Date of Conviction: 15/04/1807

Age at Conviction: Unknown

Crime Convicted of: Theft

Court Convicted at: Lancaster Quarter Sessions (held at the New Bailey, Salford)

Sentence Length: 7 Years

Ship Transported on: Aeolus

Where Arrived: Port Jackson, New South Wales

Departure Date: 02/07/1808

Arrival Date: 26/01/1809

Biography: Ann had been caught stealing goods belonging to Edmund Dawson at Manchester. She was married to James Nightingale. She had just finished serving a two year imprisonment for stealing cotton and had been released only three months earlier.

Immediately after arrival, Ann began a relationship with soldier of the 102nd Regiment Sergeant Edward Goldsborough (ship- Minerva) and by November of that year they had a son, William. Edward had had another child (also Edward) with convict Catherine Turner in 1806 and both of his children were baptised by the end of November. By December Ann had a certificate of freedom. In February 1810 Ann submitted a petition for a mitigation of her sentence and to be given a free pardon (which would allow her to leave the colony), whilst very faint it mentions her infant son and good behaviour. March 1810 was a tumultuous month, Ann’s baby son died in the first half of the month, whilst just one week later she and Edward married at St Phillips in Sydney. Ann also received an absolute pardon at the end of the same month, her petition successful, having completed less than three years of her sentence. The rush to marry and the petition is common with some of the other female convicts who left the colony with their soldier husbands of the regiment in May 1810. Pension documents for Edward exist, showing he was discharged in 1816, now infirm from service at age 53. He was from Sheffield and a scissor maker by trade. His son Edward from his earlier relationship with Catherine Turner can be found living in Chelsea on the 1851 census with his birthplace listed as Sydney.

Sadly though it does not look after everything she went through that Ann did make it back to England. She appears on the 1811 muster, the 1814 as a soldier’s wife of the 73rd, the 1816 as ‘single at Sydney’, 1819 as a washerwoman and the 1820 and 21 as married at Sydney. Ann may well have settled in a common law relationship in her later years which means we can’t find out what has happened to her.