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{{short description|11 British ships establishing an Australian penal colony}}
The '''First Fleet''' is the name given to the group of people and ships who sailed from [[England]] in [[May]] [[1787]] to establish the first European colony in [[New South Wales]]. It was a [[convict]] settlement, marking the beginnings of [[penal transportation|transportation]] to [[Australia]]. The fleet was led by Captain (later Admiral) [[Arthur Phillip]].
{{About|the British colonial fleet|the United States Navy unit known as the First Fleet|United States First Fleet}}
{{Other uses|First fleet (disambiguation)}}
{{pp-semi-indef|small=yes}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2013}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2019}}
{{Infobox event
| title = <!-- Title to display, if other than page name -->
| image = View of Botany Bay.jpg
| image_upright =
| image_alt =
| caption = An engraving of the First Fleet in [[Botany Bay]] at voyage's end in 1788
| time =
| timezone =
| duration = 250 days
| date = 13 May 1787 to 20 January 1788
| venue =
| location = [[Portsmouth]], [[England]] and [[Botany Bay]], [[Colony of New South Wales]]
| coordinates = <!-- {{coord|LAT|LON|region:XXXX_type:event|display=inline,title}} -->
| theme =
| cause = Counter [[French colonial empire|French imperialism]] in the Pacific and [[Penal transportation]]
| motive = Establishment of a [[Penal colony]]
| patron = [[John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich|Lord Sandwich]] and Sir [[Joseph Banks]]
| organisers = [[Thomas Townshend, 1st Viscount Sydney|The Viscount Sydney]] as [[Home Secretary|Secretary of State for the Home Office]]
| participants = Captain [[Arthur Phillip]], [[Governor of New South Wales]] and Major [[Robert Ross (British Marines officer)|Robert Ross]], [[Lieutenant-Governor of New South Wales]]
| outcome = Beginning of [[History of Australia|European settlement in Australia]]
| reported deaths = 48 [[Burial at sea|died at sea]]
| notes =
}}


The '''First Fleet''' were 11 British ships which transported a group of settlers to [[mainland Australia]], marking the beginning of the [[History of Australia (1788–1850)|European colonisation of Australia]]. It consisted of two [[Royal Navy]] vessels, three [[Combat stores ship|storeships]] and six [[Penal transportation|convict transports]] under the command of Captain [[Arthur Phillip]]. On 13 May 1787, the ships, with over 1,400 [[Convicts in Australia|convicts]], [[New South Wales Marine Corps|marines]], sailors, colonial officials and free settlers onboard, left [[Portsmouth]] and travelled over {{convert|24000|km|mi}} and over 250 days before arriving in [[Botany Bay]] in January 1788. There, they established the [[colony of New South Wales]], a [[penal colony]] which would become the first British settlement in Australia.
<!-- ===Background to the settlement===
[''under construction''] -->
==People of the First Fleet==
The number of people directly associated with the First Fleet will probably never be exactly established, and all accounts of the event vary slightly. Gillen (see References below, p.445) gives the following statistics:


==History==
'''Embarked at Portsmouth'''
[[John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich|Lord Sandwich]], together with the President of the [[Royal Society]], Sir [[Joseph Banks]], the eminent scientist who had accompanied Lieutenant [[James Cook]] on his [[First voyage of James Cook|1770 voyage]], was advocating establishment of a British colony in [[Botany Bay]], [[New South Wales]].{{sfn|Frost|Moutinho|1995|p=110}}<ref>{{Cite book|last=Gascoigne|first=John|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/39524807|title=Science in the service of empire : Joseph Banks, the British state and the uses of science in the age of revolution|date=1998|isbn=0-521-55069-6|location=Cambridge, UK|pages=187|oclc=39524807|access-date=18 July 2021|archive-date=18 July 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210718112107/https://www.worldcat.org/title/science-in-the-service-of-empire-joseph-banks-the-british-state-and-the-uses-of-science-in-the-age-of-revolution/oclc/39524807|url-status=live}}</ref> Banks accepted an offer of assistance from the American [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]] [[James Matra]] in July 1783. Under Banks's guidance, he rapidly produced "A Proposal for Establishing a Settlement in New South Wales" (24 August 1783), with a fully developed set of reasons for a colony composed of American Loyalists, Chinese and South Sea Islanders (but not convicts).<ref>{{Cite book|last=Carter|first=Harold B.|url=https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/936496|title=Interpreting Australia: British Perceptions of Australia since 1788|publisher=Sir Robert Menzies Centre for Australian Studies|year=1988|editor-last=Delamothe|editor-first=Tony|location=London|pages=4–23|chapter=Banks, Cook and the Century Natural History Tradition|editor-last2=Bridge|editor-first2=Carl|access-date=18 July 2021|archive-date=29 May 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140529200901/http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/936496|url-status=live}}</ref> The decision to establish a colony in Australia was made by [[Thomas Townshend, 1st Viscount Sydney|Thomas Townshend, Lord Sydney]], Secretary of State for the Home Office.<ref name="HistNSWgovPhillip1">{{cite web |author1=George Burnett Barton |title=History of New South Wales From the Records, Volume I – Governor Phillip – Chapter 1.4 |url=http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks12/1204171h.html#ch-07 |website=Project Gutenberg of Australia |publisher=Charles Potter, Government Printer |access-date=25 April 2019 |year=1889}}</ref> This was taken for two reasons: the ending of [[Penal transportation|transportation of criminals]] to North America following the [[American Revolution]],<ref>{{cite web|title=Why were convicts transported to Australia|publisher=Sydney Living Museums|access-date=16 December 2013|url=http://www.hht.net.au/discover/highlights/kids_fact_sheets/why_were_convicts_transported_to_australia|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131202222157/http://www.hht.net.au/discover/highlights/kids_fact_sheets/why_were_convicts_transported_to_australia|archive-date=2 December 2013|url-status=dead}}</ref> as well as the need for a base in the [[Pacific Ocean|Pacific]] to counter [[French colonial empire|French expansion]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Cameron-Ash |first=Margaret |author-link= |date=2021 |title=Beating France to Botany Bay: The race to found Australia |url=https://quadrant.org.au/product/beating-france-to-botany-bay-the-race-to-found-australia/ |location=Balmain |publisher=Quadrant Books |page= |isbn=9780648996125}}</ref>
* Officials and passengers: 15
* Ships' crews: 323
* Marines: 247
* Marines wives and children: 46
* Convicts (males): 582
* Convicts (females): 193
* Convicts' children: 14
* ''Total embarked: 1420''


In September 1786, Captain [[Arthur Phillip]] was appointed [[Commodore (Royal Navy)|Commodore]] of the fleet, which came to be known as the First Fleet, which was to transport the convicts and soldiers to establish a colony at Botany Bay. Upon arrival there, Phillip was to assume the powers of [[Captain General]] and [[Governor of New South Wales|Governor in Chief]] of the new [[Colony of New South Wales|colony]]. A subsidiary colony was to be founded on [[Norfolk Island]], as recommended by Sir [[John Call]] and Sir [[George Young (Royal Navy officer)|George Young]], to take advantage for naval purposes of that island's native flax ([[harakeke]]) and timber.<ref name="Atkinson">{{Cite journal|last=Atkinson|first=Alan|date=1990-04-01|title=The first plans for governing New South Wales, 1786–87|url=https://doi.org/10.1080/10314619008595830|journal=Australian Historical Studies|volume=24|issue=94|pages=22–40|doi=10.1080/10314619008595830|s2cid=143682560 |issn=1031-461X}}</ref><ref>‘Memo. of matters to be brought before Cabinet’, State Library of New South Wales, Dixon 12Library Add. MS Q522</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=King|first=Robert J.|title=Norfolk Island: Phantasy and Reality, 1770-1814|year=2003|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41563142|journal=The Great Circle|volume=25|issue=2|pages=20–41|jstor=41563142|issn=0156-8698}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article63477180|title=Historic Landmarks|newspaper =[[Townsville Daily Bulletin]]|location=Qld.|date=2 October 1952|access-date=22 January 2012|page=5|publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article60569425|title=Australian Discovery and Colonisation|work=[[Empire (newspaper)|The Empire]]|location=Sydney|date=14 April 1865|page=8|publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
'''Landed at Port Jackson'''
* Officials and passengers: 14
* Ships' crews: 306
* Marines: 245
* Marines wives and children: 54
* Convicts (males): 543
* Convicts (females): 189
* Convicts' children: 22
* ''Total landed: 1373''


The cost to Britain of outfitting and dispatching the Fleet was £84,000 (about £9.6&nbsp;million, or $19.6 million as of 2015).<ref>{{cite web|title=Purchasing Power of British Pounds from 1264 to Present|publisher=MeasuringWorth|year=2009|url=http://www.measuringworth.com|access-date=23 November 2015}}</ref>{{sfn|O'Brien|1970|p=195}}
During the voyage there were 22 births (13 males, 9 females), while 69 people either died, were discharged, or deserted (61 males and 8 females). As no complete crew musters have survived for the six transports and three storeships, there may have been as many as 110 more seamen. See [[#Notable First Fleet members|section]] below for list of notable Fleet members.


==Ships==
==Preparation for the voyage==


===Royal Naval escort===
The decision to send convicts to [[Botany Bay]] was taken by the [[British Government]] on 18 August 1786. Preparations to obtain ships, convicts, guards and provisions began soon after. At the time the five hulks in service held about 1300 men, and selected convicts, including women from county gaols were transferred to the ''Dunkirk'' [[hulk (ship)|hulk]] at [[Plymouth]] and the [[New Gaol]] in [[Southwark]]. Optimistically, it was hoped to be able to sail in October, but a series of postponements were made. In mid April 1787 the ''St James's Chronicle'' commented that “strange as it may appear, we are credibly informed of the Fact that the Transports for Botany Bay have not as yet sailed". [Gillen, p.xxiv]
On 25 October 1786 the 10-gun {{HMS|Sirius|1786|6}}, lying in the dock at Deptford, was commissioned, and the command given to Phillip. The armed tender HMAT {{HMS|Supply|1759|3}} under command of Lieutenant [[Henry Lidgbird Ball]] who was also commissioned to join the expedition. [[David Blackburn (Royal Navy officer)|Lt. David Blackburn]] was the ship's [[Master (naval)|Master]].<ref name="ADB2">{{Australian Dictionary of Biography|last=Fletcher|first=B.H.|year=1967|volume=2|id2=http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/phillip-arthur-2549|title= Phillip, Arthur (1738–1814)|access-date=25 April 2019}}</ref><ref name="ADB Blackburn">{{Australian Dictionary of Biography|last= Hirst|first= Warwick|year=2005|volume=Supplementary Volume|id2=blackburn-david-12800|title= Blackburn, David (1753–1795)|accessdate= 26 July 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=1790 HMS Sirius Anchor and Cannon |url=http://www.migrationheritage.nsw.gov.au/exhibition/objectsthroughtime/sirius-anchor-cannon/index.html |website=Objects Through Time |publisher=Migration Heritage Centre NSW |access-date=25 April 2019}}</ref><ref name="On this day">{{Cite web |last=Leila Berney |date=2014-10-10 |title=On this day: Arthur Phillip born |url=http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/blogs/on-this-day/2014/10/on-this-day-arthur-phillip-born |access-date=5 March 2015 |publisher=[[Australian Geographic]]}}</ref><ref name=Hunter>{{Citation |last= Hunter|first= John|year= 1792|title= An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island |publisher= University of Sydney Library|publication-place= Sydney|url=https://adc.library.usyd.edu.au/data-2/hunhist.pdf |access-date= 3 October 2021}}</ref> On 15 December, Captain [[John Hunter (Royal Navy officer)|John Hunter]] was assigned as second captain to ''Sirius'' to command in the absence of Phillip, whose presence, it was to be supposed, would be requisite at all times wherever the seat of government in that country might be fixed.<ref name=Hunter/>


{| class="wikitable"
By October 1786, more than 200 marines had volunteered for Botany Bay duty, and Major Robert Ross was chosen to command them. The man chosen to lead the expedition, command ''HMS Sirius'', and take on the governorship of the colony, was Captain Arthur Phillip, of whom the first lord of the admiralty said “the little I know of [him] would [not] have led me to select him". [Gillen, p.xxiv]
|+ Naval escorts (departed England 13 May 1787)<ref name="auto">Mundle 2014, p. 83</ref>
! scope="col" | Ship
! scope="col" | Type
! scope="col" | Master
! scope="col" | Crew, Officials, Marines<ref name="King">{{cite web |last1=King |first1=Philip Gidley |title=official journal being a narrative of the preparation and equipment of the First Fleet and voyage to New South Wales |url=http://archival-classic.sl.nsw.gov.au/_transcript/2017/D00007/a1519.html |access-date=26 November 2019}}</ref>
! scope="col" | From
! scope="col" | Arrived<br>Botany Bay
! scope="col" | Duration<br>(days)
|-
! scope="row" | [[HMS Sirius (1786)|HMS ''Sirius'']]
| 10 gun
| [[John Hunter (Royal Navy officer)|John Hunter]]
| 200
| [[Portsmouth]]
| 20 January 1788
| 252
|-
! scope="row" | [[HMAT Supply (1759)|HMAT ''Supply'']]
| Armed tender
| [[Henry Lidgbird Ball]]
| 55 + 2 <small>(convicts transferred on route)</small>
| [[Spithead]]
| 18 January 1788
| 250
|}


====HMS ''Sirius''====
The convict ships were fitted out with strong hatch bars between decks, bulkheads to divide convicts from crew, and guns and ammunition. Provisions included food such as flour, pease, rice, butter, salted beef and pork, bread, soup, cheese, water and beer. Coal and wood were provided for fuel. Beads, looking glasses and other gifts for native inhabitants were included. Vast amounts of hardware items were taken - tents (for the settlers to live in until huts had been built), wagons, wheelbarrows, gunpowder, collapsible furniture for the governor, scientific instruments, paper, ropes, crockery, glass panes for the governor's windows, ready-cut wood, cooking equipment (including some complete cast-iron stoves), and a miscellany of weapons. Other items included tools, agricultural implements, seeds, spirits, medical supplies, bandages, surgical instruments, handcuffs, leg irons and chains. A prefabricated house for the governor was constructed and packed flat. 5000 bricks for construction and thousands of nails were loaded. As the party was venturing into unknown territory, it had to carry all its provisions to survive until it could make use of local materials, assuming suitable supplies existed, and could grow its own food and raise livestock.
''Sirius'' was Phillip’s [[flagship]] for the fleet. She had been converted from the merchantman ''Berwick'', built in 1780 for [[Baltic Sea|Baltic]] trade. She was a 520 ton, sixth-rate vessel, originally armed with ten guns, four six-pounders and six carronades, Phillip had ten more guns placed aboard.


====HMAT ''Supply''====
Convicts were delivered to the transports from the hulks and gaols with no reference to skills, or fitness to contribute to the creation of the new colony. The first arrivals embarked on the transports at [[Woolwich]] and [[Gravesend, Kent|Gravesend]] in early January, and continued throughout the next three months. Gradually the ships made their way to [[Portsmouth]], where the last convicts were loaded on the day the fleet sailed. Eventually the fleet set sails and moved off down the [[English Channel]] on [[13 May]] [[1787]].
''Supply'' was designed in 1759 by shipwright Thomas Slade, as a yard craft for the ferrying of naval supplies. Measuring 170 tons, she had two masts, and was fitted with four small 3-pounder cannons and six {{small|{{frac|1|2}}}}-pounder swivel guns. Her armament was substantially increased in 1786 with the addition of four 12-pounder carronades.


