Gentleman John Smith

He was born in Manchester in 1787.[1] At 20, he was arrested for stealing stocking and sentenced to seven years transportation.[1] In 1809 he took the name John Sidebottom.[1]

He was sent to prison hulks at Portsmouth on 18 December 1809.[1] He traveled on the ship Indian which arrived in Port Jackson on 16 December 1810.[1] On 16 December 1811 he was reported as absconding from Eber Bunker at Georges River.[1] He stole and then sold tobacco from a warehouse, but was found not guilty on the lesser charge of stealing from a warehouse.[1] In 1861, he was accused of lighting a fire to defraud Liverpool and London Fire and Life Insurance Company.[2]

He went to Newcastle for penal settlement.[1] He was sent on the Lady Nelson from Parramatta on 8 July 1815. In 1817 he was appointed Chief Constable of Newcastle.[1]

In 1818 he was one the first convicts to occupy a farm at Wallis Plains (East Maitland).[2] He owned various properties including a stream flour mill and the Black Horse Inn there.[2]

On 11 July 1814 he married Mary Furber.[1] He became a father to Mary's three-year-old, George,[2] and together they had seven more children: James (1815), Sophia (1816), Eliza (1817), Mary Ann (1818), John Thomas (1819), Matilda (1820) and William Henry (1821).[3]

In 1838 he purchased 28 acres of land in the Fullerton Cove called Stanley Park to fulfill a contract from the military to supply beef.[4]

Smith died in 1870 and is buried in Christ Church burial ground.[1]