Convict Queen Page 21

  'I've heard of him. Wasn't he on Norfolk Island?'

  'Yes, and he made a fine job of it until he went back to England some years ago. He says he doesn't favour either side.'

  The news spread quickly from Sydney. It wasn't long before Foveaux exercised his powers. Colonel William Paterson, who was acting Lieutenant-Governor, but who had been in Tasmania, returned, and sent both Macarthur and Johnston to England for trial. Bligh had remained under house arrest, but agreed to go to England when a new Governor was appointed.

  It took a long time, but eventually Major-General Lachlan Macquarie, head of the new 102nd Regiment of Foot, which was to replace the New South Wales Corps, arrived.

  'I'm staying,' Thomas said, to Mollie's relief. 'The 102nd will be better run.'

  Molly had served almost six years of her sentence, and Thomas had promised to give her some of the cattle. She was on her way, she thought, to her goal of becoming wealthy. Not as wealthy as some of the free settlers, she accepted, but much better off than if she had remained in England.

  The next few years were the most peaceful Molly had known. Without Macarthur to stir up trouble the new Governor assumed control. Her seven years were up, she and Thomas were prospering, as was the colony. The main sadness was the news of her father's death, in a rare letter from her brother Samuel. He was ninety-three, a great age, and Molly shed many tears for him, for the grief she had given him, and for the other members of her family who had died, or whom she would never see again.

  And then, three years later, her world fell apart. She hadn't noticed that some of the new cattle that had been wandering loose, and which she had brought into her own pens, had the government brand underneath her own. It was faint, and only close inspection revealed it. But someone, perhaps jealous of her prosperity, had made such an inspection. Molly was tried, sentenced to seven years and sent to the penal colony at Coal Harbour, now called Newcastle.

  *

  CHAPTER 15

  Molly decided that Newcastle was even worse than the gaols in England. The first twenty or so prisoners had built the place when they were sent there in 1804, and it had expanded every year since then, so that now it housed over a thousand prisoners and their gaolers. More were brought every day, and they were the worst of the convicts, who had committed more crimes since arriving in New South Wales, and were often vicious, hard men who would start a fight on little or no provocation. Many had served in the Peninsular army or at the battle of Waterloo, and were both tough and resentful that after their discharge from the army they had found civilian life difficult, so turning to crime to survive. Punishment by flogging was an everyday occurrence, and murder amongst the prisoners not unknown. Her crime, she thought, had been minor in comparison.

  The town was expanding, even a school was built, but life for the convicts was hard, unrelenting work. As well as mining for coal they were set to cutting down the many cedar trees that surrounded the settlement and filled the lower Hunter Valley. It was, Molly heard, such fertile land they were calling it the colony's garden. They also had to collect lime and salt. She had to find a way of making life tolerable, and she'd always managed to improve matters for herself through men.

  Her first move was to beg an interview with one of the overseers, a Welshman who, she was told, had only recently been posted to Newcastle. He was lounging at a desk, and left her standing in front of it, not inviting her to sit down on the only other chair in the room. Somehow she had not expected any courtesies from the overseers, but that was a minor aggravation. After all, to him all the prisoners were scum, to be treated like dirt. She smiled, and in a soft voice which emphasised her Shropshire upbringing, pointed out to him that she was a skilled seamstress, and her time could be better spent sewing for the officers than scraping the Stockton mangrove swamps for salt.

  'You are impertinent,' he replied, and she may have imagined it, but his Welsh accent seemed stronger than before.

  'No, sir, I'm just trying to be helpful, so that you can use us for what we are best suited.'

  He grinned, and she smiled back. Men were usually easy to manage in the end, and he was no exception.

  'I'll give you a trial,' he said, standing up. 'Come with me. I've a ripped shirt. You can start with that, and I'll see what you can do.'