==The voyage==
===Convict transports===
{| class="wikitable"
|+Convict transports (departed England 13 May 1787)<ref name="King"/>
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Ship
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Type
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Master
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Crew
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Marines
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Arrived<br>Botany Bay
! scope="col" rowspan=2 |Duration<br>(days)
! scope="col" colspan=2 |Convicts arrived (boarded)
|-
! scope="col" | Males
! scope="col" | Females
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Alexander (1783 ship)|Alexander]]''
| [[Barque]]
| Duncan Sinclair
| 30
| 41
| 19 January 1788
| 251
| 210<br><small>Two were pardoned</small>
| 0
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Charlotte (1784 ship)|Charlotte]]''
| Transport
| [[Thomas Gilbert (captain)|Thomas Gilbert]]
| 30
| 32
| 20 January 1788
| 252
| 100
| 24
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Friendship (1784 ship)|Friendship]]''
| [[Brig]]
| Francis Walton
| 25
| 42
| 19 January 1788
| 251
| 80
| 24<br><small>To Cape of Good Hope only, transferred to Lady Penrhyn</small>
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Lady Penrhyn (1786 ship)|Lady Penrhyn]]''
| Transport
| William Cropton Server
| 30
| 18
| 20 January 1788
| 252
| 0
| 101
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Prince of Wales (1786 ship)|Prince of Wales]]''
| [[Barque]]
| [[John Mason (master)|John Mason]]
| 29
| 45
| 20 January 1788
| 252
| 2
| 47
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Scarborough (1782 ship)|Scarborough]]''
| Transport
| [[John Marshall (British captain)|John Marshall]]
| 30
| 50
| 19 January 1788
| 251
| 208
| 0
|}


===Food and supply transports===
The departure of the fleet must have been greeted with fear and trepidation by the convicts and marines. They were embarking on the longest voyage ever attempted by such a large group. They were heading for a destination that was completely unexplored by Europeans, and whose conditions were only to be guessed at. Few would have had any confidence in seeing England, their families and friends, ever again.
Ropes, [[crockery]], agricultural equipment and a miscellany of other stores were needed. Items transported included tools, agricultural implements, seeds, spirits, medical supplies, bandages, surgical instruments, handcuffs, [[Legcuffs|leg iron]]s and a prefabricated wooden frame for the colony's first Government House.<ref>Correspondence, Daniel Southwell, Midshipman HMS ''Sirius'', 5 May 1788. Cited in Bladen (ed.) 1978, p. 683</ref> The party had to rely on its own provisions to survive until it could make use of local materials, assuming suitable supplies existed, and grow its own food and raise livestock.


{| class="wikitable"
With fine weather the convicts were allowed on deck, and on 3 June 1787 the fleet anchored at [[Santa Cruz]] at [[Teneriffe]]. Here fresh water, vegetables and meat were taken on board. Phillip and the chief officers were entertained by the local governor, while one convict tried unsuccessfully to escape. On 10 June they set sail to cross the Atlantic to [[Rio de Janeiro]], taking advantage of favourable trade winds and ocean currents.
|+Food and supply transports (depart England 13 May 1787)
! scope="col" | Ship
! scope="col" | Type
! scope="col" | Master
! scope="col" | Crew
! scope="col" | Arr. Botany Bay
! scope="col" | Duration (days)
|-
! scope="row" | {{ship||Golden Grove|1782 ship|2}}
| storeship
| William Sharp
| 22
| 20 January 1788
| align=right | 252
|-
! scope="row" | {{ship||Fishburn|1780 ship|2}}
| storeship
| Robert Brown
| 22
| 20 January 1788
| align=right | 252
|-
! scope="row" | ''[[Borrowdale (1785 ship)|Borrowdale]]''
| storeship
| Hobson Reed
| 22
| 20 January 1788
| align=right | 252
|}


====''Golden Grove''====
The weather became increasingly hot and humid as the fleet sailed through the tropics. Vermin, such as rats, bedbugs, lice, cockroaches and fleas, tormented the convicts, officers and marines. Bilges became foul and the smell, especially below the closed hatches, was over-powering. On ''Alexander'' a number of convicts fell sick and died. Tropical rainstorms meant that the convicts could not exercise on deck, and were kept below in the foul, cramped holds. On the female transports, promiscuity between the convicts and the crew and marines was rampant. In the doldrums, Phillip was forced to ration the water to three pints a day.
The reverend [[Richard Johnson (chaplain)|Richard Johnson]], chaplain for the colony, travelled on the ''Golden Grove'' with his wife and servants.


===Legacy===
The fleet reached Rio on 5 August and stayed a month. Ships were cleaned and water taken on board, repairs were made, stores bought. The clothing of the women convicts was disintegrating and was replaced. While the convicts remained below deck, the officers explored the city and were entertained by its inhabitants. A convict and a marine were punished for passing forged quarter-dollars made from old buckles and pewter spoons.
Scale models of all the ships are on display at the [[Museum of Sydney]]. The models were built by ship makers Lynne and Laurie Hadley, after researching the original plans, drawings and British archives. The replicas of ''Supply'', ''Charlotte'', ''Scarborough'', ''Friendship'', ''Prince of Wales'', ''Lady Penrhyn'', ''Borrowdale'', ''Alexander'', [[HMS Sirius (1786)|''Sirius'']], ''Fishburn'' and ''Golden Grove'' are made from Western Red or Syrian Cedar.<ref>{{cite web
|title = First Fleet returns to Sydney...in miniature
|url = http://www.maritimeworld.net/sn.asp?PageNumber=120
|publisher = Australia's Maritime World
|access-date = 22 November 2013
|url-status = dead
|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20140114071033/http://maritimeworld.net/sn.asp?PageNumber=120
|archive-date = 14 January 2014
|df = dmy-all
}}</ref>


Nine [[First Fleet-class ferry|Sydney harbour ferries]] built in the mid-1980s are named after First Fleet vessels. The unused names are ''[[Lady Penrhyn (1786 ship)|Lady Penrhyn]]'' and ''Prince of Wales''.
The fleet left Rio on 3 September to run before the westerlies to the [[Cape of Good Hope]], where they arrived in mid October. This was the last port of call, so the main task was to stock up on plants, seeds and livestock. The women convicts on ''Friendship'' were moved to other transports to make room for livestock purchased there. The strength of the convicts was built up with fresh beef and mutton, bread and vegetables. This Dutch colony was the last outpost of European settlement which the fleet members would see for years, perhaps for ever. “Before them stretched the awesome, lonely void of the Indian and Southern Oceans, and beyond that lay nothing they could imagine.” (Hughes, p.82)


==People==
Assisted by the gales of the latitudes below the fortieth parallel, the heavily-laden transports surged through the swells and troughs. A violent storm struck as they began to head north around Van Diemen's Land, damaging the sails and masts of some of the ships.
{{See also|List of convicts on the First Fleet|Journals of the First Fleet}}


The majority of the people travelling with the fleet were convicts, all having been tried and convicted in [[Great Britain]], almost all of them in England.<ref name="Gillen">{{cite book|last=Gillen|first=Mollie|title=The Founders of Australia: a Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet|location=Sydney|publisher=Library of Australian History|page=445|year=1989|isbn=978-0908120697}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=1788|url=http://www.migrationheritage.nsw.gov.au/exhibition/objectsthroughtime-history/ott1788/|work=Objects through Time|publisher=NSW Migration Heritage Centre|access-date=22 November 2013}}</ref> Many are known to have come to England from other parts of Great Britain and, especially, from Ireland; at least 14 are known to have come from the British colonies in North America; 12 are identified as black (born in Britain, Africa, the West Indies, North America, India or a European country or its colony).<ref name=Pybus>{{cite book|last=Pybus|first=Cassandra|title=Black Founders: the unknown story of Australia's first Black settlers|date=2006|location=Sydney|publisher=UNSW Press|url=http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/20098261|access-date=28 November 2013|isbn=9780868408491}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|editor-last=Jupp|editor-first=James|title=The Australian People: an Encyclopedia of the Nation, its People and their Origins|year=1988|location=North Ryde|publisher=Angus & Robertson|isbn=978-0207154270|pages=367–79}}</ref> The convicts had committed a variety of crimes, including theft, perjury, fraud, assault, robbery, for which they had variously been sentenced to death, which was then commuted to [[penal transportation]] for 7 years, 14 years, or the term of their natural life.<ref>{{cite book|last=Cobley|first=John|title=The Crimes of the First Fleet Convicts|date=1989|location=Sydney|publisher=Angus and Robertson|edition=2|isbn=978020714562-9}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=First Fleet Online|url=http://firstfleet.uow.edu.au/index.html|publisher=University of Wollongong|access-date=22 November 2013}}</ref>
In November Phillip transferred to ''Supply''. With ''Alexander'', ''Friendship'' and ''Scarborough'', the fastest ships in the Fleet and carrying most of the male convicts, hastened ahead to prepare for the arrival of the rest. He intended to select a suitable location, find good water, clear the ground, and perhaps even have some huts and other buildings erected. However, this 'flying squadron' reached [[Botany Bay]] only hours before the rest of the Fleet, so no preparatory work was possible.


Four companies of marines volunteered for service in the colony, these marines made up the [[New South Wales Marine Corps]], under the command of Major [[Robert Ross (British Marines officer)|Robert Ross]], a detachment on board every convict transport. The families of marines also made the voyage.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Clark|first=M.|title=The Origins of the Convicts Transported to Eastern Australia, 1787–1852|journal=Historical Studies: Australia and New Zealand|year=1956|volume=7|issue=26|page=121|doi=10.1080/10314615608595051}}</ref>
On 19 January, the coast on mainland Australia was sighted, and by next morning all the vessels were anchored in Botany Bay. This was one of the world's greatest sea voyages - eleven vessels carrying about 1400 people and stores had travelled for 252 days for more than 15,000 miles without losing a ship. Forty-eight people had died on the journey, a death rate of just over three per cent. Given the rigors of the voyage, the navigational problems, the poor condition and sea-faring inexperience of the convicts, the primitive medical knowledge, the lack of precautions against scurvy, the crammed and foul conditions of the ships, poor planning and inadequate equipment, this was a remarkable achievement.


A number of people on the First Fleet kept diaries and journals of their experiences, including the surgeons, sailors, officers, soldiers, and ordinary seamen. There are at least eleven known manuscript [[Journals of the First Fleet]] in existence as well as some letters.<ref>{{cite web|title=Journals from the First Fleet|url=http://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/stories/terra-australis-australia/journals-first-fleet|work=Discover Collections|publisher=State Library of New South Wales|access-date=22 November 2013}}</ref>
==Arrival at New South Wales==


The exact number of people directly associated with the First Fleet will likely never be established, as accounts of the event vary slightly. A total of 1,420 people have been identified as embarking on the First Fleet in 1787, and 1,373 are believed to have landed at Sydney Cove in January 1788. In her biographical dictionary of the First Fleet, [[Mollie Gillen]] gives the following statistics:<ref name="Gillen" />
It was soon realised that Botany Bay did not live up to the glowing account that Captain [[James Cook]] had given it in 1770. The bay was open and unprotected, fresh water was scarce, and the soil was poor. First contacts were made with the local indigenous people, the [[Eora]], who seemed curious but suspicious of the newcomers. The area was studded with enormously strong trees - when the convicts tried to cut them down, the tools broke, and the tree trunks had to be blasted out of the ground with gunpowder. The primitive huts built for the officers and officials quickly collapsed in rainstorms. The marines had a habit of getting drunk and not guarding the convicts properly, whilst their pompous commander, Major [[Robert Ross]], drove Phillip to despair with his arrogant and lazy attitude. Crucially, Phillip worried that his fledgling colony was exposed to attack from the Aboriginies or foreign powers.


{| class="wikitable" style="margin: 1em auto 1em auto" style="text-align:center"
''Sirius'' was sent to explore the coastline and the crew soon returned with news of a harbour to the north, with sheltered anchorages, fresh water and fertile soil. This was [[Port Jackson]], which Cook had seen and named, but not entered. A decision was taken to relocate the party to this new site.
! !!Embarked at Portsmouth!!Landed at Sydney Cove
|-
|Officials and passengers|| 15 || 14
|-
|Ships' crews || 323 || 306
|-
|Marines || 247 || 245
|-
|Marines' wives and children || 46 || 45 + 9 born
|-
|Convicts (men) || 582 || 543
|-
|Convicts (women) || 193 || 189
|-
|Convicts' children || 14 || 11 + 11 born
|-
|'''Total''' || '''1,420''' || '''1,373'''
|}


While the names of all crew members of ''Sirius'' and ''Supply'' are known, the six transports and three store ships may have carried as many as 110 more seamen than have been identified – no complete musters have survived for these ships. The total number of persons embarking on the First Fleet would, therefore, be approximately 1,530 with about 1,483 reaching Sydney Cove.
The party was startled when two French ships came into sight and entered Botany Bay. This turned out to be a scientific expedition led by [[Jean-François de La Pérouse]]. The French group remained until 10 March, but never returned to France, being wrecked with the loss of all lives in the [[New Hebrides]].


According to the first census of 1788 as reported by Governor Phillip to Lord Sydney, the non-indigenous population of the colony was 1,030 and the colony also consisted of 7 horses, 29 sheep, 74 swine, 6 rabbits, and 7 cattle.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article13751197|title=The Mayor's Opening Address.|newspaper=[[The Sydney Morning Herald]]|location=NSW|date=28 November 1889|access-date=22 January 2012|page=7|publisher=National Library of Australia}}</ref>
On 26 January, the fleet weighed anchor and by evening had entered Port Jackson. The site selected for the anchorage had deep water close to the shore, was sheltered and had a small stream flowing into it. Phillip named it [[Sydney Cove]], after [[Thomas Townshend, 1st Viscount Sydney|Lord Sydney]] the British Home Secretary. This date is still celebrated as [[Australia Day]], marking the beginnings of the first European settlement, although it is remembered as 'invasion day' by many indigenous Australians.


