Isle of the Dead is Port Arthur’s cemetery. It’s a very small island, divided so that convicts, lunatics, and paupers were laid to rest on the lower southern side while military and ‘respectable’ people were buried on the higher northern end. The island is reached by a short boat trip with commentary. My tour guide on the island said that the guides like giving the Isle of the Dead tour because they get a chance to talk about some of the individual people. I must say that I am usually a fanatical picture-taker. When travelling alone I’m prone to snapping the best self-portrait I can manage with historical or tourist sites in the background. I only took a couple pictures on the Isle of the Dead, however, and none with me. It didn’t seem right, somehow, to have a smiling picture of me in such a somber place. The tour was very informative and sensitive. We got to learn about several individuals, both convict and free. There was one convict who had been transported at 19 for stealing a silk coat that belonged to his father – and his father was the prosecutor! (The prosecutor as the term was used here was the wronged party pursuing legal action, not the lawyer.) We don’t know if this was a case of borrowing Dad’s clothes or something more serious, or if the father knew his son could end up on the other side of the world. However, when this man died at age 32 he had one of the nicer grave markers. (They don’t used the term “headstones” because they can’t be sure they are actually over the heads.) Few convicts had anything to mark their graves, which wasn’t even allowed until 1853. At the bottom of this marker, however, is chiseled “T. Pickering.” Thomas Pickering was a convict stonemason, and he’d been friends with the deceased man for eight years. He didn’t usually sign his work, either. It’s an interesting story of how friendships could be formed under the harsh conditions. I found it rather heartwarming to hear of this story, because Port Arthur was most often a place of broken men, broken hearts, and broken spirits.
Point Puer (Latin for “youth” or “boy”) juts out and nearly touches the Isle of the Dead. It’s a hugely significant site because it was the first juvenile detention center in the British Empire (and possibly the world, we were told). Many youths were getting into trouble and being transported; the age at which you were legally responsible for your actions was 7. Lieutenant Governor George Arthur decided that it might be a better idea to have a separate place for children, away from the hardened adult criminals. In 15 years some 3,000 boys were at Point Puer, most of them between the ages of 14 and 17 but some as young as 9. (Girls weren’t sent to Point Puer; the female convict system was distinct.) This was really forward-thinking for the time. So much so, in fact, that the British copied the idea at home and stopped transporting youth altogether. This made Point Puer unnecessary, so it closed in 1849. Also forward-thinking was Commandant Booth, the man in charge of Port Arthur when Point Puer opened. He insisted on giving the boys full rations. Generally at the time men would get one ration, women half a ration, and children even less. Anyone who has ever seen a teenage boy eat knows that this really doesn’t make any sense! Booth also allowed for a small bit of free time, albeit heavily regulated, in the morning and evening. In between, the boys worked hard.
However hard the work, the focus at Point Puer was on reform. Therefore the boys were taught basic reading, writing, and arithmetic. Although the effectiveness of this has been questioned, I suspect it varied based on each boy. They were also provided with religious instruction, which at that time was strictly Christian, and about half of the boys learned a trade under the supervision of a tradesman. Since Point Puer couldn’t accommodate teaching all the boys a trade, they all started out doing hard labor (clearing trees, tilling soil, etc.) and those who made a favorable impression with their attitude and actions were given the opportunity to learn a skilled trade. This would allow them to be productive citizens once they were free; ideally this would be a win-win situation for the colony and the boys. Trades taught included tailoring, stonecutting, carpentry, shoe-making, coopering, and nail-making.
Sadly, there is very little left at Point Puer. After its closure the buildings were demolished and useful material was brought across the harbor to the main settlement. We saw the wall, which is all that remains of the sawmill, and some foundations. Our guide helped bring it to life by tracing the experiences of three boys. Of particular note were a couple of curving stones left in the foundation of the trades area. They were carved by inexperienced boys but the work was very admirable.
