Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney

Subject: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Fergie
Date: 05 Jul 14 - 09:07 AM

Hi,

I'm writing a song about convict transportation and I need some assistance from Mudcatters.

In the early period of settlement at Port Jackson the Female Convict Factory at Parramatta was commonly referred to as 'the old stone jug'.

My query concerns any known slang terms or names that convicts or early settlers used when referring to the male convict prison at Hyde Park Barracks in Sydney.

Fergus Russell

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Jul 14 - 08:28 AM

Refreshing this thread in hope one of our Aussie 'Catters will be able to help Fergie.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 06 Jul 14 - 10:27 AM

hmmm, are you sure you posted this email 24 hours ago, fergie? I'm sure I would have noticed it (imagine a smiley face here) Dunno how I missed it.

I've contacted a few folklorists to see if they can help.

sandra

Hyde Park Barracks Museum

Stories from the Hyde Park Barracks Museum

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 06 Jul 14 - 10:16 PM

G'day Fergus,

I responded early today to Sandra's email cast to direct Bush Music Club email contacts ... chasing anything that might help you.

I particularly pointed out that Scott Carlin ... son of Jamie Carlin ... (one of the very earliest BMC members from ~ 60 years back ... !) is nowadays a museum manager ... and, back some years, managed the Hyde Park Barracks!

These days he has gravitated down to Hobart ... and administers a "museum" that virtually means most of inner-suburban/ harbourside Hobart ... certainly all of Battery Point - where I met and wooed my wife!

Regards,

Bob

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Fergie
Date: 07 Jul 14 - 04:28 PM

Hi Bob and Sandra,

I appreciate your assistance. I'm planning to be in Sydney in the second half of November, hope we might get an opportunity to meet up. Fergus

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 07 Jul 14 - 07:02 PM

G'day again, Fergie,

I will check, at home, for dictionaries including early Convict Era slang. Thewre was one written by a convict operating in posher (... and wealthier ..) circles. This was specifically for judges in the Sydney courts of the early convict era ... to help the 'beak' translate the testimony of convicts before the court.

I woud have several other dictionaries covering aspects of Australian slang ... but not specifically convict argot ... These are all worth a browse for your convict's slang ... but I can't guarantee anything helpful on the Convict slang names for buildings and establishments!

Regards,

Bob

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 07 Jul 14 - 07:38 PM

G'day yet again, Fergie,

Whilst contemplating slang and origins ... it does occur to me that "jug" remains ... in several slangs ... a non-specific word for a gaol. Most of the convicts transported to "Botany Bay" ( ... in fact - to Sydney, as Botany Bay was a pretty lousy prospect for either settlement or agriculture ... ) would have been initially 'housed' in tents ... while building simple wooden huts as the first Sydney dwellings.

More 'impressive' official buildings were made of stone ... once easily accessible sandstone was prospected on the north side of Sydney Harbour ... and hewn by those same convicts - then rowed back to the growing settlement on the souther shore. The Hyde Park Barracks was an early example ... after housing the Governor and his coterie was out of the way.

It's perfectly feasible that the first multi-story sandstone buildings would acquire the "stone" descriptor ... either in early Sydney - or the later Parramatta settlement ... intended to be an 'up-river' capital location along the 'London' lines.

I will scan my cluster of elderly dictionaries ... and see if I can unearth some examples of terms that seem to resonate with the early (~ ' Convict') song vocabularies.

Regards,

Bob

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 09 Jul 14 - 06:53 PM

G'day even yet again Fergie,

I only got in a quick look at the several thousand books lining several walls at home ... before heading off to the Bush Music Club Committee meeting last night.

What I need to find is The "Vocabulary of the Flash Language" (originally 2 volumes, 1819) ... written by 'transported' pickpocket James Hardy Vaux - as a guide for the local magisrates, when dealing with subsequent offences by serving or time-expired convicts ( ~ ... and hoping not to be the subject of such investigations!).

However, I suspect that the example of a vernacular name you started with might have been too obvious ... at that time ... to warrant an entry!

Regards.

BobB

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: zozimus
Date: 10 Jul 14 - 06:47 PM

Hi Fergie,
Meself and herself will be in Sydney around the same time as yerself.
"Shows that coincidence is a nut to crack ". See you in Howth 19th

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Fergie
Date: 10 Jul 14 - 07:03 PM

Hi Bob

Hardy Vaux memoir (including his slang dictionary) is HERE

Zozimus what dates will you be in Sydney? I'll be there from 24th Nov until 2nd Dec.

Ferg

Subject: RE: Folklore: Hyde Park Barracks, Sydney
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 10 Jul 14 - 08:46 PM

G'day Fergie,

Thanks for that link ... it's certainly not set up as a quick research tool ... they just want to sell you and me ... each ... a modern reprint of the full memoir!

I slugged down and through the "dictionary section" ... but he doesn't bother to cite or define any terms for prisons &c. I reckon he would not waste his printer's bill on anything the Beak was certain to know already!

I guess I'll find my own library copy of the Vaux Memoirs and 'Dictionary' ... for the judiciary' ... some time when I'm up a ladder checking the higher levels of one of some half dozen bookshelves for some other - equally obscure 'colonial era' work!

Gegards,

Bob