Of the ten ringleaders that were charged in court, four of them were English. Cunningham was hung without trial immediately at Green Hills (Windsor). English convicts made up a significant number of the rebels as well, simply through sheer numbers. Irish convicts were a minority. The "flogging parson" Samuel Marsden tried to explain this English involvement away by claiming that the Irish led the English astray but this overlooks the reality that many English convicts shared many things with the Irish political prisoners; They didn't want to be in Australia, they did not accept their fate and in many cases they did not see British authority as legitimate.

Johnothon Place

Place was an English convict who came out on the Glatton in 1803. He didn't see his situation as legitimate and became a serial escapist. Like many others he believed that China was just over the Blue Mountains, and this would be his means of escaping back to England where he could be reunited with his family. In May of 1803 he set off with three others, escaping from Castle Hill and heading for the Blue Mountains. After two weeks of travelling, they were out of rations and trying to exist in the harsh Australian landscape that was alien to European knowledge and mind.

His three fellow escapees died from starvation and exposure. Place was fortunate to be found by a settler and an Aboriginal hunting group. He was fed and sent off in the direction of a settler's hut. He was re-captured and sent to Parramatta where he wasted in a hospital on the brink of death. Once he was back to health, he was back to old tricks. He escaped again, this time when he was re-captured, his back received five hundred lashes from the colony's whip man Robert Duggan.

Like the Irish political prisoners Place was not prepared to accept his situation. But Place's reaction to it was to escape. The Irish brought a level of organisation to the same sentiment which the English convicts were unable to do. The Irish had experience at organising like-minded people, keeping their plans secret, the discipline to follow through on their plans no matter the consequence. From experience they also understand the need to arm themselves to protect against the inevitable military backlash for any insurrection.

The Irish response to their situation in the NSW colony was much more dangerous to the Governor, Rum Corps, Civil Administration and even the civil population of the colony than the haphazard escape and absconding antics of the English prisoners. It was a question of response by the Irish and English convicts - as there was sympathy between them both in neither were prepared to accept their situation and did not see the British authority over them as legitimate.

Place figured heavily in the 1804 rebellion. He was at the Government Farm during the planning of the uprising and appears to have sounded out the collaborators in the Hawkesbury along with Phillip Cunningham. Cunningham and Place both spent a great deal of time in the house of Martin Short when travelling to the Hawkesbury District. Short was a friend of Joseph Holt's and had been involved in the 1798 Irish rebellion as well as suspected in the failed 1800 NSW rebellion.

When John Cavenagh set his hut on fire on the 4th of March at Castle Hill, Place was amongst those that uprose with Cunningham, Johnston and about two hundred others in quickly taking over the Farm's armoury and gathering up all the weapons they could. Place found Robert Duggan, the whip-man who had scarred his back, hiding under a bed. John Brannon removed Duggan from the hut, where George Harrington, an English convict, beat Duggan mercilessly.

While Harrington was beating Duggan and Cunningham was rallying the convicts to bring them to order, Place took over the government store where Constable Robert Jones was. Place fired his musket at Jones but it "flashed in the pan" and misfired - saving Jones from a musket ball at close range. Another incident similar to this occurred with John Brannon who had a misfire when shooting at Constable John Beard. By this time Cunningham had control over the convicts, giving them a tongue lashing for their ill-discipline. The convicts set off in a path to Constitution Hill going from farm to farm, looting for arms, food and liquor.

When the Battle of Vinegar Hill was over, Place, along with nine others were charged with insurrection amongst other charges infront of a Rum Corps court. Place denied the charges. Other than John Neale and William Johnston, the remaining defendants claimed that they had been pressed into the rebellion against their will. Place was hung that same day at five in the evening of the trial along with John Neale and George Harrington.

So was it an Irish Rebellion?

