View/Open - CORA - University College Cork

Hulks or Prison Ships
The Act which originallyallowed for the use of hulks in 1776, contemplated its use for the
containment of the most “dangerous and daring” prisoners. However, the prison ships
became regular recipients of all ages and degree of convict including the very young and
the infirm. Such cramped conditions on board were not insignificant in the very high
mortalityrates among the ship’s population.
Hulks or demasted ships were used in harbours to accommodate prisoners. These so
called “Hulks” were used to dredge rivers such as the Thames and the prisoners contained
within the hulks or prison ships were obliged to work in the drainage schemes (Vass
1984:10).
Transportation
Transportation to colonies of the British Empire was used both from Ireland and Britain
over a long period of time. An earlier example was the use of transportation to the West
Indies of defeated Irish soldiers and their families after the Cromwellian Wars in the
middle 17 th Century. With the growth of the colonial enterprise in the 18 th and 19 th
Centuries transportation became a regular feature of punishment. Under the
Transportation Act of 1718 the American colonies received some 30,000 convicts between
the years 1718 and 1775. Many of those transported had secured a reprieve from a death
sentence which would then be substituted with a term of transportation for a specified
number of years. 10 While reform of the offender may have been advanced as an aim of
transportation, the objective of crime control at home may have equally predominated.
Even though the American War of Independence effectively foreclosed the use of North
America as a destination for transported convicts, the practice of transportation to that
colonywas alreadyin decline. For some convicts, transportation presented an opportunity
to start up a new life with greater prospects than those available at home. Thus the
prospect of transportation presented no real deterrent for many. The Revolutionary War
in North America provided a hiatus in the use of transportation as a penal remedy.
10 For example acertain James Dalton was sparedthe death penaltyfor mutinyon boardship andwas sentencedto transportation for 14 years. Upon landingin the NewWorldhe was
sold into servitude for the period of his transportation. In the event, Dalton proved incorrigible bythreateninghis master with a knife and was left to his own devices. Thus in the
example given the reformative objective of transportation must be seen to fail but the sentence did advance the objective of ridding England of a dangerous offender (Rawlings
1992:96-97)
26