John Hobbs

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OTHER: 7 March 1854: Granted a Ticket of Leave. 15 January, 1856: Received a Conditional Pardon (https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON33-1-115$init=CON33-1-115p82). --00--

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IN VDL: 26 May, 1853: On arrival in VDL, John Hobbs, convict #27927, was listed as a French polisher; 29 years old, 5’2½” tall with black hair, light brown eyes and a dark complexion. He was single, Protestant and semi-literate. Native place: Portsea, Hampshire (https://stors.tas.gov.au/CON33-1-115$init=CON33-1-96p82). He said he had been transported for setting fire to a stack of hay and was drunk at the time. Prison report from Gibraltar – “good”. Family: Father George (in Trim Street); brothers Joseph and George; sisters Emma and Sarah – London (http://foundersandsurvivors.org/pubsearch/convict/chain/ai33198). --0--

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VOYAGE: From the medical journal of the St Vincent, by Thomas Somerville, Surgeon Superintendent, Folio 2: 30 April, 1853: “John Hobbs, aged 29, convict; sick or hurt, opthalmia; put on sick list, 30 April 1853, discharged duty 3 May 1853.” (https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/browse/r/h/C4106910) --00—

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3 February, 1853: John Hobbs was sent aboard the St Vincent for transportation to VDL. --00--

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On Gibraltar, JOHN HOBBS was described as 25 years old, sentenced to 15 years for “maliciously setting fire to a stack”; “Good in Prison”; born in Portsea; Church of England; dark brown hair, hazel eyes and fair complexion, 5’2”tall; semi-literate; French polisher; single; relatives/family – at Blackfriar’s Road, London (UK, Prison Commission Records, 1770-1951; Misc.; Register of Prisoners; 1810-1822 [mislabelled]). --

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Gibraltar and Bermuda were listed public works stations (and the second stage in the penal process). On Gibraltar, as “convicts worked together with free men on the dockyards, lines between them became blurred. Convicts, like seamen, were ‘easily recognised’ by ‘their swarthy, weather beaten complexions…[and] muscular well-knit frames’. The discipline on the penal settlement was also influenced by the naval department, who superintended part of the works. In the 1840s, for example, convicts were provided ‘a half gill of rum’ at 11am and 5pm, which they drank from a trough. This mirrored the daily allowance of diluted rum, known as grog, to Royal Naval seamen in the Victorian era. Convicts were also allowed to use part of their earnings, to buy goods, usually tobacco, which they were allowed to smoke in the evening in the barracks. Though official correspondence cited health reasons for grog allowance, it seems likely that the convict authorities feared insubordination if they were banned from drinking and smoking, which were provided to the sappers and dockyard workers whom they worked alongside… In 1854, the acting overseer stated that “half of the offences were committed when the men were excited by rum”. For more serious offences, convicts were flogged with a ‘cat o’nine tails’ whip against the ‘flogging mast’, and during an investigation Dr William Baly concluded that the whip which was used was an old naval cat, which was ‘much heavier than any now used in the government prison and hulks at home, or in the army.’” (Roscoe, Katy (2018), “Convicts and the Sea: the naval influence on Gibraltar Convict Establishment” at https://staffblogs.le.ac.uk/). --

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TO GIBRALTAR: 25 January, 1849: HOBBS, JOHN #1305, arrived on Gibraltar from the Stirling Castle hulk at Portsmouth per Appoline. He was held on the Europa hulk (UK, Prison Commission Records, 1770-1951; Misc.; Register of Prisoners; 1810-1822 [mislabelled]). --

