|
|
Fisher was by this time, not only a free man, and a land owner, but he was married and had a family. Edward was married to Elizabeth Gregory at Norfolk Island on July 26, 1801 by the Rev. Henry Fulton, Elizabeth was not a convict. |
|
Edward FISHER born 1753
Edward Fisher was born in England 1753 (‘Inscriptions in Stone’ St. David’s Burial Ground 1804-1872 published 1976, compiled by Richard Lord – To the memory of Edward Fisher who departed this life August 23, 1838. [Buried 29th August] Aged 85 years) in the reign of George II (1726-1760). Whether it was in Stafford is not known, but in 1787 he was serving in the Parish of Sedgeley, Staffordshire. He had received very little education, beyond that which enabled him to do simple reading and writing. His occupation at the time was that of labourer, although in earlier years he had probably been a servant in the employ of some country gentleman, as were most boys of this time. In the eighteenth century; indeed: well into the nineteenth, according to history, the children of humble parent in England, lived a hard and dreary life of almost slavery, and the difference between the living conditions of the privileged and under privileged classes was most pronounced. There is nothing to indicate that Edward was any different to most young men of his time. He was apparently popular among friends of his own class, who it would seem erred a little on the adventurous side. Indeed; these friends may have been the cause of the great event in his life, which transported him from his native country, to a new and tragic world, and then turned him into a wealthy and highly respected citizen and landowner in far away Tasmania.
It all came about as the result of some petty thieving on February 12, 1788. Edward was brought before the court on July 30, 1788 and sentenced to 7 years transportation. Transportation meant being sent out to the convict settlement at Port Jackson in the colony of New South Wales, which Captain Phillip was about to establish, having arrived on January 26, 1788 with the first fleet, which sailed from Portsmouth on May 13, 1787. The founding of the colony of New South Wales was for the dual purpose of supplying Britain with a dumping ground for convicts after the outlet to the American colonies had been closed by the War of American Independence, and providing a home base for the whaling fleet. The War of Independence meant the closing of Atlantic bases to British whalers, and new ones had to be found. The East India Company was also interested in the founding of Botany Bay as a port on an alternate route to China.
The following information is available from the Indictment in the Oxford Circuit Assizes records (Assizes 5/108). ‘Edward Fisher late of the Parish of Sedgeley, Staffs, labourer, with Thomas Baker, James Haden, Daniel Aston, and James Dodd, tried at the Summer Assizes 28 George III (1788) for feloniously stealing two hempen sacks, value 3/-, and 275 pounds weight of hops, value $20, goods of Hugh Evans’ of the Parish of Sedgeley on 12th February 28 George II. The stolen goods were received by John Whitehouse, victualler. Fisher was found guilty, and sentenced to transportation for seven years. At the same Assizes, he was also charged with stealing a flitch of bacon, but was found not guilty.
This punishment seems very savage for the crime, but at this time it was not unusual, and the wonder is that he was not sentenced to death. Overcrowding of the jails and hulks, with the shut down of convict shipments to America, and as the result of all this punishment for petty crime sweeping through England, caused the government in 1785 to determine on transportation of convicts to Botany Bay in the new colony of New South Wales, which had been discovered by Captain Cook.
Edward had to remain a prisoner in his own country from the date of his sentence on July 30, 1788 until the end of 1790, because of difficulties of transportation to so remote a place, and until the colony was ready to receive convicts in large numbers. The small sailing ships of the time took over a year on the return journey, which was made by way of the Cape of Good Hope, mostly returning by way of China to pick up a consignment of tea or general cargo for the East India Company.
These three years must have been really tough, but not as tough as the ordeal that lay ahead. The treatment of the convicts on the long sea voyage, and the dreadful conditions awaiting them, especially those who came on the second fleet, has been sufficiently recorded for history. Sufficient to say, it is a blot that can never be erased. However, apparently Edward survived the voyage, for he arrived at Port Jackson on the ship ‘Matilda’ of the Third fleet which entered the harbour in August 1791.
