The following notice one day appeared among the official records of the
earlier days (1800) of the colony of New South Wales:--
'Whereas the persons undermentioned and described did, in the month of November, by force of arms, violently take away from His Majesty's settlement at Dalrymple a colonial brig or vessel called the Venus, the property of Mr Robert Campbell, a merchant of this territory, and the said vessel then containing stores, the property of His Majesty, and a quantity of necessary stores, the property of the officers of that settlement, and sundry other property, belonging to private individuals.'
Then follows the description of the crew, from which it will be seen
that there was every factor towards some criminal deed on board the
Venus. First of all the chief mate is mentioned:--
'Benjamin Burnet Kelly, chief mate; says he is an American. He arrived in this colony as chief mate of the Albion, a South Sea whaler (Captain Bunker); Richard Edwards, second mate; Joseph Redmonds, seaman, a mulatto or mestizo of South America 299 (came out from England in the Venus); Darra, cook, a Malay man, both ears missing; Thomas Ford and William Porter Evans, boys of 14 and 16 (Evans is a native of Rose Hill in this colony); Richard Thompson, a soldier; Thomas Richard Evans, a convict, formerly a gunner's mate on H.M.S. Calcutta (sentenced to fourteen years for desertion and striking an officer); John Lancaster or Lancashire, a convict, a very dangerous person; Charlotte Badger, convict, a very corpulent person (has an infant in arms); Kitty Hegarty, convict, very handsome woman, with white teeth and fresh complexion, much inclined to smile, a great talker.'
Then comes an official proclamation, signed 'G. Blaxcell, Secretary,
Government House, Sydney,' cautioning 'all governors and officers in
command at any of His Majesty's ports, and the Honourable East India
Company's magistrates or officers in command, at home or abroad, at
whatever port the said brig may be taken into, or met with at sea,
against any frauds or deceptions that may be practised by the offending
parties,' and asking that they might be seized and brought to condign
punishment.
The Venus, under the command of Mr S. Rodman Chace, sailed out of
Sydney Cove (as Port Jackson was then called) for Twofold Bay at the
time before mentioned. Here she remained at anchor for about five weeks,
and here it was that the first trouble began.
Captain Chace had been ashore, and about dusk was returning in his boat
to the ship, when he heard sounds of great hilarity proceeding from
those on board. On coming alongside and gaining the deck, he found that
the two convict ladies were entertaining Mr Benjamin Burnet Kelly, the
mate, with a dancing exhibition, the musical accompaniment to which was
given by Darra, the earless Malayan cook, who was seated on a tub on the
main-hatch playing a battered violin. Lying around the deck, in various
stages of drunkenness, were the male convicts and some of the crew, and
the genial Mr Kelly presided over a bucket of rum, pannikins of which
were offered to the ladies at frequent intervals by the two faithful
cup-bearers,--Ford and Evans.
Chace at once put an end to the harmony by seizing the bucket of rum and
throwing it overboard, and the drunken people about him being incapable
of offering much resistance, he put them in irons and tumbled them
below. Kelly, who was a big, truculent-looking man, then produced a
bowie knife of alarming dimensions and challenged Chace to combat, but
was quickly awed by a pistol being placed at his breast by his superior
officer. He then promised to return to his duty, provided--here he
began to weep, that--the captain did not harm Kitty Hegarty, for whom he
professed an ardent attachment.
As the Venus carried despatches for the Governor of Van Diemen's Land,
Captain Chace was eager to reach his destination, Port Dalrymple, with
all speed, and therefore was in a very anxious state of mind after the
disturbance mentioned, particularly as the mate Kelly, and the convicts
on board, seemed to have some sort of secret understanding. However,
the Venus arrived there safely, and Captain Chace duly delivered his
despatches to Lieutenant House, the Marine officer in charge. Feeling
sure that there was now no further danger to be apprehended, he spent
the night with an old shipmate, the captain of the schooner Governor
Hunter. After breakfast, accompanied by Mr House, he got into his boat
and set out for his ship. He had left instructions with the mate to get
up anchor at six o'clock and come up the river, and about seven o'clock,
as he and Mr House were being pulled towards her in the boat, they saw
that she was under weigh, and coming up.
'There's not much use in us going down, as your ship is coming up,
Chace,' said Mr House. 'Let us go ashore here in this cove and wait for
her.'
The master agreed to this, and the boat turned into a little
sandy-beached cove, where they lost sight of the ship, which, with
the light breeze then blowing, would not pass abreast of the cove for
another hour.
About an hour passed, and then they heard the sound of oars, and the
Venus boat was seen sweeping round the headland of the cove. The crew
seemed thoroughly exhausted, and many of them were cut and bleeding. In
a few moments they told their story, which was, that just after the ship
got under weigh, Kelly and the convicts sprang upon the second mate,
stunned him and pitched him below. Then, before those of the crew who
were not in league with the mutineers could offer any resistance, they
were set upon by the pilot, Thompson, the soldier, Darra, the earless
cook and the two women, all of whom were armed with pistols and swords.
'Into the boat, all of you fellows,' said Kelly, pointing a pistol at
the five seamen; 'into the boat; quick! or you are all dead men!'
The boat was towing astern, and the five seamen, seeing that the Venus
was now in the absolute possession of the mutineers, and that Kelly
would not hesitate to shoot them if they disobeyed him, went into the
boat quietly.
