COZENS, Charles.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Adventures of a Guardsman. First edition, scarce, notably so in such attractive original condition. This is one of the few personal accounts by a transportee to Australia. "Cozens, whose observations … have illuminated the convict experience for us today … paints a vivid picture of convict life both at the barracks and onboard ship" (Museum of History New South Wales).Charles Cozens (b. 1814), son of a Justice of the Peace in Pembrokeshire, was 24 at the time of his conviction. Well-educated and literate, he had been intended for a career in the church. However, he ran away from school and enlisted in the Royal Horse Guards. In 1839 he was charged at a court martial with insubordination and "shaking his fist in the face" of an officer (tribunal minutes quoted in Household Cavalry Journal).At first he was held on board a hulk at Woolwich, where he worked in the laundry, he then offers a detailed description of the layout and prevailing conditions on the ship Woodbridge which carried him to Port Jackson. On arrival in March 1840 he was accommodated at the Hyde Park Barracks, where he "encountered 'every evil in human shape'" (MHNSW).Appointed to the mounted border police at Monaro, New South Wales, he travelled "with a dray to Cooma via Paramatta, Liverpool, Berrima, and Goulburn. His narrative includes descriptions of landscape, native plants, animals and birds, and his impressions of the aborigines at Cooma, including black trackers" (Walsh & Hooton). After a year at Cooma he

Found via Rare Books Intel, a search across rare-book dealers, auction houses and marketplaces worldwide.