James Smith was an Irish indentured labourer and warder at the Pentridge Stockade.
Early years
Smith was born in Daingean, Ireland, around 1823. He met and married his wife Maria Dunne here.
The couple and their first child emigrated to Australia in 1852. They travelled aboard the Runnymede from Liverpool for Portland as assisted migrants.
Career
Smith started out working as an indentured agricultural labourer. Indentured labourers paid their passage to the New World with their labour.
After a year, the couple moved to Melbourne and James became a Pentridge Stockade warder. The city created the new prison in 1850 to take pressure off the crowded Melbourne Gaol. The prison population grew at this time with the Victorian gold rush.
Work was hard as a warder at Pentridge. James worked 12-hour shifts in all weather and risked getting sick from the prisoners. But it was a secure job with a pension.
He worked as a warder for over 30 years and rose to the rank of 'Locker in Charge of the south (Elm Street) gate'.
Personal life
The family’s first home was on the south side of Bell Street near Rodda Street. Unfortunately, fire destroyed this small timber dwelling in 1857. They then lived in an Urquhart Street ‘shanty’.
Smith made extra income from land speculation. He used this money to build a solid home for his wife and 11 children.
He built their bluestone Bell Street cottage in 1864 within 400 yards of the prison. As a warder he needed to be close enough to hear the prison bell.
The family and their descendants lived in the cottage for over 100 years. The cottage sold to Coburg Council in 1978 and is now the Coburg Historical Society Museum.
Death
Smith died in 1904, nine years after his wife. The family is buried in the Roman Catholic section of Coburg Cemetery.
Bibliography
Adapted from material supplied by historian Dr Jan Penney, GMCT Trust member 2010-2020, and by the Friends of Coburg Cemetery Inc.
Broome R (2001)Coburg: Between Two Creeks, Lothian
Coburg Historical Society (n.d.) [website]
Osborne D (2018) Pentridge: Behind the Bluestone Walls, Allen and Unwin
O’Toole S (2006)The History of Australian Corrections, University of New South Wales Press
State Library of Victoria (n.d.) Pentridge Prison [website]