The answer is yes. Despite the considerable English involvement at both the leadership and "croppie" levels of the rebellion, it was the United Irish prisoners that brought the level of organisation, discipline and planning necessary to make the rebellion have any chance of success. Further, it was the innovations in organisation by Phillip Cunningham and William Johnston that made the 1804 a rebellion where others prior to it failed before even getting off the ground.

Cunningham and Johnston instituted and maintained a level of secrecy such that the insurrection was only discovered a few hours before John Cavenagh set his hut on fire. They also recognized the military necessity for arming themselves. The Rum Corps might have been despotic monopolists, but they were also trained soldiers which ultimately gave them an over-riding advantage on the battlefield. Cunningham and Johnston also sought to overwhelm the relatively small Rum Corps and militia forces by the rebellion occurring simultaneously in Castle Hill, Parramatta and Windsor.

Without the Irish leadership, the rebellion of 1804 would have been another insurrection attempt foiled before it even got off the ground. It is hard to see how the English convicts would have achieved the same without the "hands-on" experience of the United Irish prisoners who had done this numerous times in Ireland before being transported to Australia.

When the buildings were not set on fire at Parramatta by convicts rising in rebellion in support of the Castle Hill uprising, Cunningham was faced with a dilemma. He did not believe he could take Parramatta by force, so he decided to lead his rebels to the Hawkesbury where they could join the insurrection there and present the Governor and Rum Corps with greater numbers. The rebels struck out west marching down the now dual-carriageway Old Windsor Road.

Parramatta to Green Hills

Both Parramatta and Green Hills (Windsor) failed to rebel. It is suspected that the convicts in Parramatta were unaware that March 4th was the night. The secrecy which had managed to stop the Rum Corps and Civil Administration learning of the planned rebellion also stopped the Parramatta convicts getting the information of when to uprise. The Hawkesbury rebels were to receive word from John Griffin who was travelling out to meet the pike-maker Brian Furey. Cunningham had given Griffen a short note to give to Furey. Griffin destroyed the note at the urging of publican Lewis Bulger, who promptly told Samuel Marsden of the note and the rebellion. Griffin was quickly caught and gaoled. While the note did not reach Brian Furey, the fires from Castle Hill could be seen in the Hawkesbury.

Major George Johnston had a small contingent of Rum Corps soldiers as well as some loyalist militia which he had marched at quick pace from Sydney to Parramatta. There they discovered that Governor King had declared martial law in the Hills and Hawkesbury districts and that Cunningham had headed west. Johnston split his force, one group heading down Castle Hill Road, while the other, and larger force, headed down Windsor Road. As the military and militia group headed west, roadside inhabitants gave them a running commentary of where the rebels had been.

As Johnston closed on the rebels he needed a tactic to delay them so his infantry could catch them on foot. He sent Trooper Anlezark ahead on horseback to parley with the rebels. Cunningham and Johnston spoke with Anlezark, but did not believe his claims that Governor King was right behind them, or his demands for them to surrender. Johnston required more time, so sent the Irish Catholic priest Father Dixon to talk with the rebel leaders. But Cunningham was unprepared to listen to Dixon either. Johnston had to send himself.

Johnston and Anlezark galloped ahead to meet the rebel force. The rebels numbered approximately two hundred and thirty. Johnston was asked to come into the centre of the rebel band to discuss any parley, but George Johnston demanded the rebels leaders cowardly in not wanting to come out and meet Johnston and Anlezark in the open and under the rebel muskets. This dig at the courage of Phillip Cunningham and William Johnston brought them out to meet Johnston and Anlezark. After listening to the Major for a period, they agreed to let the two officers return to their infantry to get Father Dixon again.

When Major Johnston returned he gave them a long lecture on surrendering and accepting the clemency of the Governor, but when Cunningham was asked what he wanted, he replied, "Death or Liberty." At these words the Major produced a hidden pistol and put it to William Johnston's head. Anlezark did the same with Cunningham and at this point the main Rum Corps and militia group appeared at the base of the then unnamed hill (modern-day Castlebrook Cemetery). The Major and Anlezark dragged Cunningham and Johnston back to their troops. Major Johnston then ordered his infantry to open fire on the rebel group. The rebels were untrained, did not have enough muskets and faced the Rum Corps highly trained regular soldiers with their superior weaponry. Out-gunned and with their leaders gone, the rebels could not withstand the fifteen minutes of volleys of fire from the military and militia troops.

