The Tour Guides of Carnarvon (Port Arthur) 1877-1927

Abstract

<p>Since first established as a place of punishment in 1830, Port Arthur on the Tasman Peninsula (Tasmania) has been a place of intrigue. Operating as a penal station for forty-seven years until its closure in 1877, Port Arthur earned a formidable reputation as a site of incarceration and forced labour for the colony's most feared and despised criminals - a place of punishment and production characterised by its 'geographical isolation and the availability of natural resources'. Within months of its closure in 1877, Port Arthur became a popular tourist destination, promoted as 'one of the loveliest regions [of Tasmania]... associated with some of the darkest days and darkest deeds of its history'. Visitors flocked to the site via chartered steamers and, later, a bi-weekly commercial service, until a road was built in 1908. Among the attractions was a promise that visitors could be guided around the site by some of the penal settlement's former inmates. For an additional fee, curious visitors might even be treated to a glimpse of a scar laced back. Eventually, these guides were replaced by more respectable types, including the son of a government official and a free settler from Scotland, whose presence gave a more positive and entrepreneurial tone to the local tourism industry. This article investigates the backgrounds, careers and experiences of the earliest convict guides at Port Arthur between 1877 and 1927. I establish the identity of these guides, but in doing so propose that there is little evidence to support the contemporary claims that the earliest guides were formerly incarcerated at Port Arthur.</p>