Or, how Moreton Bay dealt with the Servant Problem in the early years. Tackling the subject of the 19th century “servant problem” conjures up ideas of exacting upper- and middle-class ladies bemoaning a few specks of dust left on the mantelpiece. In our first years of free settlement, a servant could be a shepherd, labourer,Continue reading “The Plebian Tyranny.”
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Barry the Loafer – a Rogue and a Vagabond
James Barry was a labourer who made his way around Queensland in the 1870s. The term “labourer” might be a bit of an exaggeration – Mr Barry did not care to undertake much physical labour. He preferred to spend his time drinking, failing to pay for his board, and comforting the wives of men whoContinue reading “Barry the Loafer – a Rogue and a Vagabond”
The Crew of the Hopeful
Contemporary Accounts of the Crew Members. The voyage of the Hopeful labour recruiting vessel from May to July 1884 ended with criminal charges and death sentences (quickly commuted) for several senior crew members. It was the first time that charges against people engaged in that traffic had “stuck,” and resulted in the kind of penaltiesContinue reading “The Crew of the Hopeful”
The Convicts from Mauritius
In April 1840, the Colonial Secretary, by command of the Governor, did himself the honour to acquaint the Commandant at Moreton Bay that the schooner John had been engaged by the Commissariat to bring 15 prisoners to work for that department in Brisbane. The men had been transported earlier that year – 13 in theContinue reading “The Convicts from Mauritius”
The Soldiers of Moreton Bay
soldiers and the indigenous people In October 1824, the New South Wales Governor Sir Thomas Brisbane and Chief Justice Sir Francis Forbes sailed from Sydney to Moreton Bay. The object of their journey was to assess the suitability of the Moreton Bay Penal Colony, which had just been set up at Redcliffe Point. The SydneyContinue reading “The Soldiers of Moreton Bay”
Personal and Commercial.
A Tour of the Classifieds The plaintive personal advertisements for missing friends mentioned in the previous post often sat cheek by jowl with truly bizarre advertising content – gossip and rabble-rousing, and a number of inscrutable items that would only be understood by your average colonial Victorian perusing the local organ of record. The veryContinue reading “Personal and Commercial.”
The Brisbane Hospital 1885
If the early 1880s had been trying for the Brisbane Hospital, 1885 was a nightmare. Staff went missing, patients went missing and money went missing. The Hospital was the subject of a daring undercover story in the Courier, and an unfavourable Auditor-General’s Department report – the first conducted, apparently, in eighteen years. The year beganContinue reading “The Brisbane Hospital 1885”
The Queen of the Artemisia
1848 was a year of unrest and revolution in Europe. The world seemed to be in uproar. And uproar would find its way to Brisbane Town that year, not in the form of an uprising, but in the form of the Queen of the Artemisia. Before Dr Lang rounded up industrious protestants to populate “Cooksland,”Continue reading “The Queen of the Artemisia”
The Brisbane Hospital 1884
Hands-on ministrations, ‘horrors’ and vice-regal tours. By 1884, the turbulent administration of Dr Kesteven was a memory, but the Hospital still faced public criticism, largely due to its inability to make inroads into the typhoid problem. The causes of infectious disease were imperfectly known, but the appalling state of public hygiene in Brisbane in theContinue reading “The Brisbane Hospital 1884”
The Brisbane Hospital 1882-1883
Few institutions have undergone an ordeal the like of the troubles of the Brisbane Hospital in the 1880s. Accused of medical, financial and managerial incompetence, the hospital battled its way through catastrophic outbreaks of typhoid and emerged at the end of the decade being lavishly praised by the same press that had vilified it earlier.Continue reading “The Brisbane Hospital 1882-1883”
Moreton Bay and More 