The Cost of a Coat

Thursday 11 February 1808 was likely a day that John Kirkman would always regret and never forget. A simple visit to York Fair and a drink with companions William Kitchener and Joseph Wilmot at the Black Horse Inn would have far-reaching consequences – a life of hardship, misery and ignominy. Twelve days later, at the George Inn in Wakefield, John and his companions were arrested for the burglary of cloth and silver goods from the Black Horse Inn.[1]

The following day, the trio were taken to the West Riding House of Correction in Wakefield.[2] Known as ‘Monster Mansion’, its primary purpose was the detention of criminals while they awaited sentencing. Prisoners were shackled at all times, yet a stay at a House of Correction was not itself considered punishment.[3] John was no doubt beginning to understand what his future would hold.

John, Joseph and William appeared before Justice Le Blanc at the Guildhall in York at the York Lent Assizes on 12 March. They were indicted for burglary of the Black Horse Inn in the early hours of Friday 12 February, and despite protestations of innocence, all three prisoners were found guilty and sentenced to death.[4]

A report in the Hull Advertiser noted, ‘They were fine looking young men: two of them of very good address, and said to be of respectable families’.[5] The York Herald commented that ‘the prisoners said they were a great distance from home’.[6] That distance was about to get much greater.

John was removed to the prison hulk Prudentia moored at Woolwich on the Thames. He was received on to the hulk on 16 June 1808, and the Prison Hulk Register notes that he had his death sentence reduced to transportation for life to New South Wales.[7]

Life on the Prudentia was brutal. Hygiene was poor, and diseases such as dysentery spread quickly and unchecked; death rates could be as high as 30%. During the day, convicts were put to work on the wharves, digging canals and building walls to develop the Woolwich Arsenal, working up to ten hours a day. At night the men were shackled in their sleeping quarters which were crowded and so cramped that there was barely space for a man to stand.[8]  

After a year living in these hellish conditions, John left the Prudentia on 31 July 1809, bound for the ship Ann that would transport him to the Australian colonies.[9]

The Ann had transported convicts to New South Wales before. In 1801 she had been the first ship to arrive in New South Wales that year, landing on 21 February.[10] Two hundred convicts embarked on this, her second voyage, and she departed on 25 August 1809. In addition to these 200 men, the Ann carried several cabin passengers, including the Reverend Samuel Marsden and his wife.

After calling at Rio de Janeiro in November, the Ann arrived at Port Jackson on 26 February 1810 with 197 male prisoners. There had been one death aboard, and two men had been re-landed. Governor Macquarie ordered them to be mustered on 28 February, and on 3 March the prisoners were disembarked by boats to the Hospital Wharf.[11]

John was first drafted to an unknown settler, the assignment lasting for three years.[12] In 1813 he was recommended to Simeon Lord, Esq, an entrepreneurial merchant who himself had been transported to New South Wales as punishment for burglary of cloth. Lord had been tried and convicted at the Manchester Quarter Sessions in 1790 and sentenced to transportation for seven years.[13]

In September 1816, John petitioned Governor Macquarie to grant him a Ticket-of-Leave. At the time of his petition, he was ‘the Government Man to one Borau[?] (a Gov Miller) whom he pays for his Gov Work at the rate of 12/- per week’. The petition included a recommendation from Simeon Lord that stated that John was ‘in my Service for three years during which period he Conducted himself in an Honest Industrious and Sober Manner and I consider him a deserving Character’.[14]

There is little evidence about where John lived or what we work was involved in during the six years between when he arrived in 1810 and when he petitioned for his Ticket-of-Leave in 1816.

