“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
(Maya Angelou)
Tonight we give back to the transported women the dignity they were denied during their lifetimes. Now they have a story; now they have a name. Their existence is no longer a shameful footnote on the annals of history but rather a testimony to an uncrushable spirit that never died. These women were denied their most basic human rights; wrestled from their homes and their wider families, forced onto transport ships for a 4 month voyage to a foreign land they knew nothing about, conscripted to years of penal servitude that stripped them of their true worth, yet, somehow, they found a strength to withstand their torment and leave their own deep imprints on the sands of time.
I commend Dr Christina Henri for her vision in founding ‘Roses from the Heart’ and for placing a spotlight on the story of the transported women. She heard the cries of those we cannot see and chose to breathe life into their memory. The Committee of ‘Waterford’s Transported Convict Women – a Herstory’ led by Ann Fitzgerald (Secretary), Kieran Cronin (Chair), Margaret Richards, Ann Cusack, Roger and Joan Johnson, Eleanor Murphy and Ruth Murray have taken up the mantle here in Ireland to unearth the stories of the transported women and to celebrate the legacy they leave behind. Tonight is a moment in time that has been centuries in the making, chiseled from the fire of the persecution of these women and the stoic courage of a people who simply never gave up. We sense their presence among us. We honour them.
History can hit us with hard, cold facts that camouflage the real pain and suffering endured by those in the shadows. In its pure empirical form the narrative on all that has gone before can easily be subsumed into the agenda of the prevailing ruling class to give legitimacy to the systematic abuse of human rights needed to hold on to power. This is true of the 1800’s. This is so true of now. Seen in this light, history is one vast kaleidoscope of facts and chronicles over the span of time that are so often written from the perspective of the powerful. This evening is different; it narrows the lens right down to the many hidden on the underside of history whose story is rarely heard. To truly honour these women, we lift the lid on their hidden history and release the energy and beauty of a once forgotten people into the ether. Each candle, each bonnet, each recollection, re-claims each life story from the anomalies of historical narratives that eviscerated their memory. Now every person has a name.
Between 1788 and 1853, thousands of women, girls, and even some of their children were torn from their homeland and cast adrift on ships bound for an unfamiliar world, with little hope of ever returning. A total of 25,566 female convicts, along with their children, became pawns in the British Government’s grand colonial experiment. Transportation was seen as a convenient solution to overcrowded, disease-ridden prisons, while also serving the growing demand for labour in the fledgling Australian settlements.
Upon arrival, these women were assigned as servants to settlers or sent to grim penal institutions known as Female Factories – harsh, prison-like workhouses where they laboured under brutal conditions. There were five such factories in Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania). Their value was measured not only in their labour but also in their potential to bear children, seen as essential for the colony’s expansion. Sentences ranged from three years to life, and while most survived the gruelling three-month voyage, others perished before ever stepping foot on Australian soil.
For convict mothers, the journey was especially cruel. Upon arrival, their children were taken from them and placed in orphanages, often with no guarantee of ever seeing them again. If a child survived the harsh conditions, they might be returned to their mother – if she had endured her sentence and the punishing reality of colonial life. These women fought to survive years of relentless labour, an unforgiving landscape, and the crushing weight of social stigma. Branded as “damned whores” by colonial authorities, they endured a lifetime of prejudice, yet they became the unwitting founders of modern Australia. Today, an estimated 23% of Australians can trace their ancestry back to these resilient convict women.
Punishments in the colony were often cruel and degrading. Elizabeth Boucher, transported aboard the Mary Anne in 1822 for stealing a pocket handkerchief and fleeing her mistress’s house, was sentenced to 14 days on bread and water, and three days in the stocks – one hour per day. Female convicts in the lowest class, known as the Crime Class, were punished immediately upon entry to a Female Factory by having their hair cut short – a deeply humiliating act. While this may have had hygienic or medical justifications, for the women, it was a further stripping away of their identity and dignity. Their bonnet became their personal stamp of self-worth crafted in all its colour from the hands of a people who refused to surrender. They would define their true value; their true beauty, not the system that ensnared them.
With each new discovery in the research into the ‘herstory’ of these transported women, we come face to face with the raw, brutal strength of a people who would not be broken. In the face of the craziness of it all, they found something to live for. Their indomitable spirit, their stoic courage, carried them through the storm. Listen carefully and you can hear their hushed murmurings. Listen… for each one of them, there is one of us in this room tonight. Here, now, indivisible bonds transcend the limitations of time. As swallows fly homeward in telepathic streams across the skies above, so too these stoic women speak to us from afar to remind us that they no longer feel alone. Their light shines like a star against the darkened skies.
