Sitting of 7 April 1819

FEMALE CONVICTS.
Mr. Bennet[1434
rose to move an address to the Prince Regent, to stay the departure of a vessel destined to convey female convicts to New South Wales. He did not mean to cast censure upon any public office, and was perfectly aware that many abuses had been corrected by recent regulations. The system of transportation, as it had existed for some years, might be said to be at an end. His objections, however, were still many and serious: they were derived from two sources—from the process itself of transportation, and from the manner of conducting it. On the present occasion he should, however, confine his attention to the state of female convicts, whom he considered the process of transportation had a strong tendency to debase and corrupt. Notwithstanding all the precautions which had been devised, it had hitherto been found impossible to prevent a species of intercourse with the seamen, or in other words a personal prostitution, which could not fail to degrade still lower, beings already too low in moral character. A second objection against this mode of punishment was its inequality as applied to different persons. By some it was considered not as a punishment to be feared, but as an advantage to be courted. Those who had families to be separated from, and were bound by strong ties to their native country, might contemplate it with dread; but to the friendless or deserted criminal, it presented the idea of a desirable asylum. A great defect also was, that it offered no example; the punishment was not seen, and did not therefore operate, as all punishment ought, in deterring others from the commission of similar offences. The ordinary class of offenders against the law were not influenced, as had been observed by a French writer, by remote ideas of punishment: it was necessary that the pains and penalties attending misconduct should be obvious to their apprehensions, and scattered around their path. From 1787 to 1818, 2,987 women, being in the proportion of 1–7th of the men transported during the same period, had been sent out of the country. Of 220 women sent from 1816 to 1818, 121 were sentenced to the limited term of seven years transportation. These women were sent for very different periods, and yet few of them ever returned. Their only means of returning were prostitution. Many of the convicts had received judgment for capital offences, many for minor

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ones. Now the act of the 9th of the king. c. 74, had been drawn up on the principle, that persons convicted of minor offences ought to be confined to penitentiaries; and not sent at a great expense to a distant settlement. A learned judge had told him, that on the last circuit he was about to sentence a woman to be transported, when his resolution was changed by the clerk of the peace informing him that it was nearly impossible for women to return. No classification existed on board, but petty offenders were compelled to associate with capital convicts and hardened delinquents. This appeared to him in the light of a gratuitous infliction of pain, which was discreditable to a great country. He must complain also of the manner in which women were brought from country gaols to one spot, for the purpose of being put on board the vessels destined for New South Wales. One unfortunate girl had been brought from Cambridge, so bound in chains, that it was necessary to saw them asunder. Another had been brought in a state of torture all the way from Carlisle. When once on board, no distinction was observed between the small and the great offender; the girl whose passion for finery had prompted her to commit a petty theft, was placed in the same bed with the shameless prostitute who robbed on system. He held in his hand a letter written by Mr. Marsden, chaplain general in New South Wales, and stating that promiscuous intercourse between the seamen and female convicts had prevailed on board a ship which had carried out a great number of women, previously trained under the care of Mrs. Fry and others, to habits of morality and decorum. The officer commanding the vessel had enforced stricter discipline on its arrival at St. Helena, but the change was attended with hardship and cruelty. Mr. Giles, a missionary on board, declared that the utmost confusion and insubordination had prevailed, and that the convicts and passengers were unnecessarily put on short allowance of water, which produced much suffering, especially amongst the children. There was here evidence on the part of Mr. Marsden, and the House had before been put in possession of evidence, that there was a want of accommodation for the female convicts. A few of them were lodged in a factory at Paramatta, and the rest were obliged to wander in the streets, and to have recourse to prostitution in
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order to procure the means of subsistence. The misery and depravity of these persons were so great, that Mr. Marsden who had been a considerable time in the habit of contemplating them, declared that it required all his fortitude to beat the scenes which he had to witness. His object was, to save the female convicts from being sent to the factory of Paramatta; and he, for one, could not consent that any human being, either man or woman, should be sent to New South Wales, till some place was provided for their reception. He had already stated the helplessness and the hardships of the women on board the ships; he had gone out with them, and lodged them in the factory of Paramatta; and he would now show what became of them, when they had arrived there. Mr. Marsden, in a letter which he now held in his hand, said, "The hospital of Paramatta is divided into two wards, one for the reception of men, and the other for women; but as there are no locks on the doors, the men and the women have easy access to each other, in consequence of which the grossest debaucheries take place. I have remonstrated on these things again and again, but no remedy has yet been provided. These