God made the wicked Grocer
For a mystery and a sign,
That men might shun the awful shops
And go to inns to dine;
Today, I would like to indicate that sometimes, inns weren't such a good place to go, either. This is a sample chapter from a book I am working on (working title: Not Your Usual Villains).
Some of the other chapters include Women in Trousers, Drewery's case, the Archdeacon was a curate's egg, Dight's Light Horse, The Cato Street Conspirators, The Escape of the Boy Brown, The Composer Who Ran, Turning the Earth Inside Out, Off They All Ran, The Licensed Thief and The First Anzac Day. A couple of those chapters cover material to be found in entries in this blog.
Anyhow, here is one tale with a caveat: being dragged from the ms, it contains many more footnotes than I expect to see in the final version.
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I became interested
in a public house called the ‘Sheer Hulk’ when I saw it mentioned by Alexander Harris.
Now first, a word about Harris: the consensus is that he was probably a real
person, but he left few traces in the colony, and he prefaced the book he
published this way:
ADVERTISEMENT: IT is almost unnecessary to state that, though published anonymously, the truth of the accounts given in this little work may be fully depended upon; and the Author can substantiate all the great facts by an exact reference to the names, dates, and places. Of course this would be unwillingly done, on account of the ill-feeling that it would inevitably engender. He has carefully endeavoured to avoid the possibility of the identification of the parties whose actions are the subject of his remarks. His object has been rather to draw attention to a system than to interest by the detail of his mere private adventures. [1]
Not only did he
disguise situations, he also muddled them. The reader [of the whole book] will have recently encountered the case of Archdeacon Scott
prosecuting the Broadbears, while in Harris’ telling, it was the Broadbears’
employer, Mr Walker, who was prosecuted. In brief, then, Harris may not be a
reliable witness in this passage:
We went into two houses, the one called “The Black Dog,” a licensed house, the other close beside it, an old dilapidated place, properly enough called “The Sheer Hulk,” which had been deprived of its licence on account of the practices and characters admitted by its landlord; it was, however, still occupied, and as the occupier was no longer under the apprehension of losing his licence, the scenes displayed nightly were of tenfold worse character than ever. [2]
It turns out that
both houses existed, though the ‘Sheer Hulk’ pub was more interesting.
It appeared in the public records in July 1818, when three successive issues of
The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales
Advertiser listed the liquor licences for Sydney, Parramatta, Liverpool and
Windsor.
There were 14 beer and spirit licences in Cambridge Street, Cumberland
Street, Gloucester Street and Harrington Street, and so part of ‘The Rocks’.
The ‘Black Dog’ was not there, yet, but the area included Samuel Hulbert’s ‘Sheer
Hulk’ in Cambridge Street, where its neighbours included the ‘Governor King’. The
‘Punch Bowl’ and the ‘Turk’s Head’ (all spirits licences) plus ‘Chequers’, with
a beer licence. [3]
In 1823, Hulbert moved premises:
NOTICE.— Mr. Samuel Hulbert, of the Sign of the Sheer Hulk, Cambridge-street, Rocks, begs to acquaint his Friends and the Public, that he is about to REMOVE to his House, No. 14, Prince-street, Rocks, opposite the Sign of the Edinburgh Castle, where he hopes for a Continuance of their Custom. [4]
Hulbert now leaves our tale, though he appears to have died “after a lingering illness” in 1829. By
September 1823, William Foster appeared to have control of the ‘Sheer Hulk’ [5]
There were coroner’s inquests held there in 1825 and 1826 (it was normal practice
to conduct inquests in public houses at that time), and in 1828, the ‘Sheer
Hulk’ saw some drama.
