The

First Fleet The First Fleet was a fleet of 11 ships that brought the first European and African settlers to Australia. It was made up of two Royal Navy vessels, three store ships and six convict transports. On 13 May 1787 the fleet under the command ...

is the name given to the group of eleven ships carrying

convict A convict is "a person found guilty of a crime and sentenced by a court" or "a person serving a sentence in prison". Convicts are often also known as "prisoners" or "inmates" or by the slang term "con", while a common label for former convict ...

s, the first to do so, that left England in May 1787 and arrived in Australia in January 1788. The ships departed with an estimated 775 convicts (582 men and 193 women), as well as officers, marines, their wives and children, and provisions and agricultural implements. After 43 convicts had died during the eight-month trip, 732 landed at

Sydney Cove Sydney Cove (Eora: ) is a bay on the southern shore of Sydney Harbour, one of several harbours in Port Jackson, on the coast of Sydney, New South Wales. Sydney Cove is a focal point for community celebrations, due to its central Sydney locatio ...

. In 2005, the First Fleet Garden, a memorial to the First Fleet immigrants, friends and others was created on the banks of

Quirindi Quirindi ( or ) is a small town on the North West Slopes region of New South Wales, Australia, in Liverpool Plains Shire. At the , Quirindi had a population of 3,444. It is the nearest link to Gunnedah to the west and Tamworth to the north. ...

Creek at

Wallabadah, New South Wales Wallabadah is a town and locality in the New England region of New South Wales, Australia. The town is located 55 kilometres south of Tamworth on the New England Highway and is in the Liverpool Plains Shire. At the , Wallabadah had a population ...

. Stonemason Ray Collins researched and then carved the names of all those who came out to Australia on the eleven ships in 1788 on tablets along the garden pathways. The stories of those who arrived on the ships, their life, and first encounters with the Australian country are presented throughout the garden. No single definitive list of people who travelled on those ships exists; however, historians have pieced together as much data about these pioneers as possible. In the late 1980s, a simple software program with a

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data stored and accessed electronically. Small databases can be stored on a file system, while large databases are hosted on computer clusters or cloud storage. The design of databases sp ...

of convicts became available for Australian school students, both as a history and an information technology learning guide. An on-line version is now hosted by the

University of Wollongong The University of Wollongong (abbreviated as UOW) is an Australian public research university located in the coastal city of Wollongong, New South Wales, approximately 80 kilometres south of Sydney. As of 2017, the university had an enrolment of ...

. Digitised images of the lists from the Orders in Council for the First Fleet are available on the Convict Indents Index. The six ships that transported the First Fleet convicts were: * ''Alexander'' * ''Charlotte'' * ''Friendship'' * ''Lady Penrhyn'' * ''Prince of Wales'' * ''Scarborough''

List of convicts

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References

Bibliography

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External links

NSW State records: Convict Index

National Library of Australia
Canberra. Searchable catalogue of art/images from the First Fleet e.g. First Fleet, Ducie Collection, George Raper, Port Jackson Painter
St. John's First Fleeters
an edited collection of biographies on 50+ First Fleeters buried at

, published o
''The St. John's Cemetery Project''
{{Convicts in Australia Australian penal colonies Convicts on the First Fleet, List of

1787 in Great Britain Australian crime-related lists

List of convicts

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See also

References

Bibliography

External links