25/04/2004
History of New South Wales From the Records
VOLUME 1 - GOVERNOR PHILLIP 1783-1789G. B. Barton - 1889
PART I
Phillip's Commission
IF there were any serious doubt as to the real nature of the expedition on which Phillip was despatched, it might be settled by reference to the terms of his Commission, illustrated as it is by the official Instructions which accompanied it (1). There is certainly nothing in the former that could lead the reader to suppose that the sole object of the expedition was the establishment of a penal settlement; nor could a stranger to our history even gather from it that such a settlement was contemplated. The Commission conferred much the same powers on Phillip as those with which the Governors sent out to the colonies and plantations in North America and the West Indies used to be invested in days when "assemblies of freeholders" were unknown. All these Commissions seem to have been framed more or less on the same lines, and according to precedents established in the early days of the colonial system (1); the points of difference observable among them being attributable to difference in the positions occupied by the various Governors - some being appointed to Crown colonies, others to colonies possessing legislative institutions. Phillip was sent out as the Governor of a Crown colony, and consequently there was practically no limitation of his powers (2). He was appointed "Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief in and over our territory called New South Wales, extending from the northern Cape or extremity of the coast called Cape York to the southern extremity or South Cape (3), and of all the country inland westward as far as the 135th degree of east longtitude, including all the islands adjacent in the Pacific Ocean; and all the towns, garrisons, castles, forts, and all other fortifications or other military works which may be hereafter erected upon the said territory or any of the said islands."
The jurisdiction thus created was evidently designed to answer a higher purpose than that of establishing a place for the reception of convicts. Any of the adjacent islands in the Pacific Ocean - Norfolk Island or New Caledonia, for instance - might have been sufficient for that purpose, and might probably have been even better adapted to it than the mainland; but the territory placed under Phillip's administration comprised the best half of New Holland, and taking possession of it was in fact taking possession of the whole. That the intention of the British Government in occupying New South Wales was to colonise it is further shown in the direction - "that you take the oath required to be taken by Governors in the plantations, to do their utmost that the several laws relating to trade and the plantations be duly observed." The laws referred to were the celebrated Trade and Navigation Laws, passed for the purpose of keeping the colonial trade in the hands of British merchants; but unless it was intended that New South Wales should be colonised and commercial relations established between it and the mother country, the reference to those laws would have been curiously out of place in Phillip's Commission (4).
The several powers and authorities conferred upon him were such as would be required for the establishment of a civil government in any new settlement, of whatever elements its population might be composed. He was empowered - (1) to keep and use the "Great Seal of our said territory and its dependencies;" (2) to administer oaths; (3) to appoint Justices of the Peace, coroners, constables, and other necessary officers, for the administration of justice; (4) to grant pardons and to remit fines; (5) to grant custody of idiots and lunatics; (6) to levy forces for defence; (7) to execute martial law in time of invasion or at other lawful times; (8) to build and arm fortifications for defence; (9) to punish mutiny in ships-of-war according to martial law; (10) to punish offences committed on shore by men belonging to the navy; (11) to issue public moneys by warrant; (12) to grant lands; (13) to appoint fairs, marts, and markets, and also ports and harbours for shipping.
Equally significant is the following passage in the Instructions with reference to Norfolk Island:-
Norfolk Island being represented as a spot which may hereafter become useful, you are, as soon as circumstances will admit of it, to send a small establishment thither to secure the same to us, and prevent its being occupied by the subjects of any other European Power.
The only other Power which was at all likely to occupy Norfolk Island was France; and the order to take possession of it as soon as possible shows that the probability of its being occupied by the French was distinctly present to the mind of the British Government. The repeated injunctions conveyed to Phillip to lose no time in sailing with his fleet and in disembarking on his arrival, point to the same conclusion. Possibly it was apprehended that the expedition sent out by the French Government in 1785, under the command of La Pérouse (5), included some design to occupy the great territory discovered by Captain Cook. That such an apprehension would not have been altogether an unreasonable one under the circumstances - although, as a matter of fact, it would have been unfounded - is a very natural inference from the chronic state of jealousy which then existed between the two Powers. There is nothing, however, in the "Private Instructions from the King to the Sieur de la Pérouse," published by the French Government with the narrative of his voyage, that can be said to justify the suspicion. He was directed to examine the north and west coasts of New Holland; consequently he could not have had any design upon the east or south coast. During his stay in Queen Charlotte's Sound, he was to "gain intelligence whether the English have formed, or entertain the project of forming, any settlement on these islands (of New Zealand); and if he should hear that they have actually formed a settlement, he will endeavour to repair thither in order to learn its condition, strength, and object (6)." From which it would appear that, although the voyage was one of discovery, it was also designed to be the means of acquiring information with respect to new settlements by the English in New Zealand. It would also seem that the French Government had entertained the project of occupying those islands even at that time (7).
