Memorial of Rev. Henry Fulton, Chaplain - Anglican Church of ...

Memorial of Rev Henry Fulton, Chaplain, 14 February 1809, in
Historical Records of New South Wales, Vol. VII, pp. 27-32 1
MEMORIAL OF REV. H. FULTON, CHAPLAIN.
Sydney, New South Wales, 14th February, 1809.
To the Right Honorable Lord Viscount Castlereagh, His Majesty's Principal
Secretary of State for the Colonies, &c., &c., &c.
The Memorial of the Rev'd Henry Fulton, Acting Chaplain of New South
Wales,—
Most respectfully sheweth:—
That your Lordship's memorialist was appointed to the chaplaincy of
Norfolk Island in the year 1801 by Governor King, which appointment was
confirmed by Lord Hobart, as appears by his letter to His Excellency
Governor King in the beginning of the year 1803; that your Lordship's
memorialist continued to perform the duties of his office in that island unto
the end of March, 1806, when he was recalled to Port Jackson by the said
Governor King, and arrived at Sydney, New South Wales, on the seventh
day of April; that he assisted the Rev'd Samuel Marsden from that time unto
the departure of Governor King and the Rev'd Samuel Marsden from the
colony on the tenth day of February, 1807, at which time the whole of the
duties of the territory devolved on him; these duties he continued to perform
unto the 26th day of January, 1808, when Major, now Lieut.-Colonel,
1 Cited in Anglicanism in Australia. A History (B.N. Kaye ed.; Melbourne: Melbourne Univeristy Press,
2002) p. 10 & 317 n.18. Two letters were previously sent to Lord Castlereagh by Fulton, one in April, and
the other on 20 July 1808. Only the latter has been preserved in the London Record Office.

George Johnstone, of the New South Wales Corps, led the whole battalion at
head-quarters to Government House, Sydney, and confined His Excellency,
Governor Bligh, within the premises of Government House, seized the Great
Seal of the colony, all his papers, the papers of the Commissary and Judge-
Advocate, and subverted the whole Government, appointing his own
creatures, and the creatures of [28] John McArthur, Esquire, to the places of
Judge-Advocate, Commissary, Provost-Marshal, Magistrate, &c.; that the
immediate causes of these extraordinary acts are detailed in two letters
which your Lordship's memorialist had the honor of transmitting to your
Lordship — one by the ship Dart, which sailed from Port Jackson on the
17th of April last, and the other by the Rose, Richard Brooks, master, which
sailed from hence the beginning of last September; to these letters he refers
your Lordship for particulars, lest he should become too tedious by
repetitions; that though the immediate cause of the subversion of His
Majesty's Government in this territory was Governor Bligh's unwillingness
to be compelled, by six of the members of a Criminal Court, to suspend His
Majesty's Judge-Advocate and substitute another in his place who would suit
the purposes of a Botany Bay faction, yet the cause lies deeper than would
appear to a superficial observer. A Governor, weak or wicked, and willing
to sacrifice the interest of the English nation to his own private advantages
and that of a faction, may keep his situation during life; but a man who
governs, like His Excellency Governor Bligh, according to your Lordship's
instructions, and in a manner which will not subserve the purposes of
smugglers and monopolists, will soon have his Government subverted, and
all his honest adherents involved in ruin. And because they take this step,
for causes which they dare not avow, they fabricate accusations against him
of crimes which never had any existence; his most impartial and just

proceedings will be objected to as if they were the greatest crimes; and they
will record words spoken perhaps in the hours of relaxation, or in the time of
irritation, which they have endeavoured to produce these expressions new
modelled, with additions and misrepresentations will be used to excite the
disapprobation of the inexperienced and ignorant against him. That His
Excellency Governor Bligh has been confined now more than twelve months
in Government House, where he has been variously harrassed, threatened,
and insulted. The officers of His Majesty's ship Porpoise being intimate
friends of the New South Wales Corps, and of John McArthur, Esq'r., also
joined with them in supporting the rebellion. One of them (Symonds)
appointed himself captain of the Porpoise, was made a magistrate, and acted
as a member of their Criminal Courts. Kent and Ellison were members of
their Criminal Courts, and though His Excellency Governor B1igh appointed
Kent to be Acting Commander of the Porpoise, he (Kent) afterwards refused
to obey him, and carried the ship to Port Dalrymple, contrary to His
Excellency's wil1 and without his orders. That when Captain Porteus
arrived with Lieutenant Oxley, His Excellency warned them of the
impropriety of associating with rebels, invited them to his house and table,
but told them if they became intimate with rebels they could no longer be
considered as [29] his friends. Notwithstanding this, they soon accepted
invitations to dine from the principal rebels, and became their intimate
friends; and it is confidently asserted that Captain Porteus and Lieutenant
Oxley have accepted grants of lands from them to the amount of a thousand
acres each. Besides, after the arrival of Lt.-Colonel Paterson, who
superseded Lt.-Colonel Foveaux in the government of this colony, Porteus
and Oxley joined in a letter of thanks to Foveaux for his good government,
though he (Foveaux) had disobeyed, harrassed, and seriously insulted their