When the troops finally charged, the rebels could not maintain their line and were quickly overrun before fleeing. There was a quick orgy of violence, the soldiers killing prisoners in cold-blood. Major Johnston saved six captured rebels by holding his pistol to the heads of his soldiers who went to kill them. Cunningham who was a prisoner of the main vanguard of soldiers was struck by the sword of the Quartermaster Laycock. Cunningham fell down, apparently dead. The soldiers later discovered him still alive and Major Johnston taking advantage of martial law ordered him hung in Windsor.

William Johnston had managed to escape from the soldiers in the confusion of the battle, and eventually gave himself up before martial law was lifted. William Johnston was hung and then chained to a tree near a busy road outside of Parramatta. His flesh was left to rot there as a warning to any others who would challenge the authority of the colony. It was not taken down until June, and even then only at the pleas of a free lady recently arrived in Australia asking that they be buried.

Maurice Margarot was one of the Scottish Martyrs, the first political prisoners shipped to Australia. Joseph Holt was an Irish rebel who commanded an independent rebel band of approximately 1500 men in Wicklow County, Ireland. He was shipped to Australia in 1800 on the convict ship Minerva . When Holt arrived in Sydney, the Irish convicts were pretty much constantly planning rebellions and uprisings. Even though nothing could be pinned on Holt directly, Governor King had his suspicions.

Maurice Margarot

The British ruling class most likely survived the 18thC intact due to their policy of dispersement. Any seditionists, democrats, or anyone that challenged the political and social hierarchy was sent off to Australia. This started with the Scottish Martyrs in 1794. Dissidents were sent out to Australia as late as the 1850s until the Western Australian colony complained of Britain dumping political prisoners on them.

The Scottish Martyrs were Jacobins. Thomas Muir was vice-president of a Glaswegian Jacobin group. Robert Hughes writes;

Muir was an ardent constitutionalist whose offence was to advocate yearly elections of Parliament and a broadening of the Scottish franchise. He stood trial for sedition in Edinburgh in 1793, and every juror was hand-picked from the rolls of a Scottish Tory organisation.

Muir was found guilty of distributing Thomas Paine's Right of Man . An Englishman Thomas Palmer was charged soon after for distributing seditionist pamphlets which promoted parliamentary reform. He was charged, tried and sentenced in Scotland. Soon after Maurice Margarot, Joseph Gerrald and William Skirving were charged with sedition after appearing and speaking at the National Convention of British reformers meeting.

On the trip to Australia Margarot denounced his fellow martyrs and claimed they were in a mutiny plot to take over the ship. Mutinies were pretty common and the ship's captain didn't think hard before locking Muir, Palmer and Skirving up for the rest of the voyage. Lynette Ramsey Silver writes;

He [Margarot] was, however, considered by many to be a poor character, quite untrustworthy and false to his friends - an opinion which was borne out by the actions of his former comrades who, upon arrival in Sydney, publicly declined to continue to associate with him.

Once in Sydney they were set up with houses, and later given land grants. None of them did hard labor as long as they did not dabble in politics. Other than Margarot, the rest of the Scottish Martyrs held to that compromise. Margarot, however, still fancied himself a subversive but wisely did not throw his lot in publicly or openly with any of the convict rebellions which were constantly stewing with the arrival of the United Irish in 1800.

Margarot appeared to like the intrigue of it all, but was more a person of letters and speeches than any direct action. In Cunningham's plan at one point appears the notion of planting a tree of liberty in Sydney once they have conquered Parramatta and marched to the Quay. Governor King long suspected Margarot's involvement in the 1804 rebellion and was even more convinced of it when papers were seized from Margarot's house. King waited to collect more evidence, but when he was unable, he dispersed Margarot to Norfolk Island - a local form of dispersement.