  Rather to Molly's surprise that was just what he gave her, a shirt with the sleeve almost torn out, and he demanded no other services. The officers had a reputation for using the younger female prisoners, and with no payment apart perhaps from some better food. She had hoped to use her body to gain privileges, but it seemed unlikely with this man. Perhaps he already had a mistress and was satisfied with her. Molly shrugged and set to mending the shirt as neatly as possible. He might pass her on to other men.

  That was what happened, and Molly soon found herself sewing and mending for several of the officers. But that, she decided, was getting her nowhere. She needed a better connection with one, a powerful one.

  They often fed her, and one day she was offered a chunk of mouldy cheese. She grimaced and pushed it aside, though she was hungry. The normal rations were adequate but unappetising.

  'I made better cheese than this back in Parramatta,' she said. 'Butter and cream too. Don't you have anyone here who can do better than this?'

  Ben, the officer she was with that day, mending his rather neglected shirts, shook his head. 'Where do we find dairymaids in this dump?'

  'Look at me. Is there a churn here? And where does the milk come from?'

  He looked from her to the cheese. 'I'll speak to the officer in charge. We've a herd a little way up the river at Patterson Plains. I'll let you know tomorrow.'

  She had to be satisfied, but on the following day he came for her in the barracks, and said she was to pack her few belongings and come with him. Hiding her jubilation Molly stuffed her spare gown and petticoat into a canvas bag that had been Thomas's, and followed. The churn was better than the one Thomas had made for her, and she was given a bed in a small hut that housed a few younger girls. They cooked and cleaned for the soldiers in this outpost, milked the cows when they could not escape that duty, and Molly was sure did more than that. They were a lively, irreverent group, all of them coming from London, they told her, and one of them, who had been in charge of the butter making, greeted Molly with relief.

  'Me arm's droppin' off turnin' that pesky 'andle,' she said. 'You're welcome to it. I even prefer tuggin' at the blasted teats.'

  Life did not consist only of cheese and butter making. Molly had time to wander amongst the cattle, and when the soldiers saw she had no fear of them, unlike the town girls, they asked her to show the others how best to milk, for none of them were handy at it. Now, Molly thought, she only had to find one influential officer.

  *

  It took some time, but eventually Molly, with the help of one of the officers, made her request when Governor Macquarie came to visit the penal camp. She wasn't permitted to speak to him directly, but clearly her case was put fairly, her skills with cattle stressed, and her success at farming in Parramatta. She was granted a ticket-of-leave, and sent with almost a dozen other well-behaved convicts to establish a new settlement yet further up the river at Wallis Plains, named after the Newcastle Commandant. They were granted a few acres, but the whole area was densely wooded, and cutting down the trees to make room for crops was almost enough to make a few of the men give up in despair. Molly, with convict help, built a simple one-room cabin for herself near the river and cleared a small patch. She soon had the beginnings of a flourishing farm, though this time she was careful not to take in government cattle. She'd have to do things legally now.

  She'd been there for less than a year when it seemed as though it was all to be for nothing. The river was in spate and overflowing the banks. Molly woke at the noise and found her fellow ticket-of-leave convicts watching in dismay.

  'Let's hope it don't rise much further,' one of them said.

  Molly shook her head. 'It might, and it's cle
ar this valley's been flooded before. It's so flat the water will spread. Look, best be careful. We can drive the cattle higher up into the hills, and carry what else we can out of reach of the water.'

  Some demurred, but most of them soon saw the sense of this when they found the water was rising fast. Molly concentrated on driving her few cattle onto higher ground. They'd be out of reach of the water just a few yards up the hillsides that surrounded the valley. The valley floor was so wide it would absorb a good deal of flood water. She went back to rescue what she could of her few tools, which she needed for her farming, and then other belongings. She didn't yet have a churn, and so far too few cows to make it worth while making butter. When she did obtain one, which she was determined to do as soon as possible, she would need to anchor it firmly. She suspected these floods were frequent, but a churn of the type Thomas had made for her could not be carried by her alone, and all the other people in the valley would be too busy saving their own things to help her. She began to think of making a simple cart or sledge which a bullock or a sturdy horse might pull, and in future floods this would save a lot of effort. And in the future she meant to be richer, and then she would have more possessions. How effective would a boat, a simple raft or even a canoe such as the natives used, be in another such situation? When the floods receded she'd have to think about some solution.

