Decorative Bodies: The Significance of Convicts' Tattoos

Abstract

The convicts transported to Australia were probably the best documented working-class citizens of the nineteenth-century British empire. From indictment to eventual freedom, a convict's progress was meticulously recorded. Of all the material in this paper trail, the indent produced for each vessel on its arrival in the colony has proved the most useful. For each named individual the indent detailed, across a double-page, their age, literacy, religious persuasion, marital status, number of children, occupation, native place, offence, place and date of trial, sentence, previous convictions, height, complexion and hair and eye colour. The final entry completed on arrival contained observations on physical injuries, marks and scars and notes on other family members already in the colonies. Thus, to use a randomly selected example, we learn from the entry for Thomas Davis, who arrived on the York in February 1831, that he was a 42 year old illiterate, protestant ploughman and former soldier who was married with one son and five daughters. A native of Gloucestershire, he was tried at the quarter sessions in July 1830 for stealing some harnesses and sentenced to seven years transportation, perhaps because he had a previous conviction for which he had served six months imprisonment. Thomas was a small man, five feet two inches tall, with a dark, sallow complexion, brown hair turning grey and brown eyes. His entry ends with a note of those details which would further aid identification: 'Large circular scar of wound back part of head right side, anchor on right arm, heart, dart, Judy Davis, T. Davis, 1830, M.D. and anchor on left, horizontal scar left side of forehead, small raised mole over inner part left eyebrow'. The illuminating descriptive entries which give a human reality to these catalogues of misery were recorded so that identification, detection and arrest would be made easy if a convict absconded. The remaining columns of the indent were available to chart the convict's colonial history and the dates of the ticket of leave, pardon, certificate of freedom and death or departure.