Authors: Jennifer Livett
Wild Island
First published in 2016
Copyright © Jennifer Livett
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian
Copyright Act 1968
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Allen & Unwin
83 Alexander Street
Crows Nest NSW 2065
Australia
Phone:
(61 2) 8425 0100
Email:
[email protected]
Cataloguing-in-Publication details are available from the National Library of Australia
ISBN 9781760113834
ISBN 9781952534850
Set by Bookhouse, Sydney
Cover design: Alissa Dinallo
Cover image: Elisabeth Ansley / Trevillion Images
TZARA: It means, my dear Henry, that the causes we know everything about depend on causes we know very little about, which depend on causes we know absolutely nothing about. And it is the duty of the artist to jeer and howl and belch at the delusion that infinite generations of real effects can be inferred from the gross expression of apparent cause.
Tom Stoppard,
Travesties
CONTENTS
Sir John Franklin
Arctic explorer; Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemen's Land (VDL), 1837â44
Jane Franklin
His wife
Eleanor Franklin
Sir John's daughter by his first wife, Eleanor Porden
Miss Williamson
Governess to Eleanor Franklin
Sophy Cracroft
Jane Franklin's companion; niece to Sir John
Mary Franklin
Jane Franklin's companion; niece to Sir John
Henry Elliot
Sir John's young aide-de-camp
Charles O'Hara Booth
Captain in the 21st Regiment; Commandant of Port Arthur Penal Station in VDL, 1833â44
Colonel George Arthur
Lieutenant Governor of VDL for twelve years before Franklin was appointed
Eliza Arthur
His wife
Archdeacon Hutchins
Came to VDL with the Franklins
Alexander Maconochie
Geographer, convict reformer and former naval officer; came to VDL with the Franklins as Sir John's private secretary
Mary Maconochie
His wife
Dr Pilkington
Surgeon to the 21st Regiment in VDL
Lizzie Eagle
Dr Pilkington's stepdaughter
Thomas Lempriere
Commissariat Officer at Port Arthur Penal Station
Charlotte Lempriere
His wife
Dr Cornelius Gavin Casey
Medico at Port Arthur
George Boyes
Colonial Auditor in VDL, later Acting Colonial Secretary
âBobby' Knopwood
Chaplain in Hobart Town, VDL, since settlement
John Montagu
Colonial Secretary in VDL
Matthew Forster
Chief Police Magistrate in VDL
âMad' Judge Montagu
Judge in VDL; no relation to John Montagu
John Price
Police Magistrate in VDL
Charles Swanston
Director of the Derwent Bank in Hobart Town
Thomas Gregson
Wealthy owner of âRisdon', or âRestdown', in VDL; later briefly Premier of Tasmania
Picton Beete, Wharton Young and John Peddie
Charles Booth's friends in the 21st Regiment
John Gould
The âBird Man': taxidermist, bird illustrator and collector
Eliza Gould
Artist; wife to John Gould
Mathinna
Aboriginal child taken in by Jane Franklin
Duterrau
Artist
Miss Perigal
Duterrau's sister-in-law
Thomas Boch
Artist and former convict
Tom Cracroft
Brother to Sophy Cracroft; a clerk in Sir John Franklin's office in VDL
Arthur Sweet
Clerk; friend to Tom Cracroft
John Philip Gell
Young clergyman sent from England by Dr Arnold of âRugby' to be Head of the new VDL College
Captain Ainsworth
Later Major; aide to Sir John Franklin; courting Sophy Cracroft
Captain James Clark Ross
Commander of the
Erebus
, Arctic explorer, leader of the âMagnetic Expedition' of 1839â41
Captain Francis Crozier
Commander of the
Terror
, Arctic explorer, Ross's close friend and second-in-command of the âMagnetic Expedition'; courting Sophy Cracroft
Lieutenant Henry Porden Kay
Cousin to Eleanor Franklin; came to VDL with the âMagnetic Expedition'
âMick' (Thomas) Walker
Convict who, as leader of seven other convicts, escaped from Port Arthur in a whaleboat in 1839
Laplace
Captain of the French exploratory ship
L'Artémise
Mr Aislabie
Clergyman at Richmond, VDL
âTulip' Wright
Constable in Hobart Town
Jane Eyre
Orphan; governess at âThornfield Hall'
Edward Rochester
Owner of âThornfield'
Adèle
Pupil to Jane Eyre; Edward Rochester's ward
Rowland Rochester
Older brother to Edward
Mrs Alice Fairfax
Housekeeper at âThornfield Hall'; poor relation to the Rochesters
Bertha Mason
Woman from the West Indies, possibly mad . . .
