Duncan Campbell's sons tour the Continent: Chasing American Debts: John St Barbe and Captain William Raven: On the New South Wales Corps: Between Blackheath and New Zealand: The year 1792: The Larkins family expresses interest in New South Wales: A feud between slavers: The African trade war continues:

 

The Blackheath Connection

Chapter 41

 

Duncan Campbell's sons tour the Continent:

 

       On 18 January, 1792, Campbell wrote to William Rawlines, a sometime surveyor of  East India Company's ships. But he was not this season put back on duty. Rawlines and others of his family had been years in the service of Campbell, who probably recommended Rawlines to the Honble Wm. Elphinstone. Campbell's two eldest sons were to tour the Continent. They may not have been merely holidaying, they may have been attempting to drum up new tobacco business for their father? On the face of things, during 1791 Dugald and John wished to avoid London's winter by touring the Continent.

 

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      Also in November 1791, Campbell was complaining of the gin-like appearance of the rum from Saltspring these two years past, rum now fetching 4/- or 4/6d. Dugald by now was at Bologna. The boys were on their way to Paris, and Campbell noted - the Powder Merchant forgot to ship the Keg Powder from the Mary but it will be sent by first opportunity for Green Island. Then surfaced the only indication that Campbell knew the banker, Francis Baring.

 

     At the Adelphi on 15 November, 1791, Campbell wrote to Baring at Mincing Lane...

 

Campbell Letter 212:

Adelphi 15 Novr 1791

Francis Baring            Mincing Lane

                   I did myself the honor of calling upon you this morning, but being fearfull of missing you or breaking in upon your other important engagements, I put this letter in my Pocket to inform you of the request I was about to make - My two eldest Sons Dugald & John now at Paris; for the sake of avoiding the cold weather which they were afraid of from the state of their health of encountering in England, propose in their tour through the Continent to spend the Winter Months at Marseills [sic] & its neighbourhood. Hearing of your extensive correspondence with that part of the world, I humbly presume as an old Neighbour to request you will have the goodness to grant me for their use an introductory letter or two to some of your friends there, the Education & situation in life of these two young Men will I trust do no discredit to your recommendation. Any civilities they may thereby receive will upon all occasions be most thankfully remembered by

                                  Sir ([1])

 

      Campbell was evidently preoccupied, for soon he was apologising profusely. On 5  December, he wrote to Baring:

 

Campbell Letter 213:

                          Mincing Lane

I really do not know how to apologise for my remissness in not sooner acknowledging the receipt of your very polite letter covering an introductory one for my Sons to your friends at Marseilles, which I trust has by this time reached their hands at that place; I can only appeal to your Goodness for forgiveness, tho my being in the Country kept me from receiving it for some days ....[He made further apology and promised reciprocal favours at any time].

 

Campbell Letter 214:

     At the Adelphi on 6 December, 1791, Campbell wrote to Hussey Fleet at Dartford:

 

I beg leave to inclose to you Messrs Harley & Cos receipt for £26/10/- paid into their hands on your Account, being the Amount of your bill for Beer supplied to my family at the Mount to 12 Novr.

Will you have the goodness to pay Mr Hands my Annual Premo of 1 pound 3/- on a Policy from the Royal Exchga for this trouble & much other obligation permit ([2])

 

      Campbell had also on his mind... In 1792, a Jamaica House of Assembly committee reported that since 1772, 177 plantations been sold to pay debts, 55 had been abandoned, 92 were in the hands of creditors, and legal action would involve assets of about £22 million. ([3]) The trend was worsening on Jamaica. Absentee landlordism was becoming more irresponsible. His son, Dugald, was still wavering as manager of Saltspring, putting Saltspring at risk of being managed by a family outsider, and perhaps rendering Dugald a gentlemanly but otherwise useless drain on family finances. In 1792 the West Indians were impelled to improve production. They were willing to bring idle land into production, just as they were being told they could no longer use slaves. The abolitionists wished to stem this new level of production.

 

Campbell's letters to Saltspring on Jamaica were to reflect many such concerns. Jamaican sugar was faced with competition from the east. The average price of sugar (in September 1792), was 54/10d. per hundred weight, exclusive of duties and customs. The newspaper The Calcutta Gazette that year carried a long advertisement from W. Fitzmaurice, an ex-Jamaica planter, who proposed publishing a book on the cultivation and manufacture of sugar in East India Company territory. Among the list of firms handling subscriptions were included the Bank of Hindostan, Messrs Fairlie, Reid and Co., Lambert and Ross (who had wanted to supply NSW from India), Messrs Perreau? Palling? at Calcutta and Lyceum in Bombay. ([4]) For England's West Indian sugar islands, the writing was on the wall.

 

*    *    *

 

At the Africa Office:

 

African Office, 23 November, 1791...

 

      John Shoolbred to William Fawkener of Board of Trade, regarding a Privy Council Committee which had commanded that Samuel Ellis did not proceed on his voyage to Africa till they [the committee] had examined him [Ellis] on Mr. Miles' conduct at Annamboe. Samuel Ellis, a servant of the Board of Trade, then in Europe. ([5]) There was reference to "the palaver at Annamboe", apparently an important meeting with the local people.

 

Extract of the whole of the African Committee's proceedings regarding the palaver...

 

[Late 1791?]

[To] The Committee of the Company of Merchants Trading to Africa - [London]

Gentlemen,

          Having been informed that a ? ? has been sent into your Board, signed by two Partners in the House of Messrs Camden, Calvert and King, and Mr Wm Collow, both of London, against the Re-appointment of Mr Thomas Miles, the late Governor of Annamboe, we consider it a duty we owe to that Gentleman's Character, to say, that in our Intercourse with the several Ports, ..... [he is] ... fair and honourable in his Commercial Transactions ...

     (sgd) ships captains of Liverpool. Including John Davis of the ship Hero.

 

*    *    *

 

Chasing American Debts:

 

     On 30 November, 1791, Campbell and a British Creditors' committee in a firm, determined, forthright petition informed Dundas that some payments had been received from America, less so from Virginia. ([6]) The petition was signed by Campbell, John Nutt and William Molleson in respect of American debts of £2.3 million sterling outstanding. ([7]) Campbell conveyed he had lost a total of £38,135/3/10d on investments, Virginia £25,634/17/7 and Maryland, £12,500/6/3d. At the time, Campbell's agent in Virginia was a non-performer, John Rose of Leeds Town, Virginia. (George) Abel and (George M.) Macaulay had lost £5,630/3/5d in South Carolina. Stevenson, Randolph and Cheston, (the Bristol convict contractors), had lost £14,000 all in Maryland. ([8]) George Bogue had lost £2,746/15/10d. William Jones had lost £80,000 in Virginia. The losses totalled in 1791 were £2,522,952/9/5d. The break up of losses-by-states, so the merchants memorialised, was Virginia £390,225/18/1d., Maryland £310,407/11/9d., South Carolina £596,289/19/2d., Georgia £247,781/14/6d., Massachusetts £280,535/16/2d.

