Summary
Personal Information
Voyage
Transportation
William Rhodes was transported on the Hougoumont, departing 10th Oct 1867 and arriving 9th Jan 1868 with 281 passengers.
875 ton ship was built at Moulmein in 1852. http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/journal/on-this-day-in-history-australias-last-convict-ship-docks.htm ---------------------------- Incorrect Image ....This is a four masted steel hulled Barque in the drawing , im surprised Australian Geo didn't do a bit more research on this .......The Hougoumont was a works ship on the Forth Bridge Project in 1885 ....the one potrayed as a drawing in Aust Geo is the later version of this ship.....the photograph i have attached is the correct and original convict vessel. --00-- 1867 "The hired convict ship Hougoumont, which has been taken up by the Government for the conveyance of a numerous party of convicts to Freemantle, Western Australia, left the Nore on October 1, and proceeded down Channel, after receiving on board 150 convicts from the establishments at Chatham and Millbank. The convicts from the Chatham establishment, at St. Mary's, embarked from the dockyard on board the paddle-wheel steamer Adder, Mr. W. J. Blakely, and were in charge of a numerous party of convict guards and wardens, all heavily armed. Among the convicts shipped were a party of fifteen Fenians, who were engaged in the late conspiracy in Ireland, together with the officers and crew convicted of scuttling the ship Severn, and some others who have achieved notoriety from their crimes. The Fenian convicts, like the remainder of the prisoners, were chained together in gangs, but it was observed that they were kept apart from the other convicts in a portion of the vessel by themselves. The steamer Petrel also took down a number of convicts from the establishment at Millbank for shipment on board the Hougoumont, in charge of a strong escort and convict guard. On Tuesday, October 8th, the Hougoumont arrived in Portland roads. Shortly before midday ninety convicts were marched down to the Government pier at Portland under a strong escort of the 12th Light Infantry. The party included twenty-three Fenian convicts, among whom it was said, was Moriarty. The Government steamer employed in the breakwater service was used for conveying the convicts on board the Hougoumont transport ship. The convicts were chained together on embarking, and on board the steamer a strong guard of marines from her Majesty's ship St. George was formed, and saw the convicts safely placed on board the Hougoumont. The Governor of the penal settlement at Freemantle, Captain Young, is on board the Hougoumont, and returns in that ship to his sphere of duty after paying a visit to his native land." Source: Sydney Morning Herald, Thu 19 Dec 1867, p4, English Shipping, available on Trove at https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/28608271?searchTerm=hougoumont.
HougoumontReferences
| Primary Source | Australian Joint Copying Project. Microfilm Roll 93, Class and Piece Number HO11/19, Page Number 245 (125) --0-- Edgar, W. (Bill). (2018). “The precarious voyage of her majesty’s convict ship ‘Nile’ to the Swan River colony, late 1857 – and the unexpected aftermath.” The Great Circle, 40(1), 20–43. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26783779 |
| Source Description | This record is one of the entries in the British convict transportation registers 1787-1867 database compiled by State Library of Queensland from British Home Office (HO) records which are available on microfilm as part of the Australian Joint Copying Pro |
| Original Source | Great Britain. Home Office |
| Compiled By | State Library of Queensland |
| Database Source | British convict transportation registers 1787-1867 database |
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Convict Notes
NOTE: Year of Birth is taken from official records but day and month are not known. The latter dates have been entered as 01/01 because the site does not allow those fields to be left empty.