The following statistics were provided by Governor Phillip:<ref>{{cite journal |title=Convictism and Colonization, 1788 to 1828: Lachlan Macquarie|journal=Journal of the Australian Population Association |volume= 5|issue=Supplement 1 |pages=31–43 |year=1988|jstor=41110531|last1=MacQuarie |first1=Lachlan |doi=10.1007/BF03029428 |s2cid=151300089 }}</ref>
Unknown to the first European arrivals, it was to be almost two and a half years before other ships arrived with their cargo of new convicts and provisions. These were the ''[[Lady Juliana (ship)|Lady Juliana]]'' and the three ships of the infamous [[Second Fleet (Australia)|Second Fleet]].
{| class="wikitable" style="margin: 1em auto 1em auto" style="text-align:center"
! !!Male!!Female!!Children!!Total
|-
|Convicts & their children|| 548 || 188 || 17 || 753
|-
|Others || 219 || 34 || 24 || 277
|-
|'''Total''' || '''767''' || '''222''' || '''41''' || '''1,030'''
|}


The chief surgeon for the First Fleet, John White, reported a total of 48 deaths and 28 births during the voyage. The deaths during the voyage included one marine, one marine's wife, one marine's child, 36 male convicts, four female convicts, and five children of convicts.<ref>{{cite book|last=White|first=John|title=Journal of a Voyage to New South Wales|location=[Port Jackson]|publisher=privately published|year=2003|orig-year=1790|url=http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0301531.txt}} Project Gutenberg.</ref>
==Ships of the First Fleet==
There were eleven ships in the fleet, namely:


===Notable members of First Fleet===
'''Naval escorts''':
====Officials====
* [[HMS Sirius (1786)|H.M.S. ''Sirius'']]
* Captain [[Arthur Phillip]], R.N, [[Governor of New South Wales]]
* [[H.M.S. Supply|H.M.S. ''Supply'']]
* Major [[Robert Ross (British Marines officer)|Robert Ross]], [[Lieutenant Governor of New South Wales|Lieutenant Governor]] and commander of the [[New South Wales Marine Corps|marines]]
'''Convict transports'''
* Captain [[David Collins (lieutenant governor)|David Collins]], [[Judge Advocate of New South Wales|Judge Advocate]]
* ''[[Alexander (ship)|Alexander]]''
* [[Augustus Alt]], [[Surveyor]]
* ''[[Charlotte (ship)|Charlotte]]''
* [[John White (surgeon)|John White]], Principal Surgeon
* ''[[Friendship (ship)|Friendship]]''
* [[William Balmain]], assistant Surgeon
* ''[[Lady Penrhyn (ship)|Lady Penrhyn]]''
* [[Richard Johnson (chaplain)|Richard Johnson]], chaplain
* ''[[Prince Of Wales (ship)|Prince Of Wales]]''
* ''[[Scarborough (ship)|Scarborough]]''
'''Storeships'''
* ''[[Borrowdale (ship)|Borrowdale]]''
* ''[[Fishburn (ship)|Fishburn]]''
* ''[[Golden Grove (ship)|Golden Grove]]''


====Soldiers====
==Notable First Fleet members==
* Lieutenant [[George Johnston (British Marines officer)|George Johnston]]
Some of the notable First Fleet members were:
* Captain [[Watkin Tench]]
* Lieutenant [[William Dawes (British Marines officer)|William Dawes]]
* Lieutenant [[Ralph Clark]]


====Sailors====
'''Officials'''
* Captain [[John Hunter (Royal Navy officer)|John Hunter]], commander of HMS ''Sirius''
* [[Augustus Alt]], surveyor
* Lieutenant [[Henry Lidgbird Ball]], commander of HMAT ''Supply''
* [[Reverend Richard Johnson|Richard Johnson]], chaplain
* Lieutenant [[William Bradley (Royal Navy officer)|William Bradley]], 1st lieutenant of HMS ''Sirius''
* Lieutenant [[Philip Gidley King]], commandant of [[Norfolk Island]]
* [[Arthur Bowes Smyth]], ship’s surgeon on ''Lady Penrhyn''
* Lieutenant [[John Shortland (Royal Navy officer)|John Shortland]], Agent for Transports
* [[John Shortland]], son of above, 2nd mate of HMS ''Sirius''


====Convicts====
'''Crew members''' who remained in the colony
* [[Thomas Barrett (convict)|Thomas Barrett]], first person executed in colony
* [[Arthur Phillip]], governor
* [[Mary Bryant]], with her husband, children and 6 other convicts escaped the colony and eventually returned to England
* [[King, Philip Gidley]], 2nd lieutenant, later lieutenant governor of Norfolk Island, and 3rd governor of the colony
* [[John Caesar]], [[bushranger]]
* [[John Hunter (New South Wales)|John Hunter]], captain of ''[[HMS Sirius]]'', later 2nd governor of the colony
* [[Matthew Everingham]], farmer, explorer and district constable
* [[Henry Lidgbird Ball]], captain of ''[[HMS Supply]]''
* [[Henry Kable]], businessman
* [[John White (surgeon)|John White]], principal surgeon
* [[James Martin (convict)|James Martin]], was part of the escape with Mary Bryant, wrote autobiography
* [[Thomas Arndell]], assistant surgeon, later settler
* [[James Ruse]], farmer, one of the only ones in the colony at its establishment
* [[William Balmain]], assistant surgeon, later principal surgeon
* [[Robert Sidaway]], baker, opened the first theatre in [[Sydney]]
* [[Arthur Bowes Smyth]], assistant surgeon, author of journal
* [[Dennis Considen]], assistant surgeon
* [[James Squire]], brewer
* [[Frances Williams (convict)|Frances Williams]], first Welsh woman to settle in Australia<ref>{{Cite web |last=Collins |first=Hayley |date=2011-11-08 |title=Flintshire Woman Shipped to Australia for Stealing Clothes |url=https://www.leaderlive.co.uk/news/15934326.flintshire-woman-shipped-to-australia-for-stealing-clothes/ |access-date=2023-09-10 |website=[[The Leader (Welsh newspaper)|The Leader]] |language=en}}</ref>
* [[Thomas Jamison]], surgeon's mate
* [[Henry Brewer]], clerk to Phillip, provost marshall, administrator
* Quartermaster [[Henry Hacking]], settler, explorer


==Voyage==
'''Marines'''
[[File:Lady Penrhyn (sailing ship).jpg|thumb|[[Lady Penrhyn (1786 ship)|''Lady Penrhyn'']]]]
* Major [[Robert Ross (marine)|Robert Ross]], commander, later lieutenant governor of Norfolk Island
* 2nd Lieutenant [[Ralph Clark]], author of journal
* Captain [[David Collins (governor)|David Collins]], judge advocate, later commandant of first settlement at [[Hobart]]
* Lieutenant [[William Dawes (marine)|William Dawes]], engineer, surveyor, humanitarian
* Lieutenant [[George Johnston]], later commander of NSW Corps
* Captain [[Watkin Tench]], author of journal
* Lieutenant [[William Bradley (marine)|William Bradley]], author of journal, water colourist


===Preparing the fleet===
'''Convicts'''
In September 1786 Captain [[Arthur Phillip]] was chosen to lead the expedition to establish a colony in [[New South Wales]]. On 15 December, Captain [[John Hunter (Royal Navy officer)|John Hunter]], was appointed Phillip’s second. By now {{HMS|Sirius|1786|6}} had been nominated as flagship, with Hunter holding command. The armed tender HMAT {{HMS|Supply|1759|3}} under command of Lieutenant [[Henry Lidgbird Ball]] had also joined the fleet.<ref name=NelsonFleet>{{Citation |last=Hiscocks |first=Richard|year=2018 |title=The 'First Fleet' sails for New South Wales – 31 May 1787 |publisher=morethannelson.com|url=https://morethannelson.com/first-fleet-sails-new-south-wales-31-may-1787/ |access-date=16 October 2021}}</ref>
* [[Ann Inett]], de facto relationship with Philip Gidley King
* [[Margaret Dawson]], de facto relationship with William Balmain
* [[Esther Abrahams]], partner and wife of George Johnston
* [[Mary Braund]] and [[William Bryant (convict)|William Bryant]], escapees from colony
* [[James Ruse]], farmer and landowner
* [[John Baughan]], carpenter, mill owner, attacked by NSW Corps
* [[Jacob Bellett]], landowner at Norfolk Island and Van Diemen's Land
* [[Matthew James Everingham]], landowner
* [[ Edward Garth]] and [[Susannah Gough/Garth]], pioneer family
* [[Nathaniel Lucas]] and [[Olive Gascoigne]], pioneer family
* [[Henry Kable/Cabell]], constable, landowner
* [[John Caesar]], Madagascan, absconder
* [[Joshua Peck]], landowner
* [[Charles Peat]] and [[Ann Mullins]], pioneer family
* [[Robert Sidaway]], theatre owner, landholder


With Phillip in [[London]] awaiting [[Royal Assent]] for the bill of management of the colony, the loading and provisioning of the transports was carried out by Lieutenant [[John Shortland (Royal Navy officer)|John Shortland]], the agent for transports.<ref name=NelsonFleet/><ref name=McMartin>{{Citation |last=McMartin|first=Arthur|year=1967|title=Shortland, John (1739–1803)|publisher= Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University |url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/shortland-john-2658/text3643 |access-date=16 October 2021}}</ref>
Many other convicts made significant contributions to the early years of the colony, but few are remembered today, except by their descendants.


On 16 March 1787, the fleet began to assemble at its appointed rendezvous, the [[Motherbank|Mother Bank]], [[Isle of Wight]]. His Majesty's frigate ''Sirius'' and armed tender ''Supply'', three store-ships, ''[[Golden Grove (1782 ship)|Golden Grove]]'', ''[[Fishburn (1780 ship)|Fishburn]]'' and ''[[Borrowdale (1785 ship)|Borrowdale]]'', for carrying provisions and stores for two years; and lastly, six transports; ''[[Scarborough (1782 ship)|Scarborough]]'' and ''[[Lady Penrhyn (1786 ship)|Lady Penrhyn]]'', from [[Portsmouth]]; ''[[Friendship (1784 ship)|Friendship]]'' and ''[[Charlotte (1784 ship)|Charlotte]]'', from [[Plymouth]]; ''[[Prince of Wales (1786 ship)|Prince of Wales]]'', and ''[[Alexander (1783 ship)|Alexander]]'', from [[Woolwich]].<ref name=Phillip2>{{Citation |last=Phillip|first=Arthur|year=1789|title=The Voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay - chapter2|publisher=Project Gutenberg Australia|url=https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks/e00101.html#chapter-02|access-date=16 October 2021}}</ref> On 9 May Captain Phillip arrived in Portsmouth, the next day coming aboard the ships and giving orders to prepare the fleet for departure.<ref name=Hunter1>{{Citation |last=Hunter|first=John|year=1793|title= An Historical Journal of the Transactions at Port Jackson and Norfolk Island - chapter1|publisher=Project Gutenberg Australia|url=https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks/e00063.html#ch-01|access-date=16 October 2021}}</ref>
==References==
*Gillen, Mollie, ''The Founders of Australia: a biographical dictionary of the First Fleet'', Sydney, Library of Australian History, 1989.
*Bateson, Charles, ''The Convict Ships, 1787-1868'', Sydney, 1974.
*[[Robert Studley Forrest Hughes|Hughes, Robert]], ''[[The Fatal Shore]]'', London, Pan, 1988


===Leaving Portsmouth===
==Fiction==
Phillip first tried to get the fleet to sail on 10 May, but a dispute by sailors of the ''Fishburn'' about pay, they refused to leave until resolved.{{Citation needed|date=March 2023}} The fleet finally left Portsmouth, England on 13 May 1787.<ref name="Gutenberg FF">{{cite web| title= The First Fleet|url=http://gutenberg.net.au/first-fleet.html| publisher = Project Gutenberg| access-date = 24 November 2013}}</ref> The journey began with fine weather, and thus the convicts were allowed on deck.<ref name="Frost165167">Frost 2012, pp. 165–167</ref> The Fleet was accompanied by the armed frigate {{HMS|Hyaena|1778|6}} until it left English waters.<ref name="Parker7778">Parker 2009, pp. 77–78</ref> On 20 May 1787, one convict on ''Scarborough'' reported a planned mutiny; those allegedly involved were flogged and two were transferred to ''Prince of Wales''.<ref name="Parker7778" /> In general, however, most accounts of the voyage agree that the convicts were well behaved.<ref name="Parker7778" /> On 3 June 1787, the fleet anchored at [[Santa Cruz de Tenerife|Santa Cruz]] at [[Tenerife]].<ref name="Gutenberg FF" /> Here, fresh water, vegetables and meat were brought on board. Phillip and the chief officers were entertained by the local governor, while one convict tried unsuccessfully to escape.<ref>Parker 2009, p. 84</ref> On 10 June they set sail to cross the Atlantic to [[Rio de Janeiro]],<ref name="Gutenberg FF" /> taking advantage of favourable [[trade wind]]s and ocean currents.
*[[Colleen McCullough]], ''[[Morgan's Run]]'', ISBN 0099280981.

The weather became increasingly hot and humid as the Fleet sailed through the tropics. Vermin, such as rats, and parasites such as bedbugs, [[lice]], cockroaches and fleas, tormented the convicts, officers and marines. [[Bilge]]s became foul and the smell, especially below the closed hatches, was over-powering.<ref name="Parker8789">Parker 2009, pp. 87–89</ref> While Phillip gave orders that the bilge-water was to be pumped out daily and the bilges cleaned, these orders were not followed on ''Alexander'' and a number of convicts fell sick and died.<ref name="Parker8789" /> Tropical rainstorms meant that the convicts could not exercise on deck as they had no change of clothes and no method of drying wet clothing.<ref name="Parker8789" /> Consequently, they were kept below in the foul, cramped holds. On the female transports, promiscuity between the convicts, the crew and marines was rampant, despite punishments for some of the men involved.<ref name="Parker8789" /> In the [[doldrums]], Phillip was forced to ration the water to three pints a day.<ref name="Parker8789" />

The Fleet reached Rio de Janeiro on 5 August and stayed for a month.<ref name="Gutenberg FF" /> The ships were cleaned and water taken on board, repairs were made, and Phillip ordered large quantities of food.<ref name="Frost165167" /> The women convicts' clothing had become infested with lice and was burnt. As additional clothing for the female convicts had not arrived before the Fleet left England,<ref name="Frost165167" /> the women were issued with new clothes made from rice sacks. While the convicts remained below deck, the officers explored the city and were entertained by its inhabitants.<ref>Frost 2012, p. 170</ref> A convict and a marine were punished for passing forged quarter-dollars made from old buckles and pewter spoons. [[Ellen Fraser (convict)|Ellen Fraser]], Mother of second child of English parents born in the colony (John Fraser born 7 June 1789), is thought to be the female convict transferred from the "Prince of Wales" to the " Charlotte" during the stop over in Rio on 13 August 1787. Her husband, William Fraser was a convict on "Charlotte".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://familyhistorybyclaytontalbot.weebly.com/eleanor-redchester.html | title=Eleanor Redchester }}</ref>

[[File:Robert Dodd-English ships in Table Bay-0673.jpg|thumb|upright=1.6|''An English Fleet in [[Table Bay]] in 1787'', by [[Robert Dodd (artist)|Robert Dodd]]]]
The Fleet left Rio de Janeiro on 4 September to run before the [[westerlies]] to the [[Table Bay]] in southern Africa,<!-- The Fleet left Rio in South America for the Cape of Good Hope in southern Africa. Please don't change this to Cape Horn--> which it reached on 13 October.<ref>Hill 2008, pp. 120–123</ref> This was the last port of call, so the main task was to stock up on plants, seeds and livestock for their arrival in Australia.<ref name="Parker100">Parker 2009, p. 100</ref> The livestock taken on board from [[Cape Town]] destined for the new colony included two bulls, seven cows, one stallion, three mares, 44 sheep, 32 pigs, four goats and "a very large quantity of poultry of every kind".<ref name="AE">Chisholm, Alec H. (ed.), ''The Australian Encyclopaedia'', Vol. 4, p. 72, "First Fleet", Halstead Press, Sydney, 1963</ref> Women convicts on ''Friendship'' were moved to other transports to make room for livestock purchased there. The convicts were provided with fresh beef and mutton, bread and vegetables, to build up their strength for the journey and maintain their health.<ref name="Parker100" /> The Dutch colony of Cape Town was the last outpost of European settlement which the fleet members would see for years, perhaps for the rest of their lives. "Before them stretched the awesome, lonely void of the Indian and Southern Oceans, and beyond that lay nothing they could imagine."<ref>{{cite book| author= [[Robert Hughes (critic)|Robert Hughes]]| title= The Fatal Shore: A History of the Transportation of Convicts to Australia 1787–1868| location= London| publisher= Pan Books| year= 1988| isbn= 978-0-330-29892-6| page= [https://archive.org/details/fatalshorehistor00hugh/page/82 82]|url=https://archive.org/details/fatalshorehistor00hugh/page/82}}</ref>

Assisted by the gales in the "[[Roaring Forties]]" latitudes below the 40th parallel, the heavily laden transports surged through the violent seas. In the last two months of the voyage, the Fleet faced challenging conditions, spending some days becalmed and on others covering significant distances; ''Friendship'' travelled 166 miles one day, while a seaman was blown from ''Prince of Wales'' at night and drowned.<ref name="Parker106108">Parker 2009, pp. 106–108</ref> Water was rationed as supplies ran low, and the supply of other goods including wine ran out altogether on some vessels.<ref name="Parker106108" /> [[Van Diemen's Land]] was sighted from ''Friendship'' on 4 January 1788.<ref name="Parker106108" /> A freak storm struck as they began to head north around the island, damaging the sails and masts of some of the ships.

