Originally published as Douglas Wilkie, ‘Frankenstein, Convicts and Wide-Awake Geniuses: The life and death of Charles Brentani’, Victorian Historical Journal, Vol. 87, No. 1, June 2016 Extract: In 1838 Alexander Maconochie, private secretary to the Van Diemen’s Land Governor, Sir John Franklin, wrote a damning report on the state of prison discipline in the colony. … Continue reading Frankenstein, Convicts, and Wide-Awake Geniuses: The Life and Death of Charles Brentani
Colonial Victoria
Duchene / Hargraves
ALEXANDRE JULIEN DUCHENE was not even four years into a fourteen year sentence in Van Diemen’s Land in 1840 when Major D’Arcy Wentworth, the Police Magistrate at Launceston, described him as ‘a man of most exemplary conduct’. Edward Hammond Hargraves, was less than two years into enjoying his claim to have started the Australian gold … Continue reading Duchene / Hargraves
The Deconstruction of a Convict Past
Joseph Forrester, a silversmith, was transported to Van Diemen's Land in 1828 after being caught stealing diamonds from a West End London jeweller. Charles Brentani was transported to Van Diemen's Land in 1834 after being caught stealing silver from a Sheffield clergyman. Brentani was was assigned to various employers and eventually set up his own … Continue reading The Deconstruction of a Convict Past
Historia Incognita 