Governor and Commodore; that when, by Lt.-Governor Paterson's order,
great indignity and outrage were lately offered to their Governor and
Commodore's person, and that they could easily have awed them who
obeyed, and Paterson who gave the order, to desist, by threatening them with
the guns of His Majesty's ship Porpoise, they acquiesced in these outrages,
were seen in familiar conversation with the rebels, and used no endeavours
to liberate His Excellency from his very close confinement; for Colonel
Paterson wished that Captain Porteus should go to Norfolk Island in His
Majesty's ship Porpoise to compleat the evacuation. Porteus wrote to the
Governor concerning this request, who refused to comply with it, in a letter
in answer to that sent by Captain Porteus. This letter Porteus sent to the
rebels, in consequence of which the Governor was put in close arrest by
seven sentinels and a sergeant placed on Government House, and orders
given that no friend should be permitted to see him except on application
made. Your memorialist was permitted to enter once and return on Sunday,
the 29th January last, that he might perform Divine service as he was wont
to do. Next day, Lieutenant-Colonel Johnstone and Major Abbott came to
Government House in a one-horse chaise, told His Excellency that he (the
Governor) must sign an order, which one of them held in his hand, for
Captain Porteus to sail in the Porpoise to Norfolk Island, declaring at the
same time, if he refused, they would carry him to a subaltern's barrack and
confine him there, with one servant, who would be denied the privilege of
going out and in, but must receive his victuals or other necessaries at the
door from other servants who would bring them there, and they would
prevent every friend from visiting or speaking to him until he (the Governor)
signed it. As His Excellency in a most determined manner persisted in his
refusal, they took him into the chaise and drove him over to the barrack,

when Mrs. Putland, his daughter — an example of filial affection — ran
after the chaise, at a time of intense heat, under the rays of a vertical sun, and
accompanied him into his prison, panting and almost fainting, though she
could not obtain admission but by promising that she would submit to the
same confinement which they had imposed on her father. They even added
the additional hardship of denying her during two days the indulgence of her
maid servant, and finally [30] did not admit the maid servant until she
promised also to remain a prisoner. Here they kept His Excellency from
Monday to Saturday evening, and, when they could not prevail, ordered him
to prepare to be put on board the Admiral Gambier, a ship which lay in the
harbour. When he (the Governor) objected to the accommodations proposed
in that ship, where they said McArthur and Lt.-Colonel Johnstone were to
take their passage, they offered soon after His Majesty's ship Porpoise as an
alternative, which offer he accepted. 2 That His Excellency Governor Bligh
has been repeatedly threatened to be sent out of the territory from the time of
his first confinement, the 26th January, 1808; but his departure has been
delayed on various pretences until this period; that his absence now, when
forces may be expected soon from England, may cause inconvenience and
contribute to baffle His Majesty's designs by the arts which may be used to
intimidate witnesses and delude a stranger, on his first arrival, who may be
sent here in command of troops, the richest, and what might be supposed the
most respectable and honorable, officers being most engaged in the rebellion
and most affected by the causes which led to it. Of this they seem to be
aware, and avail themselves of it, and openly boast that they will be able to
delay justice by these means for five or six years. That, because His
2
It will be noted that Fulton refrains from making any allusion to the conditions on which Bligh was
allowed to embark on the Porpoise.