On 25 November, Phillip had transferred to ''Supply''. With ''Alexander'', ''Friendship'' and ''Scarborough'', the fastest ships in the Fleet, which were carrying most of the male convicts, ''Supply'' hastened ahead to prepare for the arrival of the rest. Phillip intended to select a suitable location, find good water, clear the ground, and perhaps even have some huts and other structures built before the others arrived. This was a planned move, discussed by the Home Office and the Admiralty prior to the Fleet's departure.<ref>Frost 2012, p. 174</ref> However, this "flying squadron" reached [[Botany Bay]] only hours before the rest of the Fleet, so no preparatory work was possible.<ref>Frost 2012, p.175</ref> ''Supply'' reached Botany Bay on 18 January 1788; the three fastest transports in the advance group arrived on 19 January; slower ships, including ''Sirius'', arrived on 20 January.<ref name="NLAFFTL">{{cite web| year= 2000|url=http://www.nla.gov.au/exhibitions/georgeraper/timeline/timeline-doc-1788.html#| title= Timeline – 1788
| work= The World Upside Down: Australia 1788–1830| publisher=[[National Library of Australia]]| access-date=27 May 2006}}</ref>

This was one of the world's greatest sea voyages – eleven vessels carrying about 1,487 people and stores<ref name="AE" /> had travelled for 252 days for more than 15,000 miles (24,000&nbsp;km) without losing a ship. Forty-eight people died on the journey, a death rate of just over three percent.

=== Arrival in Australia ===
[[File:First Fleet entering Sydney 1788 Bradley.jpg|thumb|upright=1.75|The First Fleet arrives in [[Port Jackson]], 27 January 1788, by [[William Bradley (Royal Navy officer)|William Bradley]], an officer on [[HMS Sirius (1786)|HMS ''Sirius'']].]]
[[File:The First Fleet entering Port Jackson, January 26, 1788, drawn 1888 A9333001h.jpg|thumb|Lithograph of the First Fleet entering [[Port Jackson]], 26 January 1788, by Edmund Le Bihan]]

It was soon realised that Botany Bay did not live up to the glowing account that the explorer Captain [[James Cook]] had provided.<ref>Frost 2012, p. 177</ref> The bay was open and unprotected, the water was too shallow to allow the ships to anchor close to the shore, fresh water was scarce, and the soil was poor.<ref>Parker 2009, p. 113</ref> [[First contact (anthropology)|First contact]] was made with the local indigenous people, the [[Eora]], who seemed curious but suspicious of the newcomers. The area was studded with enormously strong trees. When the convicts tried to cut them down, their tools broke and the tree trunks had to be blasted out of the ground with gunpowder.{{citation needed|date=February 2023}} The primitive huts built for the officers and officials quickly collapsed in rainstorms. The marines had a habit of getting drunk and not guarding the convicts properly, whilst their commander, Major [[Robert Ross (British Marines officer)|Robert Ross]], drove Phillip to despair with his arrogant and lazy attitude. Crucially, Phillip worried that his fledgling colony was exposed to attack from those described as [[Aboriginal Australian|"Aborigines"]] or from foreign powers. Although his initial instructions were to establish the colony at Botany Bay, he was authorised to establish the colony elsewhere if necessary.<ref name="Museum of Australian Democracy">{{cite web|title=Governor Phillip's Instructions 25 April 1787 (UK)|url=http://foundingdocs.gov.au/item-sdid-68.html|publisher =Museum of Australian Democracy|access-date=24 November 2013}}</ref>

On 21 January, Phillip and a party which included John Hunter, departed the Bay in three small boats to explore other bays to the north.<ref name="Parker115116">Parker 2009, pp. 115–116</ref> Phillip discovered that [[Port Jackson]], about 12 kilometres to the north, was an excellent site for a colony with sheltered anchorages, fresh water and fertile soil.<ref name="Parker115116" /> Cook had seen and named the harbour, but had not entered it.<ref name="Parker115116" /> Phillip's impressions of the harbour were recorded in a letter he sent to England later: "the finest harbour in the world, in which a thousand sail of the line may ride in the most perfect security ...". The party returned to Botany Bay on 23 January.<ref name="Parker115116" />

On the morning of 24 January, the party was startled when two French ships, the [[French ship Astrolabe (1781)|''Astrolabe'']] and the [[French ship Boussole (1782)|''Boussole'']], were seen just outside Botany Bay. This was a scientific expedition led by [[Jean-François de Galaup, comte de La Pérouse|Jean-François de La Pérouse]]. The French had expected to find a thriving colony where they could repair ships and restock supplies, not a newly arrived fleet of convicts considerably more poorly provisioned than themselves.<ref>Parker 2009, p. 118</ref> There was some cordial contact between the French and British officers, but Phillip and La Pérouse never met. The French ships remained until 10 March before setting sail on their return voyage. They were not seen again and were later discovered to have been shipwrecked off the coast of [[Vanikoro]] in the present-day [[Solomon Islands]].<ref>John Dunmore, "Introduction", The Journal of Jean-François de Galaup de La Pérouse, Vol. I, Hakluyt Society, 1994, pp. ccxix–ccxxii.</ref>

On 26 January 1788, the Fleet weighed anchor and sailed to [[Port Jackson]].<ref name="Gutenberg FF" /> The site selected for the anchorage had deep water close to the shore, was sheltered, and had a small stream flowing into it. Phillip named it [[Sydney Cove]], after [[Thomas Townshend, 1st Viscount Sydney|Lord Sydney]], the British [[Home Secretary]].<ref name="Parker115116" /> This date is celebrated as [[Australia Day]], marking the beginning of British settlement.<ref name="NADC">{{cite web|title= About Our National Day|url=http://www.australiaday.org.au/australia-day/about-our-national-day/|publisher=National Australia Day Council|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131230043620/http://www.australiaday.org.au/australia-day/about-our-national-day/|archive-date=30 December 2013|url-status=dead|access-date = 25 November 2013}}</ref> Contrary to popular belief, the [[Union Jack#History|British flag]] was not officially planted until 7 February 1788 when possession was formally proclaimed.{{Citation needed|date=June 2023}} There was, as always, a British naval ensign erected at the site of the military encampment, and this had been performed on the evening of 25 January 1788<ref>{{Cite web |title=7 Feb 1788 - Colony of NSW formally proclaimed |url=https://www.records.nsw.gov.au/archives/magazine/onthisday/7-february-1788 |access-date=15 July 2022 |website=State Archives & Records |archive-date=1 June 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220601090936/https://www.records.nsw.gov.au/archives/magazine/onthisday/7-february-1788 |url-status=dead }}</ref> in a small ceremony conducted by Phillip and some officers and marines from ''Supply'', with the remainder of ''Supply''{{'}}s crew and the convicts observing from on board ship. The remaining ships of the Fleet did not arrive at Sydney Cove until later that day.<ref>Hill 2008, p. 150</ref> Writer and art critic [[Robert Hughes (critic)|Robert Hughes]] popularized the idea in his 1986 book ''[[The Fatal Shore]]'' that an [[orgy]] occurred upon the unloading of the convicts, though more modern historians regard this as untrue, since the first reference to any such indiscretions is as recent as 1963.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Fatal Shore|author=Robert Hughes|date= 1986|publisher=Alfred A. Knopf|pages=88–89|isbn=9780099448549}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Great Australian Urban Legends|date=2015|publisher=Affirm Press|author=Eamon Evans|pages=116–117|isbn=9781925475241}}</ref>

=== First contact ===
The First Fleet encountered [[Indigenous Australians]] when they landed at [[Botany Bay]]. The [[Cadigal]] people of the [[Botany Bay]] area witnessed the Fleet arrive and six days later the two ships of French explorer [[Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse|La Pérouse]], the [[French ship Astrolabe (1781)|''Astrolabe'']] and the [[French ship Boussole (1782)|''Boussole'']], sailed into the bay.<ref>{{cite web
| last = Kensy
| first = Julia
| title = La Perouse
| url = http://www.dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/la_perouse
| work = Dictionary of Sydney
| access-date = 24 November 2013
}}</ref> When the Fleet moved to Sydney Cove seeking better conditions for establishing the colony, they encountered the Eora people, including the [[Bidjigal]] clan. A number of the First Fleet journals record encounters with Aboriginal people.<ref>{{cite web
| last = Derrincourt
| first = Robin
| title = Camp Cove
| url = http://www.dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/camp_cove?zoom_highlight=first+fleet
| work = Dictionary of Sydney
| access-date = 24 November 2013
}}</ref>

Although the official policy of the British Government was to establish friendly relations with Aboriginal people,<ref name="Museum of Australian Democracy" /> and [[Arthur Phillip]] ordered that the Aboriginal people should be well treated, it was not long before [[Hawkesbury and Nepean Wars|conflict began]]. The colonists did not sign treaties with the original inhabitants of the land.<ref>{{cite journal
| last = Banner
| first = Stuart
| title = Why Terra Nullius? Anthropology and Property Law in Early Australia
| journal = Law and History Review
| date = Spring 2005
| volume = 23
| issue = 1
| pages = 95–131
| jstor = 30042845
| doi = 10.1017/s0738248000000067
| s2cid = 145484253
}}</ref> Between 1790 and 1810, [[Pemulwuy]] of the [[Bidjigal]] clan led the local people in a series of attacks against the colonists.<ref>{{cite book
| last = Kohen
| first = J. L.
| title = 'Pemulwuy (1750–1802)', Australian Dictionary of Biography
| chapter = Pemulwuy (1750–1802)
| publisher = National Centre of Biography, Australian National University
| url = http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/pemulwuy-13147
}}</ref>

=== After January 1788 ===
The ships of the First Fleet mostly did not remain in the colony. Some returned to England, while others left for other ports. Some remained at the service of the Governor of the colony for some months: some of these were sent to [[Norfolk Island]] where a second penal colony was established.

1788
* 15 February – HMAT ''Supply'' sails for Norfolk Island carrying a small party to establish a settlement.<ref name="Jordan2014">{{cite book|author=Robert Jordan|title=The Convict Theatres of Early Australia, 1788–1840|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M3v6AwAAQBAJ&pg=PT438|date=1 July 2014|publisher=Currency House|isbn=978-0-9924890-1-4|pages=438–}}</ref><ref name="Kirk2012">{{cite book|author=Robert W. Kirk|title=Paradise Past: The Transformation of the South Pacific, 1520–1920|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=klglH_7KkxsC&pg=PA71|date=18 October 2012|publisher=McFarland|isbn=978-0-7864-9298-5|pages=71–}}</ref>
* 5/6 May – ''Charlotte'', ''Lady Penrhyn'' and ''Scarborough'' set sail for China.<ref name="BladenBritton1893">{{cite book|author1=Frank Murcott Bladen|author2=Alexander Britton|title=Historical Records of New South Wales|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kHIhAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA692|year=1893|publisher=Lansdown Slattery & Company|isbn=978-0-86833-003-7|pages=692–}}</ref><ref name="(Surgeon.)1790">{{cite book|author=John WHITE (Surgeon.)|title=Begin. In the press, and speedily will be published ... A journal of a voyage to Botany Bay, in New South Wales, etc|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gTtfAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA155|year=1790|pages=155–}}</ref>
* 14 July – ''Borrowdale'', ''Alexander'', ''Friendship'' and ''Prince of Wales'' set sail to return to England.<ref name="Heaton1879">{{cite book|author=John Henniker Heaton|title=Australian Dictionary of Dates and Men of the Time: Containing the History of Australasia from 1542 to May, 1879|url=https://archive.org/details/australiandicti00heatgoog|year=1879|publisher=G. Robertson|pages=[https://archive.org/details/australiandicti00heatgoog/page/n441 1]–}}</ref><ref name="Marshall2010">{{cite book|author=John Marshall|title=Royal Naval Biography: Or, Memoirs of the Services of All the Flag-Officers, Superannuated Rear-Admirals, Retired-Captains, Post-Captains, and Commanders|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Jps1Iq_-GUUC&pg=PA484|date=2010|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-108-02266-8|pages=484–}}</ref>
* 2 October – ''Golden Grove'' sets sail for Norfolk Island with a party of convicts,<ref name="Bladen1892">{{cite book|author=Frank Murcot Bladen|title=Historical Records of New South Wales|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZiQXAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA194|year=1892|publisher=C. Potter|pages=194–}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Historical Records of New South Wales: part 1. &#91;Papers relating to&#93; Cook, 1762–1780. Facsimiles of charts. 1893. Part 2. &#91;Papers relating to&#93; Phillip, 1783–1792. 1892|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ML4NAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA209|year=1892|publisher=C. Potter|pages=209–}}</ref> returning to Port Jackson 10 November, while HMS ''Sirius'' sails for [[Cape of Good Hope]] for supplies.<ref name="MeloVaz2016">{{cite book|author1=Cristina Joanaz de Melo|author2=Estelita Vaz|author3=Lígia M. Costa Pinto|title=Environmental History in the Making: Volume II: Acting|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fehODQAAQBAJ&pg=PA312|date=2016|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-3-319-41139-2|pages=312–}}</ref><ref name="Horsburgh1827">{{cite book|author=James Horsburgh|title=India Directory, Or Directions for Sailing to and from the East Indies, China, New Holland, Cape of Good Hope, Brazil and the Interjacent Ports. 3. Ed|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jNJYAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA572|year=1827|publisher=Kingsburg|pages=572–}}</ref>
* 19 November – ''Fishburn'' and ''Golden Grove'' set sail for England. This means that only HMAT ''Supply'' now remains in Sydney cove.<ref name="Barton1889">{{cite book|author=George Burnett Barton|title=History of New South Wales from the Records|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CXDOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA318|year=1889|publisher=Charles Potter|pages=318–}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=The Edinburgh Magazine, Or Literary Miscellany|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nV43AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA292-IA3|year=1789|publisher=J. Sibbald|pages=292–}}</ref>

1789
* 23 December – {{HMS|Guardian|1784|6}} carrying stores for the colony strikes an iceberg and is forced back to the Cape. It never reaches the colony in New South Wales.<ref name="Rusden1897">{{cite book|author=George William Rusden|title=History of Australia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MnrOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA59|year=1897|publisher=Melville, Mullen & Slade|pages=59–}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=The Nautical Magazine: A Technical and Critical Journal for the Officers of the Mercantile Marine|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cJ8epwiWIIQC&pg=PA189|year=1845|publisher=James Brown & Son|pages=189–}}</ref>

1790:
* 19 March – HMS ''Sirius'' is wrecked off Norfolk Island.<ref name="Henderson2016">{{cite book|author=Graeme Henderson|author-link=Graeme Henderson|title=Swallowed by the Sea: The Story of Australia's Shipwrecks|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-_PoDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA216|date=2016|publisher=National Library of Australia|isbn=978-0-642-27894-4|pages=216–}}</ref><ref name="ScottPodany1994">{{cite book|author1=David A. Scott|author2=Jerry Podany|author3=Brian B. Considine|title=Ancient & Historic Metals: Conservation and Scientific Research|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=O7pOAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA267|year=1994|publisher=Getty Publications|isbn=978-0-89236-231-8|pages=267–}}</ref><ref name="David1995">{{cite book|author=Andrew David|title=The Voyage of HMS Herald to Australia and the South-west Pacific, 1852–1861 Under the Command of Captain Henry Mangles Denham|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CxUxAQAAIAAJ|year=1995|publisher=Miegunyah Press|isbn=978-0-522-84390-3}}</ref>
* 17 April – HMAT ''Supply'' sent to [[Batavia, Dutch East Indies]], for emergency food supplies.<ref>{{cite Australian Dictionary of Biography |id2=ball-henry-lidgbird-1734/text1911 | author=Parsons, Vivienne | title=Ball, Henry Lidgbird (1756–1818) | year=1966}}</ref>
* 3 June – ''[[Lady Juliana (1777 ship)|Lady Juliana]]'', the first of six vessels of the [[Second Fleet (Australia)|Second Fleet]], arrives in Sydney cove. The remaining five vessels of the Second Fleet arrive in the ensuing weeks.<ref name="Barton1894">{{cite book|author=George Burnett Barton|title=History of New South Wales from the Records: Phillip and Grose, 1789–1794|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZCEQAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA56|year=1894|publisher=Charles Potter|pages=54–}}</ref>
* 19 September – HMAT ''Supply'' returns to Sydney having chartered the Dutch vessel ''[[Waaksamheyd (ship)|Waaksamheyd]]'' to accompany it carrying stores.<ref name="fff">{{cite web |date=15 October 2011 |title=HMAT Supply |url=https://firstfleetfellowship.org.au/ships/hmat-supply/ |access-date=9 May 2024 |publisher=First Fleet Fellowship Victoria Inc}}</ref>

