Sydney’s convict landmarks: The surviving relics of a city built by men transported to a new land
ALTHOUGH most of the Old Sydney Town that was built from 1788 until the 1840s - when transportation ceased - has vanished, it is still possible to see traces of where convicts toiled, lived and played.
ON Cadigal land the British built a city they named Sydney, a city built on the sweat of thousands of convicts.
Although most of the Old Sydney Town that was built from 1788 until the 1840s — when transportation ceased — has vanished, it is still possible to see traces of where convicts toiled, lived and played across the CBD and to the far boundaries of greater Sydney.
Some of the places created by convict hands have been transformed over the decades while others bear the marks of the colonial era.
By visiting some of these places it is possible to get a sense of what Sydney was like and get close to our convict past.
ALTHOUGH the Cadigal people were the first to live there — leaving behind marked trees, rock carvings and shell middens to attest to their presence — the area we now know as Sydney was transformed beyond recognition after the British established a penal colony here.
Apart from the dubious legality of taking the land from the indigenous people, the British also exploited the labour of prisoners, basically using convict labour as an alternative to slave labour.
The British sent prisoners here because of overcrowded prisons in Britain and the loss of the American colonies in the War of Independence.
Convicts built roads, buildings, bridges and wharves.
They were not always the most skilled, enthusiastic or productive workforce, but their labour was cheap and it allowed major building projects to be undertaken in the early years of Sydney that might otherwise have been too expensive.
By the 1830s a supply of labour from assisted immigrants made the use of convicts unnecessary.
The last shipments of convicts arrived in NSW in 1840 and transportation to Australia ended in the 1860s. The painting above shows Sydney around 1799-1802.
IN the early years of Sydney a ridge separated The Rocks and Sydney Cove from Millers Point and Cockle Bay.
In 1832 a call was put out for private contractors to construct “an opening through rock intersecting Argyle street, and for the erection of two bridges over such an opening at Cumberland street and Prince street.”
The government offered 30 convict labourers and as much explosives as necessary.
The project was soon abandoned. But after petitions from the public convict labourers had another go in 1843.
This time they removed a substantial quantity of rock, some of which was used in constructing part of the Semi-Circular Quay (later Circular Quay), but were unable to make the roadway flat enough for anything but foot traffic.
As transportation had ended there were fewer convicts available for the job, which was later finished using blasting powder in 1859.
UP to 1788 the rocky shores, small beaches or mudflats that lined Sydney Cove (Warran according to the Cadigal) were fabulous places from which to dive into the water or launch small canoes.
At least that was all the Cadigal needed it for. However, the British needed deep water close to shore or a jetty or a wharf so they could moor their ships, embark and disembark and offload cargoes.
From the moment the Europeans arrived they started to transform the shoreline with convict toil.
Wharves and jetties were built and areas of the mudflats were built up with retaining walls to stop shorefront buildings from being inundated at high tides or in rough weather.
In the early 1800s dredging and building up of the southern shore of Sydney Cove extended the shore even further and would join up with a convict-built stone wall that extended around the Domain along the eastern side of the cove around to Woollomooloo.
UP until 1819 when the Hyde Park Barracks took in its first inmates Sydney’s convicts often slept out in tents or roughly made huts, in the open air, had to pay for lodgings or stayed in servants’ quarters with free settlers or officers to whom they were assigned.
The Sydney Convict Barracks as it was known, was built by convicts for convicts using bricks made by convicts out of clay dug by convicts from clay deposits known as the Brickfields (between what is today Central station and Town Hall).
Convicts were locked in the barracks, sleeping on hammocks in dormitories. They were woken before dawn and marched out to work on projects around the town or set to work on a treadmill grinding grain at the barracks.
They returned before nightfall for muster and were locked up again. When transportation ended, thanks partly to the arrival of more immigrants to replace convict workers, the number of inmates declined.
The remainder were moved to Cockatoo Island and in 1848 the Barracks became the Female Immigration Depot.
ORIGINALLY commissioned by Governor Macquarie as a courthouse, complaints about the expense forced the design to be modified with the addition of a spire, to become a church.
Macquarie’s plans to build a grand church were shelved. Convict labourers worked on the church from 1820 to 1824. Porticos were also later added using convict teams.
COCKATOO Island was largely undeveloped until 1837 when Governor George Gipps set convicts to work transforming it into a place to house prisoners.
Over 10 years labour teams worked on creating prison cells, a guardhouse, granaries, residences for the officers and the Fitzroy Dock for ships.
Few prisoners dared to try escaping from the island because most couldn’t swim and those who could worried about sharks.
Prisoners were removed in 1869 and the island has since had various uses including a reform school and shipping yard.
The colony’s first purpose built hospital was a prefabricated structure on the western shore of Sydney Cove imported from Britain but erected by convict labourers.
In 1810 the new governor Lachlan Macquarie requested he be allowed to build a bigger hospital to cater to the growing colony.
Denied British government funds to build the hospital he put out a tender for contractors to build a hospital using convict labour.
