Lot 654

Description

Convict token, 1825, being a shaved Great Britain 1797 cartwheel penny size coin, inscribed on one side, 'Fredrick/Morgan cast/For Death/april 8 and/respited/June 14/1825', and on the other side, 'When/this you see/remember, me/when I am/bound in/Slavery'. Holed near edge for wearing, very fine and rare.

Frederick Morgan was convicted of theft in London in 1825 and sentenced to Life Imprisonment from Middlesex Goal and transported to Australia at age 17. On 22 August 1825 he departed England on the transport ship, Marquis of Hastings, loaded with 152 male convicts and arrived at Sydney on 3 January 1826. After receiving a Ticket of Leave he worked as a tailor in Sydney and later a publican at the Spread Eagle Inn at Bathurst and then Tenterfield. He received a Conditional Pardon in 1846. In 1851 he married Emma Woodward and they had 16 children. Frederick Morgan died of bronchitis on 25 May 1886 at Morganville, Randwick at age 79. Three of his sons, Frederick, Edwin and Thomas were members of the syndicate created in 1882 that was responsible for the development of a gold mine at Ironstone Mountain near Rockhampton, Queensland. In October 1886 the syndicate became the Mount Morgan Gold Mining Company which went on to become one of the most productive gold mining companies in the world.