 

The petition was... [Melville Papers, William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan]

 

London 30th Novr 1791 [To Rt Hon Henry Dundas, One of His Majesty's principal Secretaries of State]

     Sir,

We received the honor of your Letter of the 1st September last, and beg leave to offer you our respectful acknowledgements for laying the state of the claims of the British Merchants and Traders for compensation for their losses and sufferings by the American War, before His Majesty's confidential servants; and for the assurance you gave us, that they are well aware of the obstructions which we and our constituents have sustained in the recovery of the Debts due by the Subjects of the united States, and that they have not failed to make repeated representations on the subject, and that it is His Majesty's gracious intention to continue his efforts for that purpose; and that the British Minister has received instructions to consider the recovery of the Debts justly due to His Majesty's British Subjects as one of the most essential objects of his mission.

As you are pleased to intimate to us that in the execution of this duty it is incumbent on us, acting for the British Creditors, to give him every aid in our power, we beg to assure you that nothing shall be wanting on our parts to forward so desireable, and to us very necessary, an object, as the recovery of out Debts so long withheld from us.

As soon after the receipt of your Letter as we could obtain a full meeting of the General Committee, we laid the Letter before them, and after due consideration we are instructed to give the following information on the points suggested by you...."  [points follow]

            sgd Dun: Campbell John Nutt Wm Molleson [in that order]. and accompanied by an extensive list of affected creditors and in which state(s) the debts were due, being £2.4 million.

 

        This lobbying occurred late in 1791 was just after Macaulay's Pitt had taken convicts to NSW, and only shortly after the Third Fleet had arrived. It was only months before John St. Barbe in February 1792 would send out Britannia, the ship he part-owned with William Raven, who by Paine's account was a giant of a man, big enough for three men, who was so helpful to the early colony and the trading officers of the NSW Corps by sailing to various ports for stores. ([9]) (Raven's Britannia was not the  Britannia, listed in whaling records, 21 December, 1791 Capt. William Curling.) ([10])

 

       Having been distracted by his American debts, Campbell had to apologise. He did so genuinely.

 

Campbell Letter 215:

                               5 Dec 1791      Rbt Street Adelphi

          Francis Baring Mincing Lane

         I really do not know how to apologise for my remissness in not sooner acknowledging the receipt of your very polite letter covering an introductory one for my Sons to your friends at Marseilles, which I trust has by this time reached their hands at that place; I can only appeal to your Goodness for forgiveness, tho my being in the Country kept me from receiving it for some days ....[

 

He made further apology and promised reciprocal favours at any time]. ([11])

 

Campbell wrote a routine letter:

 

Campbell Letter 216:

                        Adelphi 6 Decr 1791

Hussey Fleet   Dartford

                I beg leave to inclose to you Messrs Harley & Cos receipt for £26/10/- paid into their hands on your Account, being the Amount of your bill for Beer supplied to my family at the Mount to 12 Novr.

Will you have the goodness to pay Mr Hands my Annual Premo of 1 pound 3/- on a Policy from the Royal Exchga for this trouble & much other obligation permit... ([12])

 

      On 15 December, 1791 St. Barbe, according to the 1793 Navy Office Accounts,  had a freight contract, only months after he and Macaulay had sent out Pitt. ([13]) In London, according to Treasury documents, Macaulay during December, 1791 had been attempting to make further deals for convict transportation on condition he could arrange certain matters with the East India Company. Just then, 17 December, 1791, The Dublin Chronicle reported that "The Botany Bay business is certainly to become the object of Parliamentary investigation..." ([14]) On 21 December, 1791,  from Eastsmith, Neavis and Aislabie wrote to George Rose at Treasury. Mr. William Curling, owner and South Sea husband, had stores to go on a ship in about a month. Alexander Davison had also shipped goods to NSW by Britannia Capt. Raven, the ship was on the Thames. Neavis and Aislabie wrote to George Rose/John King about stores and provisions to be sent to NSW by Kitty/Britannia, and mentioned William Curling, owners and 200 tons provisions. ([15]) (By 31 December, 1791 Richards wrote again to Banks, a little alarmed about his business ambitions. He had heard government was intending to send convicts, settlers and provisions, to Port Jackson. Was is true? Banks replied, as Mr. Nepean had left that department, he (Banks) therefore had no information. Apparently it had taken this long for Richards to realise he had been outmanoeuvred, outsmarted, that his hopes might be in vain.)

 

*     *     *     *     *

 

John St Barbe and Captain William Raven:

 

        The arrival at Sydney of Capt. William Raven, still seems somewhat mysterious. Raven won himself a good reputation about Sydney. His name is first seen in the records of the South Whale Fishery, from 1784; and he is listed by the American whaling historian, Stackpole. ([16]) Between 1787-1789, Raven was out in the Southern Whale Fishery on Saucy Ben, for John Hall, ships chandler of 265 Wapping Wall. In 1788, Raven sailed in the fishery (perhaps sealing) for St. Barbe and Co., London, on Jackall, and the same in 1789. His movements between mid-1789 and when he appeared on St Barbe's Britannia for Australia are unknown.

 

    William Raven may have been related to Edward Raven, later an under-secretary at the Home Office. On 28 September, the Sheriff of London discontinued the use of a Criminal Register of Felons. (And George Macaulay in the early 1790s was a sheriff of London). The responsibility for keeping the Criminal Register of Felons at Newgate was assumed by the Home Office (at the orders of Dundas) and given to Edward Raven. He was an extra or supplementary clerk who appears to have taken account of the growing "general criminal business" of the department. Edward Raven may thus also have known  Macaulay, and also provided a link (if no other link existed) between William Raven, St. Barbe and Macaulay?

