ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the segregation of star men at a series of convict establishments after 1880 and asks whether they received privileged treatment in the form of an assignment to softer work parties. Convict prison labour was supposed to be both deterrent and reformatory, as well as profitable. Appropriate public works projects were limited, and in the 1880s, those begun 30 years earlier were reaching their end. Many convicts, unfit for heavy work, were assigned to light labour or invalid work parties and prisons. At Chatham, star men were spared the severest forms of convict labour and assigned to skilled trade or light-labour parties. From 1885, star men built a new convict prison at Dover which, due to an unexpected fall in convict numbers, was never fully occupied. In the meantime, once its public works were completed, Chatham’s remaining convicts worked mainly in indoor workshops, including a print shop allocated to star men. When the prison closed in 1892, the majority of its star men were transferred to Portland, but its printers’ party went instead to Parkhurst invalid prison. The latter was considered the convict system’s most salubrious establishment; its star class included many former professionals and businessmen.