A stunning example of the boys’ workmanship is Port Arthur’s church. It was built by convicts in the 1830s using stones and bricks. The stones were shaped by Point Puer boys. While fire ravaged the inside (consuming, among other things, pews that were also the work of Point Puer boys), the walls are in excellent condition. This is an imposing neo-Gothic church with a front that resembles a castle, a complex shape that bends in at the back before flaring out, and an enormous arched window in the back. Inside, the empty space produces a bit of an echo, magnifying the volume of spoken words. Since the church was built up a small hill, it has a lovely view out the thin arched windows. Inside the rather small but magnificent church was one of those places that feels special, when I become calm and somber, a bit awestruck and a great deal contemplative.
It was hard to tear myself away from the lovely church, but there was more to see. I had yet to look at the Separate Prison. Once there, I decided it was the most chilling part of Port Arthur. The Separate Prison was built to try a new prison reform idea: sensory deprivation. For twenty-three hours a day, men were locked in a tiny cell with only a small window above their heads. The thick walls prevented talking with their neighbors, and there was nothing to do. For one hour a day, they were allowed to walk around, but even this was done with their head covered except the eyes. At Port Arthur this was used for the prisoners that were continuous offenders and considered incorrigible.
This sounds horrific, and it was. The cells were very small and dark. It’s no wonder that so many men went insane. However, I understand that the prison reformers were trying to do a good thing. It was unpleasant to be whipped and work in chain gangs while on minimal food rations and in thin clothing, so the reformers sought what seemed to be a more humane alternative. The idea was that this time alone would give the men an opportunity to reflect on their sins and change their ways. Problematically, this had already failed in England before the Separate Prison at Port Arthur was completed, and therein lies the biggest problem to my mind.
It was easy to understand how men went insane, and after leaving the Separate Prison I took a few minutes to savor the fact that I am alive, and free. I stopped to watch the charming green rosellas flit around the lawn, chirping their bird songs. I admired a heron standing stoically in Settlement Creek, the stream that was crucial to Port Arthur. After all, a key way that we process information is to empathize with it. The Separate Prison left me needing a few moments to center myself in the present and achieve just a bit of detachment, a reminder that this horror was not my own to experience.
The Penitentiary was a less emotional building for me to visit. It’s enormous and dominates the cluster of buildings it sits in. (The church is on the other side, a short walk away.) Originally it was built as a flour mill. Here Linus Miller, one of the Americans I’m researching who was sent to Port Arthur for absconding (running away), had to “tread the wheel.” As there was not often enough water to run the mill, convicts would turn it by walking up steps endlessly. This was tiring, of course, but they had to be careful not to miss a step. The wheel would keep going, making missing a step very dangerous. Concentration was therefore also required, but the task was so tedious it’s only natural for minds to wander. Convicts hated treading the wheel. Fortunately for them, the mill experiment only lasted a few years. The soil around Port Arthur isn’t very good, and authorities were already bringing in the grain by ship; eventually it occurred to them that they might as well just bring the grain already ground into flour. Thereafter the mill was given an addition and turned into a place to house convicts. In the 1890s the Penitentiary burned in a bushfire and then slowly collapsed. Part of the front wall has been rebuilt, although you can’t really tell just looking at it. A staircase has been built inside, which gives visitors the chance to climb up and look at the huge building with its internal walls stretching out below them. The Penitentiary was a four-story building, and as odd as it may sound I suspect it may look even more impressive than if it was in pristine condition. There’s something about being able to look down from the staircase and see from one end to the other inside the building that is fascinating.
Six of the Americans I’m studying were sent to Port Arthur, all for absconding. From Linus Miller’s memoir we know that he and another American man left their work party to see if it would be possible to get passage away from Van Diemens’ Land for the entire work party. They hoped to find sympathetic American whalers who would smuggle them out. Alas, it wasn’t to be. However, not many convicts wrote memoirs and fewer still wrote memoirs of Port Arthur. Miller’s account is used by the Port Arthur administrators and is a valuable resource.
In the end, “fascinating” is a perfect word to describe Port Arthur.
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