Convict Orphans: Lucy Frost in conversation with Cassandra Pybus
The heartbreaking stories of the colony’s forgotten children, and those who succeeded against all odds.
Many thousands of abandoned children were treated as free labour in late 19th century Australia, yet their stories have been hidden until now, even to their descendants. Lucy Frost’s painstaking research has uncovered what really happened to the convict orphans.
All families have their secrets, and a convict ancestor or an illegitimate birth were shames that families once buried deep. Among the best-hidden stories in Australia’s history are those of the convict orphans.
These are stories of abuse and abandonment, and also of great generosity and kindness from individuals who rescued and supported children. Some children managed to build happy lives for themselves, but many could not navigate a system stacked against them. There are disturbing parallels between the Queen’s Orphan Schools in Hobart and other children’s institutions in Australia into the 21st century.
Lucy Frost has spent a career researching and writing about nineteenth-century women and children. The author of Abandoned Women, No Place for a Nervous Lady and other books, she is Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Tasmania.
Cassandra Pybus is an award-winning author and a distinguished historian. She is author of twelve books and has held research professorships at the University of Sydney, Georgetown University in Washington DC, the University of Texas and King’s College London. She is descended from the colonist who received the largest free land grant on Truganini’s traditional country of Bruny Island.
Join Lucy and Cassandra at the Afterword Cafe.
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