Another Port Arthur

     To complicate things, Michael Bassett reminds us that there is another Port Arthur in Tasmania, the Chinese Port Arthur having changed its name. Presumably this was a different Arthur:
     "As some WAISers will know, another place by the same name, Port Arthur Tasmania, Australia, was the scene of an appalling tragedy a couple of years ago: a lunatic ran amok with a gun, killing many people in a crowded restaurant. Port Arthur is a small settlement down the Tasman Peninsula about 60 or so kilometers southeast from Hobart which is the capital of Tasmania. Port Arthur has a penal colony museum. The whole of Tasmania which in a former life was known as Van Diemen's Land was the worst of the penal colonies in 19th century Australia. That is if one excludes Norfolk Island which was little better than an animal cage. Tasmania is a great place to visit, as Ron Bracewell will attest: we were together on a cruise round the island a couple of years ago. Many of its tourist attractions have to do with the island's notorious past."


     My comment: Like Australia and Devil's Island, colonial America was used as a penal colony. In addition, individuals on the East Coast fled to the Western frontier to escape the law. When I was a boy in England, the expression "he went west" was used, meaning he fled from the law. This expression lost its reference to the United States. I have not heard it since my boyhood. Is it still alive? This is one source of the violence which has been characteristic of the history of the West.

Ronald Hilton - 2/29/00