Discover

For other uses see Transport (disambiguation) or Transportation (disambiguation).

'Transportation' or penal transportation is used to refer to the deporting of convicted criminals to a penal colony, for example by France to Devil's Island and by the United Kingdom (then including Ireland) to colonies in the Americas from 1620s to 1770s and New South Wales in the early 1800s. It can also be used generally to describe such activities.

Contents

Overview

See also

References

External links

Overview

A sentence of transportation could apply for life or for a specific period of time. The penal system required the convicts to work, either on government projects such as road construction, building works and mining, or assigned to free individuals as a source of unpaid labour. Women were expected to work as domestic servants and farm labourers.
A convict who had served part of his time might apply for a ticket of leave permitting some prescribed freedoms. This enabled some convicts to resume a more normal life, to marry and raise a family, and a few to contribute to the further development of the colonies. Some used the freedom to revert to their previous ways. But exile was an essential component of the punishment. At one time, returning from transportation was a hanging offence.^[1]

Transportation punished both major and petty crimes in Great Britain and Ireland from the 17th century until well into the 19th century. At the time it was seen as a more humane alternative to execution, which would most likely have been the sentence handed down to many of those who were transported, if transportation had not been introduced. From the 1620s until the American Revolution the British colonies in North America received transported British criminals, effectively double the period that Australian colonies subsequently received convicts. The American Revolutionary War brought an end to that means of disposal, and the British Government was forced to look elsewhere.
The gaols became more overcrowded and dilapidated ships were brought into service, the 'hulks' moored in various ports as floating gaols.
Transportation from Britain ended officially in 1868, although it had become unusual several years earlier.
In British colonial India, freedom fighters were transported to the Cellular Jail in the Andaman islands.
==Transportation to Australia==
In 1787 penal transportation from Britain commenced to New South Wales, a colony (now a state) in Australia. The First Fleet's arrival there is considered the founding event in Australia's colonial history.
The Second Fleet frequently is regarded as being the group of three convict ships which arrived together at Sydney Cove in Port Jackson, New South Wales in late June 1790. These ships were Surprize, Neptune, and Scarborough.
A more recent view is to consider all the ships which were intended to sail to Australia together in 1789 as constituting the Second Fleet. According to this viewpoint, it should also include the HMS Guardian, Lady Juliana (ship) and Justinian.
The Third Fleet carried over 2,000 prisoners on 11 ships, leaving Great Britain in 1791.

See also

★ Banishment

★ Deportation

★ Devil's Island

★ Millbank Prison

★ Australian history before 1901

★ Convictism in Australia

★

References

1.


★ Pardons & Punishments: Judges Reports on Criminals, 1783 to 1830: HO (Home Office) 47 Volumes 304 and 305, List and Index Society, The National Archives, Kew, Surrey, TW9 4DU.

External links

★ UK National archives

★ Convict life - State Library of NSW