 

     Edward Raven kept the Register until 3 August, 1800, when he was dismissed by Portland for negligence. ([17]) Once dismissed, Raven was  replaced by Day; and Capper, clerk for Criminal Business. Day was keeper of the Criminal Register, his job "remained outside the ordinary establishment". ([18]) Capper had a long career in prisoner management, and is often cited regarding issues of hulks management. After 1824, Capper became a small shareholder in the Australian Agricultural Company, which was to have the use of convict labour in NSW. ([19])

*    *    *

 

       The supply of New South Wales with convicts and provisions went on, the short age of "fleets' now gone. ([20]) St Barbe, ([21]) had arranged for Raven ([22]) to leave Falmouth on 15 February, 1792 in Britannia which arrived at Sydney in July, 1792. Raven part-owned the ship with St Barbe, and had a three-year fishing licence from the East India Company. Raven and St. Barbe, according to the 1793 Navy Office Accounts, had a freight contract dated 15 December, 1791, made only months after St Barbe and Macaulay had sent out Pitt. Raven, a likeable and competent man and navigator by all accounts, made the opening of Pacific sealing grounds his task. He left a gang of sealers at Dusky Bay, New Zealand, while otherwise he made four voyages of service for the officers of the NSW Corps, for which he was repaid thousands of pounds in paymaster's bills. ([23]) At times his ship was insured by the NSW Corps officers through their London army agents Cox, Cox Greenwood and Co. ([24])

 

      It is difficult not to see St. Barbe's despatch of Raven as a gesture, premeditated in London, of potential use to Major Grose and the officers of the Corps, but there is no evidence for this suspicion. ([25]) Examination of the later trading records of the officers of the NSW Corps do not bear out cynical interpretations. Linkages existed that could have provided room for massive speculation via a pre-arranged "network" of credit-providers in London, ship's captains, and army-officer traders at Sydney. Only recently has comprehensive evidence arisen that this was not the case - ([26]) the entire set of ledgers of the NSW Corps, 1792-1810, which were kept in a quite normal way by the NSW Corps London army agents, Cox Cox and Greenwood. Later, Cox and Greenwood were acquired by a Lloyd's bank and the NSW Corps ledgers languished, unexamined in a Lloyd's archive until about 1988. Australian historians about the time of the Australian Bicentennial had tracked down the ledgers and arranged for them to be transcribed in full, as the originals were in such poor condition they could not be photographed. Reproductions of a transcription of the entire ledgers are contained along with commentary in Statham's A Colonial Regiment.

 

On the New South Wales Corps:

 

      Edited by Pamela Statham, A Colonial Regiment: New Sources Relating to the New South Wales Corps, 1789-1810, sanitizes, if it does not properly rehabilitate, the usual reputation of the NSW Corps as vile and exploitative traders. This sanitisation is appropriate. The New South Wales Corps have been the subject of great prejudice in Australian history. The worst-case view of them is that they [their officers] were the most disgraceful bunch of rats ever to sully the uniforms of the British army, who scarcely ever fired a shot in anger, who took control of a new convict colony, military-junta style, and rapaciously lined their pockets, making a fortune from scratch, which could only have been done with low cunning and a brutal willingness to exploit those weaker than themselves. They also failed to report their guerilla warfare on Aboriginals to London. And so on.

 

       Statham writes, "In Australian historical novels and more recently in `teledramas', ([27]) the NSW Corps has been portrayed as a body of very rough British stationed here [at Sydney] during the foundation years who wore red coats, carried long barrelled muskets and terrified convicts and small farmers alike in the interests of maintaining order and control. Much has been made of the officers' corrupt trading activities, particularly in rum, and their use of the profits from this trade to buy up land and import livestock, until they became the virtual rulers of the colony - able to shorten the careers of, and even depose, Governors appointed by their Sovereign." ([28])

 

       Statham collected the range of prejudicial opinion on the NSW Corps. That many had criminal backgrounds in England. They were worse quality than would have been taken by most other regiments. They were disgraceful, or they were normal military men. They were orderly or they were disruptive. Scum of the earth versus ordinary men who could not find other employment. That they were not-bad types provoked beyond endurance by naval governors who may not have understood the normal lurks and perks commonly used by all managers of regiments, in the financial sense... perks which were  understood by all army agents, practices enabling everything from buying new weaponry to paying for a necessary or an unnecessary celebration for the men. The lower ranks would be paid in kind, which required their officers to hold or buy bulks goods of whatever description. It was understood by everyone, a little loose money was normally allowed to slosh about in the regimental bilges, some of it in the form of pay for "ghost men". Statham's team of researchers revealed that this loose money provided the basis for the trading engaged in by the officers of the NSW Corps. The officers may not have been entirely scrupulous, but nor were they unboundedly corrupt.

 

      The fact is, however, that no one had ever examined any entire body of evidence of the transactions of the NSW Corps in order to actually prove either a prosecution or defense of the reputation of the Corps' officers in respect of allegations about corrupt trading. And if the officers' trading was corrupt, it may have been that their dealings with ships captains was corrupt. Ergo, if it could be proved that the officers of the NSW Corps dealt with a favoured set of ships captains, and more was known about the employers and connections of those ships captains, it might be possible to demonstrate not only that the officers were corrupt. ([29]) It might be possible as well to demonstrate that a skilfully-executed plan or conspiracy was afoot, perhaps hatched much earlier in London? And even that some interested party had provided the Corps' officers with extra profit, for hitherto unknown reasons. The project of Statham and her research team grew thus:

 

     Once the NSW Corps had been formed in 1789, it used the well-known army agents, Cox and Greenwood, who kept ledgers on the Corps' financial behaviour. These ledgers 1800-1805 were finally lodged with the archives of Lloyds Bank in London, but remained unnoticed until recently. Statham's team supplemented the ledger's information with a complete listing of Treasury Bills and Paymaster's Bills issued by the NSW Corps over two decades. To this information and commentary has been added a biographical listing of every soldier in the Corps.

 

      Statham, an economic historian, believes the economic behaviour of the Corps was "the seed bed" of Australian capitalism. A typically Australian profile was set up: a reliance on imports and a resulting trade imbalance, a small role for manufacturing and a resulting over-emphasis on the service sector, a fuzziness on the boundary between private and government enterprise, rural production. All of which is a mini-guide to much Australian economic and social history, where government was also both duty-bound on the one hand, and asked by the citizenry on the other, to intervene in the life of the citizen, the family, the community.

