Arthur Bowes Smyth, surgeon of the Lady Penrhyn, does not—indeed cannot—think well of the unashamedly raucous convict women under his care. To him, they are ‘abandon’d Prostitutes’ whose mouths are filled with filth that ‘far exceeds anything…to be met [with] amongst the most profligate wretches in London.’[1] He knows that no mode of punishment can tame them; not thumb-screws, not iron fetters on their wrists, nor flogging their ‘naked Breeches’ with the cat o’ nine tails—not even the dreaded butchery of their flowing tresses.[2] They are incorrigible. Indeed,
‘every day evinces they grow more harden’d in their Wickedness; nor [does he] conceive it possible in their present situation’ on board the ship ‘to adopt any plan to compel them to behave like rational or even human beings.’[3]
No warm feelings, therefore, are kindled within the surgeon when he beholds the offspring of such lowly ‘wretches’ though the children are, of course, entirely innocent themselves.[4] When the 18-month-old child of one of his indelicate charges dies less than a month before the voyage begins, Surgeon Bowes Smyth does not think the event warrants recording any specific details, such as the name of the infant or its mother.[5] And when another one of these loose women gives birth during the voyage, his carelessness with the basic facts is telling:[6] Henrietta Langley miraculously metamorphoses into ‘Philip Langley’[7] on a list entitled ‘Children, brot. out & Born on Board Ship’ in Bowes Smyth’s journal.[8] So it is not hard to believe that when Frances Hannah is born on the ship in January 1788, the detached surgeon seems to mistakenly list her, too, as a boy named ‘Jno [John] Burleigh.’[9] After all, to Bowes Smyth, baby Frances is just another hopeless convict’s child—a child of Lady Penrhyn.
How did it come to pass that Frances was given such a poor start to her innocent young life? Perhaps the answer can be found in a house in Long Acre, London, ten years earlier.
The Silver Spoon
Elizabeth Burleigh had not been born with a silver spoon in her mouth. But as the young nursemaid cared for the more fortunate children of the gold-beater Robert Evans in Long Acre, London on 17 January 1778, she knew very well she could steal whatever it had not been her birthright to receive.[10] The silver table spoon was ‘missed…the next morning,’ but her employers ‘did not at the time suspect her.’[11] On ‘the 23rd of January, in the evening, she absconded, and never afterwards returned.’[12] Still, it was not until the next day that the reason for her sudden, unexplained departure was discovered: ‘I missed a piece of gold,’ Evans would later testify:
‘I had left a parcel of gold (contrary to my usual course) on the mantle-piece in my dining room; the parcel contained 10 oz. in different pieces, but this piece was the largest in the parcel.’[13]
The gold-beater tracked down the errant nursemaid ‘with great difficulty’ and ‘charged her with this fact; she confessed she had stole the piece of gold from off the mantle-piece, and that it was at a pawnbroker’s in Clare-market.’[14] Though she refused to accompany her employer to the pawnbroker’s she ‘fell upon her knees’ and begged his forgiveness.
The following month, Evans the gold-beater gave his account of the events to the judge and jury at London’s Old Bailey. ‘Several pawnbrokers came to me, giving me an account of things which had been pawned with them by the prisoner,’ he told the court. Among the various items the pawnbrokers produced was the ‘piece of fine gold, weighing 1 oz. 3 penny wts. and 18 grains,’ and another one of Evans’s lost treasures: the silver spoon.[15]
Though she had supposedly already confessed everything to her former employer, when it came time to address the court Elizabeth did not admit to stealing the gold off the mantle-piece. Instead, she claimed she had simply ‘found the piece of gold’ whilst ‘sweeping down the stairs.’[16] She also tried to convince the court that she had ‘intended to carry the silver spoon back again’—pawning items belonging to others in times of distress and then retrieving them from the pawnbroker a few days later was a common practice in this period among low-paid working women in particular.[17] The young nursemaid was even able to call three witnesses who were willing to give her ‘a good character.’[18]
Elizabeth was found ‘GUILTY’ of grand larceny all the same, and a branding iron was heated in readiness for the first of her punishments. Before leaving the courtroom, Elizabeth’s thumb had the letter ‘T’ for ‘Thief’ burnt onto it with the branding iron to tell the world that she was light-fingered and could not be trusted. The tell-tale scar would permanently affect her employability and would also ensure she would not be shown any lenience should she come before the court again.[19] Afterwards she was whisked off to commence the second part of her punishment—imprisonment for one year.[20] The account of her trial does not stipulate where she was incarcerated, but she may have served her sentence in the house of correction. If so, the former gold-beater’s nursemaid would have become a hemp-beater. Beating hemp was just the sort of hard labour authorities believed would punish and maybe even cure the likes of Elizabeth of any criminal tendencies.[21] And maybe it did for some; but there is good reason to believe that for Elizabeth Burleigh it did not.[22]
Once a Thief, Always a Thief?