DEATH: At the time of his death, William Rhodes was working as a labourer at Lockeville, about 210kms south of Perth. He was employed by W Eldridge/Aldridge. A Mr Eldridge owned a timber station at Augusta, according to the WA Times’s Lockeville correspondent (https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2974793). Rhodes had been employed for just a week (started 7 April, 1875), earning 4s.6d. per day, when he was “accidentally killed” (Western Australia, Australia, Convict Records, 1846-1930; Convict Department, Registers; General Register for Nos 9599-10128 cont. (R16)). The circumstances of his death are not recorded in any documents viewed to date. -- LIFE AT LOCKEVILLE: From The Western Australian Times, Tuesday 5 October, 1875, p3: ‘LOCKEVILLE (From our own Correspondent.) What's become of the farm and dairy produce of this district? is the universal cry of the unhappy housewives at this Station [of the W.A. Timber Company]. Butter, Cheese and even Beef are very scarce, so scarce, indeed, that they may be put down as luxuries. Potatoes only occasionally to be met with and then of very inferior quality and trifling quantity. No hay or corn. Nothing plentiful but hardware goods, drapery, sardines and blacking. It would be an act of positive philanthropy if some enterprising individual would send us a bullock or two; as to mutton, we have forgotten the very appearance of it. The number of farms in this district would naturally lead one to suppose that there would be an abundant supply, especially when a certain clique are clamouring for a duty on imported flour. Goodness knows! we should starve were it not for the flour and provisions imported by the Timber Company and others. According to current market prices the produce of the farm was never so remunerative as at present, and yet, with all our surroundings, we are almost destitute of the common necessaries of life. The demons, apathy and indolence, are at the bottom of the mischief. No dairy or farm produce should be imported when it can be raised here with ordinary industry. We have all the appliances to produce butter, cheese, bacon, flour, preserved fruits and pickles etc, in sufficient quantity for not only home consumption, but for export. And yet these apathetic settlers are crying out for the imposition of a duty on flour. It should be first shown that the production of grain in the colony exceeds the consumption before putting the screw on imports. There are exceptions of course. One or two gentlemen in the locality are working their farms in an energetic and business like way. In England the cattle are fed to produce milk but in W. A. they are generally left to board and frequently lodge themselves as best they can; such mode of treatment resulting in a precarious supply of material. I omitted to mention in my last that a strong attempt is being made to convert all the Lockevillians to Good Templarism. Many joined the Vasse Lodge, and had the brethren in that delightful town of love and amity acted only a little in accordance with the scriptural text love thy neighbor as thyself," things might have gone on very smoothly, but alas! whispers are abroad that matters are not as they should be. It seems impossible to get the people of this district to pull all together for any good object. Chapel people are always squabbling. So are the Church people. There are two literary institutes in the town and they are at loggerheads, there is certainly something to be urged in extenuation. The unfortunate creatures have nothing else to do, for you can very rarely see any person at work in Busselton, except the police, and it is truly wonderful how they perform their arduous duties; so short handed too! Do you not think that some more modest and appropriate titles might be devised for the names of the various lodges of Good Templars for example "The Light of the Swan", "Light of the West” and so on. We shall soon have one called "The Revolving Orb of the South East Lodge”. Why not descend a step or two, to common sense such as "The Perseverance" or "At last she Moves?" The Mutual Improvement movement is progressing favorably at this station; slowly but surely. The School and Divine Services are very well attended; we have public readings every Tuesday and Thursday and are doing our trenches to infuse a musical spirit into our people here. A very troublesome shipping arrangement exists here with regard to clearing and entering crafts from this station to Bunbury. If we send only a dingy with one man to Bunbury, a distance of about 20 miles, it is required that such dingy shall be duly cleared outwards and all forms carried out as for a full rigged ship; but this is not all, to comply with this requisition the man in charge of the dingy must personally attend at the Court house, Busselton, 5 miles distant, and on his return from Bunbury again travel to Busselton to report his return and enter inwards. Thus for a mere message from here to Bunbury, the expense and loss of time, equal almost to the entire trip, is incurred. It would be a great facility to business if this arrangement was somewhat modified. The Barque "Hero of the Nile" arrived here on the 23rd inst., and will commence loading railway sleepers for New Zealand immediately. Sept, 25th 1875.’ --000--
IN WA: FREMANTLE JAIL RECORD: RHODES, William; inmate #9855, arrived 10 Jan 1868 per Hougoumont Date of Birth: 1829 Date of Death: 14 April, 1875 Place of Death: Lockeville, accidentally killed Marital Status: Married Occupation: House painter Literacy: Literate Sentence Date: 1867 Sentence Place: Manchester Crime: Rape Sentence Period: 12 years Previous Convictions: Yes Ticket Leave Date: 12 Nov 1873 Comments: General servant, labourer, bricklayer (https://fremantleprison.com.au/). --00--
