ARTHUR PHILLIP, FOUNDER AND FIRST GOVERNOR OF NEW SOUTH WALES.
Captain Cook's "discovery" of New Holland was turned to no account until a
generation later, and to Sir Joseph Banks more than to any other man
belongs the credit of the suggestion. In 1779 a commission of the House of
Commons was appointed to inquire into the question of transportation,
then, in consequence of the loss of the American colonies, an important
problem needing a speedy solution. At this period, indeed up to a much
later time, the English prison administration was notoriously bad. The
gaols were crowded and filthy, and there was no discipline; no system
governed them other than the system of rascality practised by many of the
gaolers.
Mr. Banks (as he then was) gave evidence before the House of Commons, and
strongly urged the establishment of a penal colony at Botany Bay, giving
his opinion, of course, as the botanist who had accompanied Cook and had
seen what prospect there was of establishing a settlement at New Holland.
Banks from this time till his death took a keen interest in the New South
Wales colonizing scheme, and had much influence for good in the future of
the colony. He was a man of independent means, and there is not the
slightest reason nor the least evidence to the contrary, to doubt his
perfect disinterestedness in all that he did. But when President of the
Royal Society the caricaturists and the satirists had little mercy on him,
believing him more courtier than scientist. Peter Pindar's _Sir Joseph
Banks and the Emperor of Morocco_ is only one of the many satires of which
Banks was the principal victim.
The proposals of one Jean Maria Matra and of Admiral Sir George Young for
forming new colonies to take the places of those lost to us in America,
with the evidence and subsequent advocacy of Banks, ultimately led to the
Government's decision to colonize New South Wales. But it was not until
1786 that that decision was reached, and a year later still when Captain
Arthur Phillip was given a commission as captain of the expedition and
governor of the new colony.
All that is known of Phillip prior to his appointment is contained in a
semi--official account of the expedition called _Phillip's Voyage,_
published about a hundred years ago. We are here told that his father was
a German teacher of languages who settled in London, his mother the widow
of Captain Herbert, of the royal navy, and that young Phillip was born in
Bread Street, in the parish of All Hallows, London.
It may be presumed that, by the influence of his mother's connections
through her first marriage, he was sent to Greenwich School, and thence
into the navy, where he began his career under Captain Michael Everett at
the outbreak of war in 1755.
At twenty-three he was serving as a lieutenant in the _Stirling Castle_,
and later on, when peace came, after a turn of farming in the New Forest,
he volunteered to serve under the Portuguese Government. Leaving the
Portuguese service with distinction, he rejoined the English navy in 1778,
and the Admiralty at once made him master and commander of the _Basilisk_,
fireship, soon afterwards appointing him post captain. He commanded the
_Ariadne_, frigate, later on the _Europe_, and was then selected for the
command of the first fleet to New South Wales. All the remarkable story of
the colonizing expedition does not belong to this chapter on Phillip, but
it runs through the lives of the four naval governors.
Lord Sydney, the Home Secretary of the day, selected Phillip, and Lord
Howe, then at the head of the Admiralty, expressed this opinion on the
appointment:--
"I cannot say the little knowledge I have of Captain Phillip would
have led me to select him for a service of this complicated
nature; but as you are satisfied of his ability, and I conclude he
will be taken under your direction, I presume it will not be
unreasonable to move the King for having His Majesty's pleasure
signified to the Admiralty for these purposes as soon as you see
proper, so that no time may be lost in making the requisite
preparations for the voyage."
It took a long time to prepare the expedition, and when the fleet sailed
from Spithead on May 13th, 1787, the transports had been lying off the
Motherbank with their human freight on board for months before; yet,
through the neglect of the shore officials, they sailed without clothing
for the women prisoners and without enough [Sidenote: 1787]
cartridges to do much more than fill the pouches of the marine guard.
There were eleven sail altogether: the _Sirius_, frigate, the _Supply_,
tender, six transports, and three storeships. The frigate was an old East
Indiaman, the _Berwick_. She had been lying in Deptford Yard, had been
burnt almost to the water's edge not long before, and was patched up for
the job. The _Supply_ was a brig, a bad sailer, yet better in that respect
than the _Sirius_, though much overmasted; she was commanded by Lieutenant
Ball.
The expedition was a big affair, and it seems curious enough nowadays that
so little interest was taken in it. There were more than a thousand people
on board, and one would have thought that if the departure of the convicts
did not create excitement, the sailing of the bluejackets and the guard of
about 200 marines bound for such an unknown part of the world would have
set Portsmouth at any rate in a stir. But the Fitzherbert scandal, the
attack on Warren Hastings, and such-like stirring events were then town
talk, and at that period there were no special correspondents or, for the
matter of that, any newspapers worth mentioning, to work up popular
excitement over the event.