Seven and a half years later, a young servant named Elizabeth Dalton was on trial at the Old Bailey. Dalton had allegedly entered the shop of linen-draper Joseph Earle in the Strand between five and six in the evening on Monday 12 September 1785 and asked the shop assistant Daniel Willis the price of ‘some lawns.’[23] Whilst showing her some, Willis ‘saw her with her hand in her pocket as if she was putting something under her apron…and…kept her in suspence [sic] as long as [he] could, till somebody came into the shop.’[24] Eventually the shop owner, Earle, did come in and he, too, ‘saw something about [Dalton’s] hands and cloak as she went out.’[25] He immediately suspected her and ‘cast [his] eye on a pile of pocket handkerchiefs.’[26] Observing that it appeared as if some of them were gone’ and that ‘the top one appeared to be moved out of its place,’ Earle went after her.[27] Dalton, however, had a head start and was already twenty yards from the door.
In her haste to make a fast getaway, Dalton ran ‘full-butt’ into a fast-walking ‘black’ man named John Johnson.[28] The collision proved fortuitous for the linen-draper as it gave him the precious seconds he needed to catch up. Earle ‘tapped [Dalton] upon the shoulder, and begged her to come back’ to his shop.[29] As Dalton turned back with Earle, John Johnson ‘saw the…handkerchiefs drop from her…picked them up’ and followed the pair, assuming the young woman had legitimately purchased and unwittingly lost them.[30]
Upon returning to the shop, Earle told his suspect to sit down. “What business have you to desire me to stay here?” Dalton haughtily demanded to know before running off again.[31] Earle pursued her, but Dalton was a fast runner and ‘got some distance’ before he could catch her. When he finally did, he took her to the beadle, who examined her and, of course, ‘found nothing upon her.’[32] In the meantime, John Johnson had returned the discarded handkerchiefs to Earle’s shop thinking he was doing the young lady a courtesy. In fact, John Johnson had secured Dalton a seven year sentence and a place on the Lady Penrhyn.[33]
The Lady Penrhyn began taking on her convict cargo in early January 1787. Though prohibited by the Captain and the Lieutenants, it did not take long for the convict women and the seamen on board to become entangled. At 10 o’clock on the night of April 19, Lieutenant William Collins ‘went down into the Women’s Births & call’d over the names of the Convicts: found 5 missing; 4 wt. the Sailors & one wt. Squires the 2d. Mate [sic].’[34] Orders were given for all five women to be ‘put in Irons.’[35] As per his usual form, Surgeon Bowes Smyth did not bother to mention the names of the women who were subjected to this punishment, but nine months later Frances Hannah was born to Elizabeth Dalton. And on 20 April 1788, when the little girl was baptised at Warrane (Sydney Cove) in Cadigal Country, her surname was the same as that of John Clements: a seaman and carpenter on board the Lady Penrhyn.[36]
Though Surgeon Arthur Bowes Smyth had clearly not ever been overly fastidious with names, he at least made an exception when creating his list of convict women aboard the Lady Penhryn. For next to the name, occupation, crime, and sentence of Frances’s mother, Elizabeth Dalton, the surgeon did not neglect to note her alias: Elizabeth Burleigh. Perhaps ‘Elizabeth Dalton,’ who had stolen some handkerchiefs and some time with a sailor, and ‘Elizabeth Burleigh,’ who had stolen the silver spoon ten years before, were one in the same.[37] As Frances grew up, would she have seen a strange scar in the shape of a letter ‘T’ on her mother’s thumb and wondered what it meant?
