TRANSPORTEES FROM GLOUCESTERSHIRE TO AUSTRALIA,1783-1842

During research to complete my series “Wanton Wenches & Incorrigible Rogues”, I came across this amazing and valuable piece of work. As several of my current protagonists – ones in whom I have a family interest – were born in the parish of St George, Bristol, it came to my memory that once upon a time, people who were “had up” (as my parents would have said) were tried in the County where their alleged crimes were committed, whatever their actual address. St George and the outparish, (i.e. outside Lawford’s Gate, Old Market) of the parish of St Philip and St Jacobs, and everything east of the City, right up to “Kingswood” (the lingua franca term for the area) was all once Gloucestershire, and felons would have been tried in Gloucester.

The book is online, though in pdf, so takes a bit of wading through, (404 pages), but fully surname indexed, with introductory pages of academic research.

TRANSPORTEES FROM GLOUCESTERSHIRE TO AUSTRALIA, 1783-1842

I have come belatedly to this absolute gem of information and from it I intend to extract people in different categories which are of personal interest to me as listed below:

• “Real Bristolians” as well as those whose address is now in Bristol.
• Coalminers/Colliers
• Military, (Army & Navy)
• Strangers from out of area

& of course,

• Women

Well, it’s an idea, and I hope to keep the pieces short.

I was driven from Bristol near to the vicinity of Gloucester City the other evening. It’s not exactly walking distance. I think of the St George & St Philip’s desperados, travelling the same route, tied up or even chained, bumping along the road in an open mule cart, behind a man with a whip, and another at the back, on their way to Gloucester Gaol. In the cold. In the rain. They would have feared the hangman, but most on conviction would have been sent to a prison hulk, where they would languish, awaiting their eventual fate.

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The title pic is Gloucester County Gaol in 1795, by Thomas Bonnor