A VICIOUS CIRCLE – THE HANGMAN’S NOOSE
Tuesday, February 28th, 2017‘The death penalty was brought to Australia with the First Fleet’. Mike Edwards, The Hanged Man, The Life and Death of Ronald Ryan, 2002.
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‘I don’t think that he [Thomas Barrett] had the least thought that he was to suffer…the body hung for an hour and was then buried in a grave dug very near the gallows’. Marine Lieutenant Ralph Clark, First Fleet Journal
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‘In determining the daily ration no distinction was drawn between the marines and the convicts…the standard adopted was that of the troops serving in the West Indies’. Wilfrid Oldham, Britain’s Convicts to the Colonies, Library of Australian History, Sydney 1990
‘When leaving Botany Bay Phillip noticed two [2] French ships in the offing…there would seem to be “some justification for the saying that England won Australia by six [6] days”. Edward Jenks, History of the Australian Colonies cited H.E. Egerton, A Short History of British Colonial Policy, Methueun, London 1928
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‘In British eyes it [the First Fleet], if it has been noticed at all, was a small, peace-time convoy, which founded a colony’. Roger Knight, Studies [no. 10] From Terra Australia to Australia, eds. John Hardy and Alan Frost, Highland Press, Canberra 1989
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Botany Bay – 1788 – January, 18-20: A large armed English fleet of 11 vessels with a complement of 1500 souls reached Botany Bay in the middle of January 1788.
Overwhelming male one-half were convicted criminals – 750 male combatants and 193 women prisoners – reprieved death on condition they be exiled ‘from the realm’ .
Sydney Cove – 26 January: By ‘8 pm’ on the 26th of January the entire English fleet having evacuated Botany Bay were riding at anchor in Sydney Cove nine (9) miles (14km) north of the original beach-head.