An Attached Surgeon
While Assistant Surgeon Arthur Bowes Smyth apparently thought nothing whatsoever of Elizabeth Dalton alias Burleigh, his colleague, the apothecary and First Fleet Assistant Surgeon Thomas Arndell, thought quite differently.[38] Frances Hannah was not yet two years old when her mother Elizabeth shifted her affections from Frances’s father John Clements to Surgeon Arndell, who was evidently willing to form an attachment with her despite her convict status.[39] On 9 July 1790, ‘William Burleigh, son of Thomas Arndell Assistant Surgeon & Elizabeth Burleigh Convict,’ was born and soon after baptised ‘at Rose Hill’, later renamed Parramatta, in Burramattagal Country.[40] Frances Hannah, the base-born ‘convict’s child’ who came into the world on a ship full of women looked down upon as harlots, could now (unofficially) call a ‘gentleman’ and a ‘surgeon’ her stepfather.[41]
At the time of William’s baptism, Frances’s stepfather was in charge of Parramatta’s first hospital, which had been hastily erected in 1789.[42] For his salary of £91 and 5 shillings a year, Surgeon Arndell worked alongside Surgeon John Irving, Australia’s first emancipated convict, in the wholly inadequate and unsanitary ‘Tent Hospital.’[43] The hospital, which was only ever supposed to be temporary, was ‘totally destitute of every conveniency.’[44] It accommodated a mere 200 convicts in a town with a rapidly increasing convict population that was terribly afflicted with dysentery and other serious, debilitating and fatal illnesses.[45]
Given the conditions of his workplace, it is hardly surprising that soon after the foundations for a new clay brick hospital were laid, Surgeon Arndell requested permission to retire from medicine in favour of living the life of a settler.[46] Governor Arthur Phillip subsequently granted him 60 acres at Parramatta, which Arndell worked with great success despite continuing to work at the hospital until October 1794.[47] The quality of the new brick hospital’s design, construction and overall conditions also left much to be desired, so Arndell was doubtless relieved to finally receive confirmation that he would be able to retire on a pension of £50.[48] Arndell went on to receive further land grants and even became a magistrate.[49]
Frances’s half brother William Burleigh Arndell had been laid to rest in St. John’s Cemetery, Parramatta on 4 March 1792 aged ‘19 months and 23 days,’ but Surgeon Arndell and Elizabeth had a further six children together.[50] Elizabeth’s children would have been educated, well dressed, and respectable. As to be expected, all ‘married well’—all except one. This was not a case of a wicked stepfather favouring his own children above the ‘base born’ child of John Clements. Against the odds Frances Hannah, who had not been considered important enough by Surgeon Bowes Smyth to have her name and gender recorded correctly on board the Lady Penrhyn, had become a member of a respected family in the colony and, like her half-siblings, the once hopeless child had every chance of leading a successful life—if only she had lived.
On 23 January 1800, almost 12 years to the day since the Lady Penrhyn sailed into Warrane (Sydney Cove) with the convict Elizabeth Dalton’s newborn baby on board, ‘Francefs Hannah Clements’ was consigned to the earth at St. John’s Cemetery, Parramatta in the same grave as her half-brother William Burleigh Arndell.[51] Frances’s mother Elizabeth would finally marry Surgeon Thomas Arndell six years later at Bulyayorang (Windsor) and in 1808 welcomed the arrival of their youngest child.[52] It was only right that the couple should call this, their one and only legitimate child, ‘Frances Hannah Arndell.’[53]
CITE THIS
Michaela Ann Cameron, “Frances Hannah Clements: The Convict’s Child,” St. John’s Online, (2016) https://stjohnsonline.org/bio/frances-hannah-clements/, accessed [insert current date]
References
Primary Sources and Databases
- Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787–1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, transcript and c.1790 copy accessed 16 October 2016.
- Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2).
- Parish Baptism Registers, Textual records, St. John’s Anglican Church Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia.
- Richard Phillips, The Book of English Trades, and Library of the Useful Arts, (London: The Juvenile Library, 1818).