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TRIAL: 10 May, 1847: John Hobbs and two others were tried for arson and convicted at the Old Bailey, as per the trial transcript below: “1304. JOHN HOBBS, THOMAS FREDERICK WEBSTER and ROBERT LEWER, were indicted for feloniously setting fire to a stack of hay, the property of Frederick Piggott; and that Webster had been before convicted of felony. MR. ROBINSON conducted the Prosecution. FREDRICK PIGGOTT. I am an estate agent, and have a farm in the Kew-road, in the parish of Richmond. At the back of that farm I had a hay-rick sixty or seventy yards from the high-road—on the 23rd of April, at a quarter to eight o'clock in the evening, I went round it, and saw it safe—at half-past eight, or a quarter to nine, I received information, which induced me to go to it again—I found it on fire, it was in a blaze all the way round—there were some faggots under it burning—it had been laid on faggots—with the assistance of some of my neighbours, I extinguished the fire—the faggots were burnt—it is impossible that combustion could be the cause of it, because it was old hay—I know nothing of the prisoners. HENRY UPTON (policeman). On the night of the 23rd of April I was on duty in the Kew-road, on the Richmond side of Mr. Piggott's hay-rick, about 200 yards from it—about five minutes after eight o'clock in the evening, and met the three prisoners going towards the premises, about 200 yards from the place—when they saw me they made a stop—two of then looked round, and crossed over the road—the rick was safe when I had passed it—in about twenty minutes I saw it on fire. SAMUEL WINLET. I am a market-gardener, and live at Richmond. On the night of the 23rd of April, a little after half-past eight o'clock in the evening, I saw the prisoners in Sandy-lane—Mr. Piggott's meadow joins the lane—they were coming as if from the hay-rick—they were in the lane when I first saw them—at the time I saw them I noticed the hay-rick—it was on fire—they had their backs towards it—they asked me if there was an engine kept in the parish—I said, yes, there was—they came towards the cross road, towards Richmond—I went towards the rick—in going from Sandy-lane into Kew-road they would not have to cross the meadow where the stack was (not where I met them), but in getting from Kew-road to Sandy-lane they would—I had seen them at half-past two o'clock the same afternoon walking from Sandy-lane—they asked me where that road led them to—I know nothing about them. Prisoner Webster. Q. When we met you in the afternoon did we speak to you? A. You asked where the road led; I said, ‘To Richmond,’ and you went that way—you were in company with the other prisoners. KINGSTON MARK (police-sergeant). On 23rd April I went to the place where the fire was, and afterwards went to the police-station and found the three prisoners there—I did not hold out any inducement or threat to them—they told me they wished to make a statement to me—that they had come to give themselves up for setting fire to the hay rick—I told them I was willing to hear anything they might have to say at the same time, I cautioned them that it would be taken down, and produced in evidence—I asked them if they were willing that I should take down what they said—they said, ‘Yes,’ and I did so—they were all three together—as one made a statement I asked the others if they agreed with it—they said, ‘Yes,’ and they all signed it—this is it—(produced)—I took their shoes from their feet—I saw footmarks near the stack, and compared those footmarks with their shoes in the direction they said they went, and found they corresponded. The prosecutor's statement was here read, as follows:—‘John Hobbs, a native of London, labourer; Thomas Frederick Webster, a native of London, labourer; Robert Lewer, a native of London, labourer; state, that between eleven and twelve o'clock this day, they came into Richmond by way of Kew Bridge; that they begged the halfpence to cross the bridge, and were the whole day in Richmond without anything to eat; that their lives for some time past had been spent in such misery and poverty, they were determined, when they left London this morning, to do something to alter it, and looked out for a stack to set fire to. ‘About a quarter or half-past eight o'clock, as nearly as they can say, they climbed over the gate at the farm where the stack was set fire to (Mr. Piggott's); they all three went to the back part of the hay-stack; they then made three holes in the stack (by pulling out the hay so as to admit their arms as far as they could reach) one in the centre, the others at each end of the back part of the stack from the barn, when they all three lit lucifers from a pipe which Hobbs had, and set fire in the different holes at the same time; the side of the stack instantly was in a blaze; that they then ran away, and got through a gap of the hedge behind the stack, and then through another hedge by a gap into a ploughed-field, across this field, over a white gate, into a lane behind, (a road); then turned to the right at the top of the lane, and passed New Richmond into the main road; they then returned down the road and looked at the fire, where they stopped till the engine arrived, and then returned to Richmond, came to the police-station, where they gave themselves up. ‘They also all declare, that they voluntarily make this statement, and that no promise has been held out to them; and that they have been properly cautioned that what they said would be taken down and produced in evidence against them. ‘JOHN HOBBS, ‘THOMAS FREDRICK WEBSTER, ‘ROBERT LEWER.’ Webster's Defence. My Lord and gentlemen of the jury: the offence of which I stand charged is one of a very heavy character, and which, I am very sorry to say, has brought me before your notice this day. My Lord and gentlemen, perhaps you will not credit what I am going to say to you; but I will fearlessly speak to you, convinced that I am innocent, and that what I am going to say is true. It is true that I was in Richmond during the day on which the fire occurred, and I also was the company of the other persons charged with me, and that I was also present at the fire; but I can assure your Lordship that the stack was not fired by me. But being reduced to the deepest distress, through the want of work, and not having tasted food for some time past, I was induced to accompany the other persons, and accuse myself of committing the crime, which has caused my friends a great deal of anguish and regret, that I had not applied to them for assistance. My Lord, I was never in the company of those persons accused with me, but on the day the fire occurred; nor can I, to my recollection, ever remember seeing them before. The only thing that criminates me, is the marks which the officer states was made by the shoes which I wore; but I can assure you that they were not the print of my footsteps; for I never entered the field where the ground was capable of receiving any impression. My Lord, it is not at all improbable that the marks were caused by some person who assisted at the fire, and who, in the excitement of the moment, has not since remembered crossing the field. But, my Lord, I hope you will pause before you proceed to sum up the evidence adduced against me; for it would be doing me a great injustice without being convinced of my guilt; for the confession which I signed in an unthinking moment, and which has been used as evidence against me, which the keen pangs of hungers has induced me to put my signature to, is a falsehood, of which I have had reason to repent. My lord, taking all these considerations before your notice, and weighing the evidence brought against me, I may be led to hope for a favourable issue of my trial, and which I may be led to expect from an impartial and uncorrupted jury. WILLIAM POCOCK (police-constable F 14). I produce a certificate of Webster's former conviction—(read—Convicted June, 1844, and confined two? years)—I was present at the trial—he is the person—he has been convicted at this Court since that, and had three months—I proved the former conviction then. WEBSTER — GUILTY. Aged 20.— Transported for Twenty Years. HOBBS — GUILTY. Aged 23.— Transported for Fifteen Years. LEWER — GUILTY. Aged 16.— Transported for Ten Years." (https://www.oldbaileyonline.org/) --00--