Revised Jun 22 2021
The execution of the task which had been recommended by King, and which entailed an amazing sacrifice of property, devolved upon one whose name has often been mentioned in this work, especially in its earlier pages. Captain Bligh of the Bounty had been appointed Governor of New South Wales in 1805; and in December, 1806, William Windham, Esq., then Secretary of State for the Colonies, despatched to Governor Bligh directions for the entire evacuation of Norfolk Island. The reasons alleged for this measure were the vast expense of maintaining the settlement, the difficulty of keeping up a communication between it and Port Jackson; the danger attending an approach to an island without a port secure from tempests, and even without a road in which ships could safely anchor. Many of the convicts were removed, against their own wishes, to Port Dalrymple, and other places in Van Diemen's Land; but the entire removal of prisoners did not take place until the year 1807. About eighteen years after this, another change came over the destiny of Norfolk Island. In 1825, during the government of Sir Thomas Brisbane, the island was again constituted a penal settlement; and, in June the same year, it was occupied by Captain Turton, with fifty soldiers, and about the same number of prisoners. For several subsequent years the horrors of the place, owing to the frightfully vicious condition of the convicts, became proverbial. In 1839, there were upwards of seven hundred prisoners.