ABSTRACT
From the 18th-century Horsham smugglers' inns, to the dramatic incidents on a convict ship to Parramatta's Government House in New South Wales, to the dreadful Hawkesbury floods, the Vinegar Hill Irish Rebellion, to the infamous Rum Rebellion which deposed the New South Wales Governor William Bligh, the Barsden memoirs seem to have packed in a great deal during its early pages. From Barsden's first maritime venture on the brig Active on a black whaling expedition to the waters of Van Diemen's Land, the people encounter him stepping from childhood directly into adulthood. There is one aspect concerning the Barsden memoirs that deserves mention, and that is Barsden's sense of history. There is one aspect concerning the Barsden memoirs that deserves mention, and that is Barsden's sense of history. When one looks at the document as a whole, and when one considers how much detail he devotes to relative events, one is amazed at his sense of history.