On the way out the fleet called at Teneriffe, at Rio, and at the Cape to
refresh; and Phillip's old friends, the Portuguese, gave him a hearty
welcome and much assistance at the Brazils. When the ships reached Botany
Bay in January, 1788, the voyage of thirty-six weeks had ended without
serious misfortune of any kind. Lieutenant Collins, of the Marines,
Judge-Advocate and historian of the expedition, thus sums up the case:--
"Thus, under the blessing of God, was happily completed in eight
months and one week a voyage which, before it was undertaken, the
mind hardly dared to contemplate, and on which it was impossible
to reflect without some apprehension as to its termination. This
fortunate completion of it, however, afforded, even to ourselves,
as much matter of surprise as of general satisfaction; for in the
above space of time we had sailed 5021 leagues, had touched at the
American and African continents, and had at last rested within a
few days' sail of the antipodes of our native country without
meeting with any accidents in a fleet of eleven sail, nine of
which were merchantmen that had never before sailed in that
distant and imperfectly explored ocean. And when it is considered
that there was on board a large body of convicts, many of whom
were embarked in a very sickly state, we might be deemed
peculiarly fortunate that of the whole number of all descriptions
of persons coming to form the new settlement only thirty-two had
died since their leaving England, among whom were to be included
one or two deaths by accidents, although previous to our departure
it was generally conjectured that before long we should have been
converted into an hospital ship. But it fortunately happened
otherwise; and the spirits visible in every eye were to be
ascribed to the general joy and satisfaction which immediately
took place on finding ourselves arrived at that port which had
been so much and so long the theme of our conversation."
[Illustration: CAPTAIN ARTHUR PHILLIP. From an engraving after a portrait
by F. Wheatly, prefixed to "The Voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay"
[London, 1789]. _To face p_. 78.]
To understand fully what Phillip's good management had effected, without
going into detail, it may be said at once that no succeeding voyage, in
spite of the teachings of experience, was made with such immunity from
sickness or mutiny. The second voyage, generally spoken of as that of the
second fleet, for example, was so conducted that Judge-Advocate Collins
says of it:--
"The appearance of those prisoners who did not require medical
assistance was lean and emaciated. Several of these miserable
people died in the boats as they were rowing on shore or on the
wharf as they were being lifted out of the boats, both the living
and the dead exhibiting more horrid spectacles than had ever been
witnessed in this country. All this was to be attributed to
confinement, and that of the worst species--confinement in a small
space and in irons, not put on singly, but many of them chained
together. On board the _Scarborough_ a plan had been formed to
take the ship.... This necessarily, on that ship, occasioned much
future circumspection; but Captain Marshall's humanity
considerably lessened the severity which the insurgents might
naturally have expected. On board the other ships the masters, who
had the entire direction of the prisoners, never suffered them to
be at large on deck, and but a few at a time were permitted there.
This consequently gave birth to many diseases. It was said that on
board the _Neptune_ several had died in irons; and what added to
the horror of such a circumstance was that their deaths were
concealed for the purpose of sharing their allowance of provisions
until chance and the offensiveness of a corpse directed a surgeon
or someone who had authority in the ship to the spot where it
lay."
Phillip's commission made him governor-in-chief, and captain-general over
all New South Wales, which then meant from Cape York, in the extreme north
of Australia, to the "south cape of Van Diemen's Land," then, of course,
supposed to be part of the main continent. He was ordered to land at
Botany Bay and there form the settlement, but was given a discretionary
power to change the site, if he considered it unsuitable.
[Illustration: A VIEW OF BOTANY BAY. From an engraving from a drawing by
R. Cleveley, in "The Voyage of Governor Phillip to Botany Bay" [London,
1789].]
Recognizing the unsuitability of Botany Bay, Phillip, before all the ships
of the first fleet were arrived, set out in an [Sidenote: 1788]
open boat to explore the coast; and so, sailing northward, entered that
bay only mentioned by Cook in the words before quoted, "abrest of an open
bay," and by Hawkesworth (writing in the first person as Cook) thus:--
"At this time" (noon May 6th, 1770) "we were between two and three
miles from the land and abrest of a good bay or harbour, in which
there appeared to be a good anchorage, and which I called Port
Jackson."
Perhaps, when Phillip's boat passed between the north and south heads of
Port Jackson, he exclaimed what has so often been repeated since: "What a
magnificent harbour!" And so on the 26th January, 1788, Sydney was founded
upon the shores of the most beautiful bay in the world.
