Published articles

A collection of articles published in peer-reviewed journals or specialist publications.

• Organising the Convicts on Australia's First Fleet. Gary L. Sturgess, The Great Circle, Vol.46, No.2, 2024, pp.33-43, forthcoming.

• A Portrait Miniature of Captain William Hill. Gary L. Sturgess, Australiana, November 2024, pp.6-8.

• Classic Texts Revisited: The Fatal Shore by Robert Hughes. Gary L. Sturgess, The Great Circle, Vol.46, No.1, 2024, pp.89-94. (A copy of this article can be obtained through The Great Circle.)

• The Britannia Cashbook. Gary L. Sturgess. The Great Circle, Vol.46, No.1, 2024, pp.34-44. The second in the series of Research Notes. (A copy of this articles can be obtained through The Great Circle.)

• The Melville Cup. Gary L. Sturgess. The Great Circle, Vol.45, No.2, 2024, pp.72-81. The first in a series of 'Research Notes' titled 'The Botany Baymen: Notes on Australia's Early Maritime History'. (A copy of this article can be obtained through The Great Circle.)

• Success to the Borrowdale. Gary L. Sturgess. The Great Circle, Vol. 41, No. 1, 2019, pp.1-14. The life and death of a First Fleet ship and her captain.

• Two-Up School Is In. Gary L. Sturgess, The Daily Telegraph, 18 April 2019, p.30. An article I wrote on my role in the legalisation of two-up on Anzac Day when I was Director General of the NSW Cabinet Office, which also touches on the early history of the game among the convicts.

• Guillaume Richard/William Richards: A Huguenot Back Story to Australia’s First Fleet. Gary L. Sturgess. Huguenot Times, Number 32, November 2018, pp.1-4. The First Fleet contractor was born into an interesting Huguenot family from New York.

• Convict Transportation to New South Wales, 1787–1849: Mortality Rates Reconsidered. Gary L. Sturgess, Sara Rahman and George Argyrous. Australian Economic History Review, Vol. 58, No. 1, March 2018, pp.62-86. A statistical analysis of mortality rates on convict ships, done with two of my colleagues from the Australian and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG). The evidence confirms that mortality rates fell a decade and half earlier than previously thought.

• A Government Affair? Reassessing the Contractual Arrangements for Australia's First Fleet, Part 2. Gary L. Sturgess. The Great Circle, Vol. 39, No. 1, 2017, pp.29-54. The second of a two-part series establishing that, contrary to claims by some historians, there was a contract for the First Fleet.

• A Government Affair? Reassessing the Contractual Arrangements for Australia's First Fleet, Part 1. Gary L. Sturgess. The Great Circle, Vol. 38, No. 2, 2016, pp.1-25. The first part in a series on the contractual arrangements for the First Fleet.

• Arthur Phillip: Commodore of the Fleet. Gary L. Sturgess. Sydney Journal, Vol.5, No.1, 2017, pp.20-38. The written version of a paper presented at a seminar held at the Museum of Sydney to honour Governor Arthur Phillip. My contribution was a study of his performance as the commander of the fleet on the outward voyage.

• Commissioning Human Services: Lessons from Australian Convict Contracting. Gary L. Sturgess, George Argyrous, and Sara Rahman. Australian Journal of Public Administration, vol. 76, No. 4, 2016, pp.1-13. A paper with my ANZSOG colleagues, based on the statistical analysis that was published 15 months later.

• Phillip's Landing. Michael Flynn & Gary L. Sturgess. Inside History, September-October 2015, pp.31-33. An article written by Michael Flynn and myself, explaining where the First Fleet landing actually took place - see also PowerPoint presentations on the same subject.

• Managing a Global Enterprise in the Eighteenth Century: Anthony Calvert of The Crescent, London, 1777–1808. Gary L. Sturgess & Ken Cozens. The Mariner's Mirror, 30 Apr 2013, pp.171-195. A study of Anthony Calvert, the managing partner of Camden, Calvert & King, the firm which won the contracts for the Second and Third Fleets - written with my friend and colleague, Ken Cozens, who had done ground-breaking research on the firm.

• Colony No Ship of Fools. Gary L. Sturgess, Sydney Morning Herald, 6 August 2011. My review of Alan Frost's last book on the First Fleet, 'The First Fleet: The Real Story'.