Page:A colonial autocracy, New South Wales under Governor Macquarie, 1810-1821.djvu/207

 prison where it was cooler than in the bunks. When the alarm was given the soldiers fired and continued to fire for some time through the grating. They killed three men and wounded twenty-two. Frightened to go down in the dark, the surgeon left the wounded and the dead uncared for through the long stifling night. From that time only half rations were served out, and every night seventy (sometimes a hundred) men had been chained naked to an iron cable in the prison. These were the chief facts reported by Campbell to the Governor in one of the most terrible documents of the convict times.

The master and surgeon had acted throughout without waiting for proofs and in blind terror. There was much reason to doubt whether there had ever been any real cause for this terror, whether a plot had ever been formed, and whether the story of two tale-bearers, confirmed by conversations overheard by terrified and suspicious men, had not been a complete fabrication.

When Macquarie received the report he was much disturbed. An examination of the hatchways made it quite certain that no attempts had been made to force the gratings. That much being known, he determined to detain the Chapman until further inquiries had been made, and Captain Piper, the naval officer, was instructed to retain the ship's register and not to let it out of his hands without special authority from the Governor. "The object of this injunction," wrote Campbell, "is to guard against any risk of the master of the Chapman endeavouring to escape from the harbour, which would be facilitated by his possessing the register." This was on the 9th of August, and four days later Macquarie appointed by warrant a Court of Enquiry, consisting of Judge-Advocate Wylde, D'Arcy Wentworth, Superintendent of Police, and J. T. Campbell, the Secretary, to investigate the occurrences of the voyage. The court had power to demand the presence of witnesses, to administer oaths and require the production of documents.

"Not having any court in this Colony," wrote the Governor to Lord Bathurst, "competent to take final cognisance of crimes