==Legacy==
===Last survivors===
On Sat 26 January 1842 The [[Sydney Gazette|''Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser'']] reported "The Government has ordered a pension of one shilling per diem to be paid to the survivors of those who came by the first vessel into the Colony. The number of these really 'old hands' is now reduced to three, of whom, two are now in the Benevolent Asylum, and the other is a fine hale old fellow, who can do a day's work with more spirit than many of the young fellows lately arrived in the Colony."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article2555630|title=29 Jan 1842 – Anniversary Regatta.|work=nla.gov.au|date=29 January 1842 |access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> The names of the three recipients were not given, and is academic as the notice turned out to be false, not having been authorised by the Governor. There were at least 25 persons still living who had arrived with the First Fleet, including several children born on the voyage. A number of these contacted the authorities to arrange their pension and all received a similar reply to the following received by John McCarty on 14 Mar 1842 "I am directed by His Excellency the Governor to inform you, that the paragraph which appeared in the Sydney Gazette relative to an allowance to the persons of the first expedition to New South Wales was not authorised by His Excellency nor has he any knowledge of such an allowance as that alluded to". [[Edward Deas Thomson|E. Deas Thomson]], [[Chief Secretary of New South Wales|Colonial Secretary]].{{citation needed|date=May 2020}}

Following is a list of persons known to be living at the time the false pension notice was published, in order of their date of death. At this time New South Wales included the whole Eastern seaboard of present day Australia except for Van Diemen's Land which was declared a separate colony in 1825 and achieved self governing status in 1855-6. This list does not include marines or convicts who returned to England after completing their term in NSW and who may have lived past January 1842.
*Rachel Earley: (or Hirley), convict per ''Friendship'' and ''Prince of Wales'' died 27 April 1842 at Kangaroo Point, VDL (said to be aged 75).
*Roger Twyfield: convict per ''Friendship'' died 30 April 1842 at Windsor, aged 98 (NSW reg as Twifield).
*Thomas Chipp: marine private per ''Friendship'' died 3 July 1842, buried Parramatta, aged 81 (NSW Reg age 93).
*Anthony Rope: convict per ''Alexander'' died 20 April 1843 at Castlereagh NSW, aged 84 (NSW Reg age 89).
*William Hubbard: Hubbard was convicted in the Kingston Assizes in Surrey, England, on 24 March 1784 for theft.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.firstfleet.org.au/|title=Hubbard First Fleet|work=firstfleet.org.au|access-date=17 October 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151017114857/http://firstfleet.org.au/|archive-date=17 October 2015|url-status=dead}}</ref> He was transported to Australia on ''Scarborough'' in the First Fleet. He married Mary Goulding on 19 December 1790 in Rose Hill. In 1803 he received a land grant of 70 acres at Mulgrave Place. He died on 18 May 1843 at the Sydney Benevolent Asylum. His age was given as 76 when he was buried at Christ Church St. Lawrence, Sydney on 22 May 1843.
*Thomas Jones: convict per ''Alexander'' died October 1843 in NSW, aged 87.
*John Griffiths: marine private per ''Friendship'' who died 5 May 1844 at Hobart, aged 86.
*Benjamin Cusely: marine private per ''Friendship'' died 20 June 1845 at Windsor/Wilberforce, aged 86 (said to be 98).
*[[Henry Kable]]: convict per ''Friendship'' died 16 March 1846 at Windsor, aged 84.
*John McCarty: McCarty was a marine private who sailed on [[Friendship (1784)|''Friendship'']].<ref>{{cite book|url=http://www.historyaustralia.org.au/twconvic/1180|title=1180 – McCarty, John|work=Convict Stockade: A Wiki Site for Australian Convict Researchers|date=26 February 2008|access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> McCarty claimed to have been born in Killarney, County Kerry, Ireland, ''circa'' Christmas 1745. He first served in the colony of New South Wales, then at Norfolk Island where he took up a land grant of 60 acres (Lot 71). He married first fleet convict Ann Beardsley on Norfolk Island in November 1791 after his marine discharge a month earlier. In 1808, at the impending closure of the Norfolk Island settlement, he resettled in Van Diemen's Land later taking a land grant (80 acres at Herdsman's Cove Melville) in lieu of the one forfeited on Norfolk Island. The last few years of his life were spent at the home of Mr. William H. Budd, at the Kinlochewe Inn near [[Donnybrook, Victoria]]. McCarty was buried on local land 24 July 1846,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article4759692|title=28 Jul 1846 – Domestic Intelligence.|work=nla.gov.au|date=28 July 1846 |access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> six months past his 100 birthday, although this is very likely an exaggerated age.
*John Alexander Herbert: convict per ''Scarborough'' died 19 November 1846 at Westbury Van Diemen's Land, aged 79.
*Robert Nunn: convict per ''Scarborough'' died 20 November 1846 at Richmond, aged 86.
*John Howard: convict per ''Scarborough'' died 1 January 1847 at Sydney Benevolent Asylum, aged 94.
*John Limeburner: The ''South Australian Register'' reported, in an article dated Wednesday 3 November 1847: "John Limeburner, the oldest colonist in Sydney, died in September last, at the advanced age of 104 years. He helped to pitch the first tent in Sydney, and remembered the first display of the British flag there, which was hoisted on a swamp oak-tree, then growing on a spot now occupied as the Water-Police Court. He was the last of those called the 'first-fleeters' (arrivals by the first convict ships) and, notwithstanding his great age, retained his faculties to the last."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article48544655|title=03 Nov 1847 – LONGEVITY.|work=nla.gov.au|date=3 November 1847 |access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> John Limeburner was a [[List of convicts on the First Fleet#L|convict]] on ''Charlotte''. He was convicted on 9 July 1785 at New Sarum, Wiltshire of theft of a waistcoat, a shirt and stockings.<ref>{{cite book|url=http://www.historyaustralia.org.au/twconvic/tiki-index_p.php?page=Charlotte+1788|title=Charlotte 1788|author=Scott Brown – HistoryAustralia|work=historyaustralia.org.au|access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> He married Elizabeth Ireland in 1790 at Rosehill and together they establish a 50-acre farm at Prospect.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.spathaky.name/prospecthill/history/settlement.htm|title=Prospect Hill – Settlement|work=spathaky.name|access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> He died at Ashfield 4 September 1847 and is buried at [[St John's, Ashfield#Cemetery|St John's, Ashfield]], death reg. as Linburner aged 104.
*John Jones: Jones was a marine private on the First Fleet and sailed on [[Alexander (1783 ship)|''Alexander'']]. He is listed in the N.S.W. 1828 Census as aged 82 and living at the Sydney Benevolent Asylum.<ref>Census of NSW November 1828, published in ''1828 Census of New South Wales'', edited by Malcolm Sainty and Keith Johnson, revised edition published by Library of Australian History, Sydney, 2008 (CD-ROM); Book Entry# J0669</ref> He is said to have died at the Benevolent Asylum in 1848.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.australian-english-genealogy.com/Alexander.html|title=First Fleet Ship Alexander|work=australian-english-genealogy.com|access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref>
*Jane/Jenny Rose: (nee Jones), child of convict Elizabeth Evans per ''Lady Penrhyn'' died 29 August 1849 at Wollongong, aged 71.
*Samuel King: King was a scribbler (a worker in a [[carding|scribbling mill]]<ref>Also "slubbing mill": "A mill used for the preparation of raw fleece etc, for spinning by a coarse form of [[carding]]" ({{cite web|title=English Heritage Online thesaurus|url=http://thesaurus.historicengland.org.uk/thesaurus_term.asp?thes_no=1&term_no=69323|access-date=22 November 2015}})</ref>) before he became a marine. He was a marine with the First Fleet on board {{HMS|Sirius|1786|3}}.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.fellowshipfirstfleeters.org.au/ship_sirius.htm|title=Fellowship of First Fleeters|work=fellowshipfirstfleeters.org.au|access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref> He shipped to Norfolk Island on ''Golden Grove'' in September 1788, where he lived with Mary Rolt, a convict who arrived with the First Fleet on [[Prince of Wales (1786 ship)|''Prince of Wales'']]. He received a grant of 60 acres (Lot No. 13) at Cascade Stream in 1791. Mary Rolt returned to England on ''Britannia'' in October 1796. King was resettled in Van Diemen's Land, boarding ''City of Edinburgh'' on 3 September 1808, and landed in Hobart on 3 October.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.htfs.org.au/norfolk_islanders.htm#ce1808|title=The Early Settlers from Norfolk Island|work=htfs.org.au|access-date=17 October 2015|archive-date=15 October 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181015013112/http://www.htfs.org.au/norfolk_islanders.htm#ce1808|url-status=dead}}</ref> He married [[Elizabeth Thackery]] on 28 January 1810. He died on 21 October 1849 at 86 years of age and was buried in the Wesleyan cemetery at Lawitta Road, Back River.
*Mary Stevens: (nee Phillips), convict per ''Charlotte'' and ''Prince of Wales'' died 22 January 1850 at Longford Van Diemen's Land, aged 81.
*John Small: Convicted 14 March 1785 at the Devon Lent Assizes held at Exeter for Robbery King's Highway. Sentenced to hang, reprieved to 7 years' transportation. Arrived on [[Charlotte (1784 ship)|''Charlotte'']] in First Fleet 1788. Certificate of freedom 1792. Land Grant 1794, 30 acre "Small's Farm" at Eastern Farms (Ryde). Married October 1788 Mary Parker also a First Fleet convict who arrived on [[Lady Penrhyn (1786 ship)|''Lady Penrhyn'']]. John Small died on 2 October 1850 aged 90 years.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://illawarrasmallbradleyukfirstfleetfamilies.wordpress.com/about/the-small-family-in-australi-1788-1988-updated-1995/|title=The Small Family in Australia 1788 – 1988|date=19 November 2012 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/1792467|title=The search for John Small, First Fleeter / Mollie Gillen – National Library of Australia|work=nla.gov.au|year=1985 |publisher=Library of Australian History |isbn=9780908120581 }}</ref>
*Edward Smith: aka Beckford, convict per ''Scarborough'' died 2 June 1851 at Balmain, aged 92.
*Ann Forbes: (m.Huxley), convict per ''Prince of Wales'' died 29 December 1851, Lower Portland NSW, aged 83.
*Henry Kable Jnr: aka Holmes, b. 1786 in [[Norwich Castle]] prison, son of convict Susannah Holmes per ''Friendship'' and ''Charlotte'', died 13 May 1852 at [[Picton, New South Wales]] aged 66.
*Lydia Munro: (m.Goodwin) per ''Prince of Wales'' died 29 June 1856 at Hobart, reg as Letitia Goodwin, aged 85.
*Elizabeth Thackery: [[Elizabeth Thackery|Elizabeth "Betty" King]] (née Thackery) was tried and convicted of theft on 4 May 1786 at Manchester Quarter Sessions, and sentenced to seven years' transportation. She sailed on [[Friendship (1784)|''Friendship'']], but was transferred to ''Charlotte'' at the Cape of Good Hope. She was shipped to Norfolk Island on {{HMS|Sirius|1786|3}} in 1790 and lived there with James Dodding. In August 1800 she bought 10 acres of land from Samuel King at Cascade Stream. Elizabeth and James were relocated to Van Diemen's Land in December 1807<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.htfs.org.au/norfolk_islanders.htm#2|title=The Early Settlers from Norfolk Island|work=htfs.org.au|access-date=17 October 2015|archive-date=15 October 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181015013112/http://www.htfs.org.au/norfolk_islanders.htm#2|url-status=dead}}</ref> but parted company sometime afterwards. On 28 January 1810 Elizabeth married "First Fleeter" Private Samuel King (above) and lived with him until his death in 1849. Betty King died in New Norfolk, Tasmania on 7 August 1856, aged 89 years. She is buried in the churchyard of the Methodist Chapel, Lawitta Road, Back River, next to her husband, and the marked grave bears a First Fleet plaque.
*John Harmsworth: marine's child b.1788 per ''Prince of Wales'' died 21 July 1860 at Clarence Plains Tasmania, aged 73 years.

===Smallpox===
{{main|Australian history wars#Controversy over smallpox in Australia| l1 = Controversy over smallpox in Australia|History_of_smallpox#Australia| l2 = History of smallpox in Australia}}

Historians have disagreed over whether those aboard the First Fleet were responsible for introducing smallpox to Australia's indigenous population, and if so, whether this was the consequence of deliberate action.

In 1914, [[John Cumpston|J.&nbsp;H.&nbsp;L. Cumpston]], director of the [[Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service|Australian Quarantine Service]] put forward the hypothesis that smallpox arrived in Australia with First Fleet.<ref name="autogenerated1908">Cumpston, JHL "The History of Small-Pox in Australia 1788–1908", Government Printer (1914) Melb.</ref> Some researchers have argued that any such release may have been a deliberate attempt to decimate the indigenous population.<ref>{{cite book|last=Day|first=David|title=Claiming a Continent|page=42|publisher=Harper Collins|year=2001|isbn=9780732269760}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Davis|first=Jack|editor1-last=Berndt|editor1-first=Ronald M.|editor2-last=Berndt|editor2-first=Catherine H.|title=Aborigines of the West: their Past and Their Present|publisher=University of Western Australia Press|page=58|year=1980}}</ref> Hypothetical scenarios for such an action might have included: an act of revenge by an aggrieved individual, a response to attacks by indigenous people,<ref name="Bennett, MJ 2009, pg 48">Bennett, MJ, "Smallpox and Cowpox under the Southern Cross: The Smallpox Epidemic of 1789 ...", ''Bulletin of the History of Medicine'', 83(1), Spring 2009, pg 48.</ref> or part of an orchestrated assault by the [[New South Wales Marine Corps]], intended to clear the path for colonial expansion.<ref>{{cite journal|title=Smallpox at Sydney Cove – who, when, why?|journal=Journal of Australian Studies|first=Christopher|last=Warren|date=2 January 2014|volume=38|issue=1|pages=68–86|doi=10.1080/14443058.2013.849750|s2cid=143644513}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/smallpox-outbreak-of-sydney27s-past/5375394#transcript |title= Smallpox outbreak of Sydney's past|author= Chris Warren (radio transcript) ''Ockham's Razor'' (presenter: Robin Williams) |publisher=Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) |date= 13 April 2014 |access-date= 28 October 2015}}</ref> Seth Carus, a former Deputy Director of the [[National Defense University]] in the United States wrote in 2015 that there was a "strong circumstantial case supporting the theory that someone deliberately introduced smallpox in the Aboriginal population."<ref>{{cite journal|last=Carus|first=W. Seth|title=The History of Biological Weapons Use: What We Know and What We Don't|journal =Health Security|volume=13|issue=4|pages=219–255|date=August 2015|doi=10.1089/hs.2014.0092|pmid=26221997}}</ref>
[[File:First Fleet Smallpox.ogg|thumb|Chris Warren, "Was Sydney's smallpox outbreak of 1789 an act of biological warfare against Aboriginal tribes?", ABC Radio National – ''Ockhams Razor'' (podcast) (2014); 13 minutes.]]