regulations are attended with the worst effects. What can be worse than for a clergyman coming to visit the sick, and finding men and women lying promiscuously in the same beds? There has not, for a considerable time back, been either a lamp or a candle in the hospital, nor can either be procured even to watch a dying person; and I have frequently been obliged to grope my way in going to visit the sick at night." This letter was dated on the 6th of February, 1818. He abstained from reading other parts of it, because he did not wish to criminate individuals. Whether the new system of this year, with respect to the regulations on board female convict ships would be better than that of last year, he should not inquire; but he objected to a system under which, when the women arrived at New South Wales, they had no place where they could lay their heads. He was not for letting any ship with female convicts sail from this country, till some place was provided for their reception. He did not say, that no convicts should be sent out, because there certainly was a distinction between the situation of males and that of females. He could not see why the convicts at present under sentence

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of transportation in England and Ireland might not be kept at the several houses of correction; for he could not suppose that of these so many were hardened in wickedness that danger might be apprehended from keeping them in the country. He would now ask, after the picture of misery which he had drawn, whether it would be consistent with humanity to consign any more of these wretched females to the hardships which they had to encounter on the voyage to New South Wales, and to the subsequent evils which awaited them on their arrival there? He concluded by moving, "That an humble Address be presented to his royal highness the Prince Regent, praying that his Royal Highness would be graciously pleased to stay the sailing of the Lord Wellington Female Convict ship."
Mr. Wilberforcerose to second the motion, and trusted that what he was about to say would be the means of producing the universal concurrence of the House. His hon. friend, for the unwearied attention which he had paid to this subject, was entitled to the thanks and the gratitude of the country. What he wished to state, was, that it was not necessary for those who agreed to the present motion, to concur in all the sentiments uttered on the subject by his hon. friend. They were at present engaged in an inquiry into the state of the colony, both with regard to the manner in which convicts were transported thither, and the manner in which they were treated when there; and if they thought that remedies would suggest themselves to the committee now sitting, for the hardships, to which convicts were subjected, both on the voyage and while in that country, he could not think it but right to stay the sailing of this vessel, till the result of the committee's inquiries should be known. He concurred with his hon. friend in the opinion which he entertained of Mr. Marsden's character, and thought the testimony of that gentleman ought to have great weight, although he could not have been aware that a public use was to be made of his letters; for, with the exception of that addressed to the committee, they were all written to a friend in confidence.
Mr. Bathurstsaid, his hon. friend who had last sat down, had stated that those who were not disposed to goall the length of the hon. mover might nevertheless concur in the present motion; and he seemed to think that till the committee had made
*
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their report, no more convicts should be sent out. This seemed to go far beyond the present motion; for if he understood the hon. mover, his object was only to prevent women from being sent out. But, for his part, he could not see why men should be sent while the inquiry was going on, and not women. The hon. gentleman had said, that though it might be dangerous to keep men in the country, it would not be dangerous or inconvenient to keep women. But, as an argument for sending convicts out of the country, it might be stated, that the assizes were loaded, and all the prisons in the country full. In point of morality too, he apprehended that the plan would not be favourable: for there had been frequent complaints, that in some of the gaols there was no division between the male and the female prisoners: they had accounts that in some of the best regulated gaols in the kingdom it had been found impossible to make a proper classification of the prisoners, and that in consequence vice was extremely prevalent. He thought, therefore, that to distribute the convicts among the several prisons in the country, would not be an expedient measure. There were at present 180 convicts in the different gaols, of whom forty or fifty were so advanced in years, that it was not thought proper to send them to New South Wales; there were forty of another description, for whom accommodations would soon be provided in a penitentiary; and then there still remained ninety who were not proper persons to be left in the country, and whom it was intended to transport. He was not prepared to deny that there were many inconveniences attending the situation of the female convicts, which did not apply to convicts of the other sex. He was not at present arguing on the propriety of sending out convicts; but in a moral point of view, it might be a question whether morality was not promoted by sending out women to the colony. He complained that the hon. mover had gone too far into the details which were before the committee. The hon. gentleman had said, that the female convicts, on their arrival, were all sent to Paramatta: but this was not the case. On the arrival of a ship, the inhabitants who wanted female servants went to the ship and chose such as they liked. This permission, however, was granted only to married persons. The rest of the cargo was then sent to Paramatta, but not in such a situation as had been represented.

