Wednesday, September 16, 2009 Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. The American Revolution ended the British practice of transporting convicts to the American colonies and threw Great Britain’s criminal justice system into chaos. With no place to send its convicted felons, and without a back-up plan in place, England suddenly [...]
Thursday, September 10, 2009 Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. Beginning in 1770, English courts handed out fewer transportation sentences to its convicted felons. The growing unease in the American colonies over British rule and its use as a destination for convicts probably had something to do with this trend. [...]
Thursday, September 3, 2009 Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. In 1739, Governor William Gooch of Virginia complained to the British government that “The great number of Convicts yearly Imported here, and the impossibility of ever reclaiming them from their vicious habits have occasioned a vast Charge to the Country.” [...]
Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. In a letter to the Maryland Gazette on July 30, 1767, one writer defended importing convicts from Great Britain by citing how many of them reform their ways: [A] few Gentlemen seem very angry that Convicts are imported here at [...]
Thursday, August 20, 2009 Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. Most transported convicts did not make it back to England. Escape was difficult, and the passage back to England was expensive. Even if some convicts were able to return to England after serving out their 7- or 14- year term, [...]
Thursday, August 13, 2009 Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. Samuel Ellard grew up in Spitalfields and was apprenticed to a butcher. He completed his time as an apprentice and worked in the Spitalfields Market for various people until he was arrested on March 9, 1741 for robbing a cheese [...]
Wednesday, August 5, 2009 Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. Most of the convicts who were sent to America from Great Britain stayed in America, but some made it back to their home country, legally or illegally. Convicts who escaped, ran away, or purchased their freedom soon after landing in [...]
Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. Lots of convict servants tried to run away from their owners in an attempt to escape harsh treatment from them or to regain their freedom and possibly return to Great Britain, or both. Almost as soon as the practice of [...]
Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. On July 15, 1751 the New-York Gazette, or Weekly Post-Boy reported that Onesiphorus Lucas was executed in Annapolis in a follow-up to a newspaper story that appeared two weeks earlier about how Lucas was found guilty of burglary and sentenced [...]
Filed in 5. In the New World | Also tagged Assault, Attempted Murder, Branding, Burglary, Counterfeiting, Execution, Forgery, Maryland, Pillory, Prisons and Jails, Robbery, Virginia | Note: This post is part of a series on Convict Transportation to the American colonies. Plantation owners who purchased the labor of convict servants also acquired complete legal control over them. They could rent the service of the convicts out to another plantation owner. They could transfer ownership of the convict servants to someone else [...]
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