Colleen McCullough: Morgan’s Run

“Yet somehow we have survived the first five years of this ill-conceived, misshapen experiment in men’s and women’s lives. I am not sure how this has happened, except that it is perhaps evidence of the persistence and perseverance of men and women. It would be wrong to say that England offered us a second chance here. We were not offered any chance, first or last. Rather, we behaved according to our natures. Some of us simply vowed to survive and, having survived, then hurried ‘home’ or still skulk about. And some of us, having survived, were determined to begin again as best we can with what we have. I put myself in the second group, and say of it that while we were convicts we worked hard, we incurred no official displeasure, we were not lashed or ironed, we effaced ourselves in some situations and made ourselves useful in others. After being freed by pardon or emancipation, we have taken up land and begun the alien business of farming.

“How much of England has England wasted! The intelligence, the ingenuity, the resourcefulness, the hardiness. A list of assets I could make pages long. And all of the owners had sat in English gaols and hulks utterly wasted. What is wrong with England, that England is blind enough to throw such assets away as worthless rubbish?

“It is fair to say that very few of us had any idea what sort of stuff we were made of. I know that I did not. The old tranquil, patient Richard Morgan who could not even bring himself to care about the loss of £3,000 has died, Jem. He was passive, content, unambitious and small. His griefs were the griefs of all men-loss of what he loved. His vices were the vices of all men-self-absorption and self-indulgence. His joys were the joys of all men-taking his pleasure in what he loved. His virtues were the virtues of all men-belief in God and country.

“Richard Morgan was resurrected in the midst of a sea of pain, and finds the pain of others more unbearable than his own. He takes nothing for granted, he speaks out when necessary, he guards his loved ones and his fortune with his very life, he trusts hardly anybody, and he relies on one person only-himself.

“The tragedy of it, Jem, is that despite these new beginnings we have dragged the worst of England with us-coldhearted arrogance from those who govern us or hold sway over us, the unwritten laws which make some men better than others by virtue of rank or wealth, the stigmata of poverty and despicable origins, the mistaken creed that Crown and Church can do no wrong, the ignominy of bastardy.

“So I fear for my children, who must carry the burden of my sins as well as their own. Yet I hope for them in a way I could never have hoped for my Bristol children. There is room here for them to fly, Jem. There is room here for them to matter. And when all is said and done, what more could I ask of God than that?

“I had thought to write at much greater length, but I find that I have said my piece. Look after yourself-have a care for Stephen, who brings my love with him-and write soon. Ships from England now make the voyage in under six months, and Norfolk Island is a watering place for vessels sailing to Cathay, Nootka Sound or Otaheite. With any luck, I will be able to reply to your answer before too many more children have been born. I cannot get Kitty out of the habit of conceiving, and I am too weak to say no when she throws her leg over.

“By the grace of God and the kindness of others, I have had a fine run.”

He signed it, folded the pages so that their corners met in the middle, melted wax and applied his seal. RM in chains. Then, leaving the letter to lie on his table, he leaned to blow out the lamp and went to Kitty.

Finis

The saga of Richard Morgan is not ended; he was to live for many years to come and experience yet more adventures, disasters and upheavals. I hope to continue with his family’s story.

The AmericanWar of Independence upset the European applecart profoundly, and in ways the people of the time could not have envisioned. Until then, a nation’s constitution was generally accepted as embodied in its laws; until then, the concept of a people’s existing without a monarch at the top of the social pyramid had become virtually unimaginable; until then, the rights of individuals of moderate or low status had not been considered as equal to the rights of those with rank, property and/or wealth.

One of the less well-known results of American independence was the establishment of the British colony of New South Wales and its almost immediately synchronous offshoot at Norfolk Island. There are strong differences of opinion between modern historians as to the British Crown’s reasons for colonizing a quadrant of the globe scarcely known, even including its geophysical dimensions. Some experts in the field think New South Wales was conceived and carried out purely to have somewhere to dump the hapless victims of a penal legal system by far the harshest in western Europe. Whereas others insist that higher ideals and philosophies were also involved.

I do not pretend to sufficient erudition to clarify this debate. I say only that with the closure of the thirteen American colonies to the shipment of convicts there as indentured servants, the British Crown understood that it had to find somewhere to send its convicted felons, and that that somewhere had to be at least an ocean’s breadth away from home. The occurrence of the French Revolution and growing unrest not only in Ireland but also in Scotland and Wales provided additional impetus to ensure that this penal experiment at the far ends of the earth should succeed. The story of the early decades of New South Wales and Norfolk Island contains few evidences of ultimate wealth or even the beginnings of a positive gross national product; it does, however, contain many evidences that, whatever the higher ideals and philosophies of the British Crown might have been, the place was eminently suited to the quarantine of convicts, rebels, political demagogues and free ne’er-do-wells. They could scratch a living there without representing a danger to “home.”

To me, the two most fascinating aspects of the great transportation experiment are, first, the blithe assumption on the part of the British Crown that all one had to do was do it, and, secondly, the character of its guinea pigs, the convicts. That it succeeded rests far more with the character of its guinea pigs, the convicts, than with anything else. Which is why I chose to write this novel about the genesis of the much later Commonwealth of Australia (1901) from the convict point of view.

Why were these people convicted in the first place? What in fact were the circumstances of their crimes? How did English justice work? What rights did the accused felon have at law? What were their backgrounds? How did they rub along together? Why, having been landed in an utterly alien place of no milk or honey, did they persevere? Why, having served out their sentences and in a lot of instances made enough money to buy passage home, did so relatively few choose to return home? What did they cling to to sustain their spirits? How did they cope with the brutal, soulless punitive regimes of the time? How did they view freedom when it came, and what did they think of England?

More ofthe latter part of this book takes place at Norfolk Island than at New South Wales. This unique speck in the midst of the Pacific Ocean has a rich and varied history all of its own.

There have been three separate attempts by the British Crown to colonize it, the first two of which were terminated and the island depopulated: the so-called First and Second Settlements. It is the hideous Second Settlement (1825-1855) which most people think of when it comes to unconscionable cruelty; the First Settlement (1788-1813), despite its horrors, was much kinder.