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Such of them as were refractory were obliged to work at this factory, and perhaps their labour might not enable them to procure a lodging. But here they were employed only till 3 o'clock in the afternoon, after which they were at liberty to work for themselves s and such of them as could procure work would be able to provide themselves with a lodging. With regard to the gross case of seduction which had been mentioned, it certainly did not occur in the ship which was sent out last year, nor was it known when it had occurred; and, therefore, there were no means of ascertaining who the master and surgeon were who had been guilty of such a dereliction of duty. If prisoners were not to be sent out of the country, he should think the best plan would be to have penitentiaries for their reception; but the hon. gentleman should consider, that it could not be the work of a day to provide accommodation for all the prisoners in the country. It had been said that the convicts found great difficulty in returning, when the period of their banishment had expired; but he believed that few ever wished to return, and he mentioned that merely to show that it was no additional hardship. Many of them married and settled in the country; and he thought it was stated formerly that an industrious man in the course of five years might earn as much as would pay for his passage home. He would not say that a woman could earn as much in the same time; but he thought that what he had stated was sufficient to prove that the hardship was not so great as it had been represented. The House ought not to consider that the persons about to be sent out were a number of innocent individuals; on the contrary, they were a set of persons whose bad passions, of every description, it was found most difficult to restrain without strong coercive measures. He could not, on the whole, see that any ground existed for restraining the sailing of the convict ship in question more than any other.
Mr. Buxtonsaid, it was stated in evidence before the committee, that the number of females in the manufactory at Paramatta was 150, of whom 120 were nightly discharged with no means but prostitution to maintain themselves. The witness had been asked, how large a proportion of the females supported themselves by prostitution, and the answer was nine out of ten!
Sir T. B. Martindid not intend to take up much of, the time of the House, as in the few remarks he, had to offer he would not follow the hon. member for Shrewsbury in his rambles to New South Wales, He had heard a great deal said about the height to which vice, and particularly that of prostitution, had arisen is the colony; but, from every thing which he could learn, he believed it was not so great as it; was in London. He could not see any end which the detention of the ship would answer, except one, which was a strong argument against it—that if the hon. gentleman wished to wait for the report of the committee, they would have very probably to delay the sailing until nearly the, close of the session, at which time the equinoxial gales would be near at hand, and then what a situation would these unfortunate females be exposed to? He gave credit to the hon. gentlemen for those humane feelings which prompted them to such steps; but he thought they were quite mistaken in their application, of, them on many occasions, if they continued in the same feeling, it would be better to have at once an act of parliament to reform human nature; for, by that means alone, could their views be reconciled to necessary practice.
Mr. Marryatsaid, that from the line of conduct adopted by the hon. gentleman on the other side, one might be led to suppose, that there was no such thing as an executive government. Was the House to suppose that his majesty's ministers were unfit to devise any regulation for the management of the colony? If so, hon. gentlemen had better make a motion to remove them. He conceived that no sufficient grounds had been given for the motion, and should therefore vote against it.
