Australian Convict Sites
The properties includes a selection of 11 penal convict sites, among the thousands established by the British Empire on Australian soil in the 18th and 19th centuries.
They are located on the fertile coastal strip from which the Aboriginal peoples were then forced back, mainly around Sydney and in Tasmania, as well as on Norfolk Island and in Fremantle.
They housed tens of thousands of men, women and children condemned by British justice to transportation to the convict colonies. Each of the sites had a specific purpose, in terms both of punitive imprisonment and of rehabilitation through forced labour to help build the colony.
The Convict Sites presents the best surviving examples of large-scale convict transportation and the colonial expansion of European powers through the presence and labour of convicts.
The Convict sites are:
- Kingston and Arthur’s Vale Historic Area (Norfolk Island)
- Old Government House and Domain (Parramatta New South Wales)
- Hyde Park Barracks (Sydney New South Wales)
- Brickendon–Woolmers Estates (Tasmania)
- Darlington Probation Station, (Tasmania)
- Old Great North Road (New South Wales)
- Cascades Female Factory (Tasmania)
- Port Arthur Historic Site (Tasmania)
- Coal Mines Historic Site (Tasmania)
- Cockatoo Island Convict Site (New South Wales)
- Fremantle Prison (Western Australia)
