The Haig family’s female convict servants - Part One
The convict women: rebellious, resourceful and resilient
Sculpture, Footsteps to Freedom, Rowan Gillespie.
Forty two convict women were assigned to serve the family of Captain Andrew and Elizabeth Haig, for whom Narryna was built, between 1835 and 1855. This period spans both the Assignment and Probation periods of the Tasmanian convict system. These women filled the roles of house servant, kitchen maid, laundress, nurserymaid or needlewoman with varying degrees of success. This post is the first of a series and provides overall context for this assignment history together with the story of one female convict assigned to Captain Haig. To set the scene, I will introduce you to the Haig family.
Andrew Haig and his family
Captain Andrew Haig, his wife Elizabeth, three small children and Andrew’s half sister Mary Ann, arrived in Hobart in January 1835. Also accompanying the Captain was his manservant, Neils Neilsen whom he refers to in his journals as ‘old Nelson’.
Before moving in to Narryna, the Haig family lived in cottages in Fitzroy Place and De Witt Street and above the warehouses built for Haig at the New Wharf. The warehouses are now Cargo and Jack Greene in Salamanca Place. After a short time at Narryna (October 1840-April 1842), they moved to Kelly Street then back to De Witt Street and late in 1844 to Macquarie Street where Elizabeth started a school where several women were specifically contracted to her.
Captain Haig’s warehouses now Cargo and Jack Greene on Salamanca Place
Of the 42 Haig-assigned convict women identified to date, one was Welsh, 24 English, 10 Scots and 7 Irish. Their crime in almost all cases was theft either independently or working with relatives or other accomplices. These crimes were described as ‘stealing from the person’, ‘theft from a lock fast place’ and ‘highway robbery’ and ranged from pick-pocketing, a servant stealing an item of clothing or a piece of silver or money from their master/ mistress, or ‘finding’ a dress or cloak drying on a hedge, committing robberies from houses or shops, or relieving unsuspecting clients of brothels of their pocket books. In a couple of cases the theft was of food - in one case, oranges and another, cheese and butter. Apart from theft/ larceny, two of the 42 were sentenced for receiving stolen goods and one for murder.
Their sentence was generally seven years (32 women). Other sentences were of ten years (6 women), fourteen years (2 women) and life (2 women). They were aged 16 - 50 years, but only 6 were over 30. Four women were accompanied by children. Ann Balfour arrived with a 9 month old child who is presumed to have died soon after arrival (as not recorded in any of the registers of the convict nurseries). Margaret Wright’s son Alexander Fraser was under 2 when he arrived in 1836 and is noted in the Orphan School register as having been admitted aged 4½ in 1839. He was recorded 7 years later as having been ‘apprenticed by agreement to N W Lord, Port Phillip’, in the meantime his mother had received her Ticket of Leave and married. Elizabeth Hoare arrived with her son William Jones who was admitted to the Orphan School on arrival in Hobart, aged 3 years - the usual age for children to be placed in the schools. He was discharged to his mother 12 years later, when she had received her second Ticket of Leave and married. Mary Pearn, an Irish widow with four children was allowed to bring the youngest, John, with her on the Gilbert Henderson, arriving in April 1840 when he was 6 years old. Five years later, when she had received her ticket of leave and had married John Jobling, her son was discharged to her. Neither Mary nor Elizabeth had another child [1].
These women had survived enormous hardships by the time they reached Hobart. A few had made a single bad decision, but most were repeat offenders who had lived by their wits - they were indeed habitual thieves and/ or prostitutes: surviving as best they could as members of the urban working class. Day-to-day survival was followed by stints in the workhouse and/or prison, and uncomfortable journeys to London or Dublin to embark on transport vessels for the long trip to Van Diemen’s Land. Those voyages could last up to five months and it was rare for all those on board to survive. Those who did must have had considerable inner strength.
Up until the fit-out of the vessel Anson as a female probation station in 1844, convict transports were boarded on arrival by the Principal Superintendent of Convicts and the Principal Medical Officer and then a day or even two were taken up, with the Principal Superintendent and his clerk recording details of each prisoner’s appearance as well as her own account of her crime, marital status and trade. Needless to say, no-one admitted to being by ‘habit and repute a thief’, let alone ‘on the town’ (a prostitute) though these notations appear on many of the relevant trial documents. The women clearly understood that in order to be placed in a family home, they would need to declare themselves a house servant, nursery maid, laundress/ laundry maid, needlewoman, cook or even ‘maid of all work’. From their pre-transportation history, it is clear that some had never worked as a servant and would have had very little idea of what that role might involve. Only one declared she had worked in a factory - as a ‘steam loom weaver’ and two said they were shoe or boot binders.
Several of the Haig servants had unblemished conduct records, whose only notes relate to ‘indulgences’ and ‘levels of freedom’: a ticket of leave, a permission to marry, a Conditional Pardon or a Free Certificate. For others, there was barely sufficient space to record all their misdemeanours.
Punishments ranged from a reprimand, to an extension of the original sentence of 3, 6 or even 12 months, to solitary confinement for a specific period on bread and water, time at the wash tubs or other hard labour at the Female Factory/ House of Correction. In some cases there was a further note from the magistrate to the effect that the next assignment should be ‘in the interior’.
The Female Factory, Cascades, Hobart Town / Robert Proctor Beauchamp (1819 - 1889) [2]
In Domestic Service for the Haig family
It appears that several of the women may have spent more than a year with the Haig family, but most stayed for shorter periods - in some cases, a matter of days! It is possible that some of these may have been assigned for a specific purpose - e.g. preparing for and assisting with a particular event - but there are other possibilities, such as Mrs Haig returning them for their lack of experience as domestic servants.
