Political History of Australia

As 1807 unfolded, the little British colony of New South Wales was politically charged. Previous governors had attempted to reassert official authority by writing to letters to London and saying mean words about John Macarthur and his ‘trading faction.’ Governor Bligh arrived knowing the job of bringing down Macarthur was his job and his alone.

There were a series of scandals that erupted across 1807. Almost all involved John Macarthur and Governor Bligh. Each dispute got more acrimimonus until Governor Bligh ordered the arrest of John Macarthur.

The criminal trial took place in the heart of Sydney on 25 January 1808. There were a thousand spectators thronged around the court … and then the court dramatically erupted. Governor Bligh was given an out … he was asked to appoint a new presiding judge … but Bligh declared the court chaos seditious. There was no going back. The die was cast.

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Captain William Bligh assumed office as the Governor of New South Wales in August 1806. Bligh had had a brilliant career at sea but it had been sullied by reports of him being a horrible boss. The governorship of New South Wales was seen by Bligh as a way to redeem his reputation … but rather than change his ways, he doubled down on all his worst traits. Bligh arrived with the mindset of a war-time governor. New South Wales was an administrative mess – Bligh would use state power to knock it into shape.

The first thing Governor Bligh did was secure a powerbase among the poorer farmers of the Hawkesbury-Nepean River district. Bligh then started issuing decrees that smashed the economic system that has arisen … and that by and large, was making the colony quite prosperous. All Bligh’s measures had one objective: strangle the power of the trading faction and in particular their leader – John Macarthur.

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The Hon. John Ruddick MLC is a member of the NSW Legislative Council.

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More than anyone, Sir Joseph Banks (the botanist who sailed with Captain Cook) deserves credit for creating modern Australia. For years, before and after the First Fleet, Banks served as the unofficial Minister for New South Wales.

As Banks aged however his judgement slipped and by 1804, his sway over the colony was slipping. So Banks decided to bet big by sending in as governor a famously tough guy (and loyal ally) to reassert authority – Captain William Bligh.

Bligh of course was Captain of the HMS Bounty when it suffered the most famous mutiny in Royal Navy history … but that was not a one-off and Bligh had a reputation as a brilliant officer but a bully.

Bligh was Banks’ heavyweight champion sent in to constrain John Macarthur … just when Macarthur had arrived back in the colony with a huge land grant.

Two decades of simmering political tension is getting close to boil.

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The Hon. John Ruddick MLC is a member of the NSW Legislative Council.

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Governor Philip Gidley King had had two big wins – he had secured Bass Strait and Van Diemen’s Land for Britain and he had ruthlessly and quickly crushed the Castle Hill Rebellion. But Governor King was a micro-manager and he heavily regulated not only economic activity but also the social lives of the colonists. All his central-planning resulted in the return of food rationing and general disquiet.

An exasperated Governor King wrote to London with his troubles and London oddly interpreted it as an offer of resignation and they promptly accepted that supposed resignation. Governor King had two more years as governor before his replacement arrived. He had arrived in 1800 as action man but now he slumped into despair and grew fat and sick. And then his worst nightmare – John Macarthur was back from England and not only had he gotten off scot-free over the court martial matter he had arrived with a ginormous land grant.

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The Hon. John Ruddick MLC is a member of the NSW Legislative Council.

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Produced by Sean Masters
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The 1804 Castle Hill Rebellion was the most dramatic convict uprising in Australian history. The rebels were Irish political prisoners who had arrived en masse between 1800 and 1802. They were a powder keg. Almost immediately on arrival they plotted a grand mutiny. The purpose was not just freedom … but freedom to return to fight for Irish independence.

The Castle Hill Rebellion was over and out in less than a day after being brutally crushed by Major George Johnston and the NSW Corps. Post the rebellion, Major George Johnston and his troops were now seen as the indispensable saviours of the colony.

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The Hon. John Ruddick MLC is a member of the NSW Legislative Council.

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Produced by Sean Masters
(All voices in this series as AI generated bar the narrator.)

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.