over 90% of the islanders are Black, while the remaining 10% are of European, North American or Mixed heritage.

Forced Migration – Convicts to Australia

August 23, 2012

Alec Tritton

Emigration No Comments

Throughout the 18^th and 19^th centuries, the British correctional system became severely overburdened. The population of England rose dramatically, and London soon became overcrowded. Poverty and social injustice were rife, child labour and long working hours were widespread, and living conditions were squalid and filthy. Many were unemployed, and crime was rampant.

Britain’s police and penitentiary system were practically non-existent. In fact, many government officials saw the concept of a circular prison as a very American concept, so for years, the “Bloody Code” dictated the death penalty for hundreds of crimes – many as insignificant as petty theft or minor property damage.

Fortunately, the Bloody Code was put to rest when lawmakers and judges felt that the death penalty was too harsh for many crimes. The few existing gaols of the day were so overcrowded, however, that the government converted old war ships into floating prisons moored in coastal waters. The prison hulks were horrible floating dungeons, infested with vermin and disease, poorly lit and with little ventilation.

Even by the standards of that day, the prison system soon was considered unacceptable treatment of convicts. With nowhere else to turn, the British government conceived the idea of transportation as a humane alternative to the death penalty and a practical solution to overcrowded prisons.

Initially, convicts were transported to America; however, with the onset of the American Revolution, Britain had to look elsewhere. They found a viable solution in Australia, and the first convict fleet set sail in 1787

On January 18, 1788, the fleet of ships arrived at Botany Bay, a spot that had been selected as appropriate for a penal colony. Upon arrival, however, the fleet found that the harbour was unsafe and lacked a fresh water supply, so they quickly moved on. Several days later, Captain Arthur Philip, the fleet commander, raised the British flag at Sydney Cove. A group of 751 convicts and 252 marines, along with their families, disembarked and there established the colony of New South Wales. This colony eventually became the modern city of Sydney.

Two more fleets followed quickly in 1790 and 1791. Captain Phillip, who became Governor of the colony, put convicts to work according to their particular skills and regardless of their previous crimes. Men laboured as carpenters and brick makers, farmers, shepherds, and cattlemen. Educated convicts were put to work in record-keeping.

Women, on the other hand, were considered best fit to being wives and mothers. When a female convict got married, she was freed from her servitude and released to care for her husband and subsequent children.

If convicts were well-behaved and productive, they could earn a ticket of leave, giving them greater freedom. Once a convict completed his sentence (usually seven years), he was issued a Certificate of Freedom, with which he could either return to England or settle in Australia.

New penal colonies were eventually established in Port Arthur, Tasmania and Norfolk Island. These communities were considered to be places of secondary punishment where convicts suffered harsher labor and solitary confinement.

In 1803, 300 convicts arrived in Sullivan Bay near modern-day Sorrento, Victoria. While this settlement was quickly abandoned due to poor environmental conditions, others were established and between 1844 and 1849, around 1,750 convicts arrived in the region from England.

In 1850, new convicts were beginning to arrive in Western Australia. Between 1850 and 1868, 9,668 convicts were transported to the new colony on 43 convict ships. The initial convicts were sent from the New South Wales colony in 1826 with the mission of establishing a settlement there.

By the 1830’s, opposition was growing toward the transportation of convicts to the colonies. Members of the Independent Congregation Church in England were especially outspoken and influential in ending the transportation of convicts.

By 1840, convict transportation to the New South Wales colony had ceased, and Brisbane had stopped receiving convicts the previous year. For some years Van Diemen’s Land continued to receive prisoners; however, the practice was under steady attack by the anti-transportation movement.

The last convict ship to arrive in Australia arrived on January 10, 1868. Approximately 164,000 convicts on 806 ships were relocated to Australia throughout the 80 years of convict transportation.

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