 

      The more truly this early profile accurately describes the way capitalism in Australia was seeded, the more important it would be to ascertain whether the Corps' economic activity was truly corrupt, or not. It would have been very easy indeed for any interested party in London, say, to provide some of the Corps' officers with additional credit to be used in transactions with ships captains cruising into Sydney Harbour. A mere £1000 from an interested merchant would have been sufficient. Given what Statham remarks about Australian novels and TV mini-series, it would broadly suit many typical Australian prejudices if there had been an exploitative - and identifiable - London-based  shipping interest taking advantage of a new convict colony. We have already seen how the Australian novelist, Talbot, had the First Fleet being organised by a rough, corrupt and uncommonly confident Duncan Campbell, out to further the "Campbell shipping interest". Instead of the Hughes-Talbot's inventions here, we have in fact The Blackheath Connection, which was split into two major phases and two camps of different sets of associates between 1786 and 1806. The first phase was comprised of the activity of whalers/slavers, to 1797. Its second phase was partly comprised of associates of the East India Company and the London Missionary Society, which indicates a decided change in balances. The Scots merchant Robert Campbell came coincidentally from India to Sydney at the end of phase 1, but he had no known linkages to the Blackheath Connection personnel of Phase 1. Robert Campbell did however associate with LMS-linked personnel of the Blackheath Connection's phase 2, and when he tried to develop his own shipping interest, (as with the Lady Barlow), he was deflected by London interests, including a very unlikely combination of the Enderby whalers and the East India Company, which included personnel from the Blackheath Connection phase 1. That is, London had brutally nipped an embryonic Sydney shipping interest in the bud by 1810. Meanwhile, if there had indeed been any London shipping interest exploiting Australasia, it would appear that the NSW Corps traders would have been forced to deal with that interest. There is no evidence the NSW Corps traders were so constrained. Ergo, there was no properly organised shipping interest in London exploiting Australasian opportunities. This finding is paradoxical, since it contradicts often-expressed views, such as the remarks of Sir Jerome Fitzpatrick, or the disgust of Alexander Davison, that convict contractors and suppliers were linked in a virtual conspiracy of peculation and favours. 

 

         It might have been better for NSW and its economic interests if a pre-organised shipping interest had been operating between London and Sydney. William Richards  wanted to create such an interest, and was prevented by both government, and the Blackheath Connection phase 1 group, which lasted to 1797. This only gave the Blackheath Connection phase 2 group a better opening when they appeared after 1797. Over and above all this was a shipping interest which could have done much to organise matters at NSW, and never did - the East India Company.

 

     In short, the NSW Corps traders would have behaved differently if London had produced an organised shipping interest for them to relate to, or one they had to relate to, more so if that shipping interest traded fairly. No such interest existed. During the 1790s, many convict contractors were small-time opportunists with no great impact on the Sydney convict colony. Government kept sending convict ships, but enough other shipping floated by to ensure that in London, convict contractors obtained no stranglehold on Australian commerce. This is partly why the NSW Corps officers behaved as they did - opportunistically. Their opportunism, to which they were condemned, is also why they changed their patterns of economic behaviour the way they did, when they did. Governor Hunter reported in 1798 that "a fortune of 8000 or more has been made in five years... by... officers". ([30])

 

        In particular, there is no evidence that the Corps' officers preferred for any reason to trade with ships captains linked to men of the Blackheath Connection. This exonerates, say, both George Macaulay and John St Barbe of any suspicion that they used their ships captains to influence the disastrously primitive NSW economy, which had not been planned by government; when government had irrationally assumed that an economy would not exist, nor be needed, in a new penal colony.

 

      Even with such exoneration, the joint action of Macaulay and St Barbe in taking the contract for Pitt's convict transport voyage still seems mysterious. The short time elapsing between the departures of Pitt and Britannia raises suspicions, precisely since Capt. Raven went on repeated stockbuying voyages to aid the trading activities of the NSW Corps. Given Statham's work on the NSW Corps, there now seems no reason to suspect that any of the Blackheath merchants took any action - which would not have been difficult to arrange - to keep the NSW Corps in their pocket. This realisation is important, since it is a typical Australian reaction, to feel that the British merchants contracting for convict transportation were making "big money".

 

         The money to be made from convict contracting was less than profits from slaving, it was less than "big", and there were not as many combinations amongst British merchants in the matter as one might have believed would exist - with one proviso... it is still impossible to find lists of merchants contracting to carry Irish convicts to Australia. The discovery of a list of contractors for Irish convicts could contradict these generalities. But even if it was found that combinations did exist amongst convict shippers, it would still be the case that the NSW Corps did not treat any captain or set of captains with particular favouritism. All this amounts to a rehabilitation of the NSW Corps, in that if they were monopolistic, given to extortion, or any other excesses, their excesses were not encouraged, or necessitated, by any interests in other countries, except the interests of opportunistic ships captains, especially North American captains bringing in spirits. It means that any excesses of the NSW Corps were a purely local matter.

 

       In all this, the role of the officers of the NSW Corps in "seeding" capitalism in Australia encourages a little more despair, in that the British government allowed such an unhealthy situation to become institutionalised so thoughtlessly in a colony where convict labour was supposed to benefit the state. As it happened, the British government continually and irrationally complained about the costs of its distant convict colony, harassed governors about expenditure, and then had the audacity to ignore good ideas, such as those proffered by Richards. And then to complain that its army officers in NSW were so ungentlemanly as to trade and barter in a peculiar human situation - a large open gaol on a warm seacoast which represented an undeveloped sea-lane... in a colony left without an economy, whilst more ships were to bring convicts regularly, and whalers were being encouraged into the Pacific by the Board of Trade with the full knowledge of senior ministers.

 

        As noted earlier, the history of the Thames hulks has been rendered less-than-accurate by sheer hatred of the hulks. It has also been an Australian habit of mind, a literary knee-jerk, to allow an ill-informed hatred of the "rapacious" Rum Corps, and a culturally-embedded dislike of authority the product of the convict system, to deflect attention from a more useful target for inspection - the British establishment which created Australia as a convict colony. This hatred has also distorted history-writing. And despite the St Barbe-Raven venture, Macaulay's Pitt never returned to Sydney. Macaulay sent out no other ships to Australia, and it seems that the constant frustration he'd experienced at the Company's hands made him abandon ambitions to gain any back door entry to Eastern business via convict handling, and Sydney. Till 1797 when he crashed financially, Macaulay remained content to send Pitt regularly to China, and had no greater ambitions.