ON the morning of Saturday last, from private information given our Chief Constable, he proceeded well armed, to the Sheer Hulk Public House, on the Rocks, and succeeded in capturing the unfortunate Lookay alias Edwards, for whom a reward of Fifty pounds (and a ticket of leave, should the person, be a prisoner) was offered. He was conducted before the Superintendent of Police, who refused to hear what he had to say in his defence; he will be brought up for examination again to day. [6]
Clearly, as Harris indicated, the house lost its licence at
some point, because in 1830, it was offered for sale in this way:
TO be Let or Sold, all that well-known old established Public-house, the Sheer Hulk No. 30, Cambridge-street; this House was for many Years licensed, and has recently been put into thorough repair, and is an excellent situation for business. Application to be made to Mrs. BRUNTON Prince-street. April 16, 1830. [7]
There were apparently no takers, and in June, the ‘Sheer
Hulk’ was offered at auction:
MR. BODENHAM respectfully announces, that he has received instructions to sell those valuable promises, known by the sign of the Sheer Hulk, and containing 5 rooms, now ready for immediate occupation, and in which a large fortune was accumulated by the recent Proprietor. The property is surrounded by a large population of Mechanics, from which cause there can be no doubt but an excellent livelihood, if not an independence may be secured. [8]
In July 1830, a list of Sydney publicans, licensed for the “ensuing
year” was published. It included the following in our target area:
Essex Lane. — George Johnson, Ship Inn. Joseph le Burn, Sheer Hulk.Cambridge-street . — Jasper Tunn, Whale Fishery. Daniel Rogers, Bird in Hand. Daniel Hill, Black Dog. [9]
Now comes a curious
story that is best told in the words of the victim, Alexander Monaghan, who
appears twice in one issue of the Sydney
Monitor before disappearing. Did
he die in gaol? Did Davis (or Davy) drop the law suit? Our only sources are an
editorial, quoted below, written in response to this letter to the
Editor of the Sydney Monitor, and
written from gaol on 28 August 1830:
Sir,As you are famed for taking up the cause of the unfortunate, I beg to lay before you my distressed case:—I am about sixty-four years of age. I came to the Colony in the Dromedary along with Governor Macquarie, a private in the 73d. and was made a veteran on the departure of the Regt. for Ceylon. On the 25th March, four years ago, I received from Commissary Wemyss £6. 0s. 2d. being my quarter's pension, and placed it for safety in the hands of one George Davy or Davis, who kept the Sheer Hulk on the Rocks. But the sign was down at that time. I stayed with him four or five days — one day and one night of which I took more liquor than did me good. On the third or fourth day (the 28th) I wished to settle, but he put me off. On the next day he presented my bill. It amounted to £9. I told him he had robbed me, for that it was impossible my board and lodging, including the liquor I had drunk, could come to more than one third of that sum. He told me he would broomstick me out of the house. I went off to my master, Mr. Ikin, of Liverpool, who told me I had been served right for my folly; so I never took further notice of Davy's cheating. Davy now keeps a green stall on the Brickfieldshill. The books of the Sydney Bench for years back, on inspection, will shew him to have been a very unfortunate man, supposing him to have conducted himself with propriety at all times. After I had been with Mr. Ikin for about five months, I received a summons from Davy to attend the Court of Requests at Sydney. Mr. Ikin told me, that as I resided at Liverpool, the summons was good for nothing. He sent me up the Country with some cattle, and I never heard any more of the summons till about six months after, when I was told, that an execution was out against me; but it was never served on me. I left Mr. lkin in 1828, and went to live at Jem Core's at Prospect, where I remained about twelve months. In the course of that twelve months, Davy one day came into the house with a cord in his hand and a stick, and told me to come along with him to gaol. We went to Parramatta, and called for a pot of beer at Lacey's at the toll-bar. It was the races. A parcel of native lads remonstrated with Davy on taking an old man like me to gaol, and they got between him and me, and I went home the same day. Davy never shewed me any writ for his capturing me.On the 25th June last, I drew my quarter's pension, and on the 26th, Davy and a bailiff took me again at the toll-bar at Lacey's, where I had formerly been rescued. I refused to walk, but offered to go if they would provide me a conveyance. They took hold of me, one of one side, and the other of the other, and forced me along half down the hill, and then let me fall on my face. It was a dead fall and hurt me. They then took hold of my feet, and dragged me on my back, without my hat, nearly as far as the bridge, my old head bumping against the ground all the time, and my arms flying back. My head was much cut, as the military surgeon in this place saw after I came in. The bailiff then lifted up his staff, which had a great knob at the end of it and said, " you d--d old scoundrel, if you don't walk, I'll knock your brains out." To which Davy replied, " Aye do, and we'll throw him under the bridge." I began to be much frightened, and promised to do my best at walking. Davy seeing I was cowed, then went his way, and I went on with the bailiff, as far as the first public house, kept by one Wright, since dead. There the bailiff gave me a glass of grog. We then went on, and at last turned off to the left, opposite Mr. Squires's, and put up at a settler's for the night. I found next morning my shoulder was hurt by means of the dragging. I kept my bed on Sunday. On Monday I could not eat my breakfast, but I got up, and went with the bailiff to Sydney, but never broke my fast. I remained at Davy's house on the Brickfield Hill about two hours. I suspected that from their whispering and manner, the execution was wrong, and that they had gone to the office to fetch a new one. I have been told since, that they could not take me again lawfully on a new execution; and that this second capture by the bailiff was illegal. But I say the first was illegal, not only as to justice, but also not being served in Liverpool. On entering the gaol, I found my arm very bad, and at last I asked the surgeon to look at it. I do not expect to have the use of it any more.ALEXANDER MONAGHAN. [10]
One possibility, of course, is that Monaghan did not exist,
but the following editorial describes his appearance, so there really was
somebody of this name in gaol in Sydney in 1830.