The settlement had now been established for three years, but it was still a ‘hell’ of a place, and many convicts had been shipped over to Norfolk Island, on account of the acute shortage of food at Port Jackson.
Governor Phillip had sent his Aide-de-camp Lieutenant King across to establish a settlement at Norfolk within a month of the arrival of the fleet in 1788, because it was thought at the time, if the Island was not quickly claimed for Britain, the French would take it.
It seems, Edward was kept at Port Jackson only a short time before he was transferred to Norfolk Island on the ‘Mary Anne’. As a seven year transportation sentence required at least four years to be spent in the colony, this meant Norfolk was to be his prison home until the end of 1795, when he had the option of returning to England on the first transport available or receiving a grant of land, and settling in the colony. He chose the latter, and who could wonder; this dear little island, nine hundred miles north east of Sydney, and measuring three miles by two miles, was discovered by Captain James Cook on October 10, 1774. King was not at all a harsh man, the convicts who behaved themselves were not badly treated. There could have been times, when life in such delightful surroundings was even satisfying. Of course, the story of Norfolk Island several decades later, when it became a terrible penal colony, is a very different story.
Some of the convicts shipped out were dreadful and desperate types, both men and women, but most were just normal people of this period, poor and sometimes uneducated, who had committed some trifling wrong. There were, of course, some very highly educated and trained tradesmen among these unfortunates. Many of our early buildings, and much of our early architecture which is now treasured by the National Trust, both in Tasmania and New South Wales, and indeed even at Norfolk Island, is the result of their remarkable skill and enterprise.
Nevertheless, as convicts, they were all mixed up together, and all suffered alike, to an extent where in some cases a hanging, which was common enough, meant a welcome release from further floggings and sufferings.
In spite of a certain humanitarianism shown by King, the early history of Norfolk Island was unhappy enough, but during the next decade, it seemed to go from bad to worse. The flax industry, which had been an inducement on the original settlement, and about which such high hopes were held, owing to the suitability of the soil for the cultivation of the flax plant, was not in fact successful at all, and nothing in its place seemed to develop to keep the Island going. Eventually, reports became so unsatisfactory, the Home Government was prompted to abandon the Island settlement altogether, and the final movement order was dated September 7, 1807, following advice from London dated December 30, 1806.
The proposal was to transfer the inhabitants, who now comprised not only convicts, but many men and women who had completed their sentences, married, had families, been given grants of land, and became respectable people and settlers, to Van Diemens Land, where they would be given land grants to enable a fresh start, and funds in compensation for the property being left behind at this time, Edward Fisher owned 32 acres of Norfolk land, on which was erected a small dwelling house, barn, and outhouses. Of the 32 acres, he had two under wheat, ten maize, two barley and eighteen pasture land, on which there were 24 hogs and 10 sheep. He had the help of one free employee. One has only to see Norfolk Island to know that this was an enviable set up. Few people know, even now, that to this same far off Island in the Pacific, this jewel, which was discovered before Australia, and is Britains oldest possession in the South Seas, Tasmania is indebted for a large proportion of its early settlers. The well known town of New Norfolk in the South, and Norfolk Plains in the North, remain as a memorial to this.
Foveaux was the Commandant at Norfolk Island at this time. On July 19, 1804 Foveaux assembled the thirty three larger landholders, one of which was Edward Fisher, and laid this proposal of transfer to Van Diemans Land before them, more to see what the reaction would be. It was quite well received, and some forty persons gave in their names as willing to try their fortunes in Van Diemans Land. Foveaux made certain recommendations, and among those strongly recommended by him as most industrious, and fitted for prior selection, was the name of Edward Fisher, and apparently the recommendation was accepted, for shortly after this he sailed for Port Jackson en route to Port Dalrymple in the North of Van Diemans Land (now Launceston).