Garnham Blaxcell, Alexander Riley and D’Arcy Wentworth took the contract in exchange for a monopoly on importing and distributing alcohol in the colony.
Known as the Rum Hospital, work began in 1811 and the three wings were completed in 1816. The contractors cut some corners and substantial repairs had to be made under the guidance of Francis Greenway.
The northern wing is now State Parliament, the middle wing was demolished in 1879 and rebuilt in a different style but remains a hospital, while the southern wing was later used as the Sydney Mint, making money from 1855 until 1926, but is now a bistro, conference centre and holds a Sydney Living Museums research library.
In the early years of the colony convicts worked on quarrying out sandstone to make the rocky area on the western shore of Sydney Cove livable for officers and later wealthy settlers.
The convicts themselves lived in tents or huts made from wooden slats daubed with mud, later poorly fired bricks were used that dissolved in the rain.
More substantial homes were later built for working class tenants in the 1840s using assigned convict labour. Some of these structures still survive.
In January 1788 Governor Arthur Phillip had to make do with a prefabricated tent to live in until in the convicts were set to the task of building him a more substantial home made from bricks and other material imported from Britain.
The foundations were laid in May and within a few months, the convict workers had built enough of the house for the governor to move in.
The house was demolished in 1845 after a new government house was completed (also built by convicts) but some of the footings of the original building can be seen at the Museum Of Sydney, built on the site of Sydney’s first Government House.
Convict labour also built Government House out at Parramatta which still stands.
When the First Fleet arrived here they found that there were some tracks that had been made by the indigenous people, but roads needed to be built to allow carts and wagons to travel more easily.
Convicts were employed on most of the road building projects. Some of these projects were no more than dirt tracks carved out of the wilderness, others involved putting down sandstone paving.
Convict labourers also built many of the bridges along the roads, some impressive stone bridges still stand around the city, including the Lennox Bridge at Parramatta.
While above ground there are only a select few places that resemble the ones built by convicts, underground there are remnants of many convict building projects underground.
One of them is the stream that was the colony’s first supply of fresh water, known as The Tank Stream.
There have also been many discoveries of the remains of convict built huts and other buildings found by archaeologists at construction sites across the city.
• Only one person on the First Fleet was skilled at making bricks — James Bloodsworth, a former London bricklayer who had been transported for forgery. He was responsible for designing and building many of Sydney’s first brick structures.
• Convicts not only laboured on the buildings but also designed some of them. Convicted forger and transportee Francis Greenway designed many of the buildings that convicts worked on.
• Another significant building constructed using convict power was the Macquarie Lighthouse. It was completed in 1818, but by the 1870s was beginning to crumble. A new lighthouse was built in 1881 near the site of the old one.
STANDING among Sydney’s gleaming glass and steel towers are relics of our convict past.
One is a small sandstone house nestled in the Rocks, one of the city’s most historic precincts.
Known as Cadman’s Cottage, it was built in 1816 by convict workers as part of the government dockyard on the western side of Sydney Cove.
When it was built the cottage, commissioned by Governor Macquarie, stood on a rocky shore with a small sandy beach.
It was never meant to be anything more than the cottage of a dockyard supervisor and person in charge of the government ships at the dockyard.
This person was a convict or ex-convict, so its design is simple and formal rather than ornate or decorative.
It is a typical example of what ordinary, government-built cottages would have looked like at the time.
Although it has been speculated that it could have been designed by ex-convict architect Francis Greenway there is no firm evidence of his hand in the project.
The name of the cottage comes from its best-known resident John Cadman, who lived there from 1827 until 1845, when he retired as government coxswain.
Born in 1772 in England, he was convicted of stealing a horse at Worcester in 1797 and sentenced to death, which was commuted to transportation for life. He arrived in Sydney on the Barswell in 1798.
He obtained a conditional pardon in 1814, by which time he had impressed people with his knowledge of boats, earning a position as assistant coxswain.
He received a full pardon in 1821, was master of the government cutter Mars in 1825 and was appointed coxswain at the dockyard in 1827, chief superintendent of government boats.
He held the position until Governor George Gipps’ term ended in 1845.
Gipps left the colony in 1846, by which time Cadman had retired and taken up a new career as a publican at Parramatta.
He died in 1847 and his epitaph on his tomb read,“ Not at his age wishing to serve any other Governor”.
The Water Police took over the cottage in 1846 and in 1865 it was acquired by the Sydney Sailor’s Home Trust and later resumed by the Maritime Services until it was restored and Became a tourism kiosk in 1972.
The Brickmasters by Ron Ringer (Dry Press Publishing)
The Colony: A History of Early Sydney by Grace Karskens (Allen & Unwin)
A Guide to Sydney Architecture by Graham Jahn (Watermark)
Dictionary of Sydney dictionaryofsydney.org
Sydney Living Museums sydneylivingmuseums.com.au
Department of the Environment: Heritage environment.gov.au/topics/heritage
Hyde Park Barracks sydneylivingmuseums.com.au/hyde-park-barracks-museum
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