In 1767 Cesare Beccaria’s book of ‘Crimes and Punishments’ was published in England. Beccaria said: ‘Current punishments do not stop crime. Instead of making a terrifying example [by hanging] a few criminals we should punish all criminals and punish them fairly. We need punishments that fit the crimes. Instead of relying on the death penalty, criminals should be imprisoned and do hard labour that is visible to the public.’ For 80 years, from the 1780’s to the 1860’s, transportation to Australia was a vital part of the systems of punishments. Valentine Marshall was one of the 160,000 people sentenced to transportation to Australia as a punishment.
In the 1780’s the British government had faced a crisis. Transportation had already been in use as a punishment for 100 years. But the government could no longer transport convicts to America because the colonies had won their independence. Several colonies, including the West Indian islands were considered. The last was the scarcely known Australia, discovered by James Cook. There was little possibility of sending anyone to find out whether Australia would make a good convict settlement- the round trip would have taken 18 months.
The first fleet set sail for Australia in May 1787. Eleven ships left Portsmouth, carrying 1020 people of whom 736 were convicts… Eight months later, they landed in Australia. Forty-eight people had died on the voyage.