To me, the two most fascinating aspects of the great transportation experiment are, first, the blithe assumption on the part of the British Crown that all one had to do was do it, and, secondly, the character of its guinea pigs, the convicts. That it succeeded rests far more with the character of its guinea pigs, the convicts, than with anything else. Which is why I chose to write this novel about the genesis of the much later Commonwealth of Australia (1901) from the convict point of view.
Why were these people convicted in the first place? What in fact were the circumstances of their crimes? How did English justice work? What rights did the accused felon have at law? What were their backgrounds? How did they rub along together? Why, having been landed in an utterly alien place of no milk or honey, did they persevere? Why, having served out their sentences and in a lot of instances made enough money to buy passage home, did so relatively few choose to return home? What did they cling to to sustain their spirits? How did they cope with the brutal, soulless punitive regimes of the time? How did they view freedom when it came, and what did they think of England?
More of the latter part of this book takes place at Norfolk Island than at New South Wales. This unique speck in the midst of the Pacific Ocean has a rich and varied history all of its own.
There have been three separate attempts by the British Crown to colonize it, the first two of which were terminated and the island depopulated: the so-called First and Second Settlements. It is the hideous Second Settlement (1825–1855) which most people think of when it comes to unconscionable cruelty; the First Settlement (1788–1813), despite its horrors, was much kinder.
The third attempt was yet another experiment in transportation. The descendants of the Bounty mutineers and their Tahitian women were uplifted in totality from Pitcairn Island in 1856 and given the larger and more fertile Norfolk Island as a new homeland. Some of the Pitcairners, disillusioned by broken promises, returned from Norfolk to Pitcairn after 1856, and it is their descendants who today form the minute Second Settlement on Pitcairn Island.
The so-called Third Settlement was a success, I think because the Pitcairners were already an island people in the true sense. Island peoples can cope with extremely limited landmasses, which require a very different attitude to life—and governmental style—than vast landmasses. Though since 1979 Norfolk Island has had a limited form of self-government incorporating federal powers (an odd arrangement reflecting the Australian uncertainty), it remains at the mercy of a colonial overlord from across the seas. In 1914 it passed from being a dependent territory of the British Crown to a dependent territory of the Commonwealth of Australia; successive Australian governments and their unelected public “servants” have displayed exactly the same arrogance and insensitivity to the special nature of Norfolk Island and its Pitcairn people as did the British Crown. So one wonders what Australia, long a victim of colonialism itself, has actually learned about the phenomenon of colonialism, as the peoples of its equally remote Indian Ocean dependencies suffer even more than does vocal, mutineerridden Norfolk Island.
The sources for research are very rich, but often (as in the case of the Public Records Office at Kew in London) dauntingly haphazard and confused due to inexcusable lack of funding. As in my Roman research, I tend to lean far more on original sources than on modern treatises and works of scholarship. It is necessary for any student of any period of history to go back to the sources in order to formulate opinions, deductions and ideas of one’s own.
I have not included a bibliography for the simple reason that it would run to many pages and contain as many documents as books. However, if anyone is interested in obtaining a bibliography of the published material, please write to me care of my publishers.
I must thank many people for help and information.
Chief among them is my beloved stepdaughter, Melinda, who went off to brave Kew, Bristol, Gloucester, Portsmouth and other English places, and also invaded repositories of history in Sydney, Hobart and Canberra. The materials she brought back have proven invaluable.
I must also specially thank Helen Reddy, another many-times-great-grandchild of Richard Morgan. When not singing and acting, she pursued the career of Richard Morgan to the top of her formidable bent, and furnished me with some terrific documentation.
My heartfelt thanks go to Mr. Les Brown, whose grasp of the history of Norfolk Island far exceeds anyone else’s, no matter which of the three separate settlements one is interested in. Les has been an unsung historian hero, but I now sing his praises loud and long for all to hear. What a library, what documents!
How can I forget my perennially loyal and devoted staff? Pam Crisp, my personal assistant, Kaye Pendleton and Karen Quintal in the office, the ubiquitous master-of-all-trades, Joe Nobbs, Ria Howell and Fran Johnston in the house, Dallas Crisp, Phil Billman and Louise Donald outside. It is only due to their strenuous exertions that I find the time to write at such a pace. I love you all, and thank you. Thanks also to my mother-in-law, May, who kitty-sits Poindexter the cat whenever we are away. To Jan Nobbs. To Brother John and Greg Quintal for firsthand descriptions of sawing Norfolk pine the old way, in a pit with a rip saw.
My husband, Ric, is a tower of strength as well as my best friend. He is the four-times-great-grandson of both Richard Morgan the convict, and Fletcher Christian the Bounty mutineer. How strange are the workings of fate, that the one bloodline should meet the other in 1860 on a three-by-five-mile dot in the midst of an ocean and find that on Richard Morgan’s side, that link with Norfolk Island goes back to a three-times-great-grandmother (Kate) born there in 1792. This is also true of Joe Nobbs.
In conclusion, I have not forgotten that there are still two volumes left to write in the Masters of Rome series. They will come, God willing, but it is necessary that I take a holiday from Rome, rather than yet another Roman holiday.
