History of Norfolk Island - Second Penal Settlement

Second Penal Settlement

Commandants of the second settlement:

• 6 June 1825–March 1826: Captain Richard Turton
• March 1826–August 1827: Captain Vance Young Donaldson (1791–?)
• August 1827–November 1828: Captain Thomas Edward Wright
• November 1828–February 1829: Captain Robert Hunt
• February 1829–29 June 1829: Captain Joseph Wakefield
• 29 June 1829–1834: Lieutenant-Colonel James Thomas Morisset (1782–1852)
• 1834: Captain Foster Fyans (1790–1870) (Acting)
• 1834–April 1839: Major Joseph Anderson (1790–1877)
• April - July 1839: Major Thomas Bunbury (b. c1791)
• July 1839 - March 1840: Major Thomas Ryan (b.c1790) (Acting)
• 17 March 1840–1844: Captain Alexander Maconochie (1787–1860)
• 8 February 1844 – 5 August 1846: Major Joseph Childs
• 6 August 1846 – 18 January 1853: John Giles Price (1808–1857)
• January 1853–September 1853: Captain Rupert Deering
• September 1853–5 May 1855: Captain H. Day
• 5 May 1855 – 8 June 1856: T.S. Stewart (Caretaker)

In 1824 the British government instructed the Governor of New South Wales Thomas Brisbane to occupy Norfolk Island as a place to send “the worst description of convicts”. Its remoteness, seen previously as a disadvantage, was now viewed as an asset for the detention of the “twice-convicted” men, who had committed further crimes since arriving in New South Wales. Brisbane assured his masters that “the felon who is sent there is forever excluded from all hope of return” He saw Norfolk Island as “the nec plus ultra of Convict degradation”. The convicts detained have long been assumed be a hardcore of recidivists, or 'doubly-convicted capital respites' - that is, men transported to Australia who committed fresh colonial crimes for which they were sentenced to death, and were spared the gallows on condition of life at Norfolk Island. However, a recent study has demonstrated, utilising a database of 6,458 Norfolk Island convicts, that the reality was somewhat different: more than half were detained at Norfolk Island without ever receiving a colonial conviction, and only 15% had been reprieved from a death sentence. Furthermore, the overwhelming majority of convicts sent to Norfolk Island had committed non-violent property sentences, the average length of detention was three years, and the scale of punishments inflicted upon the prisoners was significantly less than assumed.

His successor, Governor Ralph Darling, was even more severe than Brisbane, wishing that “every man should be worked in irons that the example may deter others from the commission of crime” and “to hold out as a place of the extremest punishment short of death”. Governor Arthur, in Van Diemen's Land, likewise believed that “when prisoners are sent to Norfolk Island, they should on no account be permitted to return. Transportation thither should be considered as the ultimate limit and a punishment short only of death”. Reformation of the convicts was not seen as an objective of the Norfolk Island penal settlement.

The evidence that has passed down through the years points to the creation of a "Hell in Paradise". A widespread and popular notion of the harshness of penal settlements, including Norfolk Island, has come from the novel For the Term of His Natural Life by Marcus Clarke, which appears to be based on the writings and recollections of witnesses. However, though Clarke did carry out primary research, he selected the most sensational examples possible.

Following a convict mutiny in 1834, Father William Ullathorne, Vicar general of Sydney, visited Norfolk Island to comfort the mutineers due for execution. He found it “the most heartrending scene that I ever witnessed”. Having the duty of informing the prisoners as to who was reprieved and who was to die, he was shocked to record as “a literal fact that each man who heard his reprieve wept bitterly, and that each man who heard of his condemnation to death went down on his knees with dry eyes, and thanked God.”

The 1846 report of magistrate Robert Pringle Stuart exposed the scarcity and poor quality of food, inadequacy of housing, horrors of torture and incessant flogging, insubordination of convicts, and corruption of overseers.

Bishop Robert Willson visited Norfolk Island from Van Diemen's Land on three occasions. Following his first visit in 1846 he reported to the House of Lords who, for the first time, came to realise the enormity of atrocities perpetrated under the British flag and attempted to remedy the evils. Willson returned in 1849 and found that many of the reforms had been implemented. However, rumours of resumed atrocities brought him back in 1852, and this visit resulted in a damning report, listing atrocities and blaming the system, which invested one man at this remote place with absolute power over so many people.

Only a handful of convicts left any written record and their descriptions (as quoted by Hazzard and Hughes) of living and working conditions, food and housing, and, in particular, the punishments given for seemingly trivial offences, are unremittingly horrifying, describing a settlement devoid of all human decency, under the iron rule of the tyrannical autocratic commandants. However, these conclusions have been reached by a reliance on a series of over-used (mainly published) sources, without their having been tested or drawn into question by detailed archival research. Such work is currently being done and has, for example, drawn into question the sensationalised version of Norfolk Island's past, such as in demonstrating that the widespread assumption that Norfolk Island convicts engaged in 'murder-suicide pacts' - that is, drawing lots in order to select a killer and willing victim in order to 'escape' from Norfolk Island - is a myth.

The actions of some of the commandants, such as Morisset and particularly Price appear to be excessively harsh. All but one were military officers, brought up in a system where discipline was severe throughout the period of transportation. In addition, the commandants relied on a large number of military guards, civil overseers, ex-convict constables, and convict informers to provide them with intelligence and carry out their orders.

Of the Commandants, only Alexander Maconochie appeared to reach the conclusion that brutality would breed defiance, as demonstrated by the mutinies of 1826, 1834 and 1846, and he attempted to apply his theories of penal reform, providing incentives as well as punishment. His methods were criticised as being too lenient and he was replaced, a move that returned the settlement to its harsh rule. However, recent research has also demonstrated that the level of punishment under Maconochie's regime was much higher than assumed, as the average number of lashes per flogging - 93 - was higher under Maconochie than at any other time during the second penal settlement's history.

The second penal settlement began to be wound down by the British government after 1847 and the last convicts were removed to Tasmania in May 1855. It was abandoned because transportation to Van Diemen's Land had ceased in 1853 and was replaced by penal servitude in the United Kingdom.