Penal Penalties

While some of the penal conditions were harsh, others weren’t -depending on the time and who was running the place. When the original convicts arrived from England, they weren’t imprisoned. They were assigned to work for someone as a ‘servant’. The idea was that, if this person proved to be trustworthy and rehabilitated after a couple of years, he or she would be given a ‘ticket of leave’ allowing travel anywhere in the colony to work for wages or set up a business.

Some well-behaved convicts were also granted plots of farming land. This had the authorities back in England in a bit of a quandary. On one hand, they were condoning a form of slavery. On the other, they were offering felons a far better lifestyle and future than most of the people had struggling in Dickensian London. Rather than being a deterrent, crime was becoming the ticket to freedom.