Although some convicts had experience as domestic servants, the majority did not. Many struggled with the expectations of their colonial masters and mistresses. Their work was heavy and constant: carting water and coal up and down stairs, cooking, cleaning, caring for children…They were not permitted to leave their master’s premises without a note, and could not rely on masters to provide them with food and clothing according to the regulations - although there is no evidence that Andrew and Elizabeth Haig failed in this respect.
The Haig family - probably like most - were assigned some servants who were competent and many who were not. They were certainly fortunate with their first experience - a capable young woman named Sarah Maynard.
Assigned on arrival: Sarah Maynard
Sarah Maynard, a native of Maidstone in Kent was transported for life for robbing her master of nine sovereigns. Her record describes the crime as ‘stealing in a dwelling house: embezzlement and stealing by servants’.
Following Sarah’s trial, the prosecutor submitted a petition to the Secretary of State for the Home Department, requesting mercy (imprisonment rather than transportation) in consideration of the ‘exceeding good character which had been given her by several of the most respectable persons in Maidstone with whom she had lived’. The petition also suggests that there was a ‘mandatory sentencing’ act in place: ‘the Learned Judge in passing sentence observed that the Act of Government left him no discretion as to the extent of the punishment and was therefore obliged to pass the sentence of transportation for life’, but he recommended her legal advisor make an immediate application for mercy to the Home Department [3].
Arriving on the ship New Grove in March 1835, Sarah was 22 years old, and was described as being 4’11½″ tall with a fair freckled complexion, brown hair, grey eyes, long nose and wide mouth. She was assigned to Captain Haig having described herself as a plain cook and house servant.
The Haig family had arrived two months earlier, and had rented a cottage in Fitzroy Place. Although Andrew Haig’s sister Mary Ann would have been some help to his wife Elizabeth, a capable and experienced house servant would have been a great blessing at this time. Their fourth child Jane was delivered in April 1835 - soon after Sarah’s arrival - and their fifth, Jacob on October 26 1836. By that date, Sarah had been granted permission to marry [4] a free man Thomas Newton [5] and the ceremony was performed at St David’s church on 7 November 1836 [6]. She had served the Haig family for some 20 months.
By January 1842, the census shows the Newton family living in Harrington Street in a house owned by prominent lawyer Gamaliel Butler who at that time lived at Stowell, next door to Narryna. Sarah is shown as ‘private assignment: wife of the person in charge’. There were two children listed - a boy and a girl, both between 2 and 7 years of age [7]. They are not listed in the colonial register of births, but this was not required before 1839. More details might be found in church records. Sarah was granted a Ticket of Leave on 19 May 1843 and her conditional pardon was approved on 4 December 1849.
She must surely have been grateful that her petition to the Home Department, to replace transportation with life imprisonment, had been unsuccessful?
No further records have been discovered regarding Sarah and her family. To date, no death notices for Sarah, Thomas or their children have been located. Perhaps they moved to the mainland? Thomas may, like so many others, have sought his fortune on the Victorian goldfields.
Perhaps you know more? If you know anything about Sarah and her family, please let us know by dropping us a line narryna@tmag.tas.gov.au
Next time…
In our next post find out more about two of the women who arrived with a child: Margaret Wright and Elizabeth Hoare.
Author: Felicity Hickman
Felicity has been volunteering at Narryna for the past three years and is also a Visitor Services Officer and volunteer guide at TMAG. For Seniors Week 2019, Felicity created a special tour of Narryna focussing on the experience of the Haig family’s female convict servants: this blog expands on the information presented in the tour.
Narryna’s current exhibition Hidden Histories provides further insights into these women’s lives. To see some our Hidden Histories exhibition, visit our ‘Online Exhibitions’ page, click here.
[1] The main source of information for this research is the database of the Female Convicts Research Centre (femaleconvicts.org.au) where transcribed conduct records are presented in the form of a database. Apart from the description of each woman’s appearance, her crime and sentence, ship and date of arrival, the conduct record lists every misdemeanor committed while under sentence, and the punishments imposed. The name of the master who presented her to the magistrate is generally recorded. A ‘clean’ record (with no recorded misdemeanors) may or may not mean that a woman served her whole sentence with a single master. Similarly, there is often no indication of whether, after serving a particular punishment, the woman was ‘returned to her service’ (i.e. the same master) or ‘returned to the Government’ (i.e. available to be re-assigned). The length of time a particular woman served a particular master can therefore only be deduced.
Other sources are ‘Trove’, The National Library’s digitised newspapers site - trove.nla.gov.au, the Tasmanian Names Index https://www.libraries.tas.gov.au/how-to/Pages/Names-Index-content.aspx and Captain Haig’s journals which are currently being transcribed by Narryna volunteers.
The Female Convicts Database also provides transcribed pre-transportation petitions, details from colonial musters and censuses, Government notices from local newspapers and in some cases British trial information. More documents are constantly being added to the site.
[2] Image, Female Factory, W.L. Crowther Library, Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office https://stors.tas.gov.au/ILS/SD_ILS-1103453
[3] https://www.femaleconvicts.org.au/docs/petitions/SarahMaynard_NewGrove1835.pdf
[4] Convicts under sentence (including those holding a Ticket of Leave) required permission from the Convict Department to marry. The registers of permissions show the date the application was received by the Muster Master, the date it was received by the Secretary and the result - sometimes recorded in the form yes/ no, sometimes approved/ not approved. An 1829 government notice indicated that for an application to be successful, the applicant had to have ‘conducted herself properly in service for the period of at least one year without any fault being recorded against her’ (Hobart Town Courier 26 Sept 1929 p2 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/4213582 ) After marrying, the husband became the woman’s master.
[5] TAHO CON52/1/1 p131
[6] TAHO RGD36/1/3 no 3199
[7] TAHO CEN 1/1/16 pp91- 92