Mr. Bennetsaid, he had not contended that the colony should be abolished altogether, but merely that it was in a state which needed considerable alteration before any more female convicts were sent thither. He had objected to the sending out the present ship, because he saw that the same principles were acted upon as had been continued on former occasions. With respect to the observations on the general system of prostitution among the women, he should beg the indulgence, of the House to read one sentence of the evidence taken before the committee. It was asked of one of the witnesses, before the committee, whether the women

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convicts in the colony had any other way of getting money but by prostitution? The answer of the witness was, that he was not aware of any. One consequence of their want of money was, that at the expiration of their time they had no means of returning home. Many of them had left families in this country, and of course it might be supposed that they were anxious to return to it. Without any fair means of gaining a sufficient sum to ensure that object, it was not surprising, considering their former habits, that they should have recourse to such digesting means of procuring it as had been mentioned; but there were others differently circumstanced, from age and infirmity. Upon the observation respecting his rambles to New South Wales, he should only say that he was not ashamed of them. He felt it his duty to bring the subject thus frequently before the House, and he would not be deterred by it from the sneers of any hon. member. When the House should have before them the result of the labours of the committee, it would be found, that so far from its being required to pass a law to regulate human nature, it would be only necessary to repeal some of those laws which were constantly tending to deprave it. He had no high opinion of the tender sympathies of ministers on those subjects. He had in his recollection what passed on the subject of convicts in the year 1787, when they were first sent out; when (the House would scarcely believe it) it was proposed and discussed in the privy council, whether the convicts at that time should not be sold to the Bey of Tripoli as slaves. This proposition (the proposition of lord Auckland) was considered, though of course rejected; but it showed how little disposed the government were at that time to attend to the situation of the convicts. At the same time a ship that was sent out with them, had not any settled destination; and the sentences of some of the convicts had expired before they reached the colony to which they were at length consigned. If hon. members would refer to what had been said on this subject by Collins and Hunter, they would find enough to convince them that his statements were not overcharged.
The motion was then negatived.

OXFORD CITY ELECTION.
Mr. C. Tennytonsaid, he rose for the purpose of discharging one of those painful duties
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which sometimes devolved upon members of that House; a duty, however, of the most important and indispensable nature, and one, therefore, which, however unpleasant it might be to his own feelings, he should be among the last to shrink from performing. He held in his hand a petition, signed by a considerable number of highly respectable individuals, freemen of the city of Oxford, complaining of a flagrant breach of the privileges of the Commons by interference and undue influence on the part of the duke of Marlborough at the last election for that city. It would be in the recollection of the House, that some time since an hon. and learned friend of his (Mr. Denman), presented a petition on this subject, which, bearing, in the judgment of the House, the character of an election petition, it was determined to refer it to an election committee; but the parties to that petition not having designed to question the merits of the election, declined entering into the necessary recognizances, and the complaint in consequence fell to the ground. The petition which (in consequence of the supposed absence of his hon. friend on the professional duties of his circuit) he was then entrusted to present, varied materially in its frame from that which was so disposed of by the House, and was altogether free from those objections which had diverted the former petition from the course that had been designed for it by the petitioners. The petition stated, that his grace the duke of Marlborough being a peer of this realm and a lord in parliament, in violation and contempt of the resolutions of this House, concerned himself in the late election of members to serve in parliament for the city of Oxford; openly interfered by himself and his agents in such election, proposed one of the candidates to a body of the voters; wrote letters to others, and procured their votes for such candidate; expended large sums of money on his behalf, and otherwise used his influence to procure the return of that candidate as a member of that House.—He thought it better then to acquaint the House, that after this petition should have been brought up, he had two others on the same subject to present—one of them was also signed by several respectable freemen of Oxford who had not signed the original petition, and contained a more detailed account of the charge against the noble duke: the other was signed by the mayor

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of Oxford and six other most respectable magistrates of that city, confirming the statements in the second petition to which he had referred, and praying the attention of the House to this most important subject. It might not become him as a new member of the House to endeavour to impress upon it the propriety of complying with the prayer of these petitions, by directing to them its earnest and immediate consideration; but he hoped he might be excused for expressing his humble conviction that no matter of privilege more imperiously demanded the scrutinizing investigation of the House than the interference of peers in the election of its members, and he conceived that the House would think it due to its own dignity, to institute a most active and diligent inquiry when such a case as this was represented to be, of open and undisguised interference, was distinctly pointed out to its notice. The charges preferred against the noble duke, the petitioners had fully pledged themselves to substantiate. But though he entirely concurred in their sentiments, supposing those charges to be well-founded, he begged to be understood as in no degree participating in the responsibility of that pledge, which they had so given. At the same time he was fully persuaded, and this persuasion arose from the great respectability of the petitioners, that they entertained a perfect conviction of the truth of their statements; but he sincerely assured the House, and the connexions of the noble duke, if any of them were then present, that it would afford him genuine gratification to find that the petitioners had laboured under a misapprehension respecting the conduct of the exalted individual in question, the very mention of whose name and title brought with it some of the proudest recollections of which this country could boast, and he should most gladly be convinced that the noble duke had not been unmindful of the delicacy of that political station which a peer of this realm holds in the constitution. But if, on the other hand, it should appear that the privileges of that House had been infringed in any one of the particulars stated in the petition, he trusted the House would know how, by some decisive measure, to assert and vindicate those high privileges on the preservation and integrity of which all the freedom we had enjoyed, not only constitutionally, but practically depended. He then moved that the petition be brought up.
