Free Settler or Felon
Convict and Colonial History




Convict Ship Mangles (6) - 1833


Embarked: 236 men
Voyage: 126 days
Deaths: 1 (at Sheerness)
Surgeons Journal: yes
Previous vessel: Andromeda arrived 11 March 1833
Next vessel: Diana arrived 25 May 1833
Captain William Carr
Surgeon James Rutherford
Hunter Valley convicts and passengers arriving on the Mangles in 1833

This was the sixth voyage of this ship bringing convicts to Australia. The next voyage was in 1835 when the convicts were disembarked at Hobart.

The prisoners were tried or court-martialed in the following cities and counties in England, Scotland and Wales - Middlesex, Gloucester, York, Surrey, Nottingham, Worcester, Somerset, Stafford, Chester, Lancaster, Bucks, Oxford, Sussex, Essex, Derby, Warwick, Bristol, Lincoln, Cambridge, Leicester, Salop, Bedford, London, Bristol, Kent, Tewkesbury, Devon, Perth, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling, Jedburgh, Inverary, Monmouth, Flint, Glamorgan, Brecon, Demerary, Castle Rushen and Kings Mews CM.

Surgeon James Rutherford

James Rutherford kept a Medical Journal from 8 November 1832 to 9 May 1833.....

Of 236 convicts originally embarked eighty were received at Woolwich and 156 at Sheerness. I did not notice anything peculiar in their state of health or anything in their general condition except that some of them seemed to feel the want of flannels which they said they had been long accustomed to wear. [1]

There was an outbreak of cholera on board as well as scurvy. James Rutherford remarked on a symptom of scurvy he called spontaneous salivation which he had read about, and which he thought may have also affect those who engaged in religious fasting. He treated this symptom using a mixture of nitras potassa dissolved in equal parts of vinegar and lime juice, as used by Charles Cameron surgeon on the Ferguson in 1829.

James Rutherford went into great detail in his closing notes regarding the outbreak of cholera...The case called cholera asphyxia in the summary at the end of the journal, occurred at Sheerness a few days after the embarkation of the prisoners, and was officially reported a fortnight before the ship sailed from that place. In my report on that case, I said that the patient died of a disease attended with symptoms strongly suspicious of cholera and this cautious mode of giving a name or rather declining to give any name to that isolated case of obviously most alarming disease which exhibited at its very commencement every symptom of malignant cholera that I am aware of, I adopted in order not to excite alarm believing as I did that the disorder was not imported with the prisoners but that it was occasioned be it cholera or not by the circumstance of the man having been deprived so he himself stated of flannels which he had been long accustomed to wear at the moment when he put on new clothes and was about to embark on board a convict ship not yet perhaps sufficiently aired and dried to preserve properly the health of a number of persons necessarily confined to a limited space within her sides.

For that a disease strongly resembling malignant cholera if not a mitigated form of that disease itself, might, independently of the ordinary cause of cholera whatever that may be, arise, at an early period after the embarkation of prisoners especially in the damp and foggy season of the year, on board such a ship must taken up after being for years comparatively uninhabited but occupied for the stowage of all sorts of cargo and probably before she was sufficiently dried and aired for the preservation of health in her crowded condition, when the breath and exhalations from the surface of so many individuals assembled together would greatly contribute to augment the damp of their prison, I hardly entertained a doubt.

The single death on the Mangles, that of William Buck, occurred while the ship still lay at Sheerness.

James Rutherford was also employed as surgeon on the convict ships Regalia in 1826, Pyramus in 1832 and the Hooghley in 1834.

A Visitor's Impression

Thomas Rolph gave the following account of his visit to a convict ship in November 1832 -

We were detained some time at anchor, opposite Ryde, from the prevalence of adverse winds; the motion of the ship, when at anchor, in a rough sea, is extremely disagreeable. From our detention, an opportunity was afforded me of visiting a Convict ship, then taking in stores at Portsmouth. There were arrangements in her, for conveying two hundred and eighty criminals to New South Wales. The manner in which the ship was fitted up, combined security with comfort. The holds, in which the convicts sleep, were commodious: their allowance of food very liberal, and of the best quality, and every indulgence, consistent with their safety, is extended towards them, if their conduct is orderly and well behaved. The unfortunate creatures were taken on board the ship, during our stay at Portsmouth: they gave three hearty cheers as they left the land of their fathers; most of them for ever. The government, willing to show them every kindness, ordered the ship to remain off land for ten or twelve days, in order that they may communicate with their friends.......
A brief account, together with observations, made during a visit in the West ... By Thomas Rolph

Military Guard

The Guard consisted of 29 rank and file, 7 women and 8 children attached to the 21st Fusiliers. Passengers. Captain Brand, 16th regiment, Mrs. Brand and assistant Surgeon Smith of the 17th regiment.

Departure

The Mangles sailed from London on 14th December 1832.[2]

Scilly Islands

They put into the Scilly Islands because of bad weather early in the voyage.

Port Jackson

They arrived in Port Jackson on 19th April 1833.

Convict Muster

The men were mustered on board on 24th April 1833. The indents include name, age, education, religion, marital status, family, native place, trade, offence, when and where tried, sentence, former convictions, and physical description. There are also occasional notes regarding colonial crimes.

