John+Hudson

John Hudson

John was the youngest convict he was only four when he got his first job this is Johns story: I don't remeber having a mother or father. I'm an orphan. When I was four my first job was a chimny sweap, I had to climb up inside of the chimnys and clean the soot from the bricks. The chimnys were smokey and narrow, and sometimes I'd get stuck. The master sweep used to beat us sweaps if we didn't go up.He threw me out when summer came beause there was no work then.That's when I took to theiving.A eglish boy.John Hudson was just eight years old when he was sentenced to seven years tranportation for robbing a house .The court heard he stole .One lined shirt.Valued at ten shillings.Five silk stockings.Valve five shillings .One pistol.Value five shillings.Two aprons.Value two shillings.John was first sent to Newgate prison in Lodon and then I was imprison in the hulks.John was twelve when he boarded the Friendship.One of the ships of the First Fleet in 1787 was to sail to the penal conlony of New South Whale.Chained up below with men he would have to battle sea sickness heart disease and other diseases.Finallay after a journy of nearly eight months the First Fleet arrived in Sydney Cove.John Hudson was sent to Newfolk island prison soon after he arrived in Sydney in 1788 .Convicts feared the harsh treatment and conditions at this prison settelment.Prisoner.John Hudson was sentenced to 50 lashes for being outside his hut after 9 o' clock at night he was treated badlly his feet was licking with blood but still no care what he had stolen still with blood on his arms and still no respect given. Little Felons

By Rania

John Hudson Born: In the year of 1774. Month unknown.

Life: Jonh Hudson was an orphan, one of tens of thousands of unwanted infants abandoned by the poor. It's not known how Jonh survived for almost 9 years before he came to officail notice.Like most working class children, he was unable to read or write and kept no diary or written record of his life.Jonh spent his toddler years in an abandoned shed with his family and two others.It was full of loud commotion and stank.Somehow by the age of three,Jonh was orphaned.By this stage, the other mothers in the shed were so busy looking after their own children, John left and took up life on the streets.This lead John to become a chimneysweep.This role involved climbing the dusty insides of chimneys and brushing away the soot from the side of bricks. The most profitable aspect of the mastersweeps business was to extinguish flue fires.

To do this the mastersweep would force the children to climb up the chimneys and extinguish the fires from the outside.

Crime: In 1783 at the age of 9, John was charged with breaking and entering into a London house one October night and stealing with an acomplice, one linen shirt, five silk stockings, one pistol and two aprons.

Sentence: John first appeared in the Newgate Jail Register on the 20th of October 1783. Then on the 29th of October he was charged for breaking and entering and stealing. He was sentenced to seven years of transportation at the Old Bailey on the 10th of December 1783. On the 22nd of December 1783 his name first appears on the list of convicts to be transported to America.

John Hudson was sent aboard the Mercury from Newgate Prison on the 30th of March 1784. After the convict uprising on that vessel he was retaken on the 13th of April and finally arrived at the Dunkirk Hulk in June, aged ten.

John Hudson was discharged to the Friendship on the 11th of March 1787 as the youngest male convict on the First Fleet. He was sent to Norfolk Island on the 04th of March 1790 on the Sirius.

The Voyage from Portsmouth to Sydney Cove: The First Fleet of ships to carry convicts from England to Botany Bay sailed from Portsmouth, England, on the 13th of May, 1787.

When this place proved unsuitable for a settlement the fleet made its way a short distance up the Coast and on the 25th of January 1788, entered what is now known as Sydney Harbour and anchored at Sydney Cove.

Over 252 days, the First Fleet brought over 1500 men, women and and children half way around the world from England to New South Wales.

On the 13th of May 1787, the fleet of 11 ships set sail from Portsmouth, England, let by Captain Arthur Phillip, the historic convey, which later became known as the First Fleet, carried officers, crew, marines and their families, and convicts from Britain to a distant and little known land on the far side of the world.

The Fleet consisted of two Royal Navy escorts ships, HMS Sirius and HMS Supply. They accompanied six convict transports, the Alexander, Charlotte, Friendship, Lady Penrhyn, Prince of Wales and the Scarborough, and three store ships, the Borrowdale, Fishburn and Golden Grove.

The Fleet arrived first in Botany Bay on the 18th of January and was proved unsuitable especially as it lacked a fresh supply of water.

Then on the 26th of January, the Fleet arrived at a new anchorage at Sydney Cove in Port Jackson. The new site had everything our first settlers needed: deep water close to shore, shelter and fresh water. Phillip named the site Sydney Cove, after Lord Sydney the British Home Secretary. Today this date is still celebrated as Australia Day. What he did after Settling in the Colony: Hudson along with almost 50 other children, some convicts, other children of convict women and marines, boarded the First Fleet, arriving in the New Australian Colony in 1788. Hudson was by then aged 13. In Australia Hudson became another government statistic with only one more official reference, made three years later on Norfolk Island. Fear of starvation led to a division of the First Fleeters into two convict settlements. Half remained in Sydney, the others sailed to Norfolk Island, hundreds of miles off Australia's East Coast. Hudson was one of those transferred to Norfolk Island, a settlement that became notorious for child abuse. The last official reference to Hudson, a record of punishment set out for him, provides a clear enough picture that the conditions he endured were brutal. A single line entry records Hudson's punishment on Norfolk Island as "50 lashes for being ouside his hut", after 9pm.

By Luciana