William Cawston

The Paterson region had been taken up early in the settlement of the area with land grants to ex military and settlers with enough capital. William probably arrived in the Paterson area by March or April a time when the farmers of the district were busy preparing their fields for wheat sowing.  Farmers often alternated their wheat crop with corn. William probably worked at preparing fields much as he had done in England.  When inclement weather struck William and other convicts like him would have been put to work husking maize, threshing wheat, stripping, shifting and curing tobacco, another crop found to excel in the district.  William's nine years as a convict would not have been easy. The settlers of the Hunter River often worked their assigned servants hard. If they proved recalcitrant, mutinous or insolent there was always the lash waiting or the suspension of precious supplies that the convicts had worked extra hours for.  The masters had great power over the convicts' lives. Some masters considered it an indulgence to allow their convicts to work up to 10pm at night to earn extra credit that they could exchange for tea, sugar or tobacco. Without this the convict would have had to exist on the rations provided by the Government which were inadequate. Settlers on the Paterson were also known to conduct Divine services on Sundays. Although this was a day free of labour the settlers/masters still had control over the convicts and they were expected to muster at midday to attend the services. This was done not only for moral benefit but to put a stop to the convict wandering further afield on this day and indulging in spirits, riot and ribaldry that rendered him unfit for duties the next day. The convict, who would be on foot could not hope to travel far enough unless he left at day break so the master used this as another means of controlling his work force. 

When William received his ticket of leave for the Paterson district he was then able to work to provide for himself. On the 15 February 1849, fourteen years after sentencing William received a Conditional pardon and in 1851 he married Elizabeth Kendall

John Charlewood

John Charlewood was convicted of stealing a sheep in Surry at the Surry Quarter Sessions on 9th February 1835. Also tried on this day for sheep stealing was thirty year old farm servant John Wicks.

Stealing livestock was considered a serious crime and they were both punished accordingly.  John was sentenced to Transportation for Life to Australia.  When he sailed on the Royal Sovereign on 29 July he left behind a wife, two daughters and a son.

While some convicts on board the Royal Sovereign suffered little illness, the Ships surgeon Francis Logan stated that John would not have lived another two days at sea. He had become dangerously ill with scurvy and was so weak he could not even sit up. His stomach was swollen, his skin discoloured and his appetite gone.  The surgeon administered Lime juice and preserved meat with the zest, the current cure for scorbutus, and when the ship landed John was sent immediately to the hospital on shore. 

Sydney hospital, situated in Macquarie Street was by some accounts a terrifying place. Jane in Alexander Harris' Settlers and Convicts would rather have died than to enter there again. She had been horrified to see 'scarcely dead dragged off their beds whilst yet warm and covered with some scant rag borne off to the cold and solitary dead house'.(p53).

John survived his ordeal and received a Ticket of Leave for the Bathurst district by the Bathurst Bench of Magistrates in September 1844. He received a Conditional Pardon in 1849

William Clay

Born in Warwick in 1815, William Clay was to spend the rest of his days far distant from Warwick's bustling streets where he worked as a shoemaker. After transportation he was sent to work  in the Hunter Valley's Patrick Plains and the isolated and lonely Liverpool Ranges . The Liverpool Ranges lay beyond the boundaries of the colony when William was assigned to John Earl at Patrick Plains.

John Earl  arrived on the 'Thalia' in the winter of 1823.  He brought with him upwards of £500 and extensive sheep farming experience.  He was granted 1500 acres and named his grant Glenridding. By spring of 1823 he had arrived at his holdings with his wife, children and assigned servants to begin sheep farming. 

In 1837, 14 years after his arrival in the colony, Earl was granted a license to depasture stock beyond the boundaries of the colony.  John Earl was just one of many who quickly took up the land beyond the boundaries (nineteen counties). These men were often wealthy and influential squatters but also among them were clergymen, school teachers, publicans – anyone in fact who could raise enough money for a flock and servants to keep them.  Governor Gipps introduced Squatter's licenses in 1836 and a £10 annual fee irrespective of the size of their tenure was charged.

Arriving in 1835, William Clay may have been sent to Liverpool ranges to work as a shepherd or hut keeper on one of Earl’s stations. These runs or stations  were manned by two shepherds who looked after the sheep by day and a hutkeeper who maintained the yards and hut and was responsible for the sheep by night. Their living arrangements would have been in a bark roofed hut close by the sheep enclosures. Usually the huts were 10 x 14 feet and made with split slabs. They consisted of one room with a dirt floor. A fireplace would be at one end and the sleep area consisted of beds made on sheets of bark lifted off the ground by logs of wood laid underneath the head and the foot. The lives of the hutkeepers and shepherds were often miserable and isolated.  Food and supplies were often inadequate and for those such as William who could read and write the shortage of reading material was another harsh reminder of their lowly position in the colony.

William Cocks  was a farm servant convicted of stealing sheep. He was assigned to J.S. Corse at the Vale of Clywdd in 1837 and was issued with a Ticket of Leave in 1844 for district of Bathurst and a Conditional Pardon in 1849.

William Collins was born in Essex and convicted of sheep stealing. A Ticket of Leave was  issued for district of Queanbeyan in 1844 and a Conditional Pardon issued 1850.

Israel Cottle was born in Shepton Mallett, Somerset. A shoemaker's boy, he was convicted of stealing poultry and on arrival in Australia was assigned to Cyrus Matthew Doyle at Windsor.

Israel Cottle died in 1888.

John Couch Of St. Austell, Cornwall.