Remember Me (25 page)

Tench smiled. White was always ranting about the scourge of venereal diseases. They were rife here of course, but Tench couldn’t believe as White did that the whole future of this new land was at risk because of it.

‘At least the
Juliana
brought news,’ Tench said cheerfully. ‘I am amazed to hear of the revolution in France. When I was in Paris I confess to being appalled by the excesses of the aristocracy. And good news too that King George has recovered from his madness. What do you know of this sickness he suffered?’

‘Very little. I’m just an old saw-bones,’ White shrugged. ‘But I am glad Farmer George is well again. As glad as I was to find the
Juliana
has enough rations for two years for her convicts.’

Tench smiled. That news had been the very best, a huge relief for everyone. It was just a shame they
hadn’t been told immediately, then there would have been less hostility towards the new arrivals. Now everyone was hoping that the
Justinian
from Falmouth, which was apparently fully loaded with stores and equipment, would arrive before the next huge influx of convicts.

But personally Tench was most grateful for the letters from home that were brought out by the ship. He felt he had stood up remarkably well to all the discomforts and deprivations of the settlement, but the sense of isolation from his friends and family had almost broken him at times. Indeed, if he was truthful, there had been times in the past two years when he feared he would never live to see them again.

‘Let’s drink a toast to the light at the end of a very dark tunnel,’ he suggested.

White filled their glasses. ‘Light to banish the darkness,’ he said, and chuckled. ‘Though with another three transports, and a thousand convicts on their way, we’ll need a great deal of light to banish that darkness.’

Mary and Will stood together at the harbour, quaking as they looked out across the bay to the
Neptune
and the
Scarborough
. They could see the longboats being lowered to bring the convicts ashore. But the terrible stench coming from the ships was enough for them to know that what they were about to see was going to be utterly appalling.

It had been bad enough on the previous day, helping the sick from the
Surprise
to the hospital. Many of those
convicts were so frail that they were unable to walk, having lain in their own vomit and excreta for most of the voyage. But today was going to be even worse.

The
Justinian
had arrived on 20 June, bringing joy to everyone in the settlement as she carried ample provisions and much-needed equipment, along with animals. She had left England some time after the
Surprise
,
Neptune
and
Scarborough
, the three transport ships carrying another 1,000 convicts. But she had overtaken them and made the voyage in only five months. Full rations were issued once again, and working hours put back to normal. The
Justinian
left again as soon as her cargo was unloaded, to take provisions to Norfolk Island.

On the 23rd the flag was struck again, but it was two days before the ship which had been signalled sailed into the bay. This was the
Surprise
, carrying 218 male convicts and a detachment of the newly formed New South Wales Corps.

It was shocking to hear that there had been forty-two deaths during the voyage, and another hundred were sick. And when the Reverend Johnson went aboard, he reported back that the convicts were lying almost naked in the holds, too sick to move or help themselves.

Mary and Will, along with many other convicts, had come forward willingly to help, but the sights and smells were so awful that many of the volunteers turned tail and ran. Few of the women helpers could stop themselves from crying openly. It was patently obvious that these new arrivals had been half starved and kept below decks
for almost the entire voyage. Many of them would never recover.

They had barely got those men washed, fed and under blankets, before the other two ships arrived. The Reverend Johnson went aboard the
Scarborough
, but was advised by the captain not to go below decks. The terrible stench coming from the holds was enough to deter him, and he didn’t even attempt to board the
Neptune
.

Tents had hurriedly been erected in front of the hospital, and there was food, water, clothes and medicine in readiness. The night before, as Mary tried to sleep, the smell from the ships at anchor made her stomach heave. It was a hundred times worse than anything she’d experienced on the
Dunkirk
. Although her heart went out to the poor souls in their suffering, she had felt she couldn’t possibly help again today.