Other historians have disputed the idea that there was a deliberate release of smallpox virus and/or suggest that it arrived with visitors to Australia other than the First Fleet.<ref>{{cite book|first=Peter|last=Biskup|chapter=Aboriginal History|title=New History: Studying Australia Today|editor1-last=Osborne|editor1-first=G.|editor2-last=Mandle|editor2-first=W.F.|publisher=Allen & Unwin|year=1982|page=30}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Macknight, C. C. |title=Macassans and the Aboriginal past in ''Archaeologia Oceania'' | date=1986 | volume=21 | pages=69–75}}</ref><ref name="campbell"/><ref name="willis 2010">{{Cite journal| author1=Willis, H. A | title=Poxy history [Smallpox and Aboriginal history.] | journal=Quadrant | date=September 2010 | volume=54 | issue=9 | pages=70–73 | issn=0033-5002 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal| author1=Willis, H.A. | title=Bringing Smallpox with the First Fleet | journal=Quadrant |year=2011 | volume=55 | issue=7–8 | page=2 | issn=0033-5002}}</ref> It has been suggested that live smallpox virus may have been introduced accidentally when Aboriginal people came into contact with [[variolation|variolous matter]] brought by the First Fleet for use in anti-smallpox inoculations.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/smallpox-in-sydney-1789/3145560|title=Smallpox in Sydney: 1789|publisher=[[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]]|date=30 April 2009}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Warren|first=C.|title=Could First Fleet smallpox infect Aborigines? – A note|journal=Aboriginal History|issue=31|pages=152–164|url=https://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=382267759356262;res=IELAPA}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Mear|first=C.| title = The origin of the smallpox in Sydney in 1789
| journal = Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society
| volume = 94
| issue = 1
| pages = 1–22
}}</ref>

In 2002, historian Judy Campbell offered a further theory, that smallpox had arrived in Australia through contact with fishermen from [[Makassar]] in Indonesia, where smallpox was endemic.<ref name="campbell">Judy Campbell, '' Invisible Invaders: Smallpox and Other Diseases in Aboriginal Australia 1780–1880'', Melbourne University Press, 2002, Foreword & pp 55, 61, 73–74, 181</ref><ref>During the writing of her book, Campbell consulted [[Frank Fenner]], the head in 1977–1980 of a successful campaign by the [[World Health Organization]] to eradicate smallpox internationally.</ref> In 2011, Macknight stated: "The overwhelming probability must be that it [smallpox] was introduced, like the later epidemics, by [Indonesian] [[Trepanging|trepang]]ers ... and spread across the continent to arrive in Sydney quite independently of the new settlement there."<ref>{{cite journal|last=Macknight|first=Campbell|title=The view from Marege': Australian knowledge of Makassar and the impact of the trepang industry across two centuries|journal=Aboriginal History|year=2011|volume=3|pages=121–143}}</ref>

There is a fourth theory, that the 1789 epidemic was not smallpox but [[chickenpox]] – to which indigenous Australians also had no inherited resistance – that happened to be affecting, or was carried by, members of the First Fleet.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.canberratimes.com.au/act-news/chickenpox-blamed-for-aboriginal-deaths-20130807-2rh3m.html|title=Chickenpox blamed for Aboriginal deaths|work=The Canberra Times|date=7 August 2013 |access-date=17 October 2015}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=http://caepr.anu.edu.au/Seminars/13/Seminar-Topics%E2%80%94Series-2/07_8_Seminar.php |title=The 'myth' of smallpox at Sydney Cove in April 1789 - CAEPR - ANU |access-date=27 January 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170202101013/http://caepr.anu.edu.au/Seminars/13/Seminar-Topics%E2%80%94Series-2/07_8_Seminar.php |archive-date=2 February 2017 |url-status=dead }}</ref> This theory has also been disputed.<ref>In A. Dirk Moses (ed.)''Genocide and Settler Society'', Berghahn Books, 2004, p79ff.</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=Letters page |journal=United Service|volume=65|issue=1|date=March 2014|page=7|url=http://www.rusinsw.org.au/Papers/2014AU05.pdf}}</ref>

===Commemoration Garden===
[[File:Wallabadah.jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|The First Fleet Memorial Garden, [[Wallabadah, New South Wales]]]]

After Ray Collins, a stonemason, completed years of research into the First Fleet, he sought approval from about nine councils to construct a commemorative garden in recognition of these immigrants. [[Liverpool Plains Shire|Liverpool Plains Shire Council]] was ultimately the only council to accept his offer to supply the materials and construct the garden free of charge. The site chosen was a disused caravan park on the banks of [[Quirindi]] Creek at [[Wallabadah, New South Wales]]. In September 2002 Collins commenced work on the project. Additional support was later provided by Neil McGarry in the form of some signs and the council contributed $28,000 for pathways and fencing. Collins hand-chiselled the names of all those who came to Australia on the eleven ships in 1788 on stone tablets along the garden pathways. The stories of those who arrived on the ships, their life, and first encounters with the Australian country are presented throughout the garden.<ref>[http://www.theage.com.au/travel/travel-factsheet/wallabadah--places-to-see-20081126-6i43.html Wallabadah – Places to See] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090706220348/http://www.theage.com.au/travel/travel-factsheet/wallabadah--places-to-see-20081126-6i43.html |date=6 July 2009 }} Retrieved on 4 May 2009</ref> On 26 January 2005, the First Fleet Garden was opened as the major memorial to the First Fleet immigrants. Previously the only other specific memorial to the First Fleeters was an obelisk at [[Brighton-Le-Sands, New South Wales]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://monumentaustralia.org.au/themes/landscape/settlement/display/101546-first-fleet--monument-bicentennial-monument-|access-date=20 February 2017|title=First Fleet Monument (Bicentennial Monument)|website=Monuments Australia}}</ref> The surrounding area has a barbecue, tables, and amenities.

=== First Fleet Park ===
First Fleet Park is situated in [[The Rocks, New South Wales|The Rocks]], near the site of the First Fleet's landing. The area has remained in public ownership continually since 1788, under the control of various agencies. It was previously used for a hospital, Queen's Wharf, shops and houses, the first Commissariat Store and the first post office.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |title=First Fleet Park |url=http://www.shfa.nsw.gov.au/sydney-About_us-Heritage_role-Heritage_and_Conservation_Register.htm&objectid=120 |access-date=2022-06-28 |website=Heritage and Conservation Register |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Commissariat Stores |url=https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/commissariat_stores |access-date=2022-06-28 |website=The Dictionary of Sydney}}</ref> Archaeological remains are extant on the site dating back to the earliest days of settlement.<ref name=":0" />


==See also==
==See also==
*[[History of Australia]]
*[[Convicts on the First Fleet]]


{{Portal|Australia}}
[[Category:Australian immigration]]

[[category:Australian history]]
* [[Australian frontier wars]]
[[de:First Fleet]]
* [[Convicts in Australia]]
* [[Convict women in Australia]]
* [[European maritime exploration of Australia|European exploration of Australia]]
* [[History of Australia (1788–1850)]]
* [[History of Indigenous Australians]]
* [[Journals of the First Fleet]]
* [[Penal transportation]]
* [[Prehistory of Australia]]
* [[Second Fleet (Australia)]]
* [[Terra nullius#Australia|Terra nullius]]
* [[Third Fleet (Australia)]]
* [[Banished (TV series)]] – a short-lived 2015 dramatisation
* ''[[For the Term of His Natural Life]]'' – story by [[Marcus Clarke]]

==References==
===Citations===
{{Reflist}}

===Bibliography===
* {{cite book|title=Historical Records of New South Wales. Vol. 2. Grose and Paterson, 1793–1795|editor-last=Bladen|editor-first=F. M.|location=Mona Vale|publisher=Lansdown Slattery|year=1968|isbn=978-0868330037}}
* {{cite book |title =The precarious life of James Mario Matra : voyager with Cook, American loyalist, servant of empire | first1 =Alan | last1 =Frost |author1-link=Alan Frost |first2=Isabel |last2=Moutinho | year =1995 | publisher =The Miegunyah Press | isbn = 9780522846676 }}
* {{cite book|last=Frost|first=Alan|author-link=Alan Frost|title=The First Fleet: the real story|location=Collingwood|publisher=Black Inc|year=2012|isbn=9781863955614}}
* {{cite book|last=Gillen|first=Mollie|title=The Founders of Australia: a Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet|location=Sydney| publisher=Library of Australian History|year=1989|isbn=978-0908120697}}
* {{cite book|last=Hill|first=David|title=1788: the brutal truth of the First Fleet: the biggest single migration the world had ever seen|location=North Sydney|publisher=Heinemann|year=2008|isbn=9781741667974}}
* {{cite book|last1=Lewis|first1=Wendy|last2=Balderstone |first2=Simon|last3=Bowan|first3=John|title=Events That Shaped Australia| location=Frenchs Forest|publisher=New Holland|edition=2|year=2011|isbn=9781742572246}}
* {{cite book|author-link=Rob Mundle|last=Mundle|first=Rob|title=The First Fleet|location=Sydney|publisher=Harper Collins|year=2014|isbn=9780733332364}}
* {{cite book|last=O'Brien|first=Eris|title=The Foundation of Australia (1786–1800)|location=London|publisher=Greenwood P.|edition=2|year=1970|isbn=9780837129686|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/foundationofaust0000obri}}
* {{cite book|last=Parker|first=Derek|title=Arthur Phillip: Australia's First Governor|location=Warriewood|publisher=Woodslane P.|year=2009|isbn=9781921203992}}

==Further reading==
*{{cite book|last=Gillen|first=Mollie|title=The Search for John Small, First Fleeter|location=Sydney|publisher=Library of Australian History|year=1985|isbn=978-0908120581}}
*{{Citation | author1=Phillip, Arthur | author2=Currey, John | author3=Banks Society | title=The voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay : compiled from authentic papers |year=2010 | publisher=Banks Society | isbn=978-0-949586-19-3 }}

===Fiction===
*James Talbot, ''The Thief Fleet'', 2012, {{ISBN|978-1-4699148-2-4}}
*[[Colleen McCullough]], ''[[Morgan's Run]]'', {{ISBN|0-09-928098-1}}
*[[Timberlake Wertenbaker]], ''[[Our Country's Good]]'', {{ISBN|0-413-73740-3}}
*[[Thomas Keneally]], ''[[The Playmaker]]'', {{ISBN|0-340-42263-7}}
*[[William Stuart Long]], ''The Exiles'', {{ISBN|978-0-8398-2824-2}} (hardcover, 1984) {{ISBN|978-0-440-12369-9}} (paperback, 1979) {{ISBN|978-0-440-12374-3}} (mass market paperback, 1981)
*William Stuart Long, ''The Settlers'', {{ISBN|978-0-86824-020-6}} (hardcover, 1980) {{ISBN|978-0-440-15923-0}} (paperback, 1980) {{ISBN|978-0-440-17929-0}} (mass market paperback, 1982)
*William Stuart Long, ''The Traitors'', {{ISBN|978-0-8398-2826-6}} (hardcover, 1984) {{ISBN|978-0-440-18131-6}} (mass market paperback, 1981)
*D. Manning Richards, ''Destiny in Sydney: An epic novel of convicts, Aborigines, and Chinese embroiled in the birth of Sydney, Australia'', {{ISBN|978-0-9845410-0-3}}

==External links==
{{commons category-inline}}
{{Library resources box
|onlinebooks=no
|by=no
|lcheading=First Fleet, 1787–1788
}}
* [http://www.pcug.org.au/~pdownes/dps/1stflt.htm Complete list of the convicts of the First Fleet] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061205210728/http://www.pcug.org.au/~pdownes/dps/1stflt.htm |date=5 December 2006 }}
* [http://firstfleet.uow.edu.au/search.html Searchable database of First Fleet convicts]
* [http://library.sl.nsw.gov.au/search/X?first%20fleet The First Fleet – State Library of NSW]
* [http://acms.sl.nsw.gov.au/item/itemDetailPaged.aspx?itemID=825606 State Library of NSW – First Fleet Re-enactment Company records, 1978–1990: Presented by Drs Trish and Wally Franklin]
* [https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/primo-explore/search?query=any,contains,first%20Fleet%20Re-enactment%20Voyage&tab=default_tab&search_scope=E&vid=SLNSW&facet=topic,include,First%20Fleet%20Re-enactment,%201987-1988.&offset=0 State Library of NSW – First Fleet Re-enactment Voyage 1987-1988]
* [http://www.oceania.org.au/expedition/May%2013th_Speech_Final_Draft_12-05-2016.pdf The First Fleet (1788) and The Re-enactment Fleet (1988) Some Untold History – Dr Wally Franklin and Dr Trish Franklin: An address to celebrate the 229th Anniversary of the sailing of the First Fleet from Portsmouth on 13th May 1787]
* {{Gutenberg| no=12565 | name=An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales}}
* {{Gutenberg| no=15100 | name=The Voyage of Governor Phillip To Botany Bay}}
* [http://gutenberg.net.au/first-fleet.html Project Gutenberg Australia: The First Fleet]
* [http://www.convictrecords.com.au/ Convict Records]
* [http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/resources/family-history/convicts Convict Transportation Registers Database (Online)] University of Queensland. Retrieved 9 February 2015.
* [https://stjohnscemeteryproject.org/collections/st-johns-first-fleeters/ "St. John's First Fleeters"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180205184724/https://stjohnscemeteryproject.org/collections/st-johns-first-fleeters/ |date=5 February 2018 }} in Michaela Ann Cameron (ed.), ''[https://stjohnscemeteryproject.org/ The St. John's Cemetery Project],'' (2018): an edited collection of biographies and profiles on the 50+ First Fleeters buried in Australia's oldest surviving European cemetery: [[St John's Cemetery, Parramatta]]

{{Convicts in Australia}}
{{Authority control}}

[[Category:First Fleet| ]]
[[Category:1788 in Australia]]
[[Category:Convictism in Australia]]
[[Category:History of immigration to Australia]]
[[Category:History of New South Wales]]
[[Category:Maritime history of Australia]]

Latest revision as of 15:47, 30 November 2024

First Fleet
An engraving of the First Fleet in Botany Bay at voyage's end in 1788
Date13 May 1787 to 20 January 1788
Duration250 days
LocationPortsmouth, England and Botany Bay, Colony of New South Wales
CauseCounter French imperialism in the Pacific and Penal transportation
MotiveEstablishment of a Penal colony
Patron(s)Lord Sandwich and Sir Joseph Banks
Organised byThe Viscount Sydney as Secretary of State for the Home Office
ParticipantsCaptain Arthur Phillip, Governor of New South Wales and Major Robert Ross, Lieutenant-Governor of New South Wales
OutcomeBeginning of European settlement in Australia
Deaths48 died at sea

The First Fleet were 11 British ships which transported a group of settlers to mainland Australia, marking the beginning of the European colonisation of Australia. It consisted of two Royal Navy vessels, three storeships and six convict transports under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip. On 13 May 1787, the ships, with over 1,400 convicts, marines, sailors, colonial officials and free settlers onboard, left Portsmouth and travelled over 24,000 kilometres (15,000 mi) and over 250 days before arriving in Botany Bay in January 1788. There, they established the colony of New South Wales, a penal colony which would become the first British settlement in Australia.