Joseph Holt

Like Margarot, Holt had a knack for self-preservation. He was also rather conceited. His book, "A Rum Story" is very difficult to read for that reason. Holt was a farmer in Wicklow County and originally a Loyalist. This was until a group of Loyalists burnt his house down. Holt reacted by killing the group's leader and then burning the leader's house down in reprisal. Holt then joined the United Irishman and successfully managed a large guerrilla force in the wake of the the defeat at the Irish battle of Vinegar Hill. This poem is attributed to Holt;

They burned my house,
They blighted all my hope -
In the king's name,
And drove me to the Pope.
They made me take a rebel's chance;
To save my life -
My children and my wife,
I would have even fought for France.

The "they" in the first two lines is a bit disingenuous. It was a money dispute between Joseph Holt and Thomas Hugo which led to the violence and house burning. After becoming rebel, Holt managed to avoid being captured for five months or so, with no-one giving him up either despite a hefty reward being on his head. In the end he surrendered believing he could take advantage of an amnesty. He also offered to switch sides again if the Loyalists gave him a pardon and compensated him for his house being burnt down. He was charged and sent to Australia. Holt managed to have his pregnant wife and child sail out with him.

Skilled labor was in high demand in Sydney. The colony was having trouble feeding itself, and the knowledge of a farmer, which Holt had been in Ireland, was invaluable. William Cox was sailing on the same ship to Australia. He had a farm out in the Hills district at Dundas and Cox quickly made Holt superintendent of the farm. By all accounts Holt ran the farm efficiently.

Though Holt was amongst the first group of Irish political prisoners sent to New South Wales, planning insurrections were pretty much constant from his arrival until he was sent off to Norfolk Island by Governor King.

Holt was implicated in the foiled rebellion of August 1800 along with James Harrold of being a ringleader, but the Governor and Samuel Marsden did not have sufficient evidence to determine if he really was. They didn't for Harrold either, but packed him off to Norfolk Island just in case. Holt was permitted to remain in Castle Hill, but was forced to watch the flogging of two Irishmen suspected of pike-making;

The place they flogged them their arms pulled around a large tree and their breasts squeezed against the trunk so the men had no power to cringe ... There was two floggers, Richard Rice and John Johnson the Hangman from Sydney. Rice was left-handed man and Johnson was right-handed, so they stood at each side, and I never saw two threchers in a barn move their strokes more handier than those two man-killers did. ...

I [Holt] was to the leeward of the floggers ... I was two perches from them. The flesh and skin blew in my face as it shook off the cats. Fitzgerald received his 300 lashes. Doctor Mason - I will never forget him - he used to go feel his pulse, and he smiled, and said: "This man will tire you before he will fail - Go on." ... During this time [Fitzgerald] was getting his punishment he never gave so much as a word - only one, and that was saying, "Don't strike me on the neck, flog me fair."

When he was let loose, two of the constables went and took hold of him by the arms to keep him in the cart. I was standing by. [H]e said to them, "Let me go." He struck both of them with his elbows in the pit of the stomach and knocked them both down, and then stepped in the cart. I heard Dr. Mason say that man had enough strength to bear 200 more.

Next was tied up Paddy Galvin, a young boy about 20 years of age. He was ordered to get 300 lashes. He got one hundred on the back, and you could see his backbone between his shoulder blades. Then the Doctor ordered him to get another hundred on on his bottom. He got it, and then his haunches were in such a jelly that the Doctor ordered him to be flogged on the calves of his legs. He got one hundred there and as much as a whimper he never gave. They asked him if he would tell where the pikes were hid. He said he did not know, and would not tell. "You may as well hang me now," he said, "for you never will get any music from me so." They put him in the cart and sent him to the Hospital.