On 8 January 1815, John and Martha Kirkman baptised their son Thomas at St Philip Church in Sydney, suggesting that John married soon after he arrived in New South Wales.[15] There is no record of the marriage, and other than Martha’s death in 1845 at the age of 71, nothing is known of her.[16]

It is likely that John remained in Sydney and continued working as the Government Man for the Government Miller after his Ticket-of-Leave was granted; in 1820, he was paid 2/5/0 for fixing a Flour Machine.[17]

In July 1822, he was employed as a Sawyer in Illawarra by Robert Cooper, who had applied for and been granted permission to procure cedar in the region.[18] This opportunity may have arisen due to John’s connections with Simeon Lord – in the 1820s, Lord was involved in the exportation of cedar to England.[19] 

 John was still working in Illawarra as a Sawyer in 1825.[20] Whether his family travelled with him or whether they remained in Sydney is not clear, but it does seem John may have been a romantic at heart. In January of 1826, he was sentenced to 10 days on the treadmill for ‘conveying messages and communications’ between a convict George Stewart and the daughter of a Mrs Pedley.[21]

 These snippets are the only glimpses into John’s life that the records reveal. His son Thomas became the licensee of the Hero of Waterloo hotel in Fort St in Sydney in June 1846, nine months after John’s wife Martha died at the same address.[22] Thomas erected a headstone for his mother in the Sandhills Cemetery. The inscription made no mention of his father John, suggesting that perhaps the family had become estranged.[23]

By 1855, John’s son Thomas had relinquished the license of the Hero of Waterloo and moved to Castlemaine in Victoria to try his hands on the goldfields.[24] Where John was and what he was doing at the time is not known.

John died alone in the Liverpool Asylum in Sydney on 30 March 1856, aged 79.[25]

That one day in February 1808 had taken him from what would seem to have been a carefree and privileged life to one of hardship, misery and ignominy. Did he remember that day as he lay dying in the makeshift bed in the Asylum? Did he regret it?

 
References

[1] ‘York Lent Assizes 1808’, York Herald, 19 March 1808, p. 2.; ‘York Lent Assizes 1808’, Hull Advertiser and Exchange Gazette, 19 March 1808, p. 4.

[2] John Kirkman, Prison record, West Yorkshire Archive Service, Wakefield, England, Reference C118: Wakefield Prison, West Yorkshire, England, Prison Records, 1801-1914, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

[3] Institutional History Society. ‘Wakefield Prison’. https://institutionalhistory.com/homepage/prisons/major-prisons/wakefield-prison/, accessed 6 June 2021.

[4] ‘York Lent Assizes 1808’

[5] ‘York Lent Assizes’.

[6] ‘York Lent Assizes’.

[7] John Kirkman, Prudentia, Prison Hulk Register, The National Archives, Microfilm, HO9, UK Prison Hulk Registers and Letter Books, 1802-1849, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

[8] Royal Arsenal History. ‘Prison Hulks’. https://www.royal-arsenal-history.com/prison-hulks.html, accessed 6 June 2021.

[9] John Kirkman, Prudentia.

[10] Charles Bateson, The Convict Ships 1787-1868, Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow, 1985, p.338.

[11] Free Settler or Felon. ‘Convict Ship Ann 1810’. https://www.freesettlerorfelon.com/convict_ship_ann_1810.htm, accessed 13 June 2021; Bateson, The Convict Ships, pp. 338, 381.

[12] John Kirkman, Ann, 1810, Petition for mitigation of sentence, State Records New South Wales, Fiche 3173, 4/1849, p. 55, New South Wales, Australia, Colonial Secretary's Papers, 1788-1856, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

[13] John Kirkman, Petition for mitigation of sentence; Australian Dictionary of Biography. ‘Lord, Simeon (1771-1840)’. https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/lord-simeon-2371, accessed 6 June 2021.

[14] John Kirkman, Petition for mitigation of sentence.

[15] Baptism of Thomas Kirkman, baptised 8 January 1815, St Philip, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Australia Births and Baptisms, 1792-1981 (Index only, no image currently available), FamilySearch.org, accessed 9 June 2021.

[16] Death certificate of Martha Kirkman, died 4 September 1845, Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, New South Wales, V1845245 30B.

[17] ‘Government and General Orders’, Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, 8 January 1820, p. 2, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article2179183.

[18] Robert Cooper, Earl Spencer, 1813, Permission to procure cedar, State Records Authority of New South Wales, Series 897, Reels 6041-6064, 6071-6072, New South Wales, Australia, Colonial Secretary's Papers, 1788-1856, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

[19] Australian Dictionary of Biography. ‘Lord, Simeon (1771-1840)’.