Excellency Governor Bligh is a man of inflexible integrity, courage, and
determination, a Botany Bay faction (if I may so speak) cannot direct him,
according to their views and designs; they cannot have spirits at will to sell
and barter; they cannot have the goods sent out here to barter with the
settlers for grain and hogs at a very low price, in order to encourage those
people who are employed in agriculture and for the benefit of the colony at
large, — I say they cannot have them for money at a very low rate, that they
may sell them by retail and barter at an enormous price, according to the
present practice; they cannot, by pretended sales of ships to Americans and
Portugese, carry on a smuggling trade to China by bartering for tea, sandal-
wood — which they obtain in large quantities now in the islands of the
Pacific Ocean; they cannot have such immense grants of land and
Government cattle as will enable them still more to controul a Governor and
leave him helpless in their hands; they could not, while Governor Bligh held
the reins of Government, treat him with contempt, or carry on seditious
practices, without being brought to justice for so doing; they could not make
the Benches of Justice and Criminal and Civil Courts the instruments of
faction, and of a subordination which places the New South Wales Corps
and their creatures at the head of everything; and so much have they
attended lately to their own gain, and neglected the general good, that the
crops this last [31] harvest are greatly diminished, and even a scarcity
dreaded this year, notwithstanding the great plenty which was in the colony
when His Excellency Governor Bligh was first confined. That their
eagerness to possess themselves of the property of the colony was their
inducement to confine Governor Bligh. They have the arms, the discipline,
the Courts of Justice, the magistracy, and the riches of the colony in their
hands; and woe be to the man who dared to think differently from them. In

short, they are erecting a building which, if permitted to go on, will, without
any confusion to them, enable them, sooner than may be expected, to bid
defiance to the English nation, which they have already so grossly insulted
in the person of His Majesty's representative. They are building a Babel,
and I have not a doubt but some officer of integrity, who loves the empire at
large, will come down with sufficient strength from England, like the
instrument of the Deity, to confound their languages and scatter them over
the face of the land. That officers come here without fortune or principle,
and often without information or segacity [sic] enough to see the tendency of
these proceedings. It cannot therefore be wondered at that they are soon
corrupted by the prospects of gain which are held out to them, in controuling
or confining a Governor, to follow the example of those whom they find
here before them and betray the interests of that nation and Sovereign by
whom they are supported. We cannot wonder that naval officers, without
any resentment, will suffer themselves to be accounted inferior to the
military. Doctor Harris and Major Johnstone encouraged Lieutenant Ellison,
of H.M.S. Porpoise, to marry a lady whose mother was a convict, and were
present at the marriage, though they would not suffer an officer of the New
South Wales Corps to do the same; nor did the other naval officers seem to
be hurt by the distinction. That reports are circulated of, and pretended
crimes attributed to, the Governor with great industry, to alienate the minds
of the people from him; and if any person has segacity [sic] enough to see
the cause of these things and maintain his fidelity and support to a Governor,
he must very accurately watch his own steps; for if the appearance of a
crime is found in him they will pretend it to be of the most serious nature —
often lawful actions and bounden duties are interpreted as crimes, and the
person disgraced by unprincipled justices and members of Criminal Courts.

If the person be in debt, his creditor, under the influence of this junto,
immediately acts an unjust or unmerciful part in seizing his effects and
selling them at half value, and incarcerating his person. That your
Lordship's memorialist has been silenced from doing the public duties of his
office since the 26th day of Jan'y, 1808, partly by their first issuing an order
to that purpose on account of his well-known attachment to the Governor
and Government, and partly because, when long after they wished that he
would perform publickly the [32] duties of his office, he was afraid lest he
should be involved in the crime of treason by acting thus by rebels. That
your Lordship's memoralist has acted as domestic chaplain for His
Excellency Governor Bligh since his confinement, and hopes, as he has a
large family, that his pay will not be discontinued on account of the part
which he has taken in this unprecedented affair, for he is determined not to
act unless for those of know[n] loyalty until the people of the colony receive
punishment or pardon for their crimes; and thus he must act with great
caution, as making any distinction might expose him to great persecution
from the present Government. That your Lordship's memorialist was,
immediately after the 26th day of January, 1808, ordered out of his barrack
and under the necessity of purchasing a house for his family to dwell in.
That his removal was the cause of great loss and damage, and that he has
since been deprived of many advantages which he would have otherwise
possessed by the indulgence of Government. That your Lordship's
memorialist has got into considerable debt on all these accounts, which will
be increasing unless his agent in London receives his pay, as he was wont to
do while memorialist was in the execution of his office.
HENRY FULTON.