EMBARKATION: 1867, 30 September: William Rhodes was sent from Millbank to board the Hougoumont for transportation to WA (UK, Prison Commission Records, 1770-1951 for Willm Rhodes; Millbank Prison; Register of Prisoners; 1866-1867; image 219). “The hired convict ship Hougoumont, which has been taken up, by the Government for the conveyance of a numerous party of convicts to Freemantle, Western Australia, left the Nore on October 1, and proceeded down Channel, after receiving on board 150 convicts from the establishments at Chatham and Millbank. The convicts from the Chatham establishment, at St. Mary's, embarked from the dockyard on board the paddle-wheel steamer Adder, Mr. W. J. Blakely, and were in charge of a numerous party of convict guards and wardens, all heavily armed. Among the convicts shipped were a party of fifteen Fenians, who were engaged in the late conspiracy in Ireland, together with the officers and crew convicted of scuttling the ship Severn [only two were on the Hougoumont – Thomas Berwick and Lionel Holdsworth, each sentenced to 20 years for fraud], and some others who have achieved notoriety from their crimes. The Fenian convicts, like the remainder of the prisoners, were chained together in gangs, but it was observed that they were kept apart from the other convicts in a portion of the vessel by themselves. The steamer Petrel also took down a number of convicts from the establishment at Millbank, for shipment on board the Hougoumont, in charge of a strong escort and convict guard. On Tuesday, October 8th, the Hougoumont arrived in Portland roads. Shortly before midday ninety convicts were marched down to the Government pier at Portland under a strong escort of the 12th Light Infantry. The party included twenty-three Fenian convicts, among whom it was said, was Moriarty [not the senior Fenian, Captain Moriarty; rather, this was Bartholomew Moriarty, aged 17]. The Government steamer employed in the breakwater service was used for conveying the convicts on board the Hougoumont transport ship. The convicts were chained together on embarking, and on board the steamer a strong guard of marines from her Majesty's ship St. George was formed, and saw the convicts safely placed on board the Hougoumont. The Governor of the penal settlement at Freemantle, Captain Young, is on board the Hougoumont, and returns in that ship to his sphere of duty after paying a visit to his native land.” (Sydney Morning Herald, 19 Dec 1867, p4, at https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/28608271). --00--
1867, 11 April: Admitted to Millbank Prison, #3175, William Rhodes, alias William Burke, 37, married, painter; Roman Catholic; semiliterate; twice previously convicted; “sullen and vindictive”; family – wife Hannah Rhodes, Birmingham; convicted of rape, 12 years, at Manchester Assizes 9 March, 1867 (UK, Prison Commission Records, 1770-1951 for Willm Rhodes; Millbank Prison; Register of Prisoners; 1866-1867; image 219). --0--
JAILS: 1867: Held at Salford Gaol; served 1 month 2 days in separate confinement (UK, Prison Commission Records, 1770-1951 for Willm Rhodes; Millbank Prison; Register of Prisoners; 1866-1867; image 219). “After a sentence of transportation [or penal servitude] was handed down, the prisoner entered into a separate stage where he was placed into an individual cell, isolated from others, apart from brief periods of exercise and attendance at chapel. However, no communication of any kind with other prisoners was permitted at any time. The philosophy behind this penal methodology had its provenances in the religious, monastic traditions; i.e., that in the isolation of his cell the malefactor would be able to contemplate the errors of his way, unadulterated by the negative influences of former contemporaries, and be reformed.” (Edgar, 2018, pp39-40) When first put into practice, the mandated period of separate confinement was 18 months. By the late 1840s, authorities had conceded that such conditions of imprisonment were “injurious to many prisoners’ mental health” and the stint was reduced to 12 months. Periods of separate confinement were reduced further “as a prisoner displayed good behaviour tendencies” (Edgar, 2018, p40). Millbank, Pentonville, Wakefield and Mountjoy in Ireland were the “Probation” or “Separate” prisons, as were some local jails. --0--
NEWSPAPER REPORTS OF TRIAL: From the Manchester Courier, 16 March, 1867, p6: “South Lancashire Assizes. Salford Hundred. Crown Court. Yesterday (Before Mr Justice Shee). ...The court was occupied for the remainder of the day in cases which required no reporting. James Livesey, 32, was convicted of a violent assault upon Betsy Holt, at Birtle-cum-Bamford, on the 4th of February; and William Rhodes, 37, of a violent assault upon Mary Shaughnessy, an Irishwoman, at Manchester, on the 1st February. His lordship deferred sentencing the prisoners until this (Saturday) morning.” (https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000206/18670316/027/0006) -- From the Manchester Courier, 20 March, 1867, p4: “SOUTH LANCASHIRE ASSIZES. SALFORD HUNDRED. CROWN COURT.— (Before Mr. Justice Shee) William Rhodes, found guilty a violent assault upon Mary Shaughnessy, at Manchester, was sentenced to penal for twelve years; William Livsey, for similar upon Betsy Holt, at Birtle-cum-Bamford, was sentenced to ten years' penal servitude; and John Hamer, found guilty of a violent assault upon Elizabeth Ross, at Bolton, was sentenced to penal servitude for fifteen years.” (https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000206/18670320/014/0004) --0--
TRIAL: 1867, 15 March: Convicted of rape, and two previous convictions, and sentenced to 12 years’ penal servitude at Manchester Assizes, Lancashire, commencing 9 March (England & Wales, Criminal Registers, 1791-1892 for William Rhodes; England; Lancashire; 1867; image 98). --0--