Phillip's "eye for ground" told him that the shores of Port Jackson were a
better site for a settlement than the land near Botany Bay, but he had no
sooner landed his people than the need for better soil than Sydney
afforded was apparent. Then began a series of land expeditions into the
interior, in which, with such poor means as these pioneers possessed, the
country was penetrated right to the foot of the Blue Mountains. The first
governor, despite the slight foothold he had established at Sydney--little
better such a home than the deck of a ship--persistently searched for good
land, and before his five years of office had expired agricultural
settlement was fairly under way.
On the seaboard, although he was almost without vessels (scarcely a decent
open boat could be mustered among the possessions of the colonists), with
the boats of the _Sirius_ the coast was searched by Phillip in person as
well as by his junior officers.
Major Ross, who commanded the Marines, and who was also
lieutenant-governor, described the settlement thus:--
"In the whole world there is not a worse country than what we have
yet seen of this. All that is contiguous to us is so very barren
and forbidding, that it may with truth be said, 'Here nature is
reversed, and if not so, she is nearly worn out'; for almost all
the seed we have put in the ground has rotted, and I have no doubt
it will, like the wood of this vile country, when burned or rotten
turn to sand;"
Captain Tench, one of Ross' officers, wrote:--
"The country is very wretched and totally incapable of yielding to
Great Britain a return for colonising it.... The dread of
perishing by famine stares us in the face. [Sidenote: 1792]
The country contains less resources than any in the known world;"
and the principal surgeon, White, described the colony in these words:--
"I cannot, without neglect of my duty to my country, refrain from
declaring that if a 'favourable picture' has been drawn, it is a
'gross falsehood and a base deception.'"
Yet shortly before Phillip left it, in 1792, Collins says:--
"In May the settlers were found in general to be doing very well,
their farms promising to place them shortly in a state of
independence of the public stores in the articles of provisions
and grain. Several of the settlers who had farms at or near
Parramatta, notwithstanding the extreme drought of the season
preceding the sowing of their corn, had such crops that they found
themselves enabled to take off from the public store some one, and
others two convicts, to assist in preparing their grounds for the
next season."
In June, according to the same authority, the ground sown with wheat and
prepared for maize was of sufficient area, even if the yield per acre did
not exceed that for the previous season, to produce enough grain for a
year's consumption.
The last returns relating to agriculture, prepared before Phillip left,
show that the total area under cultivation was 1540 acres, and the
previous year's returns show that the area had doubled as a result of the
year's work. Besides this, considerable progress had been made with public
buildings; and the convict population, which by the arrival of more
transports had now reached nearly 4000 souls, were slowly but surely
settling down as colonists.
With a thousand people to govern, in the fullest meaning of the word, and
a desolate country, absolutely unknown to the exiles, to begin life in,
Phillip's work was cut out. But, more than this, the population was
chiefly composed of the lowest and worst criminals of England; famine
constantly stared the governor in the face, and his command was increased
by a second and third fleet of prisoners; storeships, when they were sent,
were wrecked; many of Phillip's subordinates did their duty indifferently,
often hindered his work, and persistently recommended the home Government
to abandon the attempt to colonize. Sum up these difficulties, remember
that they were bravely and uncomplainingly overcome, and the character of
Phillip's administration can then in some measure be understood.
With the blacks the governor soon made friends, and such moments as
Phillip allowed himself for leisure from the care of his own people he
chiefly devoted in an endeavour to improve the state of the native race.
[Illustration: VIEW OF THE SETTLEMENT OF SYDNEY COVE, PORT JACKSON, 20th
AUGUST, 1788. Drawn by E. Dayes from a sketch by J. Hunter. From "An
Historical Journal of Transactions at Port Jackson," by Captain John
Hunter. _To face p_.84.]
As soon as the exiles were landed he married up as many of his male
prisoners as could be induced to take wives from the female convicts,
offered them inducements to work, and swiftly punished the lazy and
incorrigible--severely, say the modern democratic writers, but all the
same mildly as punishments went in those days.
When famine was upon the land he shared equally the short commons of the
public stores; and when "Government House" gave a dinnerparty, officers
took their own bread in their pockets that they might have something to
eat.
As time went on he established farms, planned a town of wide, imposing
streets (a plan afterwards departed from by his successors, to the
everlasting regret of their successors), and introduced a system of land
grants which has ever since formed the basis of the colony's land laws,
although politicians and lawyers have too long had their say in
legislation for Phillip's plans to be any longer recognizable or the
existing laws intelligible.[B]
[Footnote B: A leader of the Bar in New South Wales, an eminent Q.C. of
the highest talent, has publicly declared (and every honest man agrees
with him) that the existing land laws are unintelligible to anyone, lawyer
or layman.]
