JUNE 2019 59

n September 24, 1845, a late

afternoon sun was lighting the

waterfront sandstone warehouses

of Salamanca Place, commer-

cial hub of Hobart Town,

the capital of Australia’s

far south island, Van Diemen’s Land. Linus Wil-

son Miller, an American citizen, stood alone

in the dockyards gazing at whalers and other

vessels riding at anchor. The slim, cocky

24-year-old, a native of Stockton, New York,

was to sail the next day, a free man returning to

his homeland. Seven years earlier, Miller had entered into

a desperate enterprise that led to trial, brutalities, and

O

Far From Home

American Linus Miller, second

from left, with fellow rebels hauled

to England for trial, followed by

transport to Van Diemen’s Land.

Shackled Securely

Inmates at ancient and notorious

Newgate Prison in London endured

physical restraints like these.

confinement in Canada and England, and finally prison in

Australia’s penal colony on the island, better known to its

convict population as “Van Demon’s Land.”

Miller’s odyssey started December 5, 1837, with

an armed populist uprising in

Toronto, in what was then the

British Colony of Upper Can-

ada. Rebels, some armed only

with pitchforks, wanted more