Fisher was by this time, not only a free man, and a land owner, but he was married and had a family. Edward was married to Elizabeth Gregory at Norfolk Island on July 26, 1801 by the Rev. Henry Fulton, Elizabeth was not a convict. She had arrived on Norfolk Island at an early age, and was classified as a Convict’s Child. On 24th January 1794 she was transferred to the Woman’s List, presumably being now of adult age. It was her parent’s time that expired on 31st December 1795, when the family became Settlers. Both parents were on Norfolk Island. They were Thomas and Sarah Gregory from Middlesex.
The marriage of Edward to Elizabeth was in the presence of Thomas Gregory and Thomas Hodgetts, both of whom had been convicts. Apparently Elizabeth was illiterate, because the marriage register, which Robert G Gregory inspected in the 1960’s, only bears a cross as her mark.
There were born, presumably of the couple, six children; four boys and two girls, although it is thought one girl died in infancy. It is noted that four children are born before their marriage and two afterwards, and also that two baptism’s are held on the same day as the wedding. This is for the very obvious reason, that a minister only visited Norfolk Island very occasionally, and the sacraments of baptism and marriage had to be arranged to coincide with a visit. The children were; Edward: born circa 1798, Thomas: born March 8, 1799 (Baptized July 26, 1801); Susanna: born April 29, 1800 (Baptized July 26, 1801); Joseph and Sarah (twins) born February 7, 1802 (Baptized February 28, 1802); John: born in Sydney October 27, 1804 (Baptized November 4, 1804), and Elizabeth born c1817.
Seemingly, Edward was a steady man, and had a good reputation, or we are entitled to judge this, because not only have we seen that he was strongly recommended by Foveaux, but a letter written by Governor King dated September 26, 1805 to Lieut. Governor Paterson at Port Dalrymple suggests that he was also held in high regard by the Governor King. King went on to say “A Norfolk Island settler goes to you by the ‘Lady Nelson’ . He is entitled to 130 acres of land and other conditions agreeable to the printed directions on that head. He is a very industrious, sober, well behaved man, and a good plumber. His wife and family he has left here until another opportunity offers’. No doubt this was necessary, because the child John (your Great Great Grandfather) was born in Sydney on October 27, 1804. Apparently Port Dalrymple did not impress, and apparently Fisher preferred Norfolk, with all its disadvantages, because less than a year later, on May 15, 1806, we find Edward back in Sydney, and a most irate Governor King penning a note to Piper, who had now succeeded Foveaux as Commandant at Norfolk Island, telling him ‘If Fisher has surrendered his ground, he can have no just right to claim it being returned, as he not only put the Government to a great deal of expense in his removal, for the purpose of settling at Port Dalrymple, but he endeavoured to impress a false idea of the place to deter others from going there. There is no other reason for my allowing him to return to Norfolk Island, than a consideration of the helpless state in which his family, as well as himself, will be here’.
However, apparently Fisher had not surrendered his land, and next we find him and his family back at the Island. Had he chosen to go to the Derwent instead of Port Dalrymple, as he was given the choice of going to either place. The story may have been a different one, because he may have remained, which would have made him one of the very first settlers from Norfolk Island to arrive at Hobart Town. As it was, this honour fell to George Guest, who with his wife and six children arrived at the Derwent in the ‘Sydney’ during September 1805.
By the end of 1806, a mere eight settlers had been prevailed upon to remove to Van Diemans Land, where at this time the combined population of Hobart Town and Port Dalrymple only equalled that of Norfolk Island. Lord Hobart’s dispatch, ordering the deportation of the Norfolk Island settlers was dated 1803, and now it was being asked ‘If it has taken more than three years to remove eight settlers, how ever long will it take to move seven hundred’.
