Researchers who have claimed this convict
There are currently 4 researchers who have claimed William Robertson
- Researcher (66)
- Researcher (Beth Kebblewhite)
- Researcher (K Martin)
- Researcher (Julie Keegan)
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Biographies
When fifteen-year-old William Robertson appeared in a Manchester court on 19 July 1824 it was already the fourth time he had been charged with a felony. While his two prior sentences at ages twelve and fourteen had been measured in months, this time he was sentenced to seven years transportation after being found guilty of stealing boots. William’s convict indent shows that he was employed as a cloth cutter and shoemaker, so perhaps he was stealing boots from his place of work. So many charges at such a young age suggest he may not have had the easiest start to life, and it would be a long time before his life became any easier.
William was sent to the hulk Leviathan for processing, where he would have been issued with clothing, bedding and mess supplies. William was well behaved and orderly here. He was then sent to a convict hulk to begin serving his sentence – first the Bellerophon on the Thames for a year, and then the York at Portsmouth for another year. His two years on the convict hulks would have been spent working 10-12 hours a day in work gangs. Interestingly, another fifteen year old, Thomas Ogden, appears as the adjacent record on the criminal register and all three hulk registers. They are always transferred on the same day up until William is transported to NSW. It is uncertain whether they were conspirators in crime or just happened to be processed together, however they must have known each other well by the end of William’s time on the hulk ships.
William left England on the convict ship Midas in October 1826. There was a long spell of damp weather during the voyage, which the surgeon felt contributed to the five deaths on board. The Midas arrived at Sydney Cove on 15 February 1827. When William arrived in NSW aged seventeen, he was 5 feet 5¼ inches tall and was described as being brown haired and hazel eyed. The sea voyage had left him with a ruddy complexion, and he had a distinctive scar from a cut across the right side of his upper lip.
On his arrival in Sydney, William was assigned to Simeon Lord of Sydney, a successful and wealthy ex-convict. This assignment seems not to have worked out, as by the November 1828 NSW Census, William (recorded as William Robinson) was instead employed as a Government Servant at the Barracks, Liverpool. Life at the Barracks would have been hard and monotonous, and William would have spent his days labouring in work gangs on agricultural or public works projects such as roads, bridges and buildings. His nights would have been spent locked up within the Barracks. It was probably while employed at the Barracks that William gained his experience as a brickmaker, a trade description that begins to appear in records from 1829. A brickmaking team would have been responsible for mining clay, running it a pug-mill, pressing the clay into brick-moulds, drying the bricks and finally firing them in a brick kiln. Each team would have consisted of around 15 men working together to produce 24,000 bricks per week.
A month after the 1828 census William was on the run from his employment as a labourer at the Liverpool Barracks. Convicts were known to abscond or absent for various reasons, through self preservation or defiance, to a wish for an adventure or wanting to run a personal errand that was not allowed. For most convicts, and probably also for William, absconding was a temporary experience that fairly quickly ended in re-capture. William’s next record is a year later, in October 1829, when he was assigned on six-month loan to a Mr. Brown in Bathurst, as a brickmaker.
William received his Certificate of Freedom 21 July 1831, some four and a half years after he arrived in the Colony, and having served the full seven years of his original sentence. By then he was 5 feet 10 inches; having grown 4 ½ inches since he arrived in Australia as a teenager. He was twenty-two, and still had plenty of time left to make a new start in the Colony.
-Kristie Martin
Submitted by Researcher (K Martin) on 13 July 2017
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Disclaimer: The information has not been verified by Claim a Convict. As this information is contributed, it is the responsibility of those who use the data to verify its accuracy. Research notes
Received Certificate of Freedom 21 July 1831-Source SRNSW 31/746; [4/4307; Reel 987].
Submitted by Researcher (66) on 9 February 2018
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William (Robson) Robinson, Free by Servitude, Married Jane Margaret Stilwell 20 March 1837 Goulburn. V1837/1791 21. Died 20 January 1887, Native Dog Springs. D.C.Born Manchester England. 6342/1887.
Submitted by Researcher (66) on 9 February 2018
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MANCHESTER GAZETTE.Saturday, July 31, 1824. Transported Seven Years – Wm Robertson, 15, and Thomas Ogden, 15, for stealing boots and shoes, from Thos. Taylor, at Oldham.
Submitted by Researcher (66) on 11 February 2018
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MANCHESTER MERCURY. August 3, 1824. MIDSUMMER QUARTER SESSIONS. To be transported seven years - Wm. Robertson, 15, and Thomas Ogden, 15, Shoes from. T. Taylor, at Oldham.
Submitted by Researcher (66) on 11 February 2018
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Disclaimer: The information has not been verified by Claim a Convict. As this information is contributed, it is the responsibility of those who use the data to verify its accuracy. Sources
- The National Archives (TNA) : HO 11/6, p.88
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