Sub sections:
Introduction to Volume 1
As he stood in the dock awaiting sentence for his involement in the Castle Forbes affair, Anthony Hitchcock, 'the most intelligent’ of the men charged, pleaded that an investigation be conducted into the treatment of assigned convicts on James Mudie's estate. According to his counsel, Roger Therry, who described the proceedings in his Reminiscences (1863), Hitchcock had recommended that such an inquiry might particularly investigate ‘the merciless infliction of the lash throughout the district of the Hunter River’, and the ‘frivolous excuses’ employed by masters to prevent convicts receiving their tickets-of-leave. Hitchcock was, at that point, prohibited from exhibiting his lacerated back, and was soon after sentenced to death. |
In light of the Court's refusal to admit evidence pertaining to the treatment of convicts at Castle Forbes, and given the enormous public sympathy for the offenders, Governor Bourke, on 13th December 1833, ordered his Principle Superintendent of Convicts, F.A. Hely, and the Solicitor General, J.H. Plunkett, to proceed to Patrick's Plains to undertake 'a strict enquiry into the conduct of Messes Mudie and Larnach towards their assigned Servants, and into the proceedings of the Bench at Patrick Plains in the matter of complaints brought before them by Masters against Servants, and Vice Versa'. They were to investigate 'all points touching the subsistence, Clothing, Management and discipline' of assigned servants at Castle Forbes, and particularly to inquire into the alleged suppression of a letter of complaint addressed by John Poole to the Principle Superintendent of Convicts, referred to during the trial. On the following day, after receiving information from a Hunter Valley convict, James Brown, the commissioners were directed to also inquire into 'the practice that is said to prevail at Castle Forbes and throughout the District of Patrick Plains of labour on the Sabbath Day by convict servants'. |
| The Court of Enquiry opened at the Court House at Patrick Plains on the 19 December 1833, beginning with evidence from the convicts James Brown and James Harvey. Two days later, on the 21 December, Hitchcock and Poole were executed nearby. The Enquiry concluded on 27 December, having taken evidence from 8 convicts, 14 free settlers including John Lanarch, a clerk and a constable attached to the Bench, and a number of other men employed at Castle Forbes. In the final days of the Enquiry, other convicts employed at Castle Forbes were given the chance to air any grievances before the Court, 8 appearing, each stating they had no complaint. |
The general finding of the Enquiry was that the insinuations of mistreatment aired at trial of Hitchcock and others were unfounded. Governor Bourke's assessment was that while Mudie had evidently not treated his convicts 'with the same consideration for their wants and comfort which the neighbouring settlers evinced', he had nonetheless not 'in any remarkable degree transgressed the Regulations of Government'. Bourke communicated his opinions to Messrs Mudie and Larnach in a letter dated 13 January 1834, noting that 'the complaints are for the most part unfounded and that your general conduct towards your assigned Servants has not been marked by Hardships or oppression'. He nonetheless drew their attention to some minor infringements of the regulations concerning rations. he particularly admonished Lanarch for his 'imprudent and unjustifiable' behaviour in striking convicts, and for the 'unwarrantable and reprehensible procedure' of bringing the convict, David Jones. to trial twice on the same day for the same offence. Mudie was admonished for forcing convicts to work on Sundays under threat of punishment. On the grounds that there few other complaints tended by convicts during the Enquiry, Bourke permitted the replacement of convicts which Mudie lost or relinquished as a result of the Castle Forbes affair. |
| The depositions and related evidence collected by the Court of Enquiry were organised into 7 sections, labelled A to G. Part A comprised the evidence of convicts; Part B the evidence of local settlers, farmers, overseers, including a letter addressed to the Enquiry by John Blaxland of Wollombi. John Lanarch's deposition was marked as Part E. Part G contained copies of cases before the local bench concerning those convicts involved in the Castle Forbes affair. Our transcription of the Evidence of the Court of Enquiry replicates the structure of the material as presented to Bourke, although the copies of miscellaneous court proceedings that were appended to the evidence of particular individuals have, for the sake of convenience, been extracted and presented as Appenices to Vol.1. |