The colonial office was beginning to get very impatient, as the unsatisfactory reports about Norfolk continued to come in, and it was just no use allowing the thing to drag on. Accordingly, in December 1806, the Secretary of State wrote to Governor Bligh, now governor of New South Wales, giving the actual order for the evacuation of the Islanders to Van Diemans Land, and emphasizing that it was an order to be carried out without any further delay. The instructions were, that the settlers were to be compensated for what they left behind, but such compensation was not to exceed a cash payment of $1000, and they were to receive grants of land in proportion of two acres only for one acre of cultivated land surrendered. They were to have houses erected to the value of those given up, and they were to be victual led for two years at public expense, while those of better class were to be allowed the labour of four convicts for nine months, and two four fifteen months. Again, the settlers were to be given the choice between the Derwent and Port Dalrymple. No doubt, the opinion of Edward Fisher was very eagerly sought, as he had at least seen Port Dalrymple, even if he had not seen the Derwent, whereas the other settlers had seen nothing of the place at all. Whether Fisher influenced them against Port Dalrymple is not known, but it is known that many of them and including of course Edward Fisher, chose the Derwent. Governor Collins at Hobart Town was then given notice to receive them and their families – 386 souls in all. The first vessel to arrive was the ‘Lady Nelson’ with 15 families: three months later came the ‘Porpoise’ with 56 families: later the ‘Lady Nelson’ again: the ‘Estramina’, lastly the ‘City of Edinburgh’. The total persons moved were, 311 adults, 220 children, and 23 convicts. The number was almost double the number expected by Collins, and conditions were very difficult for the new inhabitants, who were in a desperate and miserable condition, and almost starving. Things did not improve quickly, and for the next couple of years it was a desperate struggle for mere existence at Hobart Town. Indeed, food was so short, that convicts had to be allowed to roam the island in search of it, and many of these became bushrangers, and caused much trouble for black and white people alike. Ex. Convicts also became constables, and some of them were the vilest of creatures. The Tasmanian aboriginal was practically wiped out.
The settlers were however given land grants, as promised. In the South, or the County of Buckinghamshire as it was called at the time, the grants were mostly in the Colo River area, north from Richmond, and running in a strip through to the midlands, while in the North, or the County of Cornwall as it was called, the grants were mostly at Norfolk Plains, now more commonly known as Longford, and along the South Esk River. Mostly, the grants did not exceed 40 acres. There were some 30 or 40 grants of very choice land given to picked settlers, including Edward Fisher, along the banks of the Derwent River at Sandy Bay, and about ten of these settlers built houses on their land.
Those who had done well at Norfolk Island, seemed to prosper again in Van Diemans Land, but it was tough going, and for the most part they did not succeed, but became hopeless failures. One who did win through was Edward Fisher, and during the nineteenth century in Tasmania, he and his descendants became highly respected, and some rose to positions of great wealth and influence, playing a major role in the history of the island, and particularly in the field of shipping and commerce. Future generations can be proud of their ancestor Edward Fisher, who must have been an outstanding character, even though he arrived as a convict.
It was the ‘Porpoise’ that brought the Fisher family from Norfolk Island to the Derwent. They sailed on Christmas Day 1807, and arrived in Hobart Town on January 17, 1808, a mere five years after Governor King had dispatched Lieut. Bowen to occupy Risdon on the Derwent in the name of England. The family comprised of Edward and his wife and five children: four being boys. Their names were Edward, Thomas, John and Joseph.
In 1816, records show that Edward Fisher had been allowed a measured 30 acres of land, but he had not yet received the grant. In 1819 further records show that the grant had been made, and states that it was at Kingboro (now Kingston) in addition to 85 acres at Queenboro. The districts of Kingboro and Queenboro comprised the Kingston and Sandy Bay area, and on account of its proximity to the town, and its picturesque setting, this area was later to develop into a choice residential area, and land has become very valuable. This 115 acres compares with his holding at Norfolk Island twelve years previously of 35 cleared acres, on which was erected a small house, a barn, and three log outhouses. The 85 acres at Queenboro lay on what is now Long Point, about half a mile south of the famous Wrest Point Hotel, and it ran right down to the water. It was within about a mile of Hobart town, where the shore line turns into the cove known as Sandy Bay Beach. Fisher and his two eldest sons, Edward and Thomas settled on the location in the Ross almanac of 1833. Edward and Thomas are listed as farmers of Sandy Bay. The house they built was of wood, but nothing of it remains today, although plenty of trees planted by them are still standing, and one alights from the trolley bus on Sandy Bay Road at ‘Fisher Avenue’. This is all that remains to remind Tasmanians of a pioneer family who lived for 80 years on the land they had cleared.