  One of her neighbours came up from his small house wincing.

  'What's the matter?'

  'Me arm. I think it's broke. Can ye do aught, Molly?'

  Molly thought back to her time on the Neptune, when she'd watched the surgeon deal with a sailor's broken leg. An arm couldn't be very different. She looked around and found a couple of straight sticks. First she felt the man's arm and heard the bones grating against one another. She tried to get them straight, and with the help of another man placed the sticks to hold the forearm steady, then she tore up the man's second shirt into strips and bound the arm tightly.

  Some of the others had been watching, and one, a young lad, asked if she could sew up a gash in his arm. Molly nodded. She'd brought her precious sewing needles with her, so she selected one and found some strong thread. The gash was long but not very deep, but it had bled copiously. Asking the man who had helped before to hold the lad's arm so that he didn't move, she ignored his gasps of pain and managed to sew the gash.

  'Ye'll 'ave ter be our nurse,' her helper said, and Molly laughed.

  'Only in emergencies.'

  They sat on the hillside and watched gloomily as the waters rose. It came right up to the window in Molly's cabin, and she resolved to build herself another higher up, as soon as she could afford it. The waters continued to rise, and it seemed as though they would be spending the night on the hillside. Fortunately the weather was warm, and they had all brought some food, but it would not last for many days. They had begun to ration themselves by the third day, but then help came in the form of aborigines in canoes selling dried kangaroo meat and fish, mainly eels.

  'But they won't take the coins we have,' one of Molly's nearest neighbours, whose cabin was closest to hers, said.

  'When they came to Newcastle they wanted clothes and blankets in exchange,' another said.

  'But I've only two blankets, and though the nights are warm, I need them.'

  'You have some spare clothes, don't you?'

  In the end a deal was reached, though the settlers had to let most of their spare clothing go in exchange for food. Luckily, by the time the food was all gone, the waters had begun to recede and they went back to clean their shacks where the mud and river water had left their mark. Some of the crops they had managed to sow had not been swept away by the flood, and though there was little available it was sufficient.

  *

  Molly began to think of how she might achieve her ambition of becoming a rich settler. Soon her seven years would be up, and she could add to the acres she had already been granted. There was plenty of land here. She obtained a churn, and her butter and cheese were in great demand.

  'How do we sell the cheese now we can't barter it for rum?' one of the girls who had been assigned to help her asked.

  'New coins, the Governor's sorted that,' she was told.

  It gave Molly an idea. The men, especially, would still want their rum.

  'We need rum shops,' she said.

  'Who'd run it?' the officer in charge asked.

  'I could. I used to work in the local inn back in England.'

  It took time and a good deal of persuasion, but eventually Molly was permitted to open a small shanty rum shop near the river. With Molly in charge it became very popular, and she was soon able to open another similar rum shop a short distance away. She acquired a horse in exchange for a couple of cattle, a sturdy cob that she could ride but which could also pull a sledge when another flood came along, and was gleeful as she rode between the two rum shops. It was rather different from her few bareback rides in Corvedale.

  Life was peaceful if arduous. The aborigines sometimes raided the farms, but when the settlers sent for help the soldiers soon drove off the natives. Molly, despite being almost sixty years old, gained a reputation for being able to do any tasks on the farms, from digging ditches to erecting fences. She grew rich, faster than she had thought possible, as she was permitted to keep the profits from her farming and the rum shops, of which she soon had several, and bought as much land as she could. She was given convicts to work for her, and all was going well. More people were settling in the valley. Governor Macquarie left and was replaced by Governor Brisbane. A new penal settlement was established at Port Macquarie.

