Free Settler or Felon
Newcastle and Hunter Valley
Convict and Colonial History
Free Settler or Felon is an on-going project gathering details of the lives of people who resided in the Hunter Valley, Newcastle and Central Coast in the early days of settlement.
Use the Search box on the left to access information about Hunter Valley Convicts, Settlers, Soldiers and Townsfolk.
Use the Search Box below to search the whole site.
Follow the Links to find out more about Convict Ships, Medical Practitioners, Convict Ship Surgeons, Inns and Hotels, Bushrangers, Priests and Pastors, Hunter Valley Placenames, Australian Slang and more
Convict Ships to Australia
Convict Ships - Alphabetical list of Convict Ships arriving in New South Wales, Norfolk Island, Western Australia and Van Diemens Land between the years 1788 and 1862
Convict Ship Surgeons
Convict Ship Surgeons - Surgeons who were employed on convict ships to Australia in the years 1788 - 1862
Convict Ships By Year
Convict Ships by Year - Arrival of Convict Ships by Year
Free Settler and Immigrant Ships
Free Settler Ships - Free Settler and Immigrant Ships arriving 1821 - 1842
The First Fleet
The First Fleet - The First Fleet brought the first convict ships to Australia in 1788 in a voyage that took over eight months to complete
Early Settlers Introduction
Hunter Valley Settlers - Introduction to Early Settlers Index
Hunter Valley Settlers
Hunter Valley Settlers - Index to Settlers who took up land in the early days of the colony
Hunter Valley Bushranger Index
Bushrangers Index - Early bushrangers in the Hunter Valley were mostly men desperate to escape Newcastle penal settlement where they had been sent for colonial indiscretions. Later when the Penal Settlement closed and the Valley was opened for settlement the bushrangers were mostly convicts who escaped from estates and farms or from road gangs
Hunter Valley Inns and Hotels Index
Inns & Hotels - Newcastle and Hunter Valley Inns and Hotels Index and Publicans Index
Hunter River Steamers
Hunter River Steamers - Including the Sophie Jane and other famous steamers that plied between Sydney and Newcastle after 1831
Hunter Valley Medical Practitioners
Medical Practitioners Index of some of the men and women who worked as medical practitioners in the Hunter Valley prior to 1900
Horse Patrols and the Mounted Police in the Hunter Valley
Mounted Police - Horse patrols were the forerunners of the Mounted Police. They were established in the Hunter Valley and at Bathurst when Sir Thomas Brisbane was Governor in response to Bushrangers who terrorised the districts in 1825
Military Officers
Military Officers - Notes about some of the Officers who served or settled in Newcastle and the Hunter Valley in the first half of the 19th Century
Law and Order in the Hunter Valley
Law and Order - A list of men who served as Magistrates, Chief Constables and Constables in Newcastle, Hunter Valley and Brisbane Water
Scourgers in New South Wales
Scourgers - Names of some of the Scourgers employed in New South Wales in the convict years
Indigenous Notes
Indigenous Notes - Articles about customs and ceremonies of indigenous people in the Hunter Valley region as described by various explorers, clergymen, settlers
Hunter Valley Place Names
Placenames - Notes on the Origins and Locations of Place Names in Lake Macquarie and the Hunter Valley region
Female Convicts
Female Convicts - Over fifty-two years from 1788 to 1840 when transportation of convicts came to an end, more than 12,000 women were transported to New South Wales. A woman transported on the Charlotte in 1788 could potentially have been great grandmother to one of the last sent on the Surry in 1840
Convict Names
Convict Names - Unusual male and female convict names
Convict History
Convict History - Including The Battle of Castle Hill, Famous and Infamous Convicts, Pirates, Cockatoo Island
Convict Coal Miners at Newcastle
Convict Coal Miners - Convicts sent to Newcastle to work in the coal mines in the first years of the settlement
Newcastle History
Newcastle History - including Reminiscences, George Caley, Harbour Pilots, The First Anzac Day, Discovery and Early Settlement and Convicts
Maitland History
Maitland History - People and Places 1820s - 1850s
Lake Macquarie Links
Lake Macquarie - Links
Hunter Valley History
Hunter Valley History - Explorer Allan Cunningham, Diary of George Wyndham, Memoirs of Ellen Bundock, Sir Thomas Livingstone Mitchell
Colonial History
Colonial History - Australian Slang, Cabbage Tree Hats, Military Officers, Maritime Explorers, Moreton Bay
Obituaries
Obituaries of Newcastle and Hunter Valley folk before 1900
Site Links
Site Links
Latest Pages and Additions
Australian Inventions
Lady Jane Mason Barton - wife of the first Australian Prime Minister Sir Edmond Barton
Heritage Buildings in the Newcastle region