But by dawn, the anger she felt at men putting profit before human life made her strong again. According to conversations she’d overheard between officers, transportation had been put out to private tenders. As the government offered £17 7s 6d a head for rations, the less the convicts were given to eat, the more food the ships’ owners could sell off once they arrived here. If convicts died en route, this made it even more lucrative.

Mary heard one officer comparing the transport owners unfavourably with the slave traders. As he pointed out, at least the traders were motivated to keep the slaves fit and healthy, for the better the condition they were in, the more they could be sold for. There was no such incentive even to keep convicts alive.

‘They say Captain Trail of the
Neptune
kept them all chained together,’ Will said in a subdued, shocked voice. ‘When one of the number died, the prisoners kept quiet about it to get the man’s rations. Imagine being so desperate for extra food that you’d lie next to a decomposing body!’

Mary didn’t answer him, for she knew from personal experience that she would probably do absolutely anything, however repulsive, to keep herself alive. Now she had two children to care for, her survival instinct was even stronger.

The loading of the longboats began. They watched the first few people climb slowly and hesitantly down the rope ladder, and even from the shore they could see how difficult it was for them. But they were the lucky ones; before long the sailors and troops were practically hurling people into the boats, as if they were sacks of goods, because they weren’t capable of walking, let alone climbing.

As the boat rowed in closer, a gasp went up, for the people were like skeletons. There was no eager expectancy on their faces, and they lolled as if close to death – indeed, one was dead on arrival. Two more were to take their last breath as they lay where they’d been placed on the wharf.

‘I can’t believe what I’m seeing,’ Will said, the horror in his eyes matching his cracking voice. ‘God save us from men that would let this happen.’

‘They aren’t men,’ Mary said in a loud, clear voice, feeling she could strangle those responsible with her own bare hands. ‘They’re beasts.’

Her anger fuelled her, stopped her considering the risk of infection to herself or even caring about the smell any more. The convicts were almost naked, their bodies covered with sores, wriggling maggots and faeces. She bent over one man to try to get him to drink some water, and he tried to cover his exposed penis because she was a woman.

‘I’ve seen plenty of those before,’ she said gently, touched that even in such a terrible state and close to death, he could still concern himself with propriety. ‘You’re safe now, there’s food and drink, water to wash, but you’ve got to fight to get better. Don’t you dare give up on me!’

‘Your name?’ he asked, his cracked lips splitting open with the effort to speak.

‘Mary,’ she said, wiping his face with a wet rag, ‘Mary Bryant. And yours?’

‘Sam Broome,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘God bless you, Mary.’

The sights grew worse as the day progressed, men with dysentery so bad that the fluids ran out of their bodies where they lay. Surgeon White said they were all suffering from scurvy too and ordered men to go out into the bush and pick quantities of the ‘acid berries’ he’d found had anti-scorbutic properties.

It seemed 267 people had perished before even reaching Port Jackson, and many others had died since. In fact the bodies of those who died after coming through the Heads were thrown overboard. Of the survivors, 486
were desperately sick, and most of them were not expected to recover. Mary heard as she helped one woman with a tiny infant that she hadn’t even had her shackles removed for the child’s birth. She was to be told that again several more times during the day.

Later that evening in the drawing room of Government House, Captain Phillip sat with Captain William Hill of the
Juliana
, and raged about the obscenity he’d seen that day.

‘I have spoken to the captains of the
Neptune
and the
Scarborough
,’ William Hill said. ‘In my opinion they should be hanged.’

William Hill was considered a hard man, but he had made sure the women convicts on his ship were well cared for. Some of their number had been old and feeble when they embarked, and he’d had a handful of deaths, but the rest of the women were probably better fed than they’d ever been in their whole lives. In Hill’s opinion it would have been far more humane for the courts back in England to have sent all these people to the gallows than to allow blackguards like Captain Trail of the
Neptune
to profit by their slow and painful deaths.