We call the attention of the Commissioner of the Court of Requests to a letter in the 1st column of our last page, signed Alexander Monaghan. If the statements therein made be true, we never read any thing more villainous from beginning to end. We have seen [the] old Veteran, and he bears the character of a quiet harmless old man. It is to be regretted that his late master Mr. Ikin, should have conceived, that because the old man resided in Liverpool, the service on him of the summons in person in Sydney, was invalid. Had Monaghan defended the case in person, and proved to the Commissioner the facts he alleges in his letter, we are satisfied the verdict would have been in his favour, and that a balance would have been found coming to him. This however is only one of a thousand instances, which have come to our knowledge, of the ruin of poor people from their ignorance of the forms of law, and of their strong aversion from paying that attention to lawyer's letters and writs, which they ought to pay. If the people of this Country detested a public house, as much as they do a lawyer's office, it would be well. But men naturally neglect that, which they are averse from. They are in this respect like cowards in a field of battle, who turn their backs, when the shewing of a good front, would save them from what they dread. The conduct of Davy, the Bailiff, on the last execution, by which they have maimed the grey-haired Veteran for the remainder of his miserable existence, if true, is most atrocious; and it is a pity, but he and the rascally bailiff should be trounced for it by an action for damages, in the Supreme Court at Monaghan's suit. [11]
The problem is that there is no evidence that Alexander
Monaghan existed: somebody of that name gained a land grant in the Illawarra in
1832, but by then, our chap would have been something like 66. I would offer
the Scots verdict of “not proven”, on the basis that there is no evidence of a
licensee named Davis or Davy, either.
Joseph Leburn held the licence at the ‘Sheer Hulk’ for a
number of years before Daniel Rogers took it over, and we drift out of our
period of interest.
Then again, Davis or Davy may have been real and run the
place without being the licensee. Alexander Harris usually described the places
and people he wrote about, but he was quite open about the ‘Sheer Hulk’. Harris
returned later in his book to the ‘Sheer Hulk’, and this appears to confirm that
Davy or Davis may have been real:
Our next movement was to a house on the rocks much frequented by boatmen, and known as “The Sheer Hulk,” already mentioned. It was kept at this time by a man of the name of D——, a convict free by servitude (so convicts are designated whose term of sentence has expired), as a lodging house for sailors … There is no doubt nevertheless that such a nest would have been rooted out long before but for the handsome “sweeteners” (bribes) which old D——'s profits enabled him to give the constables. [12]
There was certainly a villain, but was it Davis/Davy, or was
it whoever created the letter that appeared in the Monitor? We will probably never know, now, but if Davis/Davy
existed, he may well have been the George Davy who was charged with selling
spirits without a license in 1832, fined £30, with 7s. 6d. costs, and
given three days to pay, the alternative being four months in gaol. (The details will be found in the Sydney Herald, 9 April 1832, 2.)
[1] Alexander
Harris, Settlers and Convicts,
London, 1847.
[2]
Alexander Harris, Settlers and Convicts,
London, 1847, ch. 1.
[3] The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales
Advertiser, 18 July 1818, 2, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2178078
[4] The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales
Advertiser, 27 March 1823, 4, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2181753
[5] The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales
Advertiser, 4 September 1823, 2, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2182174
[6] The Monitor (Sydney), 14 January 1828,
7, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/31759375
[7] The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales
Advertiser, 17 April 1830, 4, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2194917
[8] The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales
Advertiser, 1 June 1830, 4, http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2195234/498982
[9] The Australian (Sydney), 7 July 1830, 1,
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/36867116
[10] The Sydney Monitor, 1 September 1830, 4,
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/32074146
[11] The Sydney Monitor, 1 September 1830, 3,
http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/32074141/4294070
[12] Alexander
Harris, Settlers and Convicts,
London, 1847, ch. 6.