History

Lord Sandwich, together with the President of the Royal Society, Sir Joseph Banks, the eminent scientist who had accompanied Lieutenant James Cook on his 1770 voyage, was advocating establishment of a British colony in Botany Bay, New South Wales.[1][2] Banks accepted an offer of assistance from the American Loyalist James Matra in July 1783. Under Banks's guidance, he rapidly produced "A Proposal for Establishing a Settlement in New South Wales" (24 August 1783), with a fully developed set of reasons for a colony composed of American Loyalists, Chinese and South Sea Islanders (but not convicts).[3] The decision to establish a colony in Australia was made by Thomas Townshend, Lord Sydney, Secretary of State for the Home Office.[4] This was taken for two reasons: the ending of transportation of criminals to North America following the American Revolution,[5] as well as the need for a base in the Pacific to counter French expansion.[6]

In September 1786, Captain Arthur Phillip was appointed Commodore of the fleet, which came to be known as the First Fleet, which was to transport the convicts and soldiers to establish a colony at Botany Bay. Upon arrival there, Phillip was to assume the powers of Captain General and Governor in Chief of the new colony. A subsidiary colony was to be founded on Norfolk Island, as recommended by Sir John Call and Sir George Young, to take advantage for naval purposes of that island's native flax (harakeke) and timber.[7][8][9][10][11]

The cost to Britain of outfitting and dispatching the Fleet was £84,000 (about £9.6 million, or $19.6 million as of 2015).[12][13]

Ships

Royal Naval escort

On 25 October 1786 the 10-gun HMS Sirius, lying in the dock at Deptford, was commissioned, and the command given to Phillip. The armed tender HMAT Supply (1759) under command of Lieutenant Henry Lidgbird Ball who was also commissioned to join the expedition. Lt. David Blackburn was the ship's Master.[14][15][16][17][18] On 15 December, Captain John Hunter was assigned as second captain to Sirius to command in the absence of Phillip, whose presence, it was to be supposed, would be requisite at all times wherever the seat of government in that country might be fixed.[18]

Naval escorts (departed England 13 May 1787)[19]
Ship Type Master Crew, Officials, Marines[20] From Arrived
Botany Bay
Duration
(days)
HMS Sirius 10 gun John Hunter 200 Portsmouth 20 January 1788 252
HMAT Supply Armed tender Henry Lidgbird Ball 55 + 2 (convicts transferred on route) Spithead 18 January 1788 250

HMS Sirius

Sirius was Phillip’s flagship for the fleet. She had been converted from the merchantman Berwick, built in 1780 for Baltic trade. She was a 520 ton, sixth-rate vessel, originally armed with ten guns, four six-pounders and six carronades, Phillip had ten more guns placed aboard.

HMAT Supply

Supply was designed in 1759 by shipwright Thomas Slade, as a yard craft for the ferrying of naval supplies. Measuring 170 tons, she had two masts, and was fitted with four small 3-pounder cannons and six 12-pounder swivel guns. Her armament was substantially increased in 1786 with the addition of four 12-pounder carronades.

Convict transports

Convict transports (departed England 13 May 1787)[20]
Ship Type Master Crew Marines Arrived
Botany Bay
Duration
(days)
Convicts arrived (boarded)
Males Females
Alexander Barque Duncan Sinclair 30 41 19 January 1788 251 210
Two were pardoned
0
Charlotte Transport Thomas Gilbert 30 32 20 January 1788 252 100 24
Friendship Brig Francis Walton 25 42 19 January 1788 251 80 24
To Cape of Good Hope only, transferred to Lady Penrhyn
Lady Penrhyn Transport William Cropton Server 30 18 20 January 1788 252 0 101
Prince of Wales Barque John Mason 29 45 20 January 1788 252 2 47
Scarborough Transport John Marshall 30 50 19 January 1788 251 208 0

Food and supply transports

Ropes, crockery, agricultural equipment and a miscellany of other stores were needed. Items transported included tools, agricultural implements, seeds, spirits, medical supplies, bandages, surgical instruments, handcuffs, leg irons and a prefabricated wooden frame for the colony's first Government House.[21] The party had to rely on its own provisions to survive until it could make use of local materials, assuming suitable supplies existed, and grow its own food and raise livestock.

Food and supply transports (depart England 13 May 1787)
Ship Type Master Crew Arr. Botany Bay Duration (days)
Golden Grove storeship William Sharp 22 20 January 1788 252
Fishburn storeship Robert Brown 22 20 January 1788 252
Borrowdale storeship Hobson Reed 22 20 January 1788 252

Golden Grove

The reverend Richard Johnson, chaplain for the colony, travelled on the Golden Grove with his wife and servants.

Legacy

Scale models of all the ships are on display at the Museum of Sydney. The models were built by ship makers Lynne and Laurie Hadley, after researching the original plans, drawings and British archives. The replicas of Supply, Charlotte, Scarborough, Friendship, Prince of Wales, Lady Penrhyn, Borrowdale, Alexander, Sirius, Fishburn and Golden Grove are made from Western Red or Syrian Cedar.[22]

Nine Sydney harbour ferries built in the mid-1980s are named after First Fleet vessels. The unused names are Lady Penrhyn and Prince of Wales.

People

The majority of the people travelling with the fleet were convicts, all having been tried and convicted in Great Britain, almost all of them in England.[23][24] Many are known to have come to England from other parts of Great Britain and, especially, from Ireland; at least 14 are known to have come from the British colonies in North America; 12 are identified as black (born in Britain, Africa, the West Indies, North America, India or a European country or its colony).[25][26] The convicts had committed a variety of crimes, including theft, perjury, fraud, assault, robbery, for which they had variously been sentenced to death, which was then commuted to penal transportation for 7 years, 14 years, or the term of their natural life.[27][28]

Four companies of marines volunteered for service in the colony, these marines made up the New South Wales Marine Corps, under the command of Major Robert Ross, a detachment on board every convict transport. The families of marines also made the voyage.[29]

A number of people on the First Fleet kept diaries and journals of their experiences, including the surgeons, sailors, officers, soldiers, and ordinary seamen. There are at least eleven known manuscript Journals of the First Fleet in existence as well as some letters.[30]

The exact number of people directly associated with the First Fleet will likely never be established, as accounts of the event vary slightly. A total of 1,420 people have been identified as embarking on the First Fleet in 1787, and 1,373 are believed to have landed at Sydney Cove in January 1788. In her biographical dictionary of the First Fleet, Mollie Gillen gives the following statistics:[23]

Embarked at Portsmouth Landed at Sydney Cove
Officials and passengers 15 14
Ships' crews 323 306
Marines 247 245
Marines' wives and children 46 45 + 9 born
Convicts (men) 582 543
Convicts (women) 193 189
Convicts' children 14 11 + 11 born
Total 1,420 1,373

While the names of all crew members of Sirius and Supply are known, the six transports and three store ships may have carried as many as 110 more seamen than have been identified – no complete musters have survived for these ships. The total number of persons embarking on the First Fleet would, therefore, be approximately 1,530 with about 1,483 reaching Sydney Cove.

According to the first census of 1788 as reported by Governor Phillip to Lord Sydney, the non-indigenous population of the colony was 1,030 and the colony also consisted of 7 horses, 29 sheep, 74 swine, 6 rabbits, and 7 cattle.[31]

The following statistics were provided by Governor Phillip:[32]

Male Female Children Total
Convicts & their children 548 188 17 753
Others 219 34 24 277
Total 767 222 41 1,030

The chief surgeon for the First Fleet, John White, reported a total of 48 deaths and 28 births during the voyage. The deaths during the voyage included one marine, one marine's wife, one marine's child, 36 male convicts, four female convicts, and five children of convicts.[33]

Notable members of First Fleet

Officials

Soldiers

Sailors

Convicts

Voyage

Lady Penrhyn

Preparing the fleet

In September 1786 Captain Arthur Phillip was chosen to lead the expedition to establish a colony in New South Wales. On 15 December, Captain John Hunter, was appointed Phillip’s second. By now HMS Sirius had been nominated as flagship, with Hunter holding command. The armed tender HMAT Supply (1759) under command of Lieutenant Henry Lidgbird Ball had also joined the fleet.[35]

With Phillip in London awaiting Royal Assent for the bill of management of the colony, the loading and provisioning of the transports was carried out by Lieutenant John Shortland, the agent for transports.[35][36]

On 16 March 1787, the fleet began to assemble at its appointed rendezvous, the Mother Bank, Isle of Wight. His Majesty's frigate Sirius and armed tender Supply, three store-ships, Golden Grove, Fishburn and Borrowdale, for carrying provisions and stores for two years; and lastly, six transports; Scarborough and Lady Penrhyn, from Portsmouth; Friendship and Charlotte, from Plymouth; Prince of Wales, and Alexander, from Woolwich.[37] On 9 May Captain Phillip arrived in Portsmouth, the next day coming aboard the ships and giving orders to prepare the fleet for departure.[38]

Leaving Portsmouth

Phillip first tried to get the fleet to sail on 10 May, but a dispute by sailors of the Fishburn about pay, they refused to leave until resolved.[citation needed] The fleet finally left Portsmouth, England on 13 May 1787.[39] The journey began with fine weather, and thus the convicts were allowed on deck.[40] The Fleet was accompanied by the armed frigate HMS Hyaena until it left English waters.[41] On 20 May 1787, one convict on Scarborough reported a planned mutiny; those allegedly involved were flogged and two were transferred to Prince of Wales.[41] In general, however, most accounts of the voyage agree that the convicts were well behaved.[41] On 3 June 1787, the fleet anchored at Santa Cruz at Tenerife.[39] Here, fresh water, vegetables and meat were brought on board. Phillip and the chief officers were entertained by the local governor, while one convict tried unsuccessfully to escape.[42] On 10 June they set sail to cross the Atlantic to Rio de Janeiro,[39] taking advantage of favourable trade winds and ocean currents.

The weather became increasingly hot and humid as the Fleet sailed through the tropics. Vermin, such as rats, and parasites such as bedbugs, lice, cockroaches and fleas, tormented the convicts, officers and marines. Bilges became foul and the smell, especially below the closed hatches, was over-powering.[43] While Phillip gave orders that the bilge-water was to be pumped out daily and the bilges cleaned, these orders were not followed on Alexander and a number of convicts fell sick and died.[43] Tropical rainstorms meant that the convicts could not exercise on deck as they had no change of clothes and no method of drying wet clothing.[43] Consequently, they were kept below in the foul, cramped holds. On the female transports, promiscuity between the convicts, the crew and marines was rampant, despite punishments for some of the men involved.[43] In the doldrums, Phillip was forced to ration the water to three pints a day.[43]

The Fleet reached Rio de Janeiro on 5 August and stayed for a month.[39] The ships were cleaned and water taken on board, repairs were made, and Phillip ordered large quantities of food.[40] The women convicts' clothing had become infested with lice and was burnt. As additional clothing for the female convicts had not arrived before the Fleet left England,[40] the women were issued with new clothes made from rice sacks. While the convicts remained below deck, the officers explored the city and were entertained by its inhabitants.[44] A convict and a marine were punished for passing forged quarter-dollars made from old buckles and pewter spoons. Ellen Fraser, Mother of second child of English parents born in the colony (John Fraser born 7 June 1789), is thought to be the female convict transferred from the "Prince of Wales" to the " Charlotte" during the stop over in Rio on 13 August 1787. Her husband, William Fraser was a convict on "Charlotte".[45]

An English Fleet in Table Bay in 1787, by Robert Dodd

The Fleet left Rio de Janeiro on 4 September to run before the westerlies to the Table Bay in southern Africa, which it reached on 13 October.[46] This was the last port of call, so the main task was to stock up on plants, seeds and livestock for their arrival in Australia.[47] The livestock taken on board from Cape Town destined for the new colony included two bulls, seven cows, one stallion, three mares, 44 sheep, 32 pigs, four goats and "a very large quantity of poultry of every kind".[48] Women convicts on Friendship were moved to other transports to make room for livestock purchased there. The convicts were provided with fresh beef and mutton, bread and vegetables, to build up their strength for the journey and maintain their health.[47] The Dutch colony of Cape Town was the last outpost of European settlement which the fleet members would see for years, perhaps for the rest of their lives. "Before them stretched the awesome, lonely void of the Indian and Southern Oceans, and beyond that lay nothing they could imagine."[49]

Assisted by the gales in the "Roaring Forties" latitudes below the 40th parallel, the heavily laden transports surged through the violent seas. In the last two months of the voyage, the Fleet faced challenging conditions, spending some days becalmed and on others covering significant distances; Friendship travelled 166 miles one day, while a seaman was blown from Prince of Wales at night and drowned.[50] Water was rationed as supplies ran low, and the supply of other goods including wine ran out altogether on some vessels.[50] Van Diemen's Land was sighted from Friendship on 4 January 1788.[50] A freak storm struck as they began to head north around the island, damaging the sails and masts of some of the ships.

On 25 November, Phillip had transferred to Supply. With Alexander, Friendship and Scarborough, the fastest ships in the Fleet, which were carrying most of the male convicts, Supply hastened ahead to prepare for the arrival of the rest. Phillip intended to select a suitable location, find good water, clear the ground, and perhaps even have some huts and other structures built before the others arrived. This was a planned move, discussed by the Home Office and the Admiralty prior to the Fleet's departure.[51] However, this "flying squadron" reached Botany Bay only hours before the rest of the Fleet, so no preparatory work was possible.[52] Supply reached Botany Bay on 18 January 1788; the three fastest transports in the advance group arrived on 19 January; slower ships, including Sirius, arrived on 20 January.[53]

This was one of the world's greatest sea voyages – eleven vessels carrying about 1,487 people and stores[48] had travelled for 252 days for more than 15,000 miles (24,000 km) without losing a ship. Forty-eight people died on the journey, a death rate of just over three percent.

Arrival in Australia

The First Fleet arrives in Port Jackson, 27 January 1788, by William Bradley, an officer on HMS Sirius.
Lithograph of the First Fleet entering Port Jackson, 26 January 1788, by Edmund Le Bihan

It was soon realised that Botany Bay did not live up to the glowing account that the explorer Captain James Cook had provided.[54] The bay was open and unprotected, the water was too shallow to allow the ships to anchor close to the shore, fresh water was scarce, and the soil was poor.[55] First contact was made with the local indigenous people, the Eora, who seemed curious but suspicious of the newcomers. The area was studded with enormously strong trees. When the convicts tried to cut them down, their tools broke and the tree trunks had to be blasted out of the ground with gunpowder.[citation needed] The primitive huts built for the officers and officials quickly collapsed in rainstorms. The marines had a habit of getting drunk and not guarding the convicts properly, whilst their commander, Major Robert Ross, drove Phillip to despair with his arrogant and lazy attitude. Crucially, Phillip worried that his fledgling colony was exposed to attack from those described as "Aborigines" or from foreign powers. Although his initial instructions were to establish the colony at Botany Bay, he was authorised to establish the colony elsewhere if necessary.[56]

On 21 January, Phillip and a party which included John Hunter, departed the Bay in three small boats to explore other bays to the north.[57] Phillip discovered that Port Jackson, about 12 kilometres to the north, was an excellent site for a colony with sheltered anchorages, fresh water and fertile soil.[57] Cook had seen and named the harbour, but had not entered it.[57] Phillip's impressions of the harbour were recorded in a letter he sent to England later: "the finest harbour in the world, in which a thousand sail of the line may ride in the most perfect security ...". The party returned to Botany Bay on 23 January.[57]

On the morning of 24 January, the party was startled when two French ships, the Astrolabe and the Boussole, were seen just outside Botany Bay. This was a scientific expedition led by Jean-François de La Pérouse. The French had expected to find a thriving colony where they could repair ships and restock supplies, not a newly arrived fleet of convicts considerably more poorly provisioned than themselves.[58] There was some cordial contact between the French and British officers, but Phillip and La Pérouse never met. The French ships remained until 10 March before setting sail on their return voyage. They were not seen again and were later discovered to have been shipwrecked off the coast of Vanikoro in the present-day Solomon Islands.[59]

On 26 January 1788, the Fleet weighed anchor and sailed to Port Jackson.[39] The site selected for the anchorage had deep water close to the shore, was sheltered, and had a small stream flowing into it. Phillip named it Sydney Cove, after Lord Sydney, the British Home Secretary.[57] This date is celebrated as Australia Day, marking the beginning of British settlement.[60] Contrary to popular belief, the British flag was not officially planted until 7 February 1788 when possession was formally proclaimed.[citation needed] There was, as always, a British naval ensign erected at the site of the military encampment, and this had been performed on the evening of 25 January 1788[61] in a small ceremony conducted by Phillip and some officers and marines from Supply, with the remainder of Supply's crew and the convicts observing from on board ship. The remaining ships of the Fleet did not arrive at Sydney Cove until later that day.[62] Writer and art critic Robert Hughes popularized the idea in his 1986 book The Fatal Shore that an orgy occurred upon the unloading of the convicts, though more modern historians regard this as untrue, since the first reference to any such indiscretions is as recent as 1963.[63][64]

First contact

The First Fleet encountered Indigenous Australians when they landed at Botany Bay. The Cadigal people of the Botany Bay area witnessed the Fleet arrive and six days later the two ships of French explorer La Pérouse, the Astrolabe and the Boussole, sailed into the bay.[65] When the Fleet moved to Sydney Cove seeking better conditions for establishing the colony, they encountered the Eora people, including the Bidjigal clan. A number of the First Fleet journals record encounters with Aboriginal people.[66]

Although the official policy of the British Government was to establish friendly relations with Aboriginal people,[56] and Arthur Phillip ordered that the Aboriginal people should be well treated, it was not long before conflict began. The colonists did not sign treaties with the original inhabitants of the land.[67] Between 1790 and 1810, Pemulwuy of the Bidjigal clan led the local people in a series of attacks against the colonists.[68]

After January 1788

The ships of the First Fleet mostly did not remain in the colony. Some returned to England, while others left for other ports. Some remained at the service of the Governor of the colony for some months: some of these were sent to Norfolk Island where a second penal colony was established.

