Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/640

 612 MUTINY AT NORFOLK ISLAND. convicts to Norfolk Island in 1827 was seized by them; they compelled the master to navigate her. Intending to go to South America they touched at the Bay of Islands. Two whaling vessels were there. Their captains suspected the newcomers. The missionaries summoned the Maoris. The whalers fired upon the convicts, who surrendered, and were guarded by the Maoris until they could be sent back to Sydney. The case in which Governor Darling's severity was most persistently impugned, and which has afforded to some persons their standard for judging him, was his conduct towards two soldiers. Sudds and Thompson, of the 57th Eegt. When Darling arrived in Sydney (Dec. 1825) he found a disposition amongst some of the soldiery to quit the service in order to become convicts. So captivating had the rewards of felony become under Macquarie's sway that soldiers were known to commit crimes in order by means of conviction to join the ranks of felons. The new Governor issued an order (2nd Jan. 1826) to check intimacy between convicts and soldiers. Of the former were many thousands, of the latter 1500, in the colony. In April 1826 two men mutilated themselves for the purpose of obtaining their discharge. Each of them underwent the loss of an arm in consequence of the self- inflicted injuries. The Governor, instead of discharging them, detached them as Pioneers at a distant penal settle- ment. Five men of the regiment had already committed robberies or maimed themselves, when (Nov. 1826) Sudds and Thompson openly committed a robbery to procure their discharge. They were sentenced by the Quarter Sessions to transportation for seven years. The Governor commuted the sentence to labour on the roads in chains ; and, to ** render their removal from the corps as impressive as possible,'*^® caused it to be effected in the presence of the troops instead of in the gaol. Stripped of their uniform, clad in convict garb, with iron collars on their necks, and irons weighing about fourteen" pounds rivetted •• Gov. Darling to Earl Bathurst, 4th Dec. 1826. The sentence did not relieve the men from further military service. '^ It was asserted by some persons that the irons weighed 28 lbs. ; l)ut the Colonial Secretary (Macleay^ mvited the editor of the Australian to examine them (Dec. 1826) and they were iouid« ^ftv^^Vo^. VI oia. respectively.