Chapter 23
Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia. 1836
Joseph Gaven had been right when he'd told Jack Finch that he would not enjoy working on the Great North Road. To begin with, Jack was optimistic. A road brought about my downfall, he had thought. Perhaps a road will be my salvation.
It was not to be.
The Great North Road was to run from Sydney northwards to Newcastle where coal had been discovered in 1795. For the best part of a year, Jack endured the horrors of life in a road gang. His optimism had faded as soon as he was attached to an iron gang and realised that not only would he have to wear irons while he worked, but also while he ate and slept. He wasn't sure which was worse. Trying to walk and work with a heavy chain attached to your legs, the shackles constantly biting into the flesh, was unbearable. Trying to sleep, with the heavy irons always there to remind you of your former life of freedom, was almost unendurable.
Jack often dreamed that he was being sent back to Sydney to make shoes with Joseph. He had nothing in common with the other iron gangers. If they weren't savage and treacherous before they were assigned to the road, they certainly were now. All of them were twice-convicted, a fact which puzzled Jack as he had been convicted only once. He wondered whether there had been an administrative error and he had been assigned to the Great North Road by mistake. But he didn't make enquiries, for he had seen what happened to those who dared to make a complaint.
One gang had refused to continue working until their conditions were improved. The constant rubbing of the shackles on their legs had caused the skin to be worn away by friction to expose raw flesh. With no opportunities for their ulcers to heal, and no medical attention other than swabbing with salt water, many of the convicts had developed such serious infections that they feared for their lives. If the protesters had expected compassion, they were sorely disappointed. It didn't take long for them to be persuaded that having their skin scraped off by their irons wasn't so bad after all. The scourgers coaxed them with their cats and the soldiers influenced them with their bayonets.
Justice on the road was non-existent. A convict could be accused of insolence for simply glaring at a soldier or overseer. And if you were accused you were guilty. Jack not only watched his step he watched everything he did. He touched his forelock when a soldier came near, kept well away when fights broke out, and did just enough work with his shovel to avoid being punished for idleness but not quite enough to be thrashed by his fellow convicts for showing them up. His reward for keeping his nose clean came a few months later.
He was taken out of his irons and placed in an out-of-iron gang. Life was a little better without shackles, but not much. The soldiers were just as sadistic as before, and fellow convicts were often worse than the soldiers. Trusties convicts who were selected to be overseers seemed to think that the way to prove that they could be trusted was to treat their fellow convicts with more brutality than the soldiers did.
All through the winter, Jack had to sleep on the ground with only a single blanket to keep out the bitter cold. Every hour or two he would wake up, frozen to the marrow, and stand dangerously close to the fire to try to get some warmth back into his bones. Further north the winters were mild, but not in the mountains of New South Wales. There were times when his misery was such that he contemplated escape but the idea soon evaporated when he thought about those who had escaped. The ones who avoided recapture usually ended up as bushrangers, having to steal food and clothes in order to survive. The ones who were recaptured were often arrested by Aborigines, for the soldiers soon learned to take advantage of the black police tracker's skills. When caught, the convict was frequently wounded and stripped of his clothes to make him think twice about taking to his heels. Many, however, needed little persuasion to 'come quietly' for survival in the bush was not easy (unless you were an Aborigine). A diet of raw snake, grubs and roots was as debilitating as the diarrhoea which it caused.
Jack stood up and looked down at himself. Apart from a single manacle on one wrist, there was little to remind him of his time in a chain gang on the Great North Road. He was often asked why he insisted on keeping the manacle and he was never able to give a satisfactory answer he just felt obliged to keep it as a reminder. His shirt was not only nearly new, but freshly laundered and ironed as well. His trousers were a perfect fit and he'd wiped the mud from his shoes when he entered the building. In front of him was a small wooden desk almost completely covered by a huge ledger containing page after page of columns of figures. Having stretched his legs, Jack returned to the straight-backed, unpadded wooden chair and resumed his task of tallying the figures. He tried not to think about how quickly he could have performed the calculations in his previous life. They'd never believe me if I told them, he thought wryly.
When work on the Great North Road had been completed, Jack was sent to the jail at Port Macquarie, 270 miles north of Sydney. Once again he was puzzled, as the prison was reserved for life-sentence prisoners those who had committed a second offence whilst in New South Wales. He began to think that he would have been better off working in an iron gang when he learned that a man could get 100 lashes for simply trying to smuggle a letter out of the gaol. He had been there only a few days when all the convicts were assembled and asked to step forward if they could write and add up. Jack saw his chance and leaped forward. He was given a test and wasn't surprised to learn that he had satisfied the examiner and would now be regarded as a Special. On the following day he began the journey south to Newcastle.
Working as a clerk in a government office wasn't quite what he had been used to in England, but he felt much more at home than when he had been in the iron gang. As well as appreciating the less-demanding work, he was also grateful for the fact that he was now in the company of educated convicts with whom he could enjoy an intelligent conversation. He had to watch his tongue, however, for it was not difficult to make remarks which made his colleagues look at him with some suspicion. He could have kicked himself when he spoke about the glorious achievements of Victorian England the puzzled looks reminding him that it would be another year before Victoria became queen. And he felt a complete fool when, on one particularly hot day, he had said that he would kill for a can of cold beer.
In his current position and situation, Jack was able to learn far more about a convict's prospects than he had in the past. He learned that he was lucky not to have been sent to the nearby coal mines where convicts worked in appalling conditions and were lucky not to be killed by rockfalls, poisonous gases, or respiratory diseases. He found out that he would have been even worse off if he had been assigned to lime-burning duties. Just north of Newcastle, convicts were forced to gather and burn oyster shells to produce lime for the manufacture of cement. When water was added to make slaked lime, caustic fumes were given off which would burn the convicts's eyes. Jack also discovered a possible explanation for his being treated as if he was serving a life sentence. Educated men were regarded as potential troublemakers. As someone told him, 'They think that brains and a bit of learning make men want to change the world.' More importantly, however, he found out that if he behaved himself for another three years he could apply for a Ticket of Leave. This would allow him to work for himself in a particular district until his sentence was completed. Jack Finch decided that he would be the most well-behaved convict in Australia.