Pardon
On 6 July 1835 William Buckley appeared at the camp site of John Batman's Port Phillip Association with a party of Aboriginal people who had told him about the sighting of a ship at Indented Head. Wearing kangaroo skins and carrying Aboriginal weapons, he walked into the camp. The three European men at the camp were William Todd, James Gumm and Alexander Thomson and five Sydney aborigines who had been left behind to maintain a base whilst John Batman had returned to Launceston. They fed him and treated him with kindness. Buckley showed them the letters "W.B." tattooed on his arm. Fearful of being shot, he told them he was a shipwrecked soldier, but a few days later he revealed his identity, to the amazement of everybody present. In September the same year, he was granted a pardon by Lieutenant-Governor Arthur, in Van Diemen's Land.
Read more about this topic: William Buckley (convict)
Famous quotes containing the word pardon:
“O, pardon me, thou bleeding piece of earth,
That I am meek and gentle with these butchers!”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“Let us pardon him his hope of a vain apocalypse, and of a second coming in great triumph upon the clouds of heaven. Perhaps these were the errors of others rather than his own; and if it be true that he himself shared the general illusion, what matters it, since his dream rendered him strong against death, and sustained him in a struggle to which he might otherwise have been unequal?”
—Ernest Renan (1823–1892)
“So spake our Father penitent; nor Eve
Felt less remorse. They, forthwith to the place
Repairing where he judged them, prostrate fell
Before him reverent, and both confessed
Humbly their faults, and pardon begged, with tears
Watering the ground, and with their sighs the air
Frequenting, sent from hearts contrite, in sign
Of sorrow unfeigned and humiliation meek.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)