Just for a moment imagine the persecution and horror of what each of these women went through. Just for a moment, let us see the story of the transported women through the eyes of one person… Julia Wilson. Convict number 8903, Julia Wilson, was born in Waterford circa 1809. Julia was tried and convicted in Dublin in 1840 for stealing a watch, for which she received a sentence of 7 years transportation. Julia was 32 years old and a widow with 4 children, 3 of whom were with her when she left on board the Mary Anne for Tasmania on 27th November 1840. After 111 days, almost 4 months later, she arrived in Hobart on 19th March 1841.
Sadly, all 3 of her children were admitted to the orphanage on arrival. Margaret, the eldest, 14 years old, was apprenticed out to the female orphan school and was married 3 years later. Mary, 7 years old, would remain at the orphanage for the following 4 years and was then re-united with her mother, who by then had received a conditional pardon. Her youngest, John, 3 years, was also re-united with his mother in 1845, 5 years later. Julia married Thomas Chadwick the following year.
Thankfully, Julia did get to see her children once she was relatively free. She would have worked hard, and shown great strength, as pardons were only given to well-behaved convicts. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for many other women and their children. Discipline, punishment, control, and religion were used in an attempt to shape these children into respectable adults. The schools were cold, with no fires, poor sanitation, and disease all contributing to high mortality rates.
Julia died in 1877 and has left a great legacy to her family and Australia. She has demonstrated, through her perseverance, how, when faced with immense challenges, she was able to build a life for herself and her family and their descendants, playing a significant role in improving the societies they became part of. Julia is just one of the many voices of resilience. Her story echoes now as it did then. I wonder what would she say if she was here tonight? What would she say to you!
* Be brave… do not wait for the right path to open for you. Find out what you truly want and direct your energies towards it. You have a choice; we hadn’t. Be guided by those you trust as you seek out new frontiers, but, above all, trust you own deepest instinct. Your inner radar will guide you home. We get one go at this journey we call life. Seize it for the adventure that it is. It is never too late.
* Always place a value on you. Never allow anyone take your self-worth away. No matter what the world threw at us, they could not subdue our spirit. Yes there is something inside each one of us so strong, something unbreakable, a life force that you will come to know in your time of trial. More than anything else, believe in you. In your darkest hour, you, like us, will come face to face with the truth about yourself and come to discover reserves of resilience you never knew you had. You see, your inner spirit is intrinsic to who you are. This is your very own core, your gateway to the life force of the universe that shapes us all. And once the storm is over you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. Only when you scale that mountain, does the panorama of possibility open up before you. You, like us, will overcome.
* Let your light shine in a way that gives hope to others. Do not make your life all about you. No matter what has gone before, dust yourself down and kick on. Remember, we are not supposed to stay wounded. We are supposed to move through our tragedies and challenges and to help each other move through the many painful episodes of our lives. Wounds are the means to receive through which we enter the hearts of other people. They are meant to teach us to become compassionate and wise. Then you begin to see with new eyes. Today, 1 billion humans on our planet go to bed hungry, 22,000 children die of hunger related disease each day – so many women, children and men scarred by war, so many displaced, afraid, alone. The unjust world we left behind still remains. The powerful still have an agenda that pays scant regard for the silent cries of those hidden in the shadows. More than ever our world needs hope, not of a utopian kind, other worldly and illusory, but a hope that compels us to listen to the voiceless, to lift them up, to empower them to take the reins of their destiny into their own hands. Only then will our story have a purpose. Only then can you truly honour the spirit of we the transported women who once lived where you are now.
* Leave your footprint on the sands of time. Your story matters. What you do with your life matters. Your legacy, like ours, lingers long after your race is done. Above all, as they say in the native Gaelic tongue of our forefathers and mothers, bi cinéalta, be kind. So my friends I leave you with a few lines from an Indian mystic, Naomi Nyi, reminding us of our shared journey in search of the only truth that matters.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
you must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
Dr Phil Brennan gave this keynote address at the ‘Voices of Resilience’ gathering in The Edmund Rice Chapel, Waterford on March 8th, 2025 to remember and honour Waterford’s Transported Convict Women. Phil and Elaine were joined by their Peace Choir in what was a truly memorable evening. Celtic Ways Ireland is proud to be associated with ‘Roses from the Heart’ and the committee of ‘Waterford’s Transported Women – a herstory’.
For further information on our Celtic Ways Ireland tour offerings for 2025, check out www.celticwaysireland.com or email us directly on info@celticwaysireland.com