Mr Oliver has been employed as Chief Clerk....." The testimonials are written by John [Giles] Price, Norfolk Island, January 1853; Rupert.B.Deering, Capt. 99th Regiment, Norfolk Island, February 1855; Henry Joseph Day, Civil Commandant, together with his further views on the "final breaking up of the Norfolk Island Establishment..."; and James Boyd, the longest serving [1853-71] Civil Commandant at Port Arthur. A lengthy note in the margin on one page is signed by Acting Comptroller General Nairn, who approved payment of a pension of £62 per annum. On his death in 1887 "The Echo" reported "Many persons - and especially those connected with the Press and with the Imperial service in these colonies as far back as the old Legislative Council, will learn with regret of the death of MrThomas Jewel Oliver, who passed away on Friday morning at "Swilley," St. Mark’s-road, Randwick.The late Mr Oliver was bom in England, near Plymouth... He was the son of Robert Bloon Oliver, a Naval Agent, and he emigrated to this colony about half a century ago. At Norfolk Island he was clerk of the bench, the civil position of which ranked next to that of the local commandment. When the Imperial establishment at Norfolk Island was abolished, Mr. Oliver was transferred to Port Arthur, inTasmania, and he there remained in a position similar to that he had previously filled - until he was pensioned off and returned to Sydney. For many years he was engaged on the Parliamentary reporting staff of the Sydney Morning Herald. $2,000–3,000 396 Gerstaëcker, Friedrich Wilhelm Christian [1816-1872] The Two Convicts (in German, Die beiden Sträflinge, 1856) [London; G. Routledge & Co., 1857] 1st edition in English; 393pp in original half-calf binding with marbled boards; title in gilt to spine. With early ownership inscription. Gerstaecker, writer and traveller, was born in Hamburg. In 1837 , aged 21, he migrated to America where he led ‘a wild and adventurous life’. On his return to Germany in 1843 he established himself as a writer of travel books. Factual accounts of his own experiences and guides for intending migrants were followed by novels on American life that made him famous in Germany. In 1849 he went from South America to the goldfields of California and thence to Australia by way of the South Sea islands. He arrived in Sydney in March 1851, took a coach to Albury and attempted to paddle down the Murray River in a self-made canoe. When it was wrecked he tramped 700 miles (1127 km) to Adelaide, ‘the wildest and most dangerous march’ of his life. He visited the German settlements in South Australia but in August the first news of the gold strike hurried him back to Sydney and the Bathurst diggings. His most popular Australian novels are Die beiden Sträflinge (1856; translated as The Two Convicts, 1857), an adventurous story of a noble bushranger which was serialized in the Examiner and Melbourne Weekly News from October 1859 to March 1860, and Im Busch (1864), set in gold diggings near Sydney. Both deal with problems that he found especially interesting in the Australian scene: the complex relation between convicts, bushrangers, natives and free settlers, the fate of German migrants in Australia and the exciting life of the goldfields. $400–600 397 GIBSON, Charles Bernard Life Among Convicts (in two volumes) [London; Hurst and Blackett, 1863] 1st ed. 304 + 305pp + 8 pages of adverts. Attractively re-bound in half-leather with marbled boards, gilt titles and decorations to spines. $400–600 ❖ 398 CASCADES No.14 Convict Work Gang Record Book: July 1865 to September 1866 72pp printed book, 20.5 x 16.5cm, leather and vellum bound, completed in manuscript with tipped-in instructions followed by records of the men in Gang.14 during this period - their names, the ship on which they were transported or arrived from Port Arthur, or, in some cases, if they were native born, the nature of their work, the period during which they performed their tasks, their conduct, their industriousness and the name of other Officer in Charge. Some of the tasks noted: Feeding Pigs, Horseman, Field labor, Bullock driver, Fencing, Farm labor, Splitting fencing, Burning Ashes, Feeding Cattle, Cook & Baker, Blacksmith, Cleaning the Station, Minding Pigs, Servant, Ploughing, etc. Various notations include "Transferred to Impression Bay", "Discharged to Hobart Town", "From Port Arthur", "Discharged to Port Arthur", "To Cascades as Servant", "1 day to Hospital", "Discharged to Freedom", "Tranferred to E.H. Neck", etc. Completely legible; a remarkable surviving document. The Cascades House of Correction occupied the former Female Factory at Cascades, South Hobart, in 1856. It housed the children of the prisoners living there as well as children who were orphaned or neglected and waiting for transferral to Queen’s Asylum or the boarding-out system. $1,000–1,500 ❖ 399 TASMANIAN PARLIAMENTARY PAPERS: October 1870 "Convicts, Paupers, and Lunatics at Port Arthur"; September 1876 "MRS. DANDRIDGE. Correspondence with the Government." (2 items) The Port Arthur Return lists the Names, Ages and Periods of Sentence of the 556 "residents"; Mrs. Dandridge petitions the Government for the continuation of the allowance she and her late husband received for the care and maintenance of Truganini (to whom she refers as Lallah Rookh") and the other Aborigines in her care. $200–250 ❖ 400 MONTHLY MUSTER ROLL-BOOK: March 1878 to August 1882 A Waterlow & Sons accounts book, completely filled-in in neat manuscript listing all those Police Officers, Court Officials and Prisoners entitled to receive Government Rations. A wealth of information and many 100s of names for further research. $500–1,000 ❖ 398 61