Port Arthur is a town and former convict settlement on the Tasman Peninsula, in Tasmania, Australia. It is located approximately southeast of the state capital, Hobart.
The site forms part of the Australian Convict Sites, a World Heritage property consisting of 11 remnant penal sites originally built within the British Empire during the 18th and 19th centuries on fertile Australian coastal strips. Collectively, these sites, including Port Arthur, are described by UNESCO as "... the best surviving examples of large-scale convict transportation and the colonial expansion of European powers through the presence and labour of convicts."
In 1996, the town was the scene of the Port Arthur massacre, the worst instance of mass murder in post-colonial Australian history.
History
Port Arthur was named after George Arthur, the lieutenant governor of Van Diemen's Land. The settlement started as a timber station in 1830, but it is best known for being a penal colony.
Penal colony
From 1833 until 1877, Port Arthur was the destination for those deemed the most hardened of convicted British criminals, those who were secondary offenders having reoffended after their arrival in Australia. Rebellious personalities from other convict stations were also sent there. In addition, Port Arthur had some of the strictest security measures of the British penal system.
Treatment of prisoners
Port Arthur was one example of the "Separate Prison Typology" (sometimes known as the model prison), which emerged from Jeremy Bentham's theories and his panopticon. The prison was completed in 1853, but then extended in 1855. The layout of the prison was fairly symmetrical. It was a cross shape with exercise yards at each corner. The prisoner wings were each connected to the surveillance core of the prison, as well as the chapel in the centre hall. From this surveillance hub, each wing could be clearly seen, although individual cells could not. This is how the Separate Prison at Port Arthur differed from the original theory of the panopticon.
The Separate Prison System also signaled a shift from physical punishment to psychological punishment. The hard corporal punishment, such as whippings, used in other penal stations was thought to only serve to harden criminals, and did nothing to turn them from their immoral ways. For example, food was used to reward well-behaved prisoners and as punishment for troublemakers. As a reward, a prisoner could receive larger amounts of food or even luxury items such as tea, sugar, and tobacco. As punishment, the prisoners would receive the bare minimum of bread and water. Under this system of punishment, the "Silent System" was implemented in the building. Here, prisoners were hooded and made to stay silent; this was supposed to allow time for the prisoner to reflect upon the actions which had brought him there. Many of the prisoners in the Separate Prison developed mental illness from the lack of light and sound. This was an unintended outcome, although the asylum was built right next to the Separate Prison. In many ways, Port Arthur was the model for many of the penal reform movements, despite the shipping, housing, and slave-labour use of convicts being as harsh, or worse, than other stations around the nation.
Activities of prisoners
Port Arthur was also the destination for juvenile convicts, receiving many boys, some as young as nine. The boys were separated from the main convict population and kept on Point Puer, the British Empire's second boys' prison. Like the adults, the boys were used in hard labour such as stone cutting and construction. One of the buildings constructed was one of Australia's first nondenominational churches, built in a gothic style. Attendance of the weekly Sunday service was compulsory for the prison population. Critics of the new system noted that this and other measures seemed to have negligible impact on reformation.
The archaeology found in Port Arthur shows that people living there participated in the mundane, material necessities of life. Not only did the people living there help prepare food, but they also participated in recreational activities such as smoking and hunting. Archaeological excavation of the Port Arthur workshops complex is overseen by the Port Arthur Historic Site Management Authority (PAHSMA). These workshops, situated on the original waterfront since 1830, housed the trades-focussed activities undertaken at the penal station including shoemakers, blacksmiths, tailors, turners and wheelwrights. A journal of the ongoing excavation and conservation work at Port Arthur is documented online by Dr Richard Tuffin.