19 Crimes turned criminals into colonists. Upon conviction, British rogues, guilty of at least one of the 19 Crimes, were sentenced to live in Australia. This punishment by “transportation” began in 1787 and many of the lawless died at sea. For the rough-hewn prisoners who made it to shore, a new world awaited. As pioneers in a frontier penal colony, they forged a new country and new lives, brick by brick.
