THE ROARING DAYS

Hokitika Guardian, 16 May 1932, Page 2

THE ROARING DAYS

CRIME IN EARLY AUSTRALIA

SOME PUNISHMENTS.

SYDNEY. May 10

"Pile I’rovost Marshall, who acted as Sheriff 0.. the County of Cumberland in tile earliest days of the- .settlement in Australia, was Henry Brewer, who was appointed by Phillip on tno voyage out. No regular reports of the due execution of sentences appear among the records in the posscsiou oi the .'supreme Court, hut tin* e are significant documents which enable one to infer that the ..policy of the authorities was, pii the whoL', considering English opinion, and the law of the time, comparatively humane, (writes W.R.S. m the' “.Sydney Morning Herald”). The proposal to do away with the precessions to.Tyburn—those ‘"disgusting seems of ribaldry and pivfanity which habitually took place when a criminal was carried .or more than two miles through, tli.* most crowded thoroughfares m London’’ (Lecky)—drew irom a great purist, Dr. Johnson, in 1783, a pretest against '‘running mad after innovation. ’’ The old method was the most satisfactory to all parties, declared the sago; the public was satisfied by a procession ; the criminal was supported by it. Why should all this be swept away? If was a Settled conviction of society that exhibitions of this kind were necessary, in 4 order to deter people from committing crime; just as the practice of mutilating and branding offenders was retained for centuries, under the belief"! that it was the best means of producing a good moral impression on the. multitude.

The Lash and the Pillory. As wo have seen by the records of the earliest criminal courts, punishment by Hogging was almost wholly resected to for a time, in other than capital eases; hut the presence of certain orders indicate that the even more barbarous ordeal of the pillory was provided for in the Provost Marshal’s equipment. It is on record that a certain discontent existed among the sailors, at the comparatively merciful beatings indicted upon deliquent convicts in contrast with those endured in the navy. There certainly was a difference in favour of thei landsman, both as to the severity of the punishment inflicted and the character of the implement used. As a customary tiling the official selected to administer punishments, by reason, ho doubt, of, their acquired expertness for the business, were drummers. One lash in tlie navy was considered equivalent in severity to several in the army, and although the lashes were numbered by dozens instead of hundreds, twelve strokes afloat were equal to one hundred 011 shore. This was partly owing to the make and material of the “oat” and also to the mode of Hogging. The naval “eat” was altogether more formidable than the military one, being made out of a piece of rope thicker than a man’s wrist, five feet in length I all over, three of which, were stiff and j solid stuff, the remaining two feet > ravelled into hard and twisted knotted ends. The military' “cat” was a wea- j pou about eighteen inches in length, | armed with thongs of the same length, eaph thong having five' or six knots compressed and hardened into sharp edges, till each had acquired the con- . sistency of horn. I

A Significant Document. A document classed with tlie miscellaneous papers found among the Court records gives ,no indication of its origin, but there is almost conclusive evidence that it was pa'i’t of testimony given by some professional, perhaps medical, witness, at a judicial inquiry shortly after 1800. Checking it off as far as possible wilth jthe decrees of the Criminal Court, it may be safely accepted a.s an authentic list of from the date of the landing until the close of the century, and as' such is proof of the leniency of the Governors, actually complained of later. It would appear front a count of the death sentences formally passed that there were many reprieves. At the head of the paper are some detached figures which seem to refer to cases medically treated in the camp, and mortality statistics. The remainder is dear:—

Executions. May, 1788.—Youth, 17 years old, for breaking open and robbing camp. December, 1788.—One , convict, for breaking into and plundering stores.

January, 1789.—Six soldiers, for breaking into and plundering the

Government Store. April, 1790.—0ne convict, for theft. August, 1790.—0ne. convict, for sheep

stea ling. October, 1790.—Tw0 convicts, felony. 1791.—0ne male convict, January, 1792.—0ne, for theft. November, 1795.—0ne. August, 1796.—0ne. November. 1797.—Five, for tubbing the store. 'kivli, 1798. Two, seizing boats to escape. February, 1799.—0ne. July, 1799. —Two men and one woman, murder. May, 1800.—Two. June. 1300.—Three. Thus, in the lapse of about 12 years ificrc were 31 executions. This would •S’S'iii to modern sense a pretty formidable record for an infant community. lm(, it was ii'/t, apparently, up to the average of the times, or the expectations of contemporary feeling in England.