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"This work was developed under the working title "Convicts transported from Ireland 1791-1820". However the records revealed a terrible Irish tragedy. Too many arrivals in Australia were not convicts at all. Many of them were placed aboard ships and despatched for no greater purpose than to rid Ireland of its Patriots ... The spirit of the Irish Exiles, particularly those of the 1797-8 Rebellion and Robert Emmett's uprising of 1801-02, lingers on in the hearts of the 8.5 million Australians who have since descended from them. This work was especially completed and published to commemorate the Bicentenary and the arrival of the first ship despatched from Ireland, The Queen, which arrived in Sydney on 26th September 1791. The cargo of prisoners from Cork were not ... the first Irish to be sent to Australia. 150 Irish convicted in English Courts and held aboard the prison hulks floating ... in the Thames near Deptford were despatched in the First Fleet which anchored in Sydney Cove on 26 January, 1788 ..." -- Introduction.… (more)