HENRY SKELTON - THIRD FLEET - One of 220 Convicts Transported on “Atlantic” 1791 Sentenced to 7 years at Launceston Assizes Transported to New South Wales NAME: HENRY SKELTON ALSO KNOWN AS: Henry Skilton (newspaper report) TRIED: 23 March 1789, Launceston SENTENCE: Death Sentence recorded; Reprieved; Transportation for 7 Years CRIME: Burglary and housebreaking from Robert Hoblyn* of Botusfleming * Robert Hoblyn shows up in various records as a Clerk of the Court in various Quarter Sessions, mainly Lostwithiel GAOL REPORT: BODMIN GAOL: Death commuted to 7 years – SHIP: Atlantic - Departed Plymouth 27 March 1791, and arrived New South Wales 20 August 1791, a voyage of 146 days, carrying 220 male convicts (18 deaths). Master Archibald Armstrong, Surgeon James Thomson. There were 18 convict deaths on the outward journey. THIRD FLEET – Eleven ships – Active, Admiral Barrington, Albermarle, Britannia, Matilda, Queen, Mary Ann, William and Ann, HMS Gorgon, Atlantic and Salamander – arrived in the Colony in 1791, bringing a total of 1,869 male convicts and 172 female convicts. NEWSPAPER REPORTS – LONDON CHRONICLE, 2 APRIL 1789 – At the Assizes for the County of Cornwall, only six prisoners were tried, and but one capitally convicted, viz: Henry Skilton, for breaking-open the dwelling-house of Robert Hoblyn, Clerk, in the Parish of Botusfleming. WHITEHALL EVENING NEWS, 2-4 APRIL 1789 – FRIDAY, APRIL 3, COUNTRY NEWS – At the Assizes for the County of Cornwall, only six prisoners were tried, and but one capitally convicted viz. Henry Skilton, for breaking open the dwelling-house of Robert Hoblyn, clerk, in the parish of Botusfleming. James Langdon, charged with the murder of John Phillips, and John Gill, charged with assisting in the said murder, were acquitted. William Rogers, charged with ravishing Jane Lea; Christopher Mitchell, charged with having, on the 9th of September 1788, fired a charged gun, loaded with powder and shot, at John Perry, and wounding his face and head; and Joan Honeywood, committed on suspicion of being the mother of an infant female child, and with having secreted the child by covering the same with earth in a pit, in the parish of Gwenier, on the 28th of October last, were all three acquitted. Elizabeth Willcocks, convicted of sheep-stealing, and Henry Barnicoat, convicted of felony at former assizes, and sentenced to seven years transportation, were ordered to remain. REFERENCES – Bodmin Gaol – http://www.jackiefreemanphotography.com/bodmin_executions.htm Last Updated: 25 February 2011 Compiled by Trish Symonds .