Mr. Bathurst, after the result of the former petition, could not perceive how this could be received. The petitioners had had an opportunity of proving their allegations in the only way, in which charges of this nature ought to be decided—before an election committee. That was the tribunal to which resort ought to have been had; because the facts charged, if they could be proved, would go to vitiate the election itself; but that opportunity was not embraced; recognizances had not been entered into, and the matter was suffered to drop. He did not see what step the hon. member could take upon it as it now stood, except it would be to move a set of angry resolutions, and they would be productive of no other effect; at least not the effect of removing the member mentioned. He should therefore oppose the petition being brought up.
Mr. Serjeant Onslomobserved, that there was nothing before the House to justify the conclusion of the right hon. gentleman, that the subscribers to the present petition were those from whom the former petition emanated; and argued, that, from the rejection of the former petition, or the abandonment of that petition by the petitioners themselves, it did not follow that other gentlemen should be precluded from complaining of a breach of privilege; and in this case the breach was alleged to be of the grossest nature. It was the duty of the House, in his opinion, to examine this complaint, not with any view to the angry discussion which the right hon. gentleman deprecated; but in order that, if the duke of Marlborough should appear, upon inquiry to have been guilty of the improper conduct imputed to him, the House might come to an appropriate resolution, condemnatory of such conduct, and also pass an address, requiring the prosecution of his grace, by his majesty's attorney general. The House ought, indeed, in this case, to follow the precedent in the reign of Anne, when sir John Packington complained of a breach of privilege on the part of the bishop of Worcester, in using undue influence at an election for the city. But as this case was of great importance, he thought that time should be afforded for its further consideration, and therefore he moved an adjournment of the debate until the 27th instant.
Mr. Wynnthought that the case of the bishop of Worcester was not relevant to

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the present question, as it did not arise but of any election petition. He did not know how far the present case ought to be considered as a breach of privileges. As far as he recollected the petition, it stated a distribution of money from the duke among the electors, and that one member had been actually proposed and supported by the duke. It would not, however, be right to receive these allegations as true, without examining into their correctness, as there was scarcely any question which affected an election that did not involve a breach of privilege. He threw out these objections cursorily, and should wish the House to determine whether they were entitled to have any weight.
Mr. Denmanthought that this petition ought to be read, as the House would then be able to understand the allegations of it. He deemed it to be extremely strange that the rejection of the former petition should lead to the rejection of this also. The question appeared to him to be within a very narrow compass, and to be in plain English, nothing more nor less than this, whether the House would or would not allow their privileges to be violated. When such a question was brought before the House, it was, in his opinion, the duty of the House, to enter into an investigation of it without delay. When he had the honour of presenting a similar petition from the same quarter, within the first fourteen days, it was objected that "here is a petition affecting the return of one of our members in a case upon which a committee is appointed to decide. It may prejudice the minds of that committee, if it be noticed by the House in another shape, and therefore to avoid the consequences the Grenville committee alone should decide upon it." This argument led the House to decide that the former petition should go to a Grenville committee. The fact was, that the former petitioners declined to prosecute their petition in this way, because they were not disposed to incur a most enormous expense of an inquiry before such a committee, the result of which might be the return of a gentleman about whom the petitioners felt no particular interest. The present petition, however, appeared to contain some additional facts as to the breach of privilege, discovered since the former one was abandoned, and as it was not open to the objections urged on the former occasion, he thought that the subject should meet with the se-
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rious consideration of the House. If it did not, the situation of that House would be singular, and he could not conceive upon what ground the petition, could be rejected, unless it were meant that no breach of privilege of that House should be investigated by the House itself. Was it to be understood that the interference of a peer at an election, or any other violation of the privileges of that House with regard to an election, could be taken cognizance of only before an election committee? All that the House had to do at present was, to receive the petition, and institute an inquiry into the allegations it contained.