The youngest prisoners were -
Michael Cray age 13, a London pickpocket with no prior convictions who was transported for life.
Thomas Carwardine age 14 a tailors boy from Brighton sentenced to 7 years for stealing coals.
Thomas Oldmeadow Fry age 14, butchers apprentice from Norfolk sentenced to transportation for life for sheep stealing.
Thomas Huddlestone age 14, errand boy from Liverpool Sentenced to 7 years transportation for stealing watches.
George Hemmings age 14 from London, errand boy. Sentenced to 7 years transportation for picking pockets.
Isaac Millor age 14 from Staffordshire, tailors boy convicted of stealing bread.
Henry Pound age 14 from Plymouth, tailors boy convicted of stealing apples.
Abraham Smith age 14 from Staffordshire, file cutter convicted of robbing a boat.
Frederick Williams, age 14 from London. Tailors boy convicted of stealing a handkerchief [3]


Occupations included the usual bakers, printers, farm servants, sweep, ostler, glass blower, groom, blacksmith, shoemaker, stable boy, coachmaker, bricklayer, cooper, boatman, weaver, whip maker, framework knitter, stagecoach driver leather trunk maker and umbrella maker. There were also others with more unusual occupations......

David James Edwards from Carnarvonshire gave his occupation as Excise officer. He was sentenced to transportation for life at Monmouth for stealing a horse

John Gordon Gibson, Attorneys Clerk from London sentenced to 7 years transportation for stealing spoons

George Heaven age 37, native place Bath. Occupation surgeons apprentice, maltster and corn factor. Convicted of forgery in London and sentenced to transportation for life. - George Heaven assisted the surgeon in the hospital on the voyage out. When convicts displayed symptoms of cholera on board he wrote a letter - couched in modest and respectful language informing the surgeon that he had seen a great deal of cholera in London and thought that the illness on board was the same.[1]

Alexander Morrison age 30 was a fully qualified shipwright convicted in London of stealing a chest.

Thomas Tongue age 29 from Lincolnshire, occupation navigator and farm labourer convicted of sheep stealing. Received free pardon dated 29 March 1841. [3]

Convicts Disembarked

The prisoners were landed on 6 May and escorted to the Prisoners Barracks at Hyde Park

Hyde Park Barracks c.1820 Hyde Park Barracks

Notes and Links

1). Hunter Valley convicts and passengers arriving on the Mangles in 1833

2). Bushranger John Roach arrived on the Mangles

3). Bushranger Thomas Farrow arrived on the Mangles

4). Bushranger James Everett arrived on the Mangles

5). Thomas Oldmeadow Fry age 14, butchers apprentice from Norfolk sentenced to transportation for life for sheep stealing became a runaway and bushranger in the Hunter Valley in 1840s. He was sent to the Newcastle Iron Gang from which he escaped and later was captured at Jerrys Plains having committed a series of robberies. He was sent to Cockatoo Island in 1846.

Convict Barracks, Cockatoo Island...Cockatoo Island convict barracks


6).Select here to read of the punishment endured by Edward Scandrake at Hyde Park Barracks in 1833.

7). Voyages of the convict ship Mangles included those in 1820, 1822, 1824, 1826, 1828, 1833, 1835, 1837 and 1840

8). Convict ships bringing detachments of the 21st regiment (Royal Scotch Fusiliers) and Officer in command of the Guard....

Mary departed London 4 September 1832 - Captain Daniels 21st regt.,

Roslin Castle departed Cork 8 October 1832 - Lieuts. Bayley and Pieter L. Campbell. 21st

Andromeda departed Portsmouth 17 November 1832 - Lieuts. Lonsdale and Armstrong 21st regt.,

Mangles departed London 14 December 1832 London

Asia departed the Downs 21 February 1833 - Lieuts. Kelly and Wilson of 6th regt.,

Lord Lyndoch departed Sheerness June 1833 - Lieut-Col. Leahy. Headquarters of 21st

Royal Admiral departed Dublin 4 June 1833 - Lieut. Ainslie 21st regt.,

Aurora departed Portsmouth 4 July 1833 Major Delisle 4th regt.,

Java departed Cork 24 July 1833 - Lieut. Wrixon, 21st regt.,

Neva departed Plymouth 29 July 1833 - Lieut. McEdwin 1st or Queens Own regt.,

Lloyds departed the Downs 25 August 1833 - Lieut. McKnight 21st regt.,

Fairlie departed England 27 October 1833

Bengal Merchant departed 28 March 1838 - Lieut. Dear of 21st regt., ;

References

[1] Journal of James Rutherford. Ancestry.com. UK, Royal Navy Medical Journals, 1817-1857 Medical Journal of James Rutherford on the voyage of the Mangles in 1833. Original data: The National Archives. Kew, Richmond, Surrey.

[2] Bateson, Charles, Library of Australian History (1983). The Convict Ships, 1787-1868 (Australian ed). Library of Australian History, Sydney pp.350-51.

[3] Convict Indents. Ancestry.com. State Archives NSW; Series: NRS 12188; Item: [4/4017]; Microfiche: 685