- Watkin Tench, A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson, (Sydney: University of Sydney Library, 1998), accessed online 23 October 2016.
Secondary Sources
- Michaela Ann Cameron, “The Colonial Hospital,” Dictionary of Sydney, (2015), http://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/the_colonial_hospital accessed 23 October 2016.
- Judith Dunn, The Parramatta Cemeteries: St. John’s, (Parramatta, NSW: Parramatta Historical Society, 1991).
- Clive Emsley, Tim Hitchcock and Robert Shoemaker, “Crime and Justice – Punishments at the Old Bailey,” Old Bailey Proceedings Online (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.0), accessed 18 October 2016.
- B. H. Fletcher, “Arndell, Thomas (1753-1821),” Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1966, accessed online 23 October 2016.
- Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet, (Sydney: Library of Australian History, 1989).
- London Lives, “Historical Background: Criminal Justice – Houses of Correction,” London Lives 1690 to 1800: Crime, Poverty and Social Policy in the Metropolis, (www.londonlives.org, version 1.1).
- Lynn MacKay, “Why They Stole: Women in the Old Bailey, 1779–1789,” Journal of Social History, Vol. 32, No. 3, (Spring, 1999): 623–639.
- R. Mannell et. al., Caring for Convicts and the Community: A History of Parramatta Hospital, (Westmead, NSW: Cumberland Area Health Service, 1988).
Notes
[1] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, transcript accessed 16 October 2016. Page image from the original copy accessed 16 October 2016. Image from another c.1790 copy of the journal accessed 16 October 2016
[2] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, accessed 16 October 2016
[3] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, transcript accessed 16 October 2016.
[4] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, transcript accessed 16 October 2016.
[5] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568. Those details are, however, provided here in the 1790 copy of the journal accessed 16 October 2016. The child was Hugh or John Sandlyn[s], son of Ann Sandlyns, alias Lyons, alias Breton, a 30-year-old needleworker who had been convicted for petty larceny.
[6] Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet, (Sydney: Library of Australian History, 1989), p.93; Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789, transcript accessed 16 October 2016, original page image from c.1790 copy of the journal accessed 16 October 2016
[7] Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet, (Sydney: Library of Australian History, 1989), p.93
[8] On the same list Wm. Green, John Sandlyns, Wm. Colley, Jno. Colepits and Jno. Lawson are coldly and matter-of-factly listed as ‘dead.’ Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789, transcript accessed 16 October 2016, original page image from c.1790 copy of the journal accessed 16 October 2016
[9] Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet, (Sydney: Library of Australian History, 1989), p.93
[10] A gold-beater was a highly skilled and trustworthy tradesman “who by continually beating gold or silver upon marble with a hammer, in thin skins, reduces these metals into very thin leaves proper for gilding or silvering copper, iron, steel, wood, and a variety of other materials.” See Richard Phillips, The Book of English Trades, and Library of the Useful Arts, (London: The Juvenile Library, 1818), pp.172-6 accessed online 19 October 2016
[11] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[12] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[13] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[14] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[15] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[16] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[17] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016. On ‘borrowing networks’ and the seemingly ‘fluid notion of private property’ which saw many items belonging to other people being pawned as a short-term solution to great ‘distress’ only to be redeemed a few days later, see Lynn MacKay, “Why They Stole: Women in the Old Bailey, 1779–1789,” Journal of Social History, Vol. 32, No. 3, (Spring, 1999): 623–639.
[18] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, trial of ELIZABETH BURLEIGH, (t17780218-12), accessed 19 October 2016.