 

       According to Gill, writing in 1967, William Raven was a friend of Philip Gidley King, and so King would have known of Raven's hopes for opening an Australasian sealing industry. ([31]) Other writers have seen King as a friend of Enderbys, but via ill-wrought perspectives. At sea on 28 April, 1792, Raven's Britannia spoke with Brothers of Dunkirk, D. Swain Master, of Milford Haven (where some Nantucket whalers had gone). ([32]) What is surprising, however, is that over years, research on the high- profile colonial convict-businesswoman, Mary Reiby ([33]), has never revealed the links existing between her husband, Thomas; to his guardian and employer, Capt. William Raven; to Raven's employer, or partner, John St Barbe, whaler, political and industrial activist, and administrator with Lloyd's of London. And the links between St Barbe, Enderby, whaling about Australasia, the members of the Board of Trade, and the highest levels of British politics between 1786 and 1800. All the connections are obvious, also inescapable, yet they have never been gathered, let alone interpreted, whether one would be interested in whaling or sealing, "Australia's first industry", or the narrower confines  of Mary Reiby's family history. Yet, one of her descendants was once a premier of Tasmania!

 

Between Blackheath and New Zealand:

 

      On 21 May, 1792 William Richards (again) wrote to Banks about the provisioning of NSW, mentioning governor Phillip's despatches sent by Queen and Atlantic to Calcutta.  The Board of Trade meeting of 2 June, 1792 had read a letter from governor Phillip on the number of sperm whales seen on the coast. (Phillip in Sydney wrote on 5 November, 1791). ([34]) Deep-sea whaling began off New Zealand in 1791-1792, with William and Ann, the first New Zealand sealer was Raven's Britannia. In 1794-95 the Fancy spent three months at the Thames River, New Zealand, cutting spars for the Indian Navy and collecting flax. As became apparent, the New Zealand bay whaling season was May to October.

 

Historical Records of New Zealand (1914) cite the journal of Archibald Menzies, which mentions instructions from Joseph Banks for HM Discovery, Capt. Joseph Whidbey, which was at Dusky Bay by 2 November, 1791 with Lts. Zacariah Mudge and Joseph Baker. ([35]) Capt. Vancouver was with Whidbey, Lt. Broughton was commander of HM Chatam, master James Johnstone. Ships were wooding and watering, and ([36]) later to Tahiti. ([37]) Francis, from Sydney, 41 tons, brought out in Macaulay's Pitt, had been launched about 25 June, 1793 by Capt. Raven, whose men as a reward were given a 232 pound hog. She went to Dusky Bay. Mr. Leith was one of the men mentioned by Murray. Leith was given charge of the sealing party Raven left at Luncheon Cove in 1792. Raven gave Lt.-Governor King a report of 2 November, 1793, on the visit to Dusky Sound, and later, Robert Murray left Raven, with Raven's approval, to sail with W. W. Bampton, on Shah Hormuzear, some of whose crew were Lascars. And throughout, the material in HRNZ emphasises the enormous respect these sailors had for Capt. James Cook. ([38]) P. G. King's journal of his visit to New Zealand to inspect flax, (and kidnap Maori "flax dressers"), indicates that earlier in London, King had been shown flax which Joseph Banks had years before gathered and taken from New Zealand. ([39]) P. G. King was aware of the Enderby whaler's interests in Australasian waters from the very first. Historians have not been so aware.

 

*     *     *

 

In 1796 was also resurrected yet again the old British fantasy of plundering the Spanish. Not even the success of the Nootka Convention had not been enough to suppress this old yearning. This time the prey was the Philippines, where there was alleged Spanish interference with English shipping. There arose an idea that a detachment of troops could be sent by Lady Shore (a convict transport which in fact disappeared) to be kept for active service for any expeditions against the Spanish at Philippine settlements. ([40]) In January 1796, Sir John Shore at Fort William, Calcutta, discussed with Capt. William Raven an idea that convicts from Sydney become soldiers at Calcutta. The idea was rejected.

 

(Meanwhile, in 1796, Enderby's neighbour St. Barbe was building a ship Tellicherry on the Thames, which he used in the convict service after 1800. Tellicherry sailed on 27 June, 1796, Capt. S. Baker for Bengal, for St Barbe.) ([41])

 

*     *     *     *     *

 

The year 1792:

 

       On 4 January, 1792, Campbell wrote to John Rose, Virginia, about debt collecting. He noted, Messrs Matthews had paid some money into accounts. ([42]) On 10  January, 1792, suffering a bad cold, he wrote to Dugald at Marseilles; and to Dugald at Nice, 27 January, 1792. ([43]) Furore had broken out in London over the Second Fleet, but Campbell was hardly going to mention that to his sons. And on 27 January, 1792, Duncan had written to Dugald at Nice, enclosing some introductory letters and bills, adding, "I need not request you will make them go as far as you can", and Duncan Jnr was still at Gravesend, "really growing a fine looking fellow... I expect him in town in a couple of days." (About this time, Duncan was a member along with Sir John Dyke of Lullingstone, of the Amicable Club, which at times met at his Adelphi address).

 

 *    *    *

 

       On 7 February, 1792, Campbell inquired of Stewart Erskine about a convict tradesman to go out on the Kitty. ([44]) In the midst of the Neptune affair, by 28 January, 1792, government had finally done something about the lack of currency in the Sydney colony, sending money out in Kitty Capt. George Ramsay, surgeon J. P. Niebuhr, arriving at Sydney 18 November, 1792. Shelton's Account No. 6, of 28 January, 1792 for the ship was with the otherwise unheard-of William Christopher for the transportation of a few convicts only. Shelton charged a mere £34/17/2d. for "Drawing and Ingrossing Assignments of the several Convicts from Mr Christopher to Governor Phillips.... The like to annex to Warrant under His Majesty's Sign Manual authorizing me to Contract for their Transportation The like to annex to Order by His Majesty in Council appointing the E Coast of NSW"... Kitty carried 3879 oz. of silver in dollars, to pay Sydney's artificers, superintendents and other staff. ([45])

 

     On 24 February, 1792, Campbell wrote to his son Dugald, C/- Messrs Donat Oris & fils of Florence:

 

Campbell Letter 217:

... We are all well, except our little girl Loisa [sic] who has been long & still continues in a poor way; [hoped spring would bring her round] Duncan has taken his leave of the Adelphi, I mean however to visit him tomorrow or next day at Gravesend from whence the Valentine is expected to depart on the 27 or 28 .... he seems to like his situation as Mess-master...  ([46])

 

     With Dugald gallivanting on the continent instead of managing Saltspring, Campbell had to instruct Saltspring's manager, William Brown. On Valentine then at Gravesend was Capt. Iver McMillan - and on 29 February, 1792, Duncan Jnr had been given a letter of credit per his father, but from Cameron, ships husband for Duncan and John Campbell. ([47]) Duncan wanted John on one of the ships managed by Cameron. It seems, also, that Campbell had little power to convince either Cameron, or any captains employed by Cameron, that a shipowner's son must be employed on a ship, just because he was the shipowner's son.

