Isabel Allende and the Convict Stain

In The Sum of Our Days, first published in 2007, the great Chilean writer, Isabel Allende comments on the substance abuse which blighted several generations of her second husband’s family. William (‘Willie’) Gordon was a Californian lawyer of Australian descent, who in spite of being part of the generation which (in Australia at least) rejected any sense of a ‘convict stain’, felt that he had passed on tainted DNA to his children. Allende wrote:

'Willie believes he has passed on a genetic defect to his offspring. His great-great-grandfather arrived in Australia in leg irons, covered in pustules and lice – just one of the 160,000 wretched souls the British sent to that land as punishment. The youngest convict, sentenced for stealing bread, was nine years old; the oldest was an eighty-two-year-old woman accused of stealing a kilo and a half of cheese, who hanged herself just days after disembarking. Willie’s ancestor – accused of who knows what trivial offense – was spared the gallows because he was a knife sharpener. In those days, having a trade or knowing how to read meant that, instead of being hanged, you were sent to Australia. The man was among the hardy few who survived thanks to their capacity to endure suffering and alcohol – a trait inherited by almost all his descendants. Little is known about the grandfather, but his father died of cirrhosis.'

I have not been able to track Gordon’s convict ancestor. His father died when he was only six years of age. Gordon said that had been ‘an adventurer, writer, and artist who invented a religion and toured the western United States sermonizing and selling his books’, a narrative which Allende used as the foundation for her 1993 book, The Infinite Plan.

Family historians say Gordon’s father was born at Grenfell in New South Wales in 1892 and worked on cargo ships as a fireman and perhaps as an apprentice boilermaker, eventually making his way to California. There were a number of Gordons in the Grenfell area in the early 20th century – they are apparently descended from Scots who arrived for the Gold Rush, so the convict taint perhaps comes through his father’s maternal side.

Allende’s interpretation of Australia’s convict history was taken almost word-for-word from The Fatal Shore, and since, when The Sum of Our Days was written, she was still married to Gordon, it seems likely that he shared Robert Hughes’ bleak view of Australia’s convict past. Allende embraced Hughes’ mistakes and with artistic licence, embellished them.

The 82-year-old women who was allegedly transported for stealing a kilo and a half of cheese and committed suicide shortly after arriving is the First Fleet convict, Dorothy Handland, described by Hughes as:

'. . . a dealer in rags and old clothes who was eighty-two years old in 1787. She had drawn seven years for perjury. In 1789, in a fit of befuddled despair, she was to hang herself from a gum tree in Sydney Cove. . .'

In weaving together her version of Australia’s convict past, Allende conflated Handland with the second oldest woman on the First Fleet transports, Elizabeth Beckford, who Hughes said was 70 years of age and transported for stealing 12lbs (almost five and a half kilos) of Gloucester cheese.

In the hope of being treated more favourably, Handland had lied about her age – she was only 63. And she did not commit suicide but returned home in 1792 at government’s expense. It is likely that Beckford was only 55 to 60, with a criminal record reaching back more than a decade, and possible involvement in the fencing of stolen goods.

The nine-year old sent out for stealing bread is undoubtedly John Hudson, who claimed he was only nine years of age and is mentioned in Hughes’ book immediately after Handland. He was a young chimney sweep transported for stealing clothes and a pistol, not the metaphorical loaf of bread.

Hudson was a repeat offender, and the only evidence as to his age was provided by the boy himself. There were significant benefits for juvenile offenders in being seen as younger than 10 years of age, including the probability of being acquitted for want of legal capacity. Since he was convicted and sentenced to transportation, it is probable that the judge did not believe him.

I have only turned up three cases of stolen bread among the First Fleet convicts. One of them took bread rolls and gingerbread cakes while stealing a quantity of money and clothing. Of the other two, one stole a flitch of bacon and the other three flitches in addition to the bread. A flitch is half a pig’s worth of bacon.

If we exclude cases of sheep- and poultry-stealing, which were usually for slaughter and sale, there were only 12 First Fleet convicts sent out for stealing food. Few of these were cases of ‘pitiful necessity’: John Hall stole 60 pounds (27 kilos) of butter, William Lane, 320 pounds (145 kilos) of pickled pork, Elizabeth Pulley, two cheeses, four pieces of bacon, several half pints of butter, a quarter of a stone (1.5 kilos) of raisins, half a stone of flour and two rolls of worsted (a woollen cloth).

For the most part, these men and women stole foodstuffs for the same reasons they stole valuables or clothing – one third of First Fleet convicts were sent out primarily for stealing cloth or clothing, another quarter for taking cash, watches or jewellery.

Contrary to the impression which Willie Gordon and his wife were given by Robert Hughes, the English criminal justice system of the late 18th century was not unremittingly harsh and unforgiving. Out of one hundred prosecutions for property offences in the City of London in the 1780s and 1790s, around half could expect to be acquitted or no-billed and 35 dealt with summarily, resulting in only minor punishments. This left seven to be transported, three to be imprisoned and one or two of the worst to be executed.

A colleague suggested to me lately that I have been too hard on Robert Hughes (see Newsletter 10, Revisiting The Fatal Shore). Given that Allende has sold some 70 million books around the world, in 35 languages, I take the view that facts matter.

Contact us

botanybaymen@gmail.com

Botany Baymen acknowledges the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and respects their connection to land, water and community.

© Botany Baymen 2024. All rights reserved.
You may download, display, print and reproduce this content for your personal or non-commercial use but only in an unaltered form and with the copyright acknowledged.

Subscribe to our latest updates

Be the first in the know. We promise no spam.