‘I understand there was a question of the prisoners on the
Scarborough
plotting to take over the ship,’ Phillip said, his small face purple with anger. ‘That would necessitate putting the ring-leaders in chains. But the conditions on the
Neptune
beggar belief. The ship should never have been considered seaworthy, she took on water constantly. The prisoners were actually up to their waists in water
for part of the voyage. No fumigation of their quarters, none of them brought up on deck for exercise and fresh air.’

‘I shall voice all this when I return to England,’ William Hill said forcefully, banging his fist on the table. ‘In my opinion these men are murderers, far worse species than you have in this colony.’

Arthur Phillip went over to the window. Below, the town was quiet, fires burning like little beacons in the darkness. He thought of all those lying in the hospital and the tents in front of it, and wondered how many more would be dead by dawn.

He was close to complete exhaustion. He had taken the position as Captain of the Fleet and then as Governor General because he believed he could make this penal colony a success. He had hoped that he could convert his criminal charges into men and women who would grasp the opportunities open to them and make something of themselves.

Sadly, he seemed to have failed. He knew now that the offer of free land at the end of their sentences would only be taken up by a few. Most were too lazy and incompetent to farm. The survivors of the Second Fleet would be prejudiced against the colony from the outset, and who could really blame them?

He was staring into the abyss again. Today he’d heard a Third Fleet was on its way with another 1,000 convicts. Many of his good officers would be returning home then. He’d done his very best, he’d tried to govern with humanity, but even a gardener couldn’t hope to grow
something of lasting beauty without basic equipment, good seed and fertile conditions.

‘You seem troubled, Arthur,’ William said from behind him. ‘Today’s events are no reflection on you.’

Phillip turned to Hill and pulled himself up erect. ‘I think they are a reflection on all of us,’ he said wearily. ‘On those who stand by and watch the guilty go unpunished, just as much as the guilty themselves.’

‘You’re very quiet this evening, Mary,’ Will said. It was Christmas Day, and he supposed she was brooding on Cornwall, and imagining her family sitting around the fire with a roast goose in their bellies. Lately he’d often heard her telling Charlotte about Fowey and her relatives there. As time went on she seemed to think about them more, rather than less.

‘It’s too hot to talk,’ she said, but smiled at him and affectionately reached out from her stool to pat his thigh. ‘It’s a wonder the little ’uns can sleep.’

It had been fearfully hot for weeks now, the animals and poultry had taken to lying down in any shade or water they could find. Will considered himself lucky to be off fishing every day, at least out in the bay there was always a breeze.

‘I thought maybe you were thinking of home,’ he said.

‘About how to get home,’ she corrected him, and grinned. ‘I think I know how to get the stuff we need.’

Will rolled his eyes with impatience. She never let up about escape. Even when she didn’t talk about it, he knew
she was thinking about it. He’d never known a woman as dogged as Mary.

Will was happy enough in the colony, though he would never admit that to anyone, least of all Mary. While they were all starving, he would gladly have gone, but the colony had got back on its feet since the Second Fleet arrived.

The help he and Mary had given the sick convicts had been noted by the officers, and as the convicts got better, they too were grateful for the kindness they’d been shown. They had nothing to reward him with except their admiration and loyalty of course, but that was enough for Will. It made him feel important.

He had the freedom to come and go as he liked within the settlement. He did a job he loved. He could treat Captain Phillip’s cutter as his own. He could get practically anything he wanted in exchange for fish. He even had a fair stash of money too, for the crews of the Second Fleet were all sick of salted pork and were glad to pay him for fish. But above all he enjoyed his status here: men looked up to him, women lusted after him. He had it all.

‘So where are you going to get it?’ he said wearily.

‘Captain Smith,’ she said.

Will was so surprised he nearly fell off his stool. Captain Detmer Smith, a Dutchman, had only been here a few days. He was the owner of a snow, the
Waaksamheyd
, that Captain Ball of the
Supply
had chartered while in Batavia. Smith had sailed in on 17 December with provisions for the colony, after an appalling voyage in which sixteen of his Malay crew had died of fever.