Description

Media: BOOK - paperback, 370 pages
Author: K. Clarke
Year: 1999
ISBN: 0958753334
Other: b&w photos, maps, bibliog, appendixes, index
Publisher: Keith Clarke

This work opens with eight chapters of the convict system. Its most valuable resource, however, is the appendices, listing the names, ship of transportation, trial and conviction, sentence, release, occupation and crime, for those 3700 convicts who were in the Port Phillip settlement before 1850. Their names are listed alphabetically by district.

Most convicts (111 pages in the largest appendix) were exiles to Port Phillip; the others were at the settlements at Port Phillip (63 pages), Sorrento (24 pages) and Western Port (4 pages); those convicted in the Supreme Court of the district are listed also (25 pages).

There are copious illustrations, engravings and maps to supplement the text, together with a list of references, including Home Office files, and a bibliography. The work is of particular interest to genealogists and family historians.

Contents:
Frontispiece
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. The Parish System and Local Government
2. Crime and Punishment
3. Pillar and Pillow Talk
4. Settlement at Sullivan's Bay (Sorrento)
5. Settlement at Western Port
6. Settlement at Melbourne
7. Recognition of Port Phillip Settlement
8. The La Trobe Years
References
Bibliography
Index
Appendices
- Imperial Measures and Conversions
- Abbreviations
- Data, Settlement at Sorrento
- Data, Settlement at Western Port
- Data, Port Phillip Settlement
- Exiles to Port Phillip
- Supreme Court of Melbourne

REVIEW:
... a goldmine of information. ... is more than just a list of names. In eight detailed chapters the author fills in the background to the British settlement of the southern shores of Australia. One important theme is the threat from the French explorers.

5 Reviews

Convicts of the Port Phillip District by Keith M Clarke
5
Posted by Ruth Murdoch on 9th Feb 2021

This book appears to have been very well researched.
I have three ancestors of whom I am uncertain as to the means and time of arrivals into Australia and this book has removed the possibility of them being convicts into the Port Phillip District. This will save me considerable effort and time I need to spend on tracing dead ends.
Convicts of Port Phillip District.
5
Posted by Ronald Aubrey on 13th Oct 2020

Excellet record of the convicts who came to Port Phillip in Victoria. The list of names is quite extensive and must have taken some time to put together. A great historical record.

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