  'They said too many had escaped and tried to get back to Sydney overland,' one of the soldiers said.

  Molly considered him. He was a handsome fellow, was Thomas Hunt, tall and dark, with a cheerful grin, and he brought them news from Newcastle and Sydney. He wasn't above helping, either, and he kept the convicts who were assigned to work on the farms in order. If she needed anything he was only too eager to find it for her. And it was some time since she had lived with a man.

  Would he want her? She was sixty, twice his age, but she knew she still attracted men. When she was serving in her rum shops several of them had sought her favours. But they were all old, and she did not fancy an old man. Back in Corvedale she had been considered pretty. She was still slender and her flesh was firm after her years of hard physical work. Her hair, long and curly, showed few strands of grey. There were lines on her face, she knew, but they were mainly laughter lines, and her cheeks, though roughened, were still rosy.

  'How long are you stationed here?' she asked when Thomas was helping her and some other convicts to build a new cabin, high enough to be out of the flood plain.

  'I've no wish to go back to Newcastle,' he said. 'I'd like to farm, here in Wallis Plains. I was born on a farm and I miss it. Being in the army isn't what I expected.'

  Molly nodded, and invited him to have supper with her. There was a cold cooked chicken, cheese, some raspberries which she was growing, and cream from the cows. Thomas ate hungrily, drank several tots of rum, and confessed he missed his mother's cooking. He was, Molly thought, just a boy, but when she put her hand on his knee he clasped it and bent to kiss it.

  'Is that the best you can do?' Molly asked, laughing, and bent towards him so that he had only to raise his head a few inches for her lips to be close to his.

  After that it was easy. He was only too eager to join her in her bed, and when, groaning, he said he'd have to leave her, but wished that night could last for ever, she laughed and said it could, if he were willing to brave the comments of his fellow soldiers.

  'What? Molly, you don't mean – ?'

  'Why not? I need a man, some jobs are too heavy for me, and I'm tired of telling old Jake that I don't want him slobbering all over me.'

  A month later, in March, they were married.

  *

  Thomas, having left the Corps, took over most of the field work. He planted several fruit trees
as a start of an orchard. Molly already had raspberries and strawberries growing. They decided not to plant vines, since neither of them knew how to look after them.

  'Later,' Molly said, 'when we see how the others get on with them.'

  She had more time now to devote to her rum shanties, which she was converting gradually to the sort of inns she recalled in England. They were profitable, and she bought land whenever she could.

  She and Thomas built a three-room cabin on the lower slopes of the hills. Never again, Molly thought, did she want her home flooded, especially as she was now able to furnish it more comfortably.

  'It's not like Elizabeth Farm,' she said, as Thomas and some convict helpers put the finishing touches.

  'Where's that?'

  'In Parramatta. The Macarthur home. Unless they are building something more magnificent at Camden.'

  'Macarthur? I hear he's causing more trouble since he came back from England.'

  'He always did and always will, however much they try to stop him. And no Governor is going to succeed.'

  Occasionally, when she was reminded of her time in Parramatta Molly wondered what had happened to Thomas there. Why did her men always have the same names, she wondered. First there had been William Gough and William Morgan. Vaguely she wondered whether they were still alive. If William Morgan was, this last marriage of hers must be another bigamous one. She shrugged. No one seemed to care. And she was very content with her new husband. He was young, vigorous in bed, and hard-working out of it. Life in Wallis Plains was better than anything that had gone before.

  Thomas kept in touch with his former mates in Newcastle, and regularly brought news of what was happening there and in Sydney back to Molly.

  'Remember those two they accused of stealing fruit last month?' he asked one day just after he'd been to Newcastle.

  'They couldn't prove it.'

  'Maybe not, but all the same they're planning to hang them. To set an example, they say. It's not as though they hadn't enough real crooks to hang.'