Although it is tolerably clear from La Pérouse's instructions that the French Government had no intention of anticipating the British in their occupation of New South Wales, a strong impression to the contrary has always prevailed in some quarters. The idea seems to have been suggested by the track of the French ships, as marked on the chart of their voyage from Kamschatka to Botany Bay. But if any suspicion as to their intentions had occurred to Governor Phillip, he would not have omitted to mention it in his first despatch from Sydney Cove, when referring to the French ships. It may also be assumed that either Captain Hunter or Lieutenant King, of the Sirius, would have made some allusion to it, when writing on the subject. But neither they, nor Judge-Advocate Collins, nor Captain Tench, each of whom also made specific reference to it, appear to have had any impression of the kind. The records left by these authorities point distinctly the other way. Captain Tench for instance, in the lively account he gives of the unexpected appearance of the strangers, says:-
"By this time the alarm had become general, and everyone appeared lost in conjecture. Now they were Dutchmen sent to dispossess us, and the moment after, store-ships from England, with supplies for the settlement. The improbabilities which attended both these conclusions were sunk in the agitation of the moment. It was by Governor Phillip that this mystery was at length unravelled, and the cause of the alarm pronounced to be two French ships which, it was now recollected, were on a voyage of discovery in the southern hemisphere. Thus were our doubts cleared up and our apprehensions banished (8)."
It seems to have been forgotten that, if the French Government had intended at that time to take possession of any part of the east coast of New Holland, there was nothing to prevent La Pérouse from exploring to the southward of Point Hicks, and hoisting the French flag at any place he pleased in that direction. The country of which Captain Cook took possession on the 21st August, 1770, extended from latitude 38° - Point Hicks - to latitude 10½ south; but although the territory claimed in Phillip's Commission covered the whole of the coast line from Cape York to the South Cape, and all the country inland westward as far as the 135th degree of east longtitude, it was still open to the French to claim, by virtue of prior discovery, any part of the territory not included in Cook's boundaries, or not actually occupied by the English. Had the exploration of the southern coast, made by Baudin in 1801-2, not been anticipated by Flinders, it is difficult to see how the right of the French to occupy the territory they claimed could have been denied; still more so had La Pérouse thought proper to explore to the southward of Pointe de Hick, instead of passing his time idly in Botany Bay. In that case the territory now included in the boundaries of Victoria and South Australia might have been added to the French dominions. The reason why he did not do so may, perhaps, be found in the statement made by Collins when referring to his departure (9). He felt so little interest in the country that he did not think it worth his while to examine it. French opinion on that subject, however, was considerably changed in 1800, when Consul Bonaparte despatched the expedition under Baudin for the purpose of making discoveries - apparently with a view to the annexation of all the unoccupied territory that could be found. The Terre Napoléon, which figures so prettily on the map published with Péron's Voyage, is a significant illustration of the great Emperor's ambition.
NOTES:
(1) Post, pp. 474, 481, 487.
(2) A good illustration of the manner in which Governors of the old school used to interpret their Commissions will be found in Edwards, History of the West Indies, vol. 11, page 395:- "Mr. Stokes, the late Chief Justice of Georgia, relates that a Governor of a province in North America (at that time a British colony) ordered the Provost-Marshal to hang up a convict some days before the time appointed by his sentence and a rule of Court for his execution. 'He meant well,' says Stokes, 'but being a military man, conceived that as he had power to reprieve after sentence, he had power to execute also when he pleased, and the criminal was actually hanged as the Governor ordered, nor could his Excellency be persuaded that, by this very act, he was himself committing felony.' And of another military Governor, it is said that he 'took it into his head to suspend a gentleman from his seat in the Council, for no other reason than marrying his daughter without his consent.'"