Mr. Goulburnsaid, that the learned gentleman had misunderstood the real question under consideration. The question was not, whether the House would not investigate a charge with regard to breach of privilege, but whether it would act according to law by refusing investigation upon such a subject in any other form than that which the law prescribed. For the sake of the character of the House, and the consistency of its proceedings, it became necessary to discountenance a petition of this nature.
Mr. Tennysonobserved, that as part of what had been said, particularly by the hon. member (Mr. Wynn) attributed to the petition statements which it did not contain, it was, in his opinion, clearly the proper course that the petition should be brought up and read, and then the debate might be pursued upon the question whether it should go to the committee of privileges. The former petition had been (as the House had determined) an election petition, from certain individuals who had not thought fit to prosecute it, and vindicate the privileges of the House at an enormous expense, a situation he thought the petitioners ought not then to have been placed in. The present was a petition and complaint from another set of individuals, upon a matter of privilege, and was quite another question. That it was so would be seen, if the petition was brought up and read. It had on the former occasion been urged, in debate, that the parties themselves, who were then sent to an election committee, might, if they did not like to prosecute their case, there, prefer another petition, confined to the question of privilege. This course had been taken; and they were now, to be told that the matter had been previously dispose of. Surely this would be a most ex-

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traordinary proceeding on the part of the House.
Mr. Denmansupported what fell from Mr. Tennyson as to the petition being brought up and read, and confirmed Mr. T.'s statement as to what had been said in debate on the former occasion.
The Speakersaid, that it was perhaps only proper that he should remind the hon. gentleman that the former petition did not, pretend to be an election petition, but only a petition regarding a breach of privilege. The original question was, that the petition be brought up; the amendment was, that the farther consideration of this question be adjourned to the 27th of April.
The question was then put upon the amendment, and negatived by 13 to 35. The original question, that the first petition be brought up, was negatived without a division.
Mr. C. Tennysonthen moved, that the second petition be brought up. He could pot conceive bow any question of privilege, which referred to the interference of peers at elections, could ever be brought under the consideration of the House, if this petition were not received. In the first instance, a petition is presented, the subject of which necessarily contains a mention of the election, at which the interference, is averted to have taken place. The moment it appears that the matter of the petition concerns an election, it is voted to be an election petition; the parties, however, are told that they may present a petition, confining themselves to the question of privilege, and avoiding all expressions which can be supposed to touch of the merits of an election. Now, he did not know where a person could be found who could shape a petition of this sort, without stating that it belonged to a matter of election. The petition he was about to offer was from other individuals than those who had been before turned round. Their object was merely to inform the House of a gross breach of its privileges, and not to seek for redress for themselves. But the House seemed disposed not even to hear their complaint read; for understanding that it concerned a matter (though a mere matter of privilege) which arose out of, and was connected with the Oxford city election, as to the merits of which a former petition had been presented and disposed of, they were about to decide that it could not be received.
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Here a desultory conversation took place between Mr. Bathurst, Mr. Wynn, sir R. Wilson, Mr. Denman, and the chancellor of the exchequer; after which the question for bringing up the second petition was put and negatived.
Mr. Tennysonthen moved, that the petition of the mayor and other city magistrates, should be brought up. He said he should not regret that this debate had taken place, because it would be a warning which would in future prevent any one from making himself so ridiculous as to bring forward any question of this sort, since nothing but pain and discomfiture could recoil upon the petitioners. In his opinion, the best thing the House could now do, would be to rescind the standing orders of the House which solemnly declares that the "interference of peers is a high breach of privilege," and not by retaining it, delude the credulous and unwary.
The question was then put, that the third and last petition be brought up, upon which the gallery was again cleared for a division. The division, however, did not take place, and the question was negatived.