Catalogue description Folio 22: Jane Pentland, aged 21, Maria Robson, aged 27, Convicts; disease or hurt,...

Folio 22: Jane Pentland, aged 21, Maria Robson, aged 27, Convicts; disease or hurt, scurvy. Put on sick list, 21 March 1833, at sea. Discharged, 30 April 1833. Presented themselves with incipient symptoms of scurvy, both having previously suffered with psora, Pentland had also suffered dysentery. ‘Recourse was had to the vegetable acids, particularly the citric, in large and frequent doses’. Shortly afterwards the ship put in at the Cape of Good Hope, having been at sea for a long time and many of the women having a ‘sallow’ and debilitated appearance.

Folio 23: Mary Gregory, aged 16, Convict; disease or hurt, amenorrhoea. Put on sick list, 5 April 1833, at sea. Discharged, 12 April 1833. ‘Of full habit’, had not menstruated for three months and presented herself with headache, costive bowels, pain in the region of the spleen, thirst and febrile heat. ‘Blood was abstracted from the arm to the amount of sixteen ounces, and a saline purgative administered, which had the effect of diminishing the febrile heat, relieving headache, and opening the bowels’.

Folio 23: List of five women treated for costiveness in April.

Folio 23: Anne Ross, Settler, aged 32, M A White, aged 21 and Sarah Riley, aged 21, Convicts, were treated for cephalalgia in April.

Folio 23: Elizabeth Harrison, aged 38, M A Avane [McAvane], aged 36, Sophia Lovell, aged 21, M Sydney, aged 39, were treated for catarrh [in April].

Folio 24: Sarah Thompson, aged 34, Mary Jackson, aged 32, Mary Saunders, aged 23, Margaret Baron, aged 32, Anne [Kean], aged 45, were treated for slight contusions [in April].

Folio 24: Maria [Mayerman], aged 21, Convict; disease or hurt, amenorrhoea. Put on sick list, 7 April 1833, at sea. Discharged, 24 April 1833. ‘A woman of colour’, put upon the list in consequence of retention of the menses, she also had slight symptoms of catarrh and costive bowels.

Folios 24-25: Anne Mansfield, aged 30, Convict; disease or hurt, rheumatism. Put on sick list, 18 April 1833, at sea. Discharged, 30 April 1833. ‘Of nervous temperament’, she was put on the list with symptoms of acute rheumatism.

Folio 25: Eleanor Marston, aged 25, Convict; disease or hurt, cynanche parotidaea. Put on sick list, 24 April 1833, at sea. Discharged, 6 May 1833. Presented herself suffering pain and swelling of the parotid gland, with slight fever.

Folio 25: Mary Miller, aged 37, Convict; disease or hurt, cynanche parotidaea. Put on sick list, 8 May 1833, at sea. Discharged, 15 May 1833.

Folios 25-26: Mary Ann White, aged 21, Convict; disease or hurt, dysentery. Put on sick list, 3 May 1833, at sea. Discharged, 13 May 1833. ‘Of full habit’, put on the list with slight dysenteric symptoms, occasioned by the cold and moist weather.

Folio 26: Mary McConnell, aged 31, Anne Cole, aged 18, Anne Kean, aged 45, were treated for catarrh [in May].

Folio 26: List of 14 women treated for costiveness [obstipatio] during May and early June. The constipation was so general that there was scarcely a day but ten or a dozen prisoners took medicine.

Folio 27: Eliza Harvey, aged 26, Convict; disease or hurt, cynanche tonsillaris. Put on sick list, 14 May 1833, at sea. Discharged, 21 May 1833. ‘Of weak nervous temperament’.

Folio 27: Anne Isherwood, aged42, Convict; disease or hurt, diarrhoea. Put on sick list, 19 May 1833, at sea. Discharged, 28 May 1833. Had frequently suffered slight bowel complaints.

Folio 28: Susan Kerr, aged 20, Convict; disease or hurt, cephalalgia. Put on sick list, 22 May 1833, at sea. Discharged, 24 May 1833. She had frequently been treated for costiveness.

Folio 28: Eleanor Neale, aged 19, Convict; disease or hurt, cynanche. Put on sick list, 29 May 1833, Sydney Harbour. Discharged to the hospital at Sydney, 3 June 1833. ‘Of a short stout stature and full habit’.

Folio 29: Mary Lambert, aged 45, Convict; disease or hurt, cynanche. Put on sick list, 7 June 1833, Sydney, New South Wales. Discharged, 14 June 1833.

Folio 30: Blank.

Folio 31: Abstract of the preceding journal, being a summary of all the cases contained therein, nosologically arranged.

Folios 32-35: Surgeon's general remarks. Arrived Woolwich 14 November 1832 and received 100 female convicts, from various prisons, and 20 settlers, including children. Sailed 11 December but was detained by contrary winds until 20 December 1832. Delayed again at Falmouth from 29 December 1832 until 3 January 1833. The weather was damp, foggy and extremely boisterous, catarrh and other inflammatory complaints were very prevalent and a great deal of sea sickness succeeded by obstinate constipation. There were favourable winds when they sailed again and they were nearly at the equator on 15 February 1833, having experienced a variety of unpleasant weather, and inflammatory fever had appeared. One patient died, a delicate, desponding woman. Constipation was prevalent and many prisoners became habitually so and needed constant medicine. Many of them were sallow and debilitated and two showed symptoms of scurvy. Since they had been 80 days at sea and where near the Cape of Good Hope it was decided to call there and get fresh food and replenish the medicine chest. On 20 March they anchored in Table Bay and received fresh meat, fruit and vegetables and, for sea supplies, 18 live sheep and 500 pounds of vegetables. This change in diet improved their health so much that there was very little sickness in the remainder of the voyage, apart from costiveness, and there was no trace of scurvy, although they did not arrive at Sydney until 25 May 1833. The surgeon suggests that female prisoners should be employed on the voyage in making their own clothes as a means of promoting good order. Since many of the prisoners have been prostitutes, ‘many of the lowest grade’, and are consequently ‘quite callous to any disgrace or punishment’, he suggests part of the prison should be railed off, or provision made to rail off individual berths, and the worst characters locked up at night. On the Diana three berths were set up in this way and proved effective. The confinement box at present supplied is insufficient since it holds only one person and in warm latitudes they should not be in it for more than four hours. The only punishment the prisoners seem to dread is having their hair shaved off but it only seems to make them worse. He also suggests extending the netting for stowing bedding during the day so that the boats and booms do not have to be used, bedding stored on them quickly becoming dirty. He remarks on the improvement on board female convict ships ‘by the late plan of fitting the closets and arranging the hospital’. J Ellis, RN, Late Surgeon Superintendent of the convict ship Diana.