“The “employment” at Port Arthur consisted chiefly of agriculture,
ship-building, and tanning. Dawes, who was in the chain-gang, was put to
chain-gang labour; that is to say, bringing down logs from the forest,
or “lumbering” timber on the wharf. This work was not light. An
ingenious calculator had discovered that the pressure of the log upon
the shoulder was wont to average 125 lbs. Members of the chain-gang were
dressed in yellow, and--by way of encouraging the others--had the word
“Felon” stamped upon conspicuous parts of their raiment.
This was the sort of life Rufus Dawes led. In the summer-time he rose
at half-past five in the morning, and worked until six in the evening,
getting three-quarters of an hour for breakfast, and one hour for
dinner. Once a week he had a clean shirt, and once a fortnight clean
socks. If he felt sick, he was permitted to “report his case to the
medical officer”. If he wanted to write a letter he could ask permission
of the Commandant, and send the letter, open, through that Almighty
Officer, who could stop it if he thought necessary. If he felt himself
aggrieved by any order, he was “to obey it instantly, but might complain
afterwards, if he thought fit, to the Commandant. In making any
complaint against an officer or constable it was strictly ordered that
a prisoner “must be most respectful in his manner and language, when
speaking of or to such officer or constable”. He was held responsible
only for the safety of his chains, and for the rest was at the mercy of
his gaoler. These gaolers--owning right of search, entry into cells at
all hours, and other droits of seigneury--were responsible only to the
Commandant, who was responsible only to the Governor, that is to say,
to nobody but God and his own conscience. The jurisdiction of the
Commandant included the whole of Tasman's Peninsula, with the islands
and waters within three miles thereof; and save the making of certain
returns to head-quarters, his power was unlimited.
A word as to the position and appearance of this place of punishment.
Tasman's Peninsula is, as we have said before, in the form of an earring
with a double drop. The lower drop is the larger, and is ornamented,
so to speak, with bays. At its southern extremity is a deep indentation
called Maingon Bay, bounded east and west by the organ-pipe rocks of
Cape Raoul, and the giant form of Cape Pillar. From Maingon Bay an arm
of the ocean cleaves the rocky walls in a northerly direction. On the
western coast of this sea-arm was the settlement; in front of it was a
little island where the dead were buried, called The Island of the
Dead. Ere the in-coming convict passed the purple beauty of this convict
Golgotha, his eyes were attracted by a point of grey rock covered with
white buildings, and swarming with life. This was Point Puer, the
place of confinement for boys from eight to twenty years of age. It
was astonishing--many honest folks averred--how ungrateful were these
juvenile convicts for the goods the Government had provided for them.
From the extremity of Long Bay, as the extension of the sea-arm was
named, a convict-made tramroad ran due north, through the nearly
impenetrable thicket to Norfolk Bay. In the mouth of Norfolk Bay was
Woody Island. This was used as a signal station, and an armed boat's
crew was stationed there. To the north of Woody Island lay One-tree
Point--the southernmost projection of the drop of the earring; and the
sea that ran between narrowed to the eastward until it struck on the
sandy bar of Eaglehawk Neck. Eaglehawk Neck was the link that connected
the two drops of the earring. It was a strip of sand four hundred and
fifty yards across. On its eastern side the blue waters of Pirates' Bay,
that is to say, of the Southern Ocean, poured their unchecked force. The
isthmus emerged from a wild and terrible coast-line, into whose bowels
the ravenous sea had bored strange caverns, resonant with perpetual
roar of tortured billows. At one spot in this wilderness the ocean had
penetrated the wall of rock for two hundred feet, and in stormy weather
the salt spray rose through a perpendicular shaft more than five hundred
feet deep. This place was called the Devil's Blow-hole. The upper drop
of the earring was named Forrestier's Peninsula, and was joined to the
mainland by another isthmus called East Bay Neck. Forrestier's
Peninsula was an almost impenetrable thicket, growing to the brink of a
perpendicular cliff of basalt.
Eaglehawk Neck was the door to the prison, and it was kept bolted. On
the narrow strip of land was built a guard-house, where soldiers from
the barrack on the mainland relieved each other night and day; and on
stages, set out in the water in either side, watch-dogs were chained.
The station officer was charged “to pay special attention to the feeding
and care” of these useful beasts, being ordered “to report to the
Commandant whenever any one of them became useless”. It may be added
that the bay was not innocent of sharks. Westward from Eaglehawk Neck
and Woody Island lay the dreaded Coal Mines. Sixty of the “marked men”
were stationed here under a strong guard. At the Coal Mines was the
northernmost of that ingenious series of semaphores which rendered
escape almost impossible. The wild and mountainous character of the
peninsula offered peculiar advantages to the signalmen. On the summit
of the hill which overlooked the guard-towers of the settlement was a
gigantic gum-tree stump, upon the top of which was placed a semaphore.
This semaphore communicated with the two wings of the prison--Eaglehawk
Neck and the Coal Mines--by sending a line of signals right across the
peninsula. Thus, the settlement communicated with Mount Arthur, Mount
Arthur with One-tree Hill, One-tree Hill with Mount Communication, and
Mount Communication with the Coal Mines. On the other side, the signals
would run thus--the settlement to Signal Hill, Signal Hill to Woody
Island, Woody Island to Eaglehawk. Did a prisoner escape from the Coal
Mines, the guard at Eaglehawk Neck could be aroused, and the whole
island informed of the “bolt” in less than twenty minutes. With these
advantages of nature and art, the prison was held to be the most secure
in the world. Colonel Arthur reported to the Home Government that
the spot which bore his name was a “natural penitentiary”. The worthy
disciplinarian probably took as a personal compliment the polite
forethought of the Almighty in thus considerately providing for the
carrying out of the celebrated “Regulations for Convict Discipline”.