[20] John Kirkman, Ann, 1810, Convict muster 1825, The National Archives of the UK, HO10, Pieces 5, 19-20, 32-51, New South Wales and Tasmania, Australia Convict Musters, 1806-1849, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

[21] ‘The Police’, Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, 12 January 1826, p. 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article2185036.

[22] The Hero of Waterloo Hotel. ‘History’. https://heroofwaterloo.com.au/history/, accessed 5 June 2021; Thomas Kirkman, Certificate for Publicans License, New South Wales, Australia, Certificates for Publicans' Licences, 1830-1849, 1853-1899, Ancestry.com, accessed 15 June 2021.

[23] Headstone for Martha Kirkman, died 2 September 1845, Sandhills Cemetery, Sydney, New South Wales, cited in Keith Johnson, comp, Gravestone inscriptions, N.S.W. Volume 1. Sydney burial ground : Elizabeth and Devonshire Streets "The Sandhills' (Monuments relocated at Bunnerong), Genealogical Publications Of Australia, Sydney, 1973, p.45.

[24] Kathryn Ellis to Teresa Collis, email, 5 April 2021, original held by the author.

[25] Burial of John Kirkman, buried 31 March 1856, Burial Register, Parish of St Luke, Liverpool, New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, Anglican Parish Registers, 1814-2011, Ancestry.com, accessed 27 April 2021.

Bibliogrpahy

Australian Convict Transportation Registers – Other Fleets & Ships, 1791-1868, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 Australian Dictionary of Biography. ‘Lord, Simeon (1771-1840)’. https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/lord-simeon-2371, accessed 6 June 2021.

 Baptism Index, St Philip, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Australia Births and Baptisms, 1792-1981 (Index only, no image currently available), FamilySearch.org, accessed 9 June 2021.

 Bateson, Charles, The Convict Ships 1787-1868, Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow, 1985.

 Digital Panopticon. ‘Convict Hulks’. https://www.digitalpanopticon.org/Convict_Hulks, accessed 6 June 2021.

 Free Settler or Felon. ‘Convict Ship Ann 1810’. https://www.freesettlerorfelon.com/convict_ship_ann_1810.htm, accessed 13 June 2021.

 Hull Advertiser and Exchange Gazette.

 Institutional History Society. ‘Wakefield Prison’. https://institutionalhistory.com/homepage/prisons/major-prisons/wakefield-prison/, accessed 6 June 2021.

 Johnson, Keith comp, Gravestone inscriptions, N.S.W. Volume 1. Sydney burial ground: Elizabeth and Devonshire Streets "The Sandhills' (Monuments relocated at Bunnerong), Genealogical Publications, Of Australia, Sydney, 1973.

 New South Wales and Tasmania, Australia Convict Musters, 1806-1849, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 New South Wales, Australia, Certificates for Publicans' Licences, 1830-1849, 1853-1899, Ancestry.com, accessed 15 June 2021.

 New South Wales, Australia, Colonial Secretary's Papers, 1788-1856, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 New South Wales, Australia, Settler and Convict Lists, 1787-1834, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 New South Wales, Australia Convict Ship Muster Rolls and Related Records, 1790-1849, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 New South Wales, Australia, Settler and Convict Lists, 1787-1834, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 New South Wales, Census and Population Books, 1811-1825, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 Prison History. ‘West Riding House of Correction at Wakefield’. https://www.prisonhistory.org/prison/west-riding-house-of-correction-at-wakefield/, accessed 6 June 2021.

 Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages, New South Wales.

 Royal Arsenal History. ‘Prison Hulks’. https://www.royal-arsenal-history.com/prison-hulks.html, accessed 6 June 2021.

 Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser.

 Sydney, Australia, Anglican Parish Registers, 1814-2011, Ancestry.com, accessed 27 April 2021.

 The Hero of Waterloo Hotel. ‘History’. https://heroofwaterloo.com.au/history/, accessed 5 June 2021.

 UK Prison Hulk Registers and Letter Books, 1802-1849, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 West Yorkshire, England, Prison Records, 1801-1914, Ancestry.com, accessed 5 June 2021.

 York Herald.