Discipline des Convicts à Van-Diemen

Out of copyright. Please acknowledge: Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales

‘Discipline des Convicts à Van-Diemen’ by Gaston de Roquemaurel, written on board the Astrolabe, 20 April – 24 May 1840. 0.32 metres of textual material (2 volumes in box) - manuscript Pair of matched notebooks numbered ‘1’ and ‘2’, manuscript in ink, totalling 88 pages, the first notebook with paper watermarked 1837 and the second 1838, written in a neat, legible hand, erasures and corrections throughout. The manuscript is concerned with the transportation of convicts to Van Diemen’s Land and was written by Roquemaurel only a few months after he left Hobart, probably while the expedition was visiting New Zealand. The manuscript references the writings of a number of important commentators on Britain’s transportation system, principally Alexander Maconochie, the great penal reformer and future superintendent of convicts on Norfolk Island. Roquemaurel has also drawn on works by other prominent colonial administrators including Governor Sir John Franklin, the police magistrate Josiah Spode, Colonial Secretary Matthew Forster and the director of public works Alexander Cheyne. Roquemaurel's report is clear evidence of France’s enduring interest in transportation and its willingness to learn from the British experience. This interest dated from La Perouse’s voyage (1785-1788) and continued with investigations into the subject by other navigators who visited Australian ports, notably Baudin, de Freycinet, Duperrey and Dumont d’Urville. These investigations culminated in the establishment of penal colonies modelled on the British system in French Guiana (known as Devil’s Island) in 1852 and New Caledonia in 1863.