Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/303

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COURT-MARTIAL AT PARRAMATTA. EXECUTIONS.

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Excellency that I never saw more zeal and activity than what has been displayed by the officers and men of this detachment for destroying and securing the runaways. . . . Cunningham, one of the rebel chiefs, who was supposed to be dead on the field, was brought in here alive, and I immediately (with the opinion of the officers) ordered him to be hung up"^[1]

Thus was a formidable insurrection stamped out by the promptitude of the Governor, and the energy of Johnston and his men, who marched in about nine hours a journey which he computed at forty-five miles. On the morning of the 5th March Johnston had left Sydney. On the 8th a court-martial was held at Parramatta. Captain Edward Abbott the president, Captain Kemp, Lieutenants Davies, Brabyn, Menzies, McCallam, and Quartermaster Laycock formed the court. Richard Atkins was the Deputy Judge-Advocate. Ten men were arraigned, most of whom pleaded that they were forced to join the rebels." All were found guilty and sentenced to death. King approved the proceedings and sentence, and dissolved the court, and three of the prisoners were hung on the day of their trial at Parramatta. One of them was a freed man who declared that he had been forced to join the rebels. Three were hung at Castle Hill, and on the 10th two were hung at Sydney. Two were pardoned by King. Other culprits were sentenced to the lash, some "at the discretion of the magistrates, and according to the opinion of the surgeons, of the number of lashes they can bear without endangering their lives."

An Order of the 5th March appointed a captain of the Parramatta Loyal Association, and added:—" Every person seen out of their houses or habitations after sunset will be apprehended as rebels, and punished accordingly; and let

↑ Various erroneous accounts of this outbreak, of the number of troops, of the death of Cunningham, &c., having obtained credence and been quoted without hesitation, it is right to quote despatches of Major Johnston, as authorities which are unquestionable and decisive. In the official list furnished by King, Cunningham is included as "executed at Hawkesbury." He was hung on the staircase of the public store there, "which he boasted in his march that he would plunder."—Sydney Gazette, 11th March 1804.
Cunningham had been overseer of stonemasons at Castle Hill. Another man, executed at Parramatta, had been overseer of carpenters. One poor wretch was the only survivor of a party of Irish who endeavoured to walk to China. The Sydney Gazette on the 11th March dilated on the extreme lenity shown by the Government to "the majority of the deluded offenders."

[1] Various erroneous accounts of this outbreak, of the number of troops, of the death of Cunningham, &c., having obtained credence and been quoted without hesitation, it is right to quote despatches of Major Johnston, as authorities which are unquestionable and decisive. In the official list furnished by King, Cunningham is included as "executed at Hawkesbury." He was hung on the staircase of the public store there, "which he boasted in his march that he would plunder."—Sydney Gazette, 11th March 1804.
Cunningham had been overseer of stonemasons at Castle Hill. Another man, executed at Parramatta, had been overseer of carpenters. One poor wretch was the only survivor of a party of Irish who endeavoured to walk to China. The Sydney Gazette on the 11th March dilated on the extreme lenity shown by the Government to "the majority of the deluded offenders."

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