Why did the British Goverment Transport/send convicts to Australia?

Question

Hi just wanting some info for an assignemnt thank you.

Answer 1

i only know this as im australian and studied australian history intensely, firstly the law system in britain at the time was, Lets say ******. you could get trnsported to australia if you stole a item of clothing from your master, but if you were caught with a brothel, you would only get 6 months prison time. the legal system was extremely strict. there was a vast difference between the classes in britain, so the poor were more likely to commit crimes which in those days had much harsher penalties. now as cells filled up in britain and were flooded with desease and very inhumane conditions, britain needed to put there convicts elsewhere. they turned to america but america didnt want convicts shipped to there prisons. so as australia was first getting settled they decided they could send there prisoners abroad due to certain crimes. once they were deported, they had to serve a certain amount of sentence depending on their crime, (usually doing hard laboure eg, building roads or woman were sent to female factories washing clothes ect,) then they were allowed ticket of leave, certain conditions were put on them during this period. usually woman went to work as female hand on runs, men usually found work on runs as sheep rearing ect. however australia provided a better life then in britain due to good food and land ( being no shortage) this stopped around 1860 when australia hit gold.

Answer 2

Peter Ustinov once said that the problems in Australia didn't arise because half the first settlers were convicts, but rather because the other half were cops.

Every Australian school student is taught that the convicts were transported because of overcrowded prisons, but it doesn't take long to question the logic of that explanation.

Why would a regime that executed starving children for stealing a loaf of bread care about overcrowded prisons?

After Britain lost her richest colony in the American Revolution, it became increasingly important to stay one step ahead of her imperialist rivals when it came to securing access to the rubber, spices and other resources of the islands in the Indian Ocean.

Portugal, France and the Netherlands all had ambitions in the region and the best way for Britain to secure her interests was to establish a colony in Australia, where the native inhabitants had been unable to fight back the settlers.

What the new colony lacked, however, was an effective workforce. Governor Philip had tried to use the local aboriginal population on farming projects but with no success.

Consequently, the convicts of England, who were often guilty mainly of being poor, were sent half way around the world as a reliable supply of forced labour.

The jail overcrowding was a factor as well, but it was not as decisive as school children are led to believe.

Someone else mentioned the Tolpuddle Martyrs, and that's an important point as well. The hangings in Britain had tapered off as the government grew more and more fearful of inciting full-scale rebellion.

Nontheless, they felt a lot safer with their political opponents half-way around the world.

A very readable background source on this whole phenomenon is Robert Hughes' (The Times art critic) book, "The Fatal Shore". I've included a link to a good summary/review of the book below.

Good luck with your assignment.

Answer 3

Because it was an easy way to deal with convicts. Less final than hanging which had been the usual way of dealing with even the most minor of offences during much of the 18th century. It also had the advantage that they didn't need large numbers of guards or feeding as would have been the case had they been imprisoned in England. It got so-called malcontents out of the way to where they could not cause trouble (Tolpuddle Martyrs, for example)

Answer 4

We sent them to the North American colonies before we sent them to Australia! The colonists there kicked us out and we transported to the Caribbean for awhile until in 1788 we sent the first ones to Australia.

Basically I think it was just "out of sight, out of mind".

Answer 5

it was basically because the jails were full. People of all sorts of ages were sent to prison for all sorts of crimes. They couldn't be sent to America anymore because of the American Revolution so they had to look for somewhere else.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convictism_in_Australia

Answer 6

over population in prison led to deceases so to lighten the situation they shipped the sick, the mentally retarded, and the most dangerous criminals. that's why Aussies are the way they are....