Maritime negotiation

Industrial relations involving seamen in Australia have a reputation for being robust. The tale of the Persia indicates that this situation has a long history.

The story begins with an incident during the voyage when two sailors broke into the single women's quarters. Apparently the Captain decided that the offenders would be dealt with at the end of the voyage.

True to his word, Captain Smith contacted the authorities in Gladstone on the day the ship anchored to have the two men taken into custody. When the local police came on board, they were surrounded by more than a dozen crewmates of the accused, who challenged that if the locals were to arrest any of them it would mean taking them all.

The matter was settled without violence and 15 men, all from the same watch on the Persia, were taken off the ship, tried for insubordination and sentenced to three months imprisonment. They were duly transferred to Brisbane under guard on another vessel.

It was claimed that the arrest of the first two offenders had been used by their mates as a convenient excuse and the threats to the Police were simply a ruse to get themselves arrested as well. The men were reportedly unhappy with the Mate who oversaw their watch and decided that a spell in Brisbane's new Green Hills Gaol (on the site of the Petrie Terrace Barracks entertainment complex) would be preferable to continuing the voyage to China and then on to South America.

This cynical view was reinforced when after serving a little under a month of their sentence, the men were released into the custody of Captain Smith and returned to the Persia. The Courier of 28 December carried a report of the almost inevitable outcome.

It is amazing that this trouble did not boil over at sea between Plymouth and Gladstone with terrible consequences for the immigrants (and for our family history!)

A full life at sea

The voyage of the Persia from Plymouth to Brisbane in 1861 was considered a good one in that "only" 20 of the 454 emigrants who embarked died en route. The Moreton Bay Courier reported that "on the whole they had been well treated and well cared for on the passage—every one of them speaking in the highest commendation alike of captain (Smyth), doctor, and chief officer."

The doctor in question was Surgeon-Superintendent Clarence Chapman. The Surgeon-Superintendent was to responsible for the welfare of the immigrants as the agent of the ship's hirer (in this case, the Queensland Goverment). In theory at least, Dr Chapman had the authority to over-rule Captain Smyth in circumstances where the business interests of the ship's owners conflicted with the needs of the people on board.

In some cases, the Surgeon-Superintendent was supported by a Matron who took principal responsibility for "women's issues" with a particular focus on the moral well-being of the single women.

To ensure the Surgeon-Superintendent carried out his duties with due care and attention, his fee was based upon the number of "statute adults" disembarked alive at the end of the journey. For delivering 438 persons including 4 born at sea, Chapman would probably have earned £387.10.0 (since children were paid as fractions).

It would not have been easy to secure the services of a suitably qualified and experienced medical practitioner prepared to be on call for more than 400 patients 24 hours a day for up to 100 days in very challenging conditions. In an ordinary voyage, he might need to deal with difficult births, various infectious "fevers", the consequences of poor nutrition and questionable hygiene, and have to perform surgery for accidental injuries. Hiring the "wrong" man as Surgeon-Superintendent could have literally fatal consequences.

Unless a young doctor undertook the role as a means of moving to the colonies to begin a new life, he faced another 100 day journey home before he could resume his usual practice. Little wonder then that migration agents needed to devise ever more elaborate schemes to make it attractive for a proven man to undertake more than one trip.

In this respect, the immigrants of the Persia were very well served. In 1861, Dr Chapman was making his sixth voyage from England to Australia in just eight years.

• July 1854 Plantagenet 247 adults and 72 children (1 death) to Sydney
• April 1855 Speedy 302 adults and 114 children (2 deaths) to Sydney
• July 1856 Ben Nevis 269 adults and 65 children (no deaths) to NSW
• September 1857 Admiral Lyons 371 adults and 77 children (12 deaths) to NSW
• December 1858 John and Lucy 334 adults and 59 children (no deaths) to Melbourne

From The Sydney Morning Herald 16 Sept 1857

Dr Chapman had not lazed away 1859-60 at home. He sailed aboard the Euxine carrying the wives and families of soldiers to India. In a 101 day journey, only one of 224 adults was lost, but 74 of the 238 children who boarded the vessel on 14 October 1859 did not complete the journey to be reunited with their fathers.

When the Persia sailed from Brisbane for China in December 1861, Dr Chapman remained on board. He served as Surgeon-Superintendent when she transported a large group of indentured labourers to Georgetown (Guyana) to work as cane cutters.

After his eventual return to England, Clarence Chapman undertook at least three four more voyages to Australia. He arrived in Port Adelaide aboard the Mary Shepherd in April 1863, then in Sydney on the Castle Eden in November 1864, and sailed into Sydney once again on 14 October 1865 aboard the Venilia.

In July of 1870, Clarence Chapman was commended in the Melbourne press for his work in bring more than 400 new settlers to Victoria aboard the Corona

New insight into an early arrival

Until a few days ago, I believed that our 3xgreat grandmother Margaret HEATHWOOD arrived in Queensland on December 3 1861. That is the date written at the top of the passenger list of the Persia, and so it is the one included in the index created by the Queensland State Archives.

The recent availability on-line of the images of many passenger lists for voyages to Moreton Bay provides an ideal opportunity to revisit some things that we thought we knew. And it is proving a very interesting exercise.

The second last line of the list for the Persia includes a surprising reference to "Arrived Port Curtis".

It is extremely unlikely that the whole complement of more than 400 immigrants would have sailed on to Central Queensland after berthing in Brisbane. Was the Persia one of the first vessels to enter Queensland through Torres Strait so that its first landfall was not Moreton Bay as I had assumed?

A search through The Moreton Bay Courier for December (and then November) 1861 revealed that the answer was "no" and "yes". After rounding the Cape of Good Hope, the Persia had followed the conventional route south of Australia but then by-passed Port Phillip, Port Jackson and Moreton Bay and sailed directly on to Port Curtis. She dropped anchor off the township of Gladstone in the morning of Saturday 16 November 1861.

Approximately half of the immigrants disembarked there and secured employment in the surrounding districts. It was reported that agents for employers in Rockhampton were offering a £10 premium on annual wages to induce servant girls to move on from Gladstone where the going rate was only £25 per annum plus board and lodgings.

Margaret HEATHWOOD was apparently unmoved by these offers and she was among those (mainly Irish) immigrants who remained on board for the trip south to Moreton Bay arriving to begin her new life, as I had always known, on 3 December.