Making suspected conspirators watch the inhumanity of a flogging appears to have been normal for suspects that couldn't be charged. After the 1804 Rebellion Father Dixon was forced to watch the flogging of rebels in Sydney and even put his hands in the broken and open flesh that had been churned up by the cat o' nine-tails.

1804

In his book Holt claims no responsibility, or participation in the 1804 rebellion, going as far to claim that he warned Cunningham and Johnston from embarking on any such path as it was folly;

In February 1804 the Devil was busy in New South Wales as ever he was in Ireland. Both Irish and English men, seeing the torment increasing, they formed an opinion that they could conquer the army and get out of the country, and so they could if the steps was taken. Several of them hinted to me about the business and I told them, as they knew after, I said: "Don't attempt any such thing. You seen in Ireland you could not depend on one another and I am sure you will be worse here."

I reasoned the case and showed them cause what would happen. As bad as laws was in Ireland they were worse there, and I told them that there was as much false swearers in New South Wales as was in Ireland, according to number more. They had not army enough, nor could they ever rally or get together.

Holt notes that the English got as attached to the idea as the Irish did. Holt was definitely aware of exactly when the uprising was to begin, he told his workers to remain at the farm and defend it. Brush Farm was left by the rebels as well. After the rebellion nothing could be pinned on Holt, but Governor King decided not to chance it - and sent Holt to Norfolk Island.

Were They Involved?

The answer is probably - but as agitators, not as active conspirators. Both Margarot and Holt were guided by selfishness to actually get their hands dirty in such a dangerous plot and plan of action. Margarot and Holt had it pretty easy in colonial New South Wales so were unwise to give that up. They were very vain men, and probably could not help meddling, hoping to come out at advantage no matter which way the rebellion went.

Government Farm was where the 1804 Rebellion occurred. Circumstances led to this location providing the right environment for a successful rebellion. However, the rebellion had no political or military goal and would have ultimately failed.

Government Farm

In 1800 the colony was still not self-sufficient in food. It was constantly on the brink of starvation. The Governor set aside thirty-two thousand acres at Castle Hill for a Government Farm to solve this food supply problem. With such a large number of acres to be farmed a large convict population was needed to provide labor for it. This placed a large number of Irish and English convicts together (approx 400).

Father Dixon was an Irish Catholic Priest who had been transported to Australia under a charge of guilty by association. He had the horror of being chained to a man who died on the convict ship out to Sydney. He watched the rats eat the flesh of the body while he was still chained to the corpse.

Dixon was given permission to hold Catholic mass and sermons for the Catholic Irish. This gave an opportunity for many United Irish to gather together legally and discuss plans to rebel. In addition the Government Farm was close to where Joseph Holt was working, this may have increased the likelihood of the Irish at Government Farm uprising with a well known Irish agitator so close by.

Finally, Castle Hill is relatively central to Parramatta and Windsor, both of which had significant convict populations. This gave greater opportunities for a co-ordinated rebellion uprising which could over-whelm any military or civil response from the Governor. While this did not happen, there was constant communication between the three settlements and a unified uprising was intended.

Focal Points

If Parramatta had of uprisen on cue, then the outcome might have been different. Hawkesbury would have uprisen then, probably hearing the news the next day. It would also have made it difficult for George Johnston's soldiers and militia coming from Sydney.

Another focal point was when Phillip Cunningham and William Johnston met Major George Johnston and Trooper Azlenark at Vinegar Hill the first time. Cunningham and Johnston should have shot the two soldiers on sight and then dumped them on Windsor Road for the marching soldiers to plainly see. Without Major Johnston's leadership the outcome may have been slightly different despite the rebels being badly out-gunned and highly inexperienced relative to the Rum Corps.

Ultimately the rebellion was doomed to failure. It had no political or military goal. It appears that the convicts just didn't want to be convicts anymore and subject to the lack of liberty, constant punishment and forced labor of convict life. With the United Irish amongst them, they had a very effective method of breaking those bonds. Despite their initial success, the rebellion would not have survived beyond that.