[19] Clive Emsley, Tim Hitchcock and Robert Shoemaker, “Crime and Justice – Punishments at the Old Bailey,” Old Bailey Proceedings Online (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.0), accessed 18 October 2016
[20] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 18 February 1778, Punishment Summary, (s17780218-1) accessed 23 October 2016
[21] Clive Emsley, Tim Hitchcock and Robert Shoemaker, “Crime and Justice – Punishments at the Old Bailey,” Old Bailey Proceedings Online (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.0), accessed 18 October 2016; London Lives, “Historical Background: Criminal Justice – Houses of Correction,” London Lives 1690 to 1800: Crime, Poverty and Social Policy in the Metropolis, (www.londonlives.org, version 1.1), accessed 18 October 2016
[22] I write, “if this Elizabeth Burleigh and First Fleeter Elizabeth Dalton were one in the same” not because I am questioning the alias recorded for Elizabeth Dalton, as there is no doubt Dalton did use the name Elizabeth Burleigh / Burley. The question is whether this “Elizabeth Burleigh” in the 1778 trial was Elizabeth Dalton alias Burleigh or simply another woman with the same name who was driven to a life of crime. My research has revealed that the name Burleigh / Burley was a common surname in London’s slums at the time, with a family containing both an Elizabeth and a Hannah Burleigh being admitted to the workhouse in the 1760s. It seems highly probable that Elizabeth Dalton alias Burleigh was a repeat offender, but this cannot be confirmed beyond a doubt with such fragmentary evidence.
[23] “Lawns” refers to lawn cloth; a plain weave (i.e. strong and hard-wearing) textile, probably linen, particularly in this instance given the context of a “linen-draper’s shop.” Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[24] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[25] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[26] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[27] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[28] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[29] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[30] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[31] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[32] Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016.
[33] Like ‘Elizabeth Burleigh,’ ‘Elizabeth Dalton’ had not been able to avoid a guilty verdict despite producing two individuals who were willing to testify to her ‘very good character’ at her trial, which took place at the Old Bailey on 14 September 1785. Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, trial of ELIZABETH DALTON, (t17850914-24), accessed 19 October 2016; Old Bailey Proceedings Online, (www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.2), 14 September 1785, Punishment Summary, (s17850914-1) accessed 23 October 2016
[34] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, accessed 16 October 2016
[35] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, accessed 16 October 2016
[36] Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, accessed 16 October 2016. The list of the crew including John Clements’ name does not appear in this transcript, accessed 16 October 2016; Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet, (Sydney: Library of Australian History, 1989), pp.74, 93. Regarding the use of the Aboriginal endonym “Warrane” and the European exonym “Sydney Cove” see Harold Koch and Luise Hercus (eds.), Aboriginal Placenames: Naming and Re-naming the Australian Landscape, (Canberra: ANU E Press, 2009), p. 37, https://books.google.com.au/books?id=HyHh-OrnRGoC&lpg=PR1&pg=PR1#v=onepage&q&f=false, accessed 26 August 2019. For a general discussion about the dual naming policy adopted in this project whilst giving prime position to indigenous endonyms and subordinating European imposed exonyms in both the colonial Australian and colonial American contexts as a mark of respect and to “sound” language, see “Name-Calling: Notes on Terminology,” in Michaela Ann Cameron (Ph.D. Diss.), “Stealing the Turtle’s Voice: A Dual History of Western and Algonquian-Iroquoian Soundways from Creation to Re-creation,” (Sydney: Department of History, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, University of Sydney, 2018), pp. 25–35, http://bit.ly/stealingturtle, accessed 28 March 2020.
[37] Elizabeth Dalton’s age is given as 21 when she was on board the Lady Penrhyn, which would have made her too young to have been the Elizabeth Burleigh who stole the silver spoon. However, it is very likely that this age was not any more accurate than Bowes Smyth’s records of details of convict women and children, such as name or gender. The trial transcripts of Burleigh and Dalton do have some similarities in the type of crime, the prisoner’s occupation (service), and the amount of people prepared to give “good character” references. The Dalton trial record notes that one witness, the black man John Johnson, stated that she was a “young woman.” If she had actually been in her mid-20s by the time she was transported rather than 21, which is only a discrepancy of a couple of years, then it is very possible she could have been the Elizabeth Burleigh who was a ‘spinster’ and working as a ‘nursemaid’ in Long Acre, London in 1778. Arthur Bowes Smyth, A Journal of a Voyage from Portsmouth to New South Wales and China in the Lady Penrhyn, 1787-1789 [manuscript], National Library of Australia, MS 4568, transcript accessed 16 October 2016.
[38] Like Arthur Bowes Smyth, Thomas Arndell was one of the assistant surgeons under the First Fleet’s Surgeon-General John White. On the journey out, Arndell cared for convicts on board Friendship.
