Shared Households and the Convict System in the Port of Sydney, NSW, in the 1820s

The surveillance of constables in 1822–1823 shows shared households in Sydney that did not derive from kinship or shipboard connections. They appeared mainly in the newer parts of the town and, in themselves, challenged the hierarchies of the convict system. The inhabitants of these houses kept property separate, used the house for diverse economic activities, and went out to work. The port and the convict system shaped the meaning of the house—open doors, buying and selling, and luxury were created by global port cultures. But the convict system, with its regulation of marriage and its capacity to reach into the house to deny freedom and return people to the status of convict, also shaped the household.