As soon as the mutineers cast off the boat's painter, Kelly came aft
with Kitty Hegarty, and placing his arms around her waist, jocularly
called out to the men in the boat to 'look at the pirate's bride, and
give his compliments and "Mrs Kelly's" compliments to Captain Chace,
Lieutenant House, and the Lieutenant-Governor.' He also charged them to
tell Lieutenant House that he was much obliged to him for lending Chace
(on a former occasion) the Narrative of Lieutenant Bligh and the Mutiny
of the Bounty, which had so much interested him (Kelly) and 'Kitty'
that they had 'decided to do Fletcher Christian's trick, and take a
cruise among the South Seas.' He then, with much accompanying laughter
from merry Miss Hegarty, put a wooden bucket on her head, and called out
to the people in the boat to look at 'Her Majesty, Queen Kitty Hegarty
of the Cannibal Islands.' Immediately after this badinage he ordered
Thompson, who was at the helm, to put it hard up; and then wore ship and
sailed out seawards.
* * * * *
News of the mutiny was at once sent to Lieutenant-Governor Paterson. But
the mutineers were not heard of for a long time. Then it was learnt that
Kelly had sailed the Venus to the coast of New Zealand and, by means
of selling a number of casks of rum to the Maoris, had acquired a
quantity of small arms, and two brass cannons, each throwing a 6-lb.
shot. At one of the places they touched at, Thompson, with the aid
of Kelly, abducted a handsome young Maori girl. She was a niece of Te
Morenga, a chief in the Bay of Islands district. The unfortunate girl,
however, so fretted, and lost so much of her attractiveness, that her
scoundrelly abductor sold her to a chief named Hukori, of Mercury
Bay, or, if he did not sell her, she eventually came into Hukori's
possession. On their voyage up the Hauraki Gulf, they raided one or two
small Maori hapus and carried off another girl, the daughter of the
chief Te Haupa, or, as he was better known, Te Totara.
* * * * *
Early in the following year Captain Bierney, of the London brig
Commerce, reported to the Governor of New South Wales that the Venus
had anchored at Te Puna, in New Zealand, and that Kelly had invited a
number of Maoris on board to an orgie. For some time a great state of
drunkenness had prevailed on board; for the Venus, among other stores,
carried a large quantity of wines and spirits, intended for the use of
the military at Van Diemen's Land. Her sails and running gear were in a
very bad state, and not the slightest discipline was maintained.
In answer to the mutineers' invitation, a number of Maoris came on
board, and Kelly, addressing the leading chiefs, told them that he
was perfectly well aware of the fact that he and those with him were
incapable of offering resistance if his visitors attempted to cut off
the ship. But, he said, he had determined to abandon the ship, and
therefore he had invited them on board so that they might take what they
wanted from her; and if they had no objection, he and his wife wished to
live ashore with them for the future. He then broached a cask of rum and
invited them to drink it.
The Maoris appeared to have fallen in with his suggestion with alacrity,
and the chief gave the leading mutineer and his wife a large whare to
live in, and also two slaves as servants.
The rest of the tale is incomplete in its details. Of the fate of the
Venus nothing is known. Probably she was burnt by the Maoris. Kelly,
Kitty Hegarty, Charlotte Badger and her child, Thompson, and two others,
lived among the natives for some time. Then the woman Kitty Hegarty
died suddenly while Kelly was away on a warlike excursion with his Maori
friends, and was hastily buried. It was alleged that she was killed by
some women, one of whom was anxious to possess Kelly for her husband.
Kelly himself was captured by a king's ship in 1808, and sent to
England, where he was hanged for piracy. Lancaster was also captured by
the master of an American whale-ship, The Brothers of Nantucket, and
taken to Sydney and hanged. The rest of the mutineers either met with
violent deaths at the hands of the Maoris, or succeeded in living their
lives out as pakeha-Maoris.
Of the other woman--Charlotte Badger--and her child nothing further was
known, save that in 1808 she and the child were offered a passage to
Port Jackson by Captain Bunker; but she declined, saying she would
rather live with the Maoris than return to New South Wales to be hanged.
This was not unnatural.
But, long afterwards, in the year 1826, an American whale-ship, the
Lafayette of Salem, reported an incident of her cruise that showed
some light on the end of Charlotte Badger.
In May 1826, the Lafayette was off 'an unknown island in the South
Seas. It was covered with trees, was about three miles long, and was
inhabited by a small number of natives. The position of this island was
in 22 deg. 30 min. south, 176 deg. 19. min. west.' The weather being
calm at the time and the natives, by the signs and gestures they made to
the ship, evidently friendly, the captain and second mate's boats were
lowered, and, with well-armed crews, pulled ashore. Only some forty or
fifty natives of a light brown colour were on the island, and these,
meeting the white men as they landed, conducted them to their houses
with every demonstration of friendliness. Among the number was a native
of Oahu (Hawaii), named Hula, who had formed one of the crew of the
London privateer Port-au-prince, a vessel that had been cut off by
the natives of the Haabai Group, in the Friendly Islands, twenty years
previously. He spoke English well, and informed Captain Barthing of the
Lafayette that the island formed one of the Tonga Group (it is now
known as Pylstaart Island), and that his was the second ship that had
ever visited the place. Another ship, he said, had called at the island
about ten years before (this would be about 1816); that he had gone off
on board, and had seen a very big, stout woman, with a little girl about
eight years of age with her. At first he thought, from her dark skin,
that she was a native, but the crew of the ship (which was a Nantucket
whaler) told him that she was an Englishwoman, who had escaped from
captivity with the Maoris.
No doubt this was the woman Badger, described in the official account of
the mutiny of the Venus as 'a very corpulent person.'
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