Repro ID: PU2088
Title: Sydney Bay, Norfolk Island in May 1855.
Description: The day after the First Fleet arrived in Botany Bay in 1788, Lieutenant Philip Gidley King RN, began selecting men and women to colonise Norfolk Island, a tiny rock thousands of miles to the east of Australia. When Captain Cook discovered Norfolk Island, he had reported that flax and giant pines grew abundantly there. Lord Sydney's instructions to King were therefore 'to send a small establishment thither to secure the same to us and prevent it being occupied by subjects of any other European Power'. Six women convicts were chosen as those 'whose characters stood fairest' and they were joined by nine male convicts and eight free men.
Creator: J Glen Wilson, [artist].
Date: c. 1855
Credit line: National Maritime Museum, London
