Henry Bolam

Level 46

JD Stubbs on 30th November 2025

Henry Bolam was born about 1823 in Winterborne-Kingston, Dorsetshire, England where his father Henry BALLAM was a shoemaker and he had siblings named Daniel, William, Charles & Charlotte BALLAM. On 30 December 1839, Henry was convicted at Worcester Quarter Sessions by Mr Watts of stealing fustian cloth. For this he was sentenced to 7 years transportation. He had a previous offence of stealing meat and was sentenced to 6 weeks imprisonment and whipped twice. While waiting to be transported, Henry spent 17 months on the Prison Hulks where he was remarked as acting orderly. On 6 April 1842, Henry set sail to Van Diemens Land onboard the Elphinstone, arriving in Hobart on 28 July 1842. Convict Indents state that he was 16 years old, Protestant, 4 feet and 9.75 inches tall, could read and write a little, and a labourer and confectioner by trade. Upon arrival he was assigned to the Point Puer Juvenile Penal Station, where he would stay until he received his Certificate of Freedom in 1847 from Point Puer. Once free, Henry made his way to the mainland and was in Victoria by 1850 where he married Irish Famine Orphan, Mary Looney, at St Francis Catholic Church in Melbourne. The couple had four known children over the course of their relationship. On the 7 January 1858, Henry was listed as having a Ticket of Leave for Warrnambool, and had been convicted for horse-stealing, being sentenced to 6 years hard labour, which was later remanded. By January 1859, Henry was employed by Donald McKinnon on Kangaroo Station, not far from Hotspur on the Smoky River. One of their children died at Hotspur and was buried in the Hotspur cemetery in July 1859. Henry BOLAM was prosecuted yet again for stealing a number of horses at Warrnambool in early 1859 with his trial being conducted later in Portland, South West Victoria, on 4 Nov 1859, after which he was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment with hard labour on the roads - 3 charges, 5, 3 & 2 years accumulative. Between his arrest and trial it appears that Henry escaped custody, as outlined in the following Police Gazette excerpt which states: “ESCAPED PRISONER The man hereafter named and described, arrested on a charge of horsestealing, escaped from the police at Casterton, at 5 p.m. on 3rd instant: - Henry Bolam, late a ticket-of-leave holder. 35 years of age, about 5 feet 5 inches high, yellow complexion, dark brown hair, black eyes, large mouth, medium chin, bald on top of head, and anchor tattoo on lower part of right arm, an Englishman. (See Police Gazette, 23rd June, 1859, p. 252 and ante, for further particulars.) He is supposed to have taken the Penola road.-6th July, 1859.” He was discharged on 10 April 1866.