Sarah Island

Penal Settlements, 1822-1833 And 1846-1847

Plot

Sarah Island on Macquarie Harbour was known in its time as an "Earthly Hell". The term may have been a little extreme, especially when compared with our modern "hells" of Auschwitz and the Burma-Thailand railway camps, but it was well-deserved, in the convicts' eyes at least. The location, far away from any of the settled areas of Van Diemen's Land, surrounded by almost impenetrable forest and country for which no maps then existed; the climate, which was very wet and windy for ten months of the year; the salt beef and pork which made up the very monotonous food ration led to the settlement being considered a hell on earth by the convicts sentenced to go there.