The peculiar fitness of Phillip for the task imposed on him was, there is
little doubt, due largely to his naval training, and no naval officer has
better justified Lord Palmerston's happily worded and well-deserved
compliment to the profession, "Whenever I want a thing well done in a
distant part of the world; when I want a man with a good head, a good
heart, lots of pluck, and plenty of common-sense, I always send for a
captain of the navy."
A captain of a man-of-war then, as now, began at the bottom of the ladder,
learning how to do little things, picking up such knowledge of detail as
qualified him to teach others, to know what could be done and how it ought
to be done. In all professions this rule holds good, but on shipboard men
acquire something more. On land a man learns his particular business in
the world; at sea his ship is a man's world, and on the completeness of
the captain's knowledge of how to feed, to clothe, to govern, his people
depended then, and in a great measure now depends, the comfort, the lives
even, of seamen. So that, being trained in this self-dependence--in the
problem of supplying food to men, and in the art of governing them, as
well as in the trade of sailorizing--the sea-captain ought to make the
best kind of governor for a new and desolate country. If your sea-captain
has brains, has a mind, in fact, as well as a training, then he ought to
make the ideal king.
Phillip's despatches contain passages that strikingly show his peculiar
qualifications in both these respects. His capacity for detail and
readiness of resource were continually demonstrated, these qualifications
doubtless due to his sea-training; his sound judgment of men and things,
his wonderful foresight, which enabled him to predict the great future of
the colony and to so govern it as to hold this future ever in view, were
qualifications belonging to the _man_, and were such that no professional
training could have given.
Barton, in his _History of New South Wales from the Records_, incomparably
the best work on the subject, says: "The policy of the Government in his
day consisted mainly of finding something to eat." This is true so far as
it goes, but Barton himself shows what finding something to eat meant in
those days, and Phillip's despatches prove that, although the food
question was the practical every-day problem to be grappled with, he, in
the midst of the most harassing famine-time, was able to look beyond when
he wrote these words: "This country will yet be the most valuable
acquisition Great Britain has ever made."
In future chapters we shall go more particularly into the early life of
the colony and see how the problems that harassed Phillip's administration
continued long after he had returned to England; we shall then see how
immeasurably the first governor was superior to the men who followed him.
And it is only by such comparison that a just estimate of Phillip can be
made, for he was a modest, self-contained man, making no complaints in his
letters of the difficulties to be encountered, making no boasts of his
success in overcoming them. The three sea-captains who in turn followed
him did their best to govern well, taking care in their despatches that
the causes of their non-success should be duly set forth, but these
documents also show that much of their trouble was of their own making. In
the case of Phillip, his letters to the Home Office show, and every
contemporary writer and modern Australian [Sidenote: 1801-14]
historian proves, that in no single instance did a lack of any quality of
administrative ability in him create a difficulty, and that every problem
of the many that during his term of office required solution was solved by
his sound common-sense method of grappling with it.
He was wounded by the spear of a black, thrown at him in a
misunderstanding, as he himself declared, and he would not allow the
native on that account to be punished. This wound, the hard work and
never-ending anxiety, seriously injured the governor's health. He applied
for leave of absence, and when he left the colony had every intention of
returning to continue his work, but his health did not improve enough for
this. The Government accepted his resignation with regret, and appointed
him to the command of the _Swiftsure_, with a special pension for his
services in New South Wales of £500 a year; in 1801 he was promoted
Rear-Admiral of the Blue, in 1804 Rear-Admiral of the White, in 1805
Rear-Admiral of the Red, in 1809 Vice-Admiral of the White, and on July
31st, 1810, Vice-Admiral of the Red.
He died at Bath on August 31st, 1814, and was buried in Bathampton Church.
For many years those interested in the subject, especially the New South
Wales Government, spent much time in searching for his burial-place, which
was only discovered by the Vicar of Bathampton, the Rev. Lancelot J. Fish,
in December, 1897, after long and persistent research.
Those by whom the services of the silent, hard-working, and self-contained
Arthur Phillip are least appreciated are, curiously enough, the Australian
colonists; and it was not until early in 1897 that a statue to him was
unveiled in Sydney. At this very time, it is sad to reflect, his last
resting-place was unknown. Phillip, like Cook, did his work well and
truly, and his true memorial is the country of which he was practically
the founder.