In 1821, a grant of 100 acres was made in the district of Ulva, which is some miles north of Hobart Town, between the towns of Richmond and Colebrook, on the western bank of the Colo River. Records up to 1829 show more grants of land to both Edward and his sons. In an application for a further grant in 1829 which was disallowed, probably on account of his age, it was stated that on one of the grants at Jericho, he was running 400 sheep and 113 heard of cattle. In 1823, grants were being made to the sons, and records show that Thomas and John got 60 acres, and Edward (Jnr) 100 acres in the district of Ulva, the land adjoining that already granted to their father. These grants were made by Sir Thomas Brisbane. There was also a William Fisher who received a grant of 100 acres adjoining that of the other Fishers in the district of Ulva. As far back as 1813, this same William Fisher had received from Governor Macquarie, a grant of 50 acres at Norfolk Plains, on the banks of the north and south Esk Rivers, near Port Dalrymple. It is interesting to note that adjoining his property at Norfolk Plains was a property owned and farmed by an ex convict from Norfolk Island by the name of Herbert, for the reason that your great great Grandfather, John Fisher, married a young woman by the name of Charlotte Herbert, and it is reasonable to assume that it was her father who was the farmer next door. If this is correct, then all the maternal grandparents of this time came from the convict settlement at Norfolk Island. William Fisher had come out on the 3rd convict convoy . He served his time at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island, as did Edward, but he only had 9.5 acres of land and there were only two children.
The Colo River valley was very fertile, and was the granary, not only of Van Diemans Land, but also of New South Wales. Indeed, Lieut. Governor Davey generously helped himself to 3000 acres for a farm, which he called ‘Carrington’. Later, it became the country seat of both Governor Sorrell and Governor Arthur. Neighbours on the Colo River who had also come from Norfolk Island were the Riordans, Woods, Nash’s and Kearneys. Carrington House was located on the west bank of the Colo River about 1.5 miles from Richmond. At this time Richmond had about 3000 inhabitants and was the third largest town in the island. Trade went by barge via Pittwater, but later a road was built to Kangaroo Point (now Bellrieve) and another to Risdon, the latter serving the Carrington property.
So, it can be assumed that father and mother worked hard, and their boys grew up and became very prosperous men. The date of Edwards death is 23rd August 1838 (as per headstone), he predeceased his wife who died in 1842. Her death occurred at the Sandy Bay home after a lingering illness. The following death notice was taken from the Cornwall Chronicle of Saturday July 16, 1842. On Monday, Mrs Fisher, relict of the late Edward Fisher of Sandy Bay, Hobart Town. They were almost the last remaining of the original colonist, having migrated from Norfolk Island at the first settlement of Van Diemans Land. Mrs Fisher suffered severely under a lingering illness, during which she received unremitting attention from Dr. Rowe, and passed away, surrounded by her family, by whom, and numerous friends, her memory will be long affectionately cherished. It would seem that her son Thomas continued on at the old home ‘Florence Dale’, and he had at least two sons and two daughters. His eldest son Edward attended the Hutchins School for several years from July 24, 1854, and the youngest son John died from heart disease at Taviuni Fiji on July 21, 1875 at the age of 26 years. The eldest daughter Elizabeth Sophie was married on December 3, 1863 by the Rev. W. Nicholson D.D. to Mr A.J.L. Gibbs of Recherche Bay. The youngest daughter Florence Helen was married on July 17, 1875 at Dunedin NZ to Mr Alfred H. Bridger, the ceremony being performed by the Rev. Thomas Roseby. D.D.
Edward’s other son Joseph also lived at Sandy Bay, and he was known to have at least one son William John, who also attended Hutchins School for several years from July 24, 1854.
Source : letter from R.G. Gregory dated 3rd November 1967