1788

  • 15 February – HMAT Supply sails for Norfolk Island carrying a small party to establish a settlement.[69][70]
  • 5/6 May – Charlotte, Lady Penrhyn and Scarborough set sail for China.[71][72]
  • 14 July – Borrowdale, Alexander, Friendship and Prince of Wales set sail to return to England.[73][74]
  • 2 October – Golden Grove sets sail for Norfolk Island with a party of convicts,[75][76] returning to Port Jackson 10 November, while HMS Sirius sails for Cape of Good Hope for supplies.[77][78]
  • 19 November – Fishburn and Golden Grove set sail for England. This means that only HMAT Supply now remains in Sydney cove.[79][80]

1789

  • 23 December – HMS Guardian carrying stores for the colony strikes an iceberg and is forced back to the Cape. It never reaches the colony in New South Wales.[81][82]

1790:

  • 19 March – HMS Sirius is wrecked off Norfolk Island.[83][84][85]
  • 17 April – HMAT Supply sent to Batavia, Dutch East Indies, for emergency food supplies.[86]
  • 3 June – Lady Juliana, the first of six vessels of the Second Fleet, arrives in Sydney cove. The remaining five vessels of the Second Fleet arrive in the ensuing weeks.[87]
  • 19 September – HMAT Supply returns to Sydney having chartered the Dutch vessel Waaksamheyd to accompany it carrying stores.[88]

Legacy

Last survivors

On Sat 26 January 1842 The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser reported "The Government has ordered a pension of one shilling per diem to be paid to the survivors of those who came by the first vessel into the Colony. The number of these really 'old hands' is now reduced to three, of whom, two are now in the Benevolent Asylum, and the other is a fine hale old fellow, who can do a day's work with more spirit than many of the young fellows lately arrived in the Colony."[89] The names of the three recipients were not given, and is academic as the notice turned out to be false, not having been authorised by the Governor. There were at least 25 persons still living who had arrived with the First Fleet, including several children born on the voyage. A number of these contacted the authorities to arrange their pension and all received a similar reply to the following received by John McCarty on 14 Mar 1842 "I am directed by His Excellency the Governor to inform you, that the paragraph which appeared in the Sydney Gazette relative to an allowance to the persons of the first expedition to New South Wales was not authorised by His Excellency nor has he any knowledge of such an allowance as that alluded to". E. Deas Thomson, Colonial Secretary.[citation needed]

Following is a list of persons known to be living at the time the false pension notice was published, in order of their date of death. At this time New South Wales included the whole Eastern seaboard of present day Australia except for Van Diemen's Land which was declared a separate colony in 1825 and achieved self governing status in 1855-6. This list does not include marines or convicts who returned to England after completing their term in NSW and who may have lived past January 1842.

  • Rachel Earley: (or Hirley), convict per Friendship and Prince of Wales died 27 April 1842 at Kangaroo Point, VDL (said to be aged 75).
  • Roger Twyfield: convict per Friendship died 30 April 1842 at Windsor, aged 98 (NSW reg as Twifield).
  • Thomas Chipp: marine private per Friendship died 3 July 1842, buried Parramatta, aged 81 (NSW Reg age 93).
  • Anthony Rope: convict per Alexander died 20 April 1843 at Castlereagh NSW, aged 84 (NSW Reg age 89).
  • William Hubbard: Hubbard was convicted in the Kingston Assizes in Surrey, England, on 24 March 1784 for theft.[90] He was transported to Australia on Scarborough in the First Fleet. He married Mary Goulding on 19 December 1790 in Rose Hill. In 1803 he received a land grant of 70 acres at Mulgrave Place. He died on 18 May 1843 at the Sydney Benevolent Asylum. His age was given as 76 when he was buried at Christ Church St. Lawrence, Sydney on 22 May 1843.
  • Thomas Jones: convict per Alexander died October 1843 in NSW, aged 87.
  • John Griffiths: marine private per Friendship who died 5 May 1844 at Hobart, aged 86.
  • Benjamin Cusely: marine private per Friendship died 20 June 1845 at Windsor/Wilberforce, aged 86 (said to be 98).
  • Henry Kable: convict per Friendship died 16 March 1846 at Windsor, aged 84.
  • John McCarty: McCarty was a marine private who sailed on Friendship.[91] McCarty claimed to have been born in Killarney, County Kerry, Ireland, circa Christmas 1745. He first served in the colony of New South Wales, then at Norfolk Island where he took up a land grant of 60 acres (Lot 71). He married first fleet convict Ann Beardsley on Norfolk Island in November 1791 after his marine discharge a month earlier. In 1808, at the impending closure of the Norfolk Island settlement, he resettled in Van Diemen's Land later taking a land grant (80 acres at Herdsman's Cove Melville) in lieu of the one forfeited on Norfolk Island. The last few years of his life were spent at the home of Mr. William H. Budd, at the Kinlochewe Inn near Donnybrook, Victoria. McCarty was buried on local land 24 July 1846,[92] six months past his 100 birthday, although this is very likely an exaggerated age.
  • John Alexander Herbert: convict per Scarborough died 19 November 1846 at Westbury Van Diemen's Land, aged 79.
  • Robert Nunn: convict per Scarborough died 20 November 1846 at Richmond, aged 86.
  • John Howard: convict per Scarborough died 1 January 1847 at Sydney Benevolent Asylum, aged 94.
  • John Limeburner: The South Australian Register reported, in an article dated Wednesday 3 November 1847: "John Limeburner, the oldest colonist in Sydney, died in September last, at the advanced age of 104 years. He helped to pitch the first tent in Sydney, and remembered the first display of the British flag there, which was hoisted on a swamp oak-tree, then growing on a spot now occupied as the Water-Police Court. He was the last of those called the 'first-fleeters' (arrivals by the first convict ships) and, notwithstanding his great age, retained his faculties to the last."[93] John Limeburner was a convict on Charlotte. He was convicted on 9 July 1785 at New Sarum, Wiltshire of theft of a waistcoat, a shirt and stockings.[94] He married Elizabeth Ireland in 1790 at Rosehill and together they establish a 50-acre farm at Prospect.[95] He died at Ashfield 4 September 1847 and is buried at St John's, Ashfield, death reg. as Linburner aged 104.
  • John Jones: Jones was a marine private on the First Fleet and sailed on Alexander. He is listed in the N.S.W. 1828 Census as aged 82 and living at the Sydney Benevolent Asylum.[96] He is said to have died at the Benevolent Asylum in 1848.[97]
  • Jane/Jenny Rose: (nee Jones), child of convict Elizabeth Evans per Lady Penrhyn died 29 August 1849 at Wollongong, aged 71.
  • Samuel King: King was a scribbler (a worker in a scribbling mill[98]) before he became a marine. He was a marine with the First Fleet on board Sirius (1786).[99] He shipped to Norfolk Island on Golden Grove in September 1788, where he lived with Mary Rolt, a convict who arrived with the First Fleet on Prince of Wales. He received a grant of 60 acres (Lot No. 13) at Cascade Stream in 1791. Mary Rolt returned to England on Britannia in October 1796. King was resettled in Van Diemen's Land, boarding City of Edinburgh on 3 September 1808, and landed in Hobart on 3 October.[100] He married Elizabeth Thackery on 28 January 1810. He died on 21 October 1849 at 86 years of age and was buried in the Wesleyan cemetery at Lawitta Road, Back River.
  • Mary Stevens: (nee Phillips), convict per Charlotte and Prince of Wales died 22 January 1850 at Longford Van Diemen's Land, aged 81.
  • John Small: Convicted 14 March 1785 at the Devon Lent Assizes held at Exeter for Robbery King's Highway. Sentenced to hang, reprieved to 7 years' transportation. Arrived on Charlotte in First Fleet 1788. Certificate of freedom 1792. Land Grant 1794, 30 acre "Small's Farm" at Eastern Farms (Ryde). Married October 1788 Mary Parker also a First Fleet convict who arrived on Lady Penrhyn. John Small died on 2 October 1850 aged 90 years.[101][102]
  • Edward Smith: aka Beckford, convict per Scarborough died 2 June 1851 at Balmain, aged 92.
  • Ann Forbes: (m.Huxley), convict per Prince of Wales died 29 December 1851, Lower Portland NSW, aged 83.
  • Henry Kable Jnr: aka Holmes, b. 1786 in Norwich Castle prison, son of convict Susannah Holmes per Friendship and Charlotte, died 13 May 1852 at Picton, New South Wales aged 66.
  • Lydia Munro: (m.Goodwin) per Prince of Wales died 29 June 1856 at Hobart, reg as Letitia Goodwin, aged 85.
  • Elizabeth Thackery: Elizabeth "Betty" King (née Thackery) was tried and convicted of theft on 4 May 1786 at Manchester Quarter Sessions, and sentenced to seven years' transportation. She sailed on Friendship, but was transferred to Charlotte at the Cape of Good Hope. She was shipped to Norfolk Island on Sirius (1786) in 1790 and lived there with James Dodding. In August 1800 she bought 10 acres of land from Samuel King at Cascade Stream. Elizabeth and James were relocated to Van Diemen's Land in December 1807[103] but parted company sometime afterwards. On 28 January 1810 Elizabeth married "First Fleeter" Private Samuel King (above) and lived with him until his death in 1849. Betty King died in New Norfolk, Tasmania on 7 August 1856, aged 89 years. She is buried in the churchyard of the Methodist Chapel, Lawitta Road, Back River, next to her husband, and the marked grave bears a First Fleet plaque.
  • John Harmsworth: marine's child b.1788 per Prince of Wales died 21 July 1860 at Clarence Plains Tasmania, aged 73 years.

Smallpox

Historians have disagreed over whether those aboard the First Fleet were responsible for introducing smallpox to Australia's indigenous population, and if so, whether this was the consequence of deliberate action.

In 1914, J. H. L. Cumpston, director of the Australian Quarantine Service put forward the hypothesis that smallpox arrived in Australia with First Fleet.[104] Some researchers have argued that any such release may have been a deliberate attempt to decimate the indigenous population.[105][106] Hypothetical scenarios for such an action might have included: an act of revenge by an aggrieved individual, a response to attacks by indigenous people,[107] or part of an orchestrated assault by the New South Wales Marine Corps, intended to clear the path for colonial expansion.[108][109] Seth Carus, a former Deputy Director of the National Defense University in the United States wrote in 2015 that there was a "strong circumstantial case supporting the theory that someone deliberately introduced smallpox in the Aboriginal population."[110]

Chris Warren, "Was Sydney's smallpox outbreak of 1789 an act of biological warfare against Aboriginal tribes?", ABC Radio National – Ockhams Razor (podcast) (2014); 13 minutes.

Other historians have disputed the idea that there was a deliberate release of smallpox virus and/or suggest that it arrived with visitors to Australia other than the First Fleet.[111][112][113][114][115] It has been suggested that live smallpox virus may have been introduced accidentally when Aboriginal people came into contact with variolous matter brought by the First Fleet for use in anti-smallpox inoculations.[116][117][118]

In 2002, historian Judy Campbell offered a further theory, that smallpox had arrived in Australia through contact with fishermen from Makassar in Indonesia, where smallpox was endemic.[113][119] In 2011, Macknight stated: "The overwhelming probability must be that it [smallpox] was introduced, like the later epidemics, by [Indonesian] trepangers ... and spread across the continent to arrive in Sydney quite independently of the new settlement there."[120]

There is a fourth theory, that the 1789 epidemic was not smallpox but chickenpox – to which indigenous Australians also had no inherited resistance – that happened to be affecting, or was carried by, members of the First Fleet.[121][122] This theory has also been disputed.[123][124]

Commemoration Garden

The First Fleet Memorial Garden, Wallabadah, New South Wales

After Ray Collins, a stonemason, completed years of research into the First Fleet, he sought approval from about nine councils to construct a commemorative garden in recognition of these immigrants. Liverpool Plains Shire Council was ultimately the only council to accept his offer to supply the materials and construct the garden free of charge. The site chosen was a disused caravan park on the banks of Quirindi Creek at Wallabadah, New South Wales. In September 2002 Collins commenced work on the project. Additional support was later provided by Neil McGarry in the form of some signs and the council contributed $28,000 for pathways and fencing. Collins hand-chiselled the names of all those who came to Australia on the eleven ships in 1788 on stone tablets along the garden pathways. The stories of those who arrived on the ships, their life, and first encounters with the Australian country are presented throughout the garden.[125] On 26 January 2005, the First Fleet Garden was opened as the major memorial to the First Fleet immigrants. Previously the only other specific memorial to the First Fleeters was an obelisk at Brighton-Le-Sands, New South Wales.[126] The surrounding area has a barbecue, tables, and amenities.

First Fleet Park

First Fleet Park is situated in The Rocks, near the site of the First Fleet's landing. The area has remained in public ownership continually since 1788, under the control of various agencies. It was previously used for a hospital, Queen's Wharf, shops and houses, the first Commissariat Store and the first post office.[127][128] Archaeological remains are extant on the site dating back to the earliest days of settlement.[127]

See also

References

Citations

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Bibliography

  • Bladen, F. M., ed. (1968). Historical Records of New South Wales. Vol. 2. Grose and Paterson, 1793–1795. Mona Vale: Lansdown Slattery. ISBN 978-0868330037.
  • Frost, Alan; Moutinho, Isabel (1995). The precarious life of James Mario Matra : voyager with Cook, American loyalist, servant of empire. The Miegunyah Press. ISBN 9780522846676.
  • Frost, Alan (2012). The First Fleet: the real story. Collingwood: Black Inc. ISBN 9781863955614.
  • Gillen, Mollie (1989). The Founders of Australia: a Biographical Dictionary of the First Fleet. Sydney: Library of Australian History. ISBN 978-0908120697.
  • Hill, David (2008). 1788: the brutal truth of the First Fleet: the biggest single migration the world had ever seen. North Sydney: Heinemann. ISBN 9781741667974.
  • Lewis, Wendy; Balderstone, Simon; Bowan, John (2011). Events That Shaped Australia (2 ed.). Frenchs Forest: New Holland. ISBN 9781742572246.
  • Mundle, Rob (2014). The First Fleet. Sydney: Harper Collins. ISBN 9780733332364.
  • O'Brien, Eris (1970). The Foundation of Australia (1786–1800) (2 ed.). London: Greenwood P. ISBN 9780837129686.
  • Parker, Derek (2009). Arthur Phillip: Australia's First Governor. Warriewood: Woodslane P. ISBN 9781921203992.

Further reading

  • Gillen, Mollie (1985). The Search for John Small, First Fleeter. Sydney: Library of Australian History. ISBN 978-0908120581.
  • Phillip, Arthur; Currey, John; Banks Society (2010), The voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay : compiled from authentic papers, Banks Society, ISBN 978-0-949586-19-3

Fiction

Media related to First Fleet at Wikimedia Commons