[39] Arndell appears to have been quite a ladies’ man, having previously fathered a child with another woman whilst his first wife was pregnant.
[40] Parish Baptism Registers, Textual records, St. John’s Anglican Church Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia.
[41] Captain Watkin Tench referred to Surgeon Thomas Arndell as a ‘gentleman’ in “Chapter X: The Arrival of the Supply from Batavia; the State of the Colony in November, 1790,” Watkin Tench, A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson, (Sydney: University of Sydney Library, 1998), p.57 accessed online 23 October 2016.
[42] Michaela Ann Cameron, “Parramatta’s General Hospital,” Dictionary of Sydney, (2015), accessed 22 October 2016; Watkin Tench, “Chapter X: The Arrival of the Supply from Batavia; the State of the Colony in November, 1790,” Watkin Tench, A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson, (Sydney: University of Sydney Library, 1998), p.57 accessed online 23 October 2016; R. Mannell et. al., Caring for Convicts and the Community: A History of Parramatta Hospital, (Westmead, NSW: Cumberland Area Health Service, 1988), pp.13-5.
[43] R. Mannell et. al., Caring for Convicts and the Community: A History of Parramatta Hospital, (Westmead, NSW: Cumberland Area Health Service, 1988), p.14.
[44] Watkin Tench, “Chapter X: The Arrival of the Supply from Batavia; the State of the Colony in November, 1790,”Watkin Tench, A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson, (Sydney: University of Sydney Library, 1998), p.57 accessed online 23 October 2016.
[45] R. Mannell et. al., Caring for Convicts and the Community: A History of Parramatta Hospital, (Westmead, NSW: Cumberland Area Health Service, 1988), pp.13-5.
[46] B. H. Fletcher, “Arndell, Thomas (1753-1821),” Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1966, accessed online 23 October 2016.
[47] B. H. Fletcher, “Arndell, Thomas (1753-1821),” Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1966, accessed online 23 October 2016.
[48] For more information on the second hospital built at the present-day Parramatta Justice Precinct Heritage Courtyard on Marsden Street, Parramatta see Michaela Ann Cameron, “The Colonial Hospital,” Dictionary of Sydney, (2015), accessed 23 October 2016 and Michaela Ann Cameron, “Parramatta Justice Precinct Heritage Courtyard,” The Old Parramattan, (2015), accessed 23 October 2016.B. H. Fletcher, “Arndell, Thomas (1753-1821),” Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1966, accessed online 23 October 2016.
[49] B. H. Fletcher, “Arndell, Thomas (1753-1821),” Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1966, accessed online 23 October 2016.
[50] Parish Burial Registers, Textual records, St. John’s Anglican Church Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia; Judith Dunn, The Parramatta Cemeteries: St. John’s, (Parramatta, NSW: Parramatta Historical Society, 1991), p.189
[51] Frances’s cause of death is unknown. According to a plaque at her grave, she died on 20 January 1800 and was buried three days later. Her surname on the headstone was written as “Clements” and her father’s name was recorded as “Clements” by Arthur Bowes Smyth, although it is hard to read and could be “Clement,” which may be why Mollie Gillen chose “Clement” when writing about Frances. As this website, with very rare exceptions, uses the spelling that appeared on the headstone itself, I have elected to use “Clements.” Judith Dunn, The Parramatta Cemeteries: St. John’s, (Parramatta, NSW: Parramatta Historical Society, 1991), p.189. The grave is in Right Section, Row 33, Memorial A (R.33.A), St. John’s Cemetery, Parramatta, not far from the graves of Frances’s fellow First Fleeters Henry Dodd and Thomas Freeman.
[52] Mollie Gillen, The Founders of Australia: A Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet, (Sydney: Library of Australian History, 1989), p.93
[53] Frances Hannah Arndell married William Gunn, a police magistrate, in Sorrell, Tasmania on 1 August 1829. They had six daughters and three sons. K. L. Read, “Gunn, William (1800-1868),” Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 1966, accessed online 20 October 2016. The other children of Thomas and Elizabeth Arndell were Elizabeth (born 1792), Mary (born 1793), Sarah (born 1796), Thomas (born 1799), James (born 1802).
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St. John's 