The day was spent at Port Arthur, a former penal settlement.
It’s well known that transportation as a punishment was sometimes meted out for quite trivial offences. What may be less well known are some of the rules and regulations once the convicts arrived here. Admittedly, Port Arthur was only used for repeat offenders but, even so, some of the everyday routine seems very harsh today.
For instance, leg shackles were frequently used when the convicts were let out of their cells, and the majority of prisoners were put to work, cutting down trees, sawing logs, making bricks, quarrying and cutting sandstone blocks, and working as blacksmiths, coopers, wheelwrights etc. Imagine doing this while shackled round the legs - I can vouch that the metal chains were horrendously heavy.
The prisoners with the worst records for indiscipline were put in the separation unit and rules were stringent there. They were kept in separate cells for a month, a year or even more for twenty three hours a day. Even when they were let out for an hour’s exercise, there was a whole sheet of paper filled with rules relating to their behaviour. For instance, their faces had to be covered with a “mask”, they had to keep exactly four yards behind the man in front and were not allowed to make any kind of contact with each other or any sound at all. They then marched quickly up and down beside a wall for a full hour.
They were made to attend church twice a week, were housed in tiered separate compartments there and had to wear masks even then (unlike Dave, who was let off today!). The service lasted for at least an hour during which they had to stand in their limited space, just managing to peep over the barrier in front and without being able to see the person next to them.
Jean