 

      Dugald was penned a letter (Campbell Letter 218 abstracted) of 2 March, 1792, C/- Messrs Donat Oris & fils at  Florence. (Dugald was C/- Messrs Le Clerc & Co at Nice.) Duncan enclosed two notes (early traveller's cheques) of Sir Robert Harris's (Herries), £100 for Dugald and £100 for Jack and two circular letters of Credit for £200 each on places they were likely to visit, Duncan suspected there had been some interceptions of the post by the delay with writing to his sons then hearing from them... People had told him interceptions are not uncommon. Dugald was soon going to Genoa. Mrs. Campbell been indisposed of last few days, so was little Loisa. Brown at Jamaica been in touch about 12 new Negro slaves which cost £577/17/-. Dugald at Rome had letters in care of Thomas Jenkins Esqr. ([48])

 

     Another letter (Campbell Letter 219 abstracted) went to Dugald... Lond 6 March 1792, Dugald Campbell, c/- Thos Jenkins Esq Rome, with money again from "Sir Robert Heries & Co... £200 each for Jack and Dugald and their correspondents at Rome, Naples, Bologna, Venice and Genoa"... Mrs Campbell was recovering from a very severe illness, the money was to do them for four months, Duncan wanted them home by August in view of shipments to Saltspring of copper boilers, which Brown badly wanted. And in view of Jack's prospects, the India ships would sail in November, though Duncan did not yet see any opening for Jack. ([49])

 

     To William Brown in Jamaica, Campbell wrote from London on 7 March 1792, concerning the new slaves on Saltspring, wanting to know the slaves' names so he could enter them in his books accordingly. (That is, in his books kept in London.) He asked about rum from Saltspring, and mentioned melancholy accounts received about St Domingo, "dreadfull in the extream [sic]" so he said little to Dugald about it, as it would only distress him. A bill for slaves of £577/17/- went to J. Wedderburn to be duly honoured by Duncan. ([50])

 

*    *    *

 

      Campbell had also been concerned with business for the British Creditors... His letter was elliptical, from London on 7 March, 1792, to John Rose in Virginia. Campbell advised he was a member of the Merchants Trading [The British Creditors, but no longer the chairman] and that a suit had been initiated in the US Federal Court by a Creditor. Campbell understood the court had declined to give a verdict till they "further deliberate on a point of such magnitude"... ([51]) Another letter went to Europe. On 30 March, 1792, Campbell wrote to Dugald at Rome, mentioning... Miss Gregg. Campbell found it difficult to get the introductions Dugald desires, Brown on Jamaica had some settlement with one Tomlinson. "The House of Commons have of late keept [sic] me in anxious employment in furnishing themselves with retrospective Accounts relative to the People who are under my charge I shall be happy when I have done with them, meantime I miss you" [He added, the London sugar market is falling]. Duncan then wrote to Brown per ship Mary. ([52])

 

      Luckily for the Campbell family, Duncan became more settled since the Continental tours had settled his two sons. Dugald returned to Saltspring, where he had the misfortune to have an overseer die. The estate had suffered while he'd been holidaying on the continent. Dugald once more faltered, and proposed giving up the management of the estate, something his father would not hear of. Duncan proposed that Dugald should adopt "Rigid Economy" and admonished his game in Europe of playing "a man of fortune". Dugald waveringly decided to stay on Saltspring, and then his father became more indulgent, about allowing improvements, about giving Dugald more power over the estate's affairs. Dugald was soon eager to buy an extra 60-70 acres for Negroe ground.

 

*     *     *

 

     Campbell in London on 4 April, 1792 wrote to William Brown, Jamaica, by the Packet:

 

Campbell Letter 220:

        ... "Yesterday moving after debating the whole preceding night, the long Contested question the Slave Trade, was carried for a gradual Abolition by a Majority of 145 - I will make no Comments in this decision; I do not yet know the arrangements intended in the bill, but I believe no time will be lost in putting it in execution..."

 

      Campbell wrote to Dugald in Rome on 10 April, 1792. It was possible there might be a berth for Jack as first mate on Capt. Cooper's New Atlas, which would be launched in August. ([53]) (Campbell noted he was so interrupted in writing this letter he scarcely knew what he had written).. Then Duncan wrote to John about Cameron. Situations had changed. John would not now to go as first mate with Capt. Cooper. About them, too, Campbell wrote to Dugald without comment on the likely abolition of the slave trade, although he used an unusual term - "we must take Neighbour's face". ([54])

 

Campbell made a usual report on convicts...

 

Campbell Letter 221:

 [A scrap of paper in the Letterbook]

                                    My Dear Sir,

                                    Herewith you will

                                    please receive a printed copy of the

                                    Papers laid before the House of Commons

                                    relative to the Convicts

                                    I am

                                    Dear Sir

                                    Your faithful and

Whitehall                            obedient servant

11 April 1792                       Ja Bradley

                             Duncan Campbell Esq ([55])

 

     By mid-May, 1792 Dugald was at Venice, c/- Conrade Martens, and Dugald now carried letters of introduction, as promised by his father, from Francis Baring of Mincing Lane. By 1 May, 1792, Duncan wrote to John c/- Conrade Martens Esq of Venice.  Campbell had now seen Capt. Cooper and assured Cooper that Jack would be home for the ship by middle of August. He added, Dugald was thinking of coming home by Germany. Loisa was mending.

 

               Dugald was in Milan in May 1792, then to Venice. From letters, John C/- Conrade Martens Esq, Venice, learned (London Ist May 1792)... Campbell had seen Capt. Cooper (on one of the family India ships managed by Cameron) and had been assured by Cooper that Jack should be home for Cooper's ship by the middle of August, Dugald was thinking of coming home via Germany. Loisa had been ill but was mending. ([56]) There was disgust in London at misleading news reports about the situation with Seringpatam, as Campbell noted...

 

       On 23 May, 1792, Campbell wrote to Dugald C/- Monsr Ami Bonnet of Milan, mentioning an account of the capture of Seringpatam, "from beginning to end a complete Forgery, & of a sort perhaps never before equalled." Campbell at this time seemed to be bumping into Cameron almost every day, one topic being Jack's employment on one of the India ships. ([57])

 

      The Campbell boys went to Venice, Milan, Marseilles, ([58]) Campbell became embarrassed by his sons' game of playing men of substance, or at least he gave that impression.  But from this time, Campbell entered a period of financial strain and was often dealing with his attorney, Mr. I. Aldridge of Red Lion Square. There had been an application from Mr. Rumball to buy Campbell's warehouses at Haydon Square. Campbell also faltered with his determination to recover his American debts.