(3) By the South Cape was then meant the southern extremity of Van Diemen's Land, discovered and named by Tasman. "A point much like the Ram Head, off Plymouth, which I take to be the same that Tasman calls South Cape, bore north four leagues off us." Captain Furneaux's Narrative, 9 March, 1773. Van Diemen's Land was supposed, until the discovery of Bass's Straits, to form part of New Holland. "Van Diemen's Land has been twice visited before. I need hardly say that it is the southern point of New Holland." - Cook's Third Voyage, vol. i, p. 103, January, 1777.
(4) The extent of the restrictions placed upon the colonies at that time with respect to their commercial relations with other countries may be understood from the following passage in the preface to the History of New Holland, 1787, page viii:- "Botany Bay and the rest of New South Wales may be rendered, in the hands of this nation, a more important instrument for the improvement of her commerce; a passive instrument, it is true; for notwithstanding the extent of its coast, that country, supposing it already colonised, can never, while the charter of the East India Company exists, possess a commerce of its own. It might, perhaps, appear impossible to prevent the inhabitants of a whole colony, especially if increased to any magnitude, from becoming merchants on their own account; but besides the restriction which it is in the power of the mother country to impose, a single Act of Legislature, rendering any person possessed of property in Great Britain or Ireland disqualified to become possessors of fixed property in New South Wales would, it is imagined, go a great way to effect such a prevention. Thus the traffick, in particular, of the English East India Company, would be inaccessible to the colonists of New South Wales, though settled on the borders of the East, as to the inhabitants of the island of St. Helena."
(5) The name is sometimes spelt Peyrouse,as, for instance, in Phillip's Voyage, where it is stated that the latter "is the right form of that officer's name;" p. 68 n. But as it is spelt Pérouse in the authorised French edition of his voyage, published in 1799, and also on the medal struck on the occasion of the expedition, there can be little doubt that Peyrouse was not then considered the right form of the name in France; although it may have been the antiquated form of it.
(6) A Voyage Round the World, under the Command of J. F. G. de La Pérouse. Translated from the French, 1799, vol i, p. 27. The last lines written by the unfortunate navigator convey the information he had obtained during his stay at Botany Bay with respect to Phillip's expedition.
(7) The apprehension of French settlement on the coast of New South Wales continued to agitate the British mind for many years after Phillip left the colony. During Governor King's administration, 1800 - 1806, the excitement caused by this apprehension reached its climax when the ships sent out by Napoleon in 1800 were known to be cruising in these seas. To appreciate the reasons for the excitement, the reader has only to compare Péron's Voyage de Découvertes aux Terres Australes, published by the French Government in 1807, with the Voyage to Terra Australis, written by Flinders and published in 1814.
(8) Narrative of the Expedition to Botany Bay, p. 50. - The latest reference to French designs appeared in an article published in the London Globe newspaper on the 26th January, 1888, on the occasion of the New South Wales Centenary, in which the writer said:- "It is not generally realised that a matter of no more than three days prevented New South Wales from becoming French instead of British territory, and even possibly from remaining so to this hour - to the exceeding simplification of the question of recidivists and Nouméan évadés. It was a race to Botany BAy between Captain Phillip, riding from England, and de La Pérouse, riding from France; and Captain Phillip's fleet beat the Boussole and the Astrolabe by just three days. De la Pérouse arrived to find the first English Governor in possession; submitted to the inevitable with national courtesy; and sailed off - to be lost on a coral reef, and to have his fate wrapped in mystery for forty years. The birth of New South Wales, as a colony, took place therefore under more than ordinary romantic circumstances... The whole past history of Australasia, in the largest sense, has hung upon that accident."
(9) "On or about Monday, the 10th of March, the French ships sailed from Botany Bay, bound, as they said, to the northward, and carrying with them the most unfavourable ideas of this country and its native inhabitants; the officers having been heard to declare that in their whole voyage they nowhere found so poor a country nor such wretched, miserable people." - Vol. i, p. 20.
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