Author: Dr. Christine Wright
Much has been written about the transportation of convicts to New South Wales in general terms, yet there have been few detailed studies of the individual experience of the convict system, and fewer still that combine analysis of different components of the system. This chapter provides a case study of John Coghill’s experiences of the convict system for over 20 years. His experiences fall into district categories: as a master mariner and transporter of convicts to New South Wales and then a landowner with assigned convicts in his care in two localities, as well as magistrate in the judicial system. The life of a convict under assignment to a private master depended very much on the attitude of the master, and Coghill was a tough, brutal master, yet dependent on cheap convict labour for his sheep enterprises. Perhaps the Irish convicts assigned to him could have expected more of a Scot who, like themselves, came from the edge of the British world, but not with this master.
