Margaret Catchpole

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Margaret Catchpole (14 March 1762 – 13 May 1819) was a British criminal, convict transportee to Australia, adventuress and chronicler.

Contents 1 Early life 2 Criminal conviction 3 Australia 4 Postumous fame 5 References

[edit] Early life

Catchpole was born at Nacton, Suffolk, the daughter of Elizabeth Catchpole^[1] and Jonathan Catchpole, head ploughman. While barely more than a child she once rode bareback into Ipswich to fetch a doctor, guiding the horse with a halter.^[2].

Catchpole had fallen in love with a sailor named William Laud, who had joined a band of smugglers; later he was pressed in to service in the navy^[2]. Laud was trying to persaude Catchpole to travel in a boat with him when another admirer of Margaret, John Barry, came to her assistance and a fight ensued, Barry was shot by Laud. Barry recovered, but a price was put on his Laud's head.^[2]

Catchpole had little education and worked as a servant for for different families until being employed by Mrs John Cobbold, wife of a wealthy Ipswich brewer, as under-nurse and under-cook in May 1793. Here she was virtually part of the family and was responsible for saving the lives of children in her care three times. She also learned to read and write here.^[1]

[edit] Criminal conviction

In mid-1795 Catchpole left the Cobbolds and became ill and was unemployed^[1]. After being told by a man named Cook that Laud was back in London, Cook persuaded Catchpole to steal a horse and ride it to London to meet her former lover — Cook's plan was to sell the horse for his own benefit^[2]. On the night of 23 May 1797 Catchpole stole John Cobbold's coach gelding and rode the horse 70 miles (110 km) to London in nine hours, but was promptly arrested for its theft and tried at Suffolk Summer Assizes^[1]. She pleaded guilty at her trial, and after evidence regarding her previous good character had been given, was asked if she had anything to say why sentence of death should not be passed upon her. She spoke with firmness, regretting her fault but not praying for mercy. Even when the death sentence was pronounced she remained composed until she saw her old father crying in the court^[2]. Her sentence was commuted to transportation for seven years.

Catchpole was a model prisoner and set such a good example to the other prisoners that there was some hope of an early release. However, Catchpole discovered that Laud was a fellow prisoner. They succeeded in meeting, and Laud suggested a way of scaling the wall by using a clothesline or clothes horse and attaching a rope to one of the spikes. Catchpole had some money hidden, which Laud had given her some years before, and she arranged with a relative that part of this should be used to pay Laud's fine and thus free him. She succeeded in scaling the wall and met Laud, but they were intercepted on the seashore just as a boat was approaching to take them away. Laud fired on the authorities and was killed, and Margaret was taken back to prison. She was tried for gaol-breaking and again condemned to death. This sentence was, on the judge's recommendation, commuted to transportation to New South Wales for life. She arrived in Sydney on the Nile on 15 December 1801. ^[2]

[edit] Australia

Margaret Catchpole's life in Australia was relatively uneventful. She was assigned as a servant to John Palmer who had arrived with the First Fleet as purser on the HMS Sirius and was now a prosperous man. After the death of her lover, Margaret had resolved never to marry and in Sydney she refused the addresses of George Caley. Later she was employed as the overseer of a farm, and while in the country became a midwife, and also kept a small farm of her own. She was happy and respected, and in a letter written to England in about 1807 she says with pardonable pride "all my quantances are my betters"—she had little education and her spelling was always her own. She was pardoned on 31 January 1814 but did not return to England.^[1] Little is known about the last 10 years of her life, but she continued her nursing, died on 13 May 1819 after catching influenza from a shepherd she was nursing, and was buried in the graveyard of St Peter's church at Richmond, New South Wales.

[edit] Postumous fame

In 1841 the Rev. Richard Cobbold ( son of her former employers) made Catchpole the subject of a novel, The History of Margaret Catchpole (London, 1845), which has often been reprinted. In the preface the author said: "The public may depend upon the truth of the main features of this narrative", but some writers, including the Rev. M. G. Watkins, author of the memoir in the Dictionary of National Biography, have taken this too literally. Margaret was quite uneducated, but Cobbold made her speak and write as a well-educated woman throughout the book. Watkins also accepted the story of her marriage in 1812 and that she did not die until 1841. The register of burials at Richmond is quite detailed. "Margaret Catchpole, aged 58 years, came prisoner in the Nile, in the year 1801. Died May 13; was buried May 14, 1819. "— Henry Fulton. In a letter dated 2 September 1811 Catchpole mentioned that she was unmarried and would be 50 on 14 March next (1812), the year of her supposed marriage (Barton, True Story, p. 163). If the story of her marriage is to be accepted two unlikely things must be believed, that marrying at 50 she left descendants, and that she was buried in her maiden name. Probably her story was confused with that of Mary Reiby.^[2]

Catchpole's letters of 8 October 1806 and 8 October 1809 are the only known eyewitness accounts of the Hawkesbury River floods of those years. She described in graphic detail the countryside, the Aboriginals, and the wildlife; she wrote of the first convict coalminers at Coal River (Newcastle) and of the savagery and immorality of the inhabitants of the colony at the time; her writings added greatly to Australia's early history.^[1]

[edit] References

• Salmonson, Jessica Amanda.(1991) The Encyclopedia of Amazons. Paragon House. Page 51. ISBN 1-55778-420-5