 

*    *    *

 

The Larkins family expresses interest in New South Wales:

 

         Considerable interest at Blackheath must also have been focussed on India by mid-1792. There was, A Report on the Proceedings of the Committee of Sugar Refiners, for the purpose of effecting a reduction in the high prices of sugar, by lowering the bounty of refined sugar exported, and correcting the evils of the West India Monopoly. London. 1792. Those issues would prompt ideas of importing sugar from the East Indies. A newspaper might have reported that on 22 November, 1792 arrived at Bombay the Imperial ship L'Aurora Guiseppe Viggal, which had touched on the coast of Brazil and at the Cape of Good Hope on 18 August, 1792, where she left Royal Admiral, Indiaman with 400 convicts for Botany Bay. (From Calcutta Gazette, 18 May, 1793). In 1792, William Pitt was Commissioner of the East India Board. MPs with an interest in the East India Company included John Baring, Stephen Lushington, Lionel Darell one of the Company directors, Paul Le Mesurier, alderman and Company director. That fellow who had sent the Botany Bay ships, William Richards was praying (recommendation No 292) of the Company to take up ships offered by him to carry convicts to NSW. ([59]) He was stretching the Company's patience considerably.

 

       Meanwhile, it has been reported by Bovill that the Larkins family of Blackheath was "ordered" by the East India Company to send their ship Royal Admiral to Sydney with convicts. ([60]) Given the usual distaste expressed by the East India Company for convict transportation, such an order seems highly unlikely. Bovill also was unaware of the Blackheath Connection, and of family links between George Macaulay and the Larkins family. It is presumably true, as Bovill suggests however, the Larkins family were well known in their area, as "an East India family". It is an item of the residential history of Blackheath that John Pascal Larkins lived at Macaulay's former residence, Dartmouth Hill House, from 1798, when Macaulay had lost substantial money and had to sell; so Macaulay sold to the family. Thomas Larkins was a Blackheath resident. ([61]) From 1792 and later, Thomas Larkins, "an East India Company man", owned the Indiaman Warren Hastings. A family Larkins from 1746-1794 were at Hyde Cliff, about Blackheath. ([62]) Macaulay's correspondence regarding Warren Hastings, being impeached still, is housed at the British Library.

 

      An Indian historian, Misra, has outlined the character of government under Warren Hastings. For 13 years, Hastings ruled, "shaping the political character" of the British government in India, in favour of despotism, but granting some recognition of the ancient laws and customs of major indigenous communities. ([63]) Pitt's India Act of 1784, the Regulating Act of 1773, were imperfect. Misra writes, evils flowed from the combination of the commercial and political functions of the Company, but no attempt was made to separate these functions. The influence of the "Nabobs" returning to Britain, such as Sir  Hugh Inglis, was unabated in London. ([64]) By April 1783, Dundas in opposition had introduced a Bill to discipline the East India Company but it lapsed without support. Pitt's predecessors had aroused "suspicion and fear" in Company circles (but the Company and its shareholders were notably hypersensitive). Pitt had got an agreement from the Company concerning partial control on India affairs, and territorial administration, with a body answering to Parliament, yet the Company had largely been left to its own commercial devices. After Pitt's India Bill was passed in July 1784, the Board of Control included Sydney, Pitt, Dundas, W. W. Grenville, Lord Mulgrave and Lord Walsingham. Sydney and Pitt rarely attended. Dundas in 1786 made a Bill to amend Pitt's India Act of 1784 - to remedy the evils due to the insufficiency of the power of the governor-general. ([65]) Dundas virtually ruled the East India Company Board of Control, and it was he who got Sir Archibald Campbell, late governor of Jamaica, in as the new governor at Madras. In 1787, the Board of Control desired to send out four European regiments as reinforcements to meet the suspected French movements in India.

 

      In 1789, efforts were to halt a trade in the sale of children, and the Company's power was rapidly expanded. East India correspondence had been divided into sectors, Public, Secret, Revenue, Military and Commercial, about 1786, and the Secret section was later subdivided into three more sections including Secret and Political. All known "secret" plans and views of foreign European powers and nations were considered. ([66]) A distinct Secret department grew in 1790. And in one central secretariat, a Company man engaged in training Company youngsters was William Butterworth Bayley, ([67]) (who was probably a relation of Thomas Butterworth Bailey, the Lancashire magistrate who in 1785 had abused ministers for not opening penitentiaries).

 

       Misra conveys, that with the East India Company under Warren Hastings, was one William Larkins, known as "competent and honest". A civil servant, he arrived as a writer in Calcutta in 1772, later an accountant-general till March 1793 when he retired and sailed for England - he had centralised the administration of accounts. ([68]) He was probably related to the Larkins family, who in turn were related by marriage to alderman  Macaulay. ([69]) And Macaulay, or at least his associates, had not yet given up on opportunities they could use at Sydney, and past Sydney to India or China. ([70])

 

        Twee shibboleths exist concerning the use of Royal Admiral as a convict transport, which came to Sydney twice before 1801 for such purposes, under two different owners. She was "an East Indiaman" -  glamourous, impressive. In fact, each of her owners had Blackheath connections. Both Australian and British writers have over-glamourised East Indiamen, largely because, over generations, the pomposity of the East India Company has encouraged this as a literary reflex. Some writers treating Royal Admiral's first convict voyage, when she was an acknowledged East Indiaman, have fallen for this trap. The voyage of Royal Admiral 1 is detailed in Bovill, Some Chronicles of the Larkins Family - The Convict Ship, 1792. ([71]) Here, Bovill makes the dubious claim that Royal Admiral's owners were "ordered" by the East India Company to send her to Sydney with convicts, for unstated reasons, reasons presumably relating to politics internal to the Company, but also relating to the Company's political relationship with government vis-à-vis the new convict colony at Sydney. It remains difficult to imagine any reasons why such an "order" would be given. It seems the Larkins' contract was taken voluntarily;  possibly in line with some plan of Macaulay's?  A second shibboleth concerning Royal Admiral is that she ended her days, after 1801, as a convict hulk on the Thames. There is irony then, in an "East Indiaman" becoming a despised convict hulk. False irony. It is unclear if she did become a hulk!

 

      George Brown ([72]) was the broker for Royal Admiral in her first convict service. He was perhaps of the firm Welbank Sharpe and Brown, flax merchants, who in 1787 had tendered Bethia which became HMAV Bounty. (The name Welbank sporadically punctuates lists of the names of merchants interested in the Pacific, never in a big way, every few years or so to 1806). And as Larkins' Royal Admiral was being organised to go out to NSW, by 2 May, 1792, Richards offered, yet again, to supply provisions to the new settlement).