Grace Poole
Bertha Mason's keeper
Harriet Adair
Artist; a widow
Nina
Harriet's stepmother
Gus Bergman
Surveyor in VDL
St John Wallace
Clergyman; cousin to Jane Eyre
Louisa Wallace
His wife
George Quigley
Captain of the
Adastra
Mr and Mrs Chesney Property
owners in VDL; passengers on the
Adastra
Polly and Natty
Their grandchildren
Lyddy
Nurserymaid to Ned Chesney
James Seymour
Doctor; passenger on the
Adastra
Robert McLeod
Newspaperman; passenger on the
Adastra
Mrs T (Tench)
Sailor-woman on the
Adastra
Peg Groundwater
Lodging-house keeper in VDL; an Orkney woman
Nellie Jack
Peg's convict servant
Mrs Parry
Property owner in VDL; friend to Knopwood
Augusta Drewitt
Friend to Sophy Cracroft
Ada Sweet
Shopkeeper; mother to Arthur Sweet
Seth Carmichael
Former convict; landlord of the Eagle and Child Inn at New Norfolk; later a horse-breeder
Dinah Carmichael
His wife
Catherine Tyndale
Wife to a lieutenant in the 21st Regiment when it was in the West Indies
READER, SHE DID NOT MARRY HIM. OR RATHER, WHEN AT LAST
she did, it was not so straightforward as she implies in her memoirs. Jane Eyre is a truthful person and her story is fascinating, but some things she could not bring herself to say. Certain episodes in her past, she admits, âform too distressing a recollection ever to be willingly dwelt upon'. When she announces in that jubilant sentence, âReader, I married him', and goes on to describe their quiet Church wedding, she is choosing to ignore the hasty ceremony that had taken place on the ship two months before.
They were married again when they returned to Englandâto make doubly certain all was legal, to sign their names in the parish records. Why mention that earlier wedding, so sombre, so desperate? In the heaving, creaking old
Adastra
on her way to the colony they never reached, with the fear of imminent death, and the odd little group of witnesses, of whom I was one.
My name is Harriet Adair, and forty years ago on that ship I was Jane Eyre's companion. That voyage also brought me friendship with another intrepid Jane: Lady Franklin. Her husband, Sir John, the Arctic Lion, was Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemen's Land during the six turbulent years when Jane Eyre and Edward Rochester had good reason to be closely interested in the island.
It is now, as I have said, four decades since that time, and those of us who know what really happenedâabout the Franklin debâcle, and
the Rochester matterâbecome fewer each year. Mr Gregson therefore asked me to write my account of those days, which he intended to collate with his own and several others, but he died two years ago, and now all the papers have been passed to George Boyes's son. On the understanding, of course, that they shall not be used while any of those closely involved are still alive. I feel certain now that this will be necessary. Visiting London recently, I found my old friend, Sophy Cracroft, Sir John Franklin's niece and Jane Franklin's long-time companion, copying out Lady Franklin's letters for publicationâbut she is editing them ruthlessly, deleting whole paragraphs and pages. She destroys each original as she finishes it. Some she burns without copying. When she told me I cried out, âHow can you, Sophy? This is our history, our lives.'
She gave me one of her steely looks, half amused, half irritated. When she was young, she was slim, almost angular in a way that always seemed to me part of her character, but now in later life she is stout, with plump rosy cheeks that give her a benevolent look. This is misleading; her mind is as angular as ever.