Date of Conviction: 29/03/1823

Age at Conviction: 26

Crime Convicted of: Uttering Forged Notes

Court Convicted at: Lancaster Assizes (held at Lancaster Castle)

Sentence Length: Life

Ship Transported on: Brothers

Where Arrived: Port Jackson, New South Wales

Departure Date: 20/11/1823

Arrival Date: 07/05/1824

Biography: Margaret, a lady’s maid, uttered three forged £1 notes claiming to be from the bank of Flintshire & Holywell along with Catherine Kewley at Liverpool. They were part of a group who had also used the notes at Chester where these prisoners were also convicted and transported. Her death sentence was reprieved. In her jail description at Lancaster Castle, she said she was born at Dublin and had a fresh complexion though was a little pitted with the smallpox. She had hazel eyes and brown hair. She was married and her husband was a hawker. She had one child with her in jail and had another behind at Liverpool who would soon join her, these were Sarah and Henry.

Elizabeth Fry recorded that ‘Eleven women from Lancaster (including Margaret) were sent to the ship ‘iron-hooped round their legs and arms, and chained to each other. The complaints of these women were very mournful, they were not allowed to get up or down from the coach without the whole being dragged together; some of them had children to carry, they received no help, or alleviation to their suffering.’

Margaret was described as ‘orderly’ onboard by the ship’s surgeon. She was sent with her children to the Parramatta Female Factory on arrival. She remarried a sailmaker called William Thurgate in 1825 and they had a further five children together. in 1829, whilst Margaret and William were living as housekeepers in ‘Mrs Leighton’s House’ at her daughters’ request, Mrs Leighton’s son, David, who wanted them to leave the house, violently assaulted Margaret. She received £10 in compensation for her injuries.