 

*     *     *

 

      There is an Australian folk song about "Botany Bay":

"Come all you men of learning

and a warning take from me, ... shun bad company..."

 

which has lines,

 

"It was on the twenty-eighth of May

from England we did steer..."

 

      This is presumably a London song. Was there any convict transport which actually sailed on May 28 of any given year? The song may well refer to Royal Admiral I,  which left England on May 23, 1792, and was at Torbay, 30 May. Royal Admiral II, (the same ship  with different owners) also sailed May 23, after 1800. ([73]) (There sailed on 30 May, 1792, Royal Admiral I, Capt. Essex Henry H Bond, NSWales, China, Capt. T. Larkins. (A Lloyd's sail-by date). She was 914 tons, quite large. Her surgeon was Richard Alley, earlier on Lady Juliana. ([74]) Royal Admiral arrived at Sydney on October 7, 1792, and has since received undue deference as an "Indiaman". Shelton's Contract No 7, dated 8 May, 1792 was made with Thomas Larkins Esq. Commander, for Royal Admiral. ([75])

 

    By now, news of the Third Fleet's safe and healthy arrival had reached London. Allegations were made only about abuses regarding the rations on Queen. ([76])

 

*    *    *

 

A feud between slavers:

 

     Just two days later, at the Board of Trade meeting 10 May, 1792, Shoolbred of the Africa Company  was wondering about a missive of 20 April, about the employment of craft on the coast of Africa, about mid-1791, before the "Palaver affair" had broken out. ([77]) At the Board of Trade meeting of 14 May, 1792, arose the matter of the complaints of the slavers Camden, King and Collow about the conduct of Miles on the Coast of Africa, and Miles' re-appointment to there (as governor). Richard Miles continued pleading for his brother - the memorialists had been "cruel" to Thomas Miles. Richard complained, "these very men had been enjoying (and still continue to benefit by) a free and almost uninterrupted monopoly of the Trade at Annamboe"... On 18 May, 1792, African merchants Bourke, Barnes, Casamajor, French and Calvert, and Thomas King, attended the Board of Trade, alleging Miles had broken navigation laws and caused trade rivalries all along the African coast by employing American-built ships, which employment was expressly forbidden by the Africa Company. ([78])

 

      It was also explained that company servants were allowed to trade in compensation for their small salaries, but that they were not permitted to deal in Negro slaves. From September 1788, to January 1792, one J. Currie had been about the African coast for Calvert, as supercargo on Recovery Capt. Andrew Hewson, assisting in the trade based at Annamboe. (The Board of Trade was told this in the same month as Donald Trail was acquitted for alleged crimes with the Second Fleet trip, in June 1792). ([79]) Not until June 1792 did Currie return to London, able to give evidence to the Board of trade in support of allegations made against Miles by Camden, King and Collow. ([80])

 

        At the Board's meeting on 14 May, 1792, a letter was proffered from Joseph Fayver/Sayver to Messrs Camden, Calvert and King of 31 December, 1791, one of other letters. A letter from Martin Watts to Messrs Collow and King dated 9 February, 1792 alleged that Thomas Miles had traded on the African Coast using American-built ships  (which was against British regulations). ([81]) A meeting followed on 16 May, 1792, again about Miles and Africa - adjourned till the 18th, when Messrs Bourke, Barnes, Casamajor, French and Calvert of the Africa Committee attended about Miles. The Board of Trade committee now thought Miles had been trading contrary to Act 5 Geo 3, c.44. The Africa Company observed that the Statute had prohibited their Servants from engaging in the Export of Negroes, and not to forbid their entry into trade generally. That the governor [on the African Coast] had always traded except in Negroes. Also, so that servants did not sell slaves to foreign powers, to make up for their small salaries which anyway were paid in merchandise sent out by the Africa Co. Mr. King was called in, and he said that Miles had traded all along the coast and caused rivalries with merchants. So the feud progressed.

 

The African trade war continues:

 

       At the Board of Trade meeting of 14 November, 1792. the Miles' Africa trade war affair dragged on. Further evidence had been gathered. By the meeting of 28 November, 1792, African merchants had discussed the late governor of the Fort of Annamboe, rash in his dispute with the natives, the burning of town of Agaii; (sgd Stephen Cottrell). ([82]) By the meeting of 29 November, 1792, Shoolbred had written back to the Board of Trade about the dismissal of Thomas Miles from Africa Company service. By the meeting of 5 December, 1792, Bristol and Liverpool African merchants had applied to send guns and gunpowder to African coast. (One is unsure whether they wanted to do this because Miles was gone, or not).

 

     By 31 December, 1791, one Joseph Sayver (Sawyer?) had written to Camden et al on the issues. On 9 February, 1792, one Martin Watt had alleged in a letter to Camden et al  that Thomas Miles had been trading on the African coast in American-built ships in defiance of regulations. Since Calvert was on the board of the African Company, - and, presumably, had a "conflict of interest"? - Camden and King joined with another African merchant, Collow, ([83]) in complaining to the Board of Trade about Miles' trading and irregularities in the governance by Richard Miles about Annamboe. Publicly at least, Calvert stayed out of the fracas. The Board heard more. On 10 May, Shoolbred informed the Board of Trade about the employment of craft before the Annamboe "Palaver affair" had broken out.

 

*     *     *

 

    About 16 December, 1793, John St Barbe tendered Canada Capt. Muirhead, which was not allowed as a convict transport. He then offered Surprize Capt. Patrick Campbell, to carry 110 convicts. Surprize was also in poor condition. ([84]) The suggestion is that links existed between St Barbe and Calvert, but Calvert was backing off. The Blackheath Connection between 1793 and 1797 began to sag. Anthony Calvert et al withdrew from Australasian business by 1794. With an increasing effort being made in Parliament to stem the slave trade, the slavers were probably reassessing commercial options, and it appears they opted to scale down their engagements at Cape Coast Castle, on the African Coast generally, split up, and concentrate on ship insurance at Lloyd's. ([85]) In terms of the mercantile status quo in the City of London, the merchants opening the Pacific had been rebellious. It is not surprising then to find their names associated from 1798 with the rebel insurers' book at Lloyd's - the Red Book. The clearest book on the names associated with The Battle of The Red Book versus The Green book at Lloyd's, is by George Blake. ([86]) Enter, the Blackheath Connection